Best plant-based milk: 9 cartons checked for calcium and B12

Our pick is Ripple Unsweetened Original: 8 g of protein, 440 mg of calcium and 0 g of sugar a cup, fortified with vitamins D2 and B12, and made without the top 9 allergens. For coffee, take Oatly Barista Edition. A short ingredient list is not a better milk: Oatly’s 4 Ingredient oat drink has 0 mg of calcium.

Oatly builds both of those oat cartons on the same base of water and oats. The Barista Edition goes on to add rapeseed oil, three calcium salts, vitamin D2 and vitamin B12, and its panel shows 350 mg of calcium and 15% of the Daily Value for B12 in a cup. The 4 Ingredient adds sea salt and citrus fiber and stops. Its panel reads 0 mcg of vitamin D and 0 mg of calcium, and there is no B12 line on it. The same split runs through the nine milks below. The three with the shortest lists, Edensoy Unsweetened (water and soybeans), Elmhurst’s unsweetened oat milk (water, oats and salt) and the Oatly 4 Ingredient, carry 40 mg of calcium or less and list no B12. Nothing requires them to. The FDA has set no compositional requirements for plant-based milk alternatives, and the NIH notes that plant foods have no vitamin B12 unless they are fortified. If a glass of plant milk is one of the places your B12 comes from, the clean label is the carton that leaves it out, and our piece on why vegans need B12 covers the rest of that question.

Prices below are what makers’ own stores showed in November 2026, for the three that sell these cartons direct; shelf prices vary and move often. Nothing here says how a milk tastes or behaves in your coffee. Where a maker says what its milk is for, that is the maker’s claim, and it is labeled as one.

Nine plant milks, label by label

Milk	Made from	Protein per cup	Calcium per cup	B12 on the label	Skip it if
Ripple Unsweetened Original	Pea protein	8 g	440 mg	Listed; amount not on the maker’s page	You want the B12 figure before you reach the store
Silk Original Soymilk	Soybeans, cane sugar	8 g	470 mg	2.4 mcg, 100% DV	You count added sugar
Edensoy Unsweetened	Soybeans	12 g	40 mg	None	This carton is supposed to cover your calcium
Oatly Barista Edition	Oats, rapeseed oil	3 g	350 mg	0.4 mcg, 15% DV	You drink it by the glass and watch sugar
Oatly Oat Drink 4 Ingredient	Oats	3 g	0 mg	None	You expect anything from it beyond oats
Elmhurst Unsweetened Milked Oats	Oats	3 g	22 mg	None	You want calcium, or the lowest price per carton
Califia Farms Unsweetened Almondmilk	Almonds	1 g	470 mg	None	You count on your milk for B12
Silk Unsweet Almondmilk	Almonds	1 g	470 mg	1.1 mcg, 45% DV	The milk is doing the job of a protein
Good Karma Unsweetened Flaxmilk + Protein	Flax oil, pea protein	5 g	290 mg	1.3 mcg, 60% DV	You want the most calcium per cup

Ripple Unsweetened Original

This is the carton for a vegan household that wants one milk to do everything. Ripple makes it from water, pea protein and high oleic sunflower or safflower oil, then adds vitamin A, vitamin D2, vitamin B12, tricalcium phosphate and a few gums. By Ripple’s figures a cup carries 8 g of protein, 440 mg of calcium and 0 g of sugar.

Its FAQ answers the vegan question in full. All Ripple products are vegan, the calcium comes from mineral sources, and every vitamin used to fortify the milk is suitable for vegans. It is the only maker page we read that vouches for its vitamins. Ripple also says the milk is made without the top 9 allergens and that all its products are made without nuts, which makes it the carton for a table with a soy or nut allergy.

Two things count against it. The refrigerated carton is sold in stores only, with no price on Ripple’s site. And the page names vitamin B12 in the ingredients without saying how much a cup holds, so if you track B12 by the label, read the panel on the carton in your hand.

Silk Original Soymilk

Cane sugar is the second ingredient, straight after the soymilk. That puts 4 g of added sugar in every cup, and it is the one line that counts against this carton. The rest of the panel has 8 g of protein, 470 mg of calcium, 3 mcg of vitamin D, and 2.4 mcg of vitamin B12, which is 100% of the Daily Value. Of the milks here that print a B12 figure, that is the highest.

Silk’s page calls it dairy-free and Non-GMO Project Verified and does not use the word vegan for it. Nothing on the ingredient list comes from an animal, the vitamin D is D2, and the natural flavors are not explained. It contains soy. Once a refrigerated carton is open, Silk says to finish it within 7 to 10 days. If added sugar is the number you watch, Ripple and Edensoy both match or beat its protein with 0 g of it.

Edensoy Unsweetened

Two ingredients, purified water and organic soybeans. The panel under them has the most protein of the nine, 12 g a cup, with 0 g of added sugar. At $4.76 for 32 fl oz on Eden’s own store, it is also the lowest of the three prices we found.

Keep reading down the panel. Vitamin D is 0 mcg, calcium is 40 mg, and there is no B12 line. That is what two ingredients give you. Buy it for cooking, where soy protein is the point and the pot does not care about fortification. Do not buy it as the milk that covers your calcium and B12, because on this label it covers neither.

Oatly Barista Edition

Oatly says it formulated the Barista Edition to work particularly well in hot drinks like coffee, at 3% fat against 2% in its Original. The fat comes from low erucic acid rapeseed oil, and dipotassium phosphate sits further down the list. Oatly lists Vegan and Kosher-Pareve among the product’s certificates.

Per cup it lists 140 calories, 7 g of fat, 3 g of protein, 350 mg of calcium, 3.6 mcg of vitamin D and 0.4 mcg of vitamin B12. The sugar line is the odd one. It reads 7 g, all of it declared as added, on a carton with no sweetener in the ingredients. In a splash of coffee that hardly registers. Poured by the glass, it is 7 g of added sugar in every cup, so keep this carton by the coffee machine.

Oatly Oat Drink 4 Ingredient

Oatly names this one an oat drink rather than an oatmilk, and the list is oat base (water, oats), sea salt and citrus fiber. A cup has 80 calories, 1 g of fat and 3 g of protein, and the same 7 g of sugar as the Barista, all declared as added. Then come the bottom rows, where the vitamin D and calcium figures both read 0.

It is honest about what it is. The trouble is that it shares a brand and an oat base with the Barista Edition, and a buyer could fairly assume the two differ only in fat. Don’t buy it to stand in for a glass of milk.

Elmhurst Unsweetened Milked Oats

Elmhurst lists filtered water, whole grain oats and salt, and says the carton has no gums or oils. Its panel is the useful contrast to Oatly’s. A cup has 100 calories, 3 g of fiber, 3 g of protein and 1 g of total sugar, with 0 g of added sugar. If you want oat milk without a sugar line, this is the one here.

It costs for the privilege. A 2-pack of 32 fl oz cartons is $13.98 on Elmhurst’s store, which works out to $6.99 a carton, the highest of the three prices we found. The panel shows 0 mcg of vitamin D and 22 mg of calcium, and no B12 row. Elmhurst says its oat products are certified gluten-free. Skip it if the carton has to pull nutritional weight in your week.

Califia Farms Unsweetened Almondmilk

Califia adds calcium carbonate, vitamin A and vitamin D2 to its almondmilk, and the panel shows 470 mg of calcium and 4.4 mcg of vitamin D a cup. The page carries a vegan logo and says it contains almonds. Califia’s own page is not sure of the calories; the panel says 35 a cup and the description says 40. Protein is 1 g.

What it doesn’t have is any B12. There is none in the ingredients and no row for it on the panel. Next to the Silk almondmilk below, with the same calcium and the same 1 g of protein, B12 is the line that separates the two cartons. If your milk is part of how you get B12, take the other one.

Silk Unsweet Almondmilk

For an almond milk that covers B12, this is our pick. Silk lists 1.1 mcg of vitamin B12 a cup, 45% of the Daily Value, alongside 470 mg of calcium, 4 mcg of vitamin D and 4 mg of vitamin E, with 30 calories and 0 g of sugar. The vitamin D is D2. As with the soymilk, Silk calls it dairy-free and the page does not call the milk vegan. It contains almond.

The cost is protein. A cup has 1 g, against 8 g in Silk’s own soymilk, and cereal that has to carry part of breakfast wants the soy.

Good Karma Unsweetened Flaxmilk + Protein

The base is filtered water and cold pressed flax oil, with pea protein added, and Good Karma says it is made without nuts, dairy, soy, lactose or gluten. A cup has 50 calories, 5 g of protein and 0 g of sugar, plus 1.3 mcg of vitamin B12 (60% of the Daily Value) and 2.2 mcg of vitamin D2. Good Karma also gives a figure of 1,200 mg of plant-based omega-3 per serving. That is the maker’s number, and this page makes no claim about what it does for you.

It is shelf-stable until opened, and Good Karma sells it on its store as a 6-pack of 32 oz cartons for $31.99, about $5.33 a carton by our arithmetic. The weak line is calcium: 290 mg a cup, the lowest of the six cartons here that add calcium. Skip it if calcium is the reason you buy a fortified milk at all.

Why an unsweetened oat milk lists 7 g of added sugar

Oatly says none of its oatmilks except the chocolate one contain added sweeteners such as cane sugar. The sugar comes from the way it makes the base. Enzymes liquefy the oats and break their starch down into smaller pieces, including maltose, and Oatly says FDA guidance counts sugar created during production as added. The FDA’s labeling guidance says it plainly. Sugars created through the controlled hydrolysis of starch in plant-based beverages such as oat and rice drinks have to be declared as added sugars on the Nutrition Facts label.

So the 7 g on both Oatly cartons is the label doing what the FDA asks of an oat drink made this way. Elmhurst’s oat milk, from water, oats and salt, shows 1 g of total sugar and 0 g added. Its page does not describe its process, so the panel is all we can compare, and the panel is what you’ll have in the aisle too. For oat milk, the ingredient list tells you nothing about sugar. The Added Sugars row does. Silk Original’s 4 g is simpler. Cane sugar is on its list.

What to read on the carton before it goes in the cart

Start at the bottom of the panel. A carton with no B12 row has no B12, and four of the nine here have none. Calcium splits the same way. The six that add it list 290 to 470 mg a cup, and the three that don’t list 0 to 40 mg. How much calcium a day those numbers have to add up to is in our article on vegans and calcium.

Then check which vitamin D it is. All six fortified cartons here list D2. The NIH describes vitamin D2 as made by irradiating ergosterol from yeast, and vitamin D3 as typically made from lanolin taken from sheep’s wool, with a lichen-based D3 also available. A plant milk that lists D3 and makes no vegan claim is one to email the maker about, and our guide to whether vitamin D3 is vegan covers what to ask.

Read the vegan word separately from the dairy-free one. Silk’s pages say dairy-free and leave vegan out. Oatly lists a vegan certificate, and Ripple’s FAQ goes as far as the vitamins. Dairy-free settles the milk. It says nothing about where the vitamins or the natural flavors came from.

For a child, start with the FDA’s 2023 consumer page, which says infants should not have milk or plant-based milk alternatives before 12 months, and that children from 12 through 23 months can be offered whole milk or fortified, unsweetened soy milk. Neither soy milk here fits. Silk Original is fortified but sweetened, and Edensoy is unsweetened but not fortified. Ask your pediatrician which carton to buy.

Last, the date. Silk gives its refrigerated drinks 7 to 10 days once open, and a shelf-stable carton like Good Karma’s goes in the fridge once it’s opened.

Buy Ripple for the fridge door and Oatly Barista for the coffee, and if the shelf only has the short-list carton, read its bottom three rows first. The rest of the week’s shopping is on our vegan grocery list.