What FODMAP Status Means for a Fibre Ingredient
FODMAP is an acronym for several groups of short-chain carbohydrates: fermentable oligosaccharides, disaccharides, monosaccharides and polyols. A fibre ingredient's status depends on which of these groups it belongs to or contains, and how much of it is eaten in one serve. Some fibres are built from the exact carbohydrates the framework measures; others are unrelated structurally and depend entirely on testing.
Ingredient by Ingredient
| Ingredient | Status | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Inulin | High FODMAP | A fructan. Fructans are one of the FODMAP groups by definition. |
| FOS (fructo-oligosaccharides) | High FODMAP | Also a fructan. |
| GOS (galacto-oligosaccharides) | High FODMAP | A galacto-oligosaccharide, its own FODMAP group. |
| Wheat bran | High FODMAP at typical serves | Wheat is a significant fructan source. |
| Psyllium | Not independently verified | We could not confirm a specific Monash-published serve threshold from a source we'd opened directly. |
| PHGG | Not independently verified | Same as above. |
| Resistant dextrin | Not independently verified | Same as above. |
| Soluble corn fibre | Not independently verified | Same as above. |
| Acacia (gum arabic) | Not independently verified | Same as above. |
Where this table says "not independently verified," it means we couldn't confirm a specific rating from a Monash-published source we'd opened ourselves, not that the ingredient is assumed safe or unsafe. The honest answer for those rows is that the rating needs checking against the current Monash FODMAP app or the product's own testing, not inferred from the ingredient name.
Why Serve Size Changes the Answer
FODMAP status is rarely a fixed property of an ingredient; it's usually a property of a specific amount of that ingredient. A food can test low FODMAP at one serve size and high at a larger one, because the carbohydrates that matter accumulate with quantity. This is true even for high-fructan ingredients like inulin: a very small amount in a recipe behaves differently to a full supplement dose. Checking a specific product's serve size against its own testing is more reliable than generalising from the ingredient name alone.
Certified Product vs Low FODMAP Ingredient
These are two different questions. A specific finished product can be laboratory tested and carry a low FODMAP certification mark, which is a statement about that product as manufactured, at that serve size. Separately, an individual ingredient can be described as low FODMAP based on its own composition, without the finished product containing it having gone through full product-level certification. Neither one tells you about the other automatically: a certified product used an uncertified ingredient at some point in its supply chain, and an ingredient with a good FODMAP profile doesn't make the finished product certified. See our page on what low FODMAP certification actually tests for for more on the certification process itself.
How to Check a Specific Product
The most reliable approach is to check the specific product you're using, at the serve size on the label, against the current Monash FODMAP app or the product's own published testing, rather than relying on the ingredient name alone.