• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to footer
Zippy Facts Logo

Zippy Facts

Interesting Random Facts

  • Animals
  • Culture
  • Firsts
  • Food
  • Geography
  • Health
  • History
  • Inventions
  • Language
  • Mythology
  • Odds
  • People
  • Religion
  • Science
  • Space
  • Universe
  • World
You are here: Home / Science / How Can You Tell a Can of Diet Coke From a Can of Regular Coke Without Opening Them?

How Can You Tell a Can of Diet Coke From a Can of Regular Coke Without Opening Them?

May 20, 2020 by Karen Hill

It isn’t difficult, and it works with Pepsi too. It’s based on the fact that a can of the diet drink is slightly lighter than a can of the regular drink.

Regular Coca-Cola is sweetened with sugar (sucrose) or corn sweeteners, which are other sugars, usually fructose, maltose and/or glucose. Diet Coke, on the other hand, is sweetened with aspartame, an artificial sweetener.

Gram for gram, aspartame is 150 to 200 times sweeter than sucrose, so only a tiny amount of it is needed to produce the same sweetness as in the sugared product. While the amount of sugar in the regular drink is 2 or 3 percent, there are only a few hundredths of a percent of aspartame in the diet drink.

Therefore, a can of the diet drink is very slightly lighter in weight.

Your buddy can’t tell the difference just by hefting the two cans. But if he fills a sink with water and places the unopened cans in it, the diet can will float higher in the water than the regular can, which might even sink.

I can tell a can of diet Coke from a can of regular Coke without opening them or reading their labels.

Related Facts

  • How do you get a hard-boiled egg to go through a small bottle opening without breaking it?
  • Why Is Glacier Ice Purer Than Regular Ice and How Is Glacier Ice Formed Without Impurities?
  • Which U.S. president threw the most opening-day baseballs?
  • How Do You Tell the Difference Between All the Stars In the Sky Without a Telescope or Binoculars?
  • What is the Difference between a Salamander and a Newt and how can you tell them Apart?
  • What Is the Difference Between a Frog and a Toad and How Can You Tell Them Apart?

Filed Under: Science

About Karen Hill

Karen Hill is a freelance writer, editor, and columnist. Born in New York, her work has appeared in the Examiner, Yahoo News, Buzzfeed, among others.

Previous Post: « Why Does Champagne Spray All Over the Place When I Open the Bottle?
Next Post: How Do Fruit Powered Clocks Work Using Lemons and Oranges As Batteries? »

Footer

Follow

  • Facebook
  • Flickr
  • GitHub
  • Google+
  • Instagram
  • LinkedIn
  • Medium
  • Pinterest
  • StumbleUpon
  • Tumblr
  • Twitter
  • YouTube

Categories

Accomplishments Animals Culture Firsts Food Geography Health History Inventions Language Mythology Odds People Religion Science Space Universe World Your Body

About

Zippy Facts empowers the world by serving educational content that is accessible to everyone.

A tribute to growing up, zippyfacts.com showcases interesting and unusual facts about the world.

Our mission is to use technology to facilitate knowledge transfer and sharing.

Copyright © 2021 Zippy Facts

  • About Us
  • Contact
  • Privacy Policy