Every figure here is one ounce, because that is the honest serving
An ounce is 28 grams — a small handful, not the fistful you take standing at the cupboard. Most people eat two or three ounces in a sitting without noticing, which is how a 2g snack becomes a 6g one.
Fibre is already subtracted below. That matters more here than anywhere else on the site: chia and flax are almost entirely fibre, so their total carbohydrate looks alarming and their net carbs are nearly nothing.
THE SHORT ANSWER
Macadamias and pecans by the handful. Cashews basically never.
All figures per 1 oz / 28g, raw or dry-roasted.
Best Choices
UNDER 2.5G NET CARBS PER OUNCEHigh fat, low carb, and filling. These are the ones to keep in the house.
RULE OF THUMB
The fattier the nut, the lower the carbs. Macadamias win twice.
THE PORTION PROBLEM
Nobody eats one handful
Nuts are the most calorie-dense food in the kitchen — roughly 190 calories an ounce, and an ounce disappears in about thirty seconds. The carbs rarely break a keto day. The calories quietly stall it.
A "handful" is not a measurement. Measured against a scale, most people's handful is closer to two ounces, and a bowl on the coffee table is four or five before the programme ends.
DO THIS ONCE
Weigh 28g of the nut you eat most and tip it into the bowl you always use. Look at it properly. That picture is worth more than any tracking app, and you only need it once per nut.
ONE OUNCE, COUNTED OUT
6
Brazil nuts
11
Macadamias
14
Walnut halves
19
Pecan halves
21
Hazelnuts
23
Almonds
Moderate
2.5–4G NET CARBS PER OUNCEFine once a day, weighed. These are the ones that turn into three ounces while you read.
THE PEANUT FOOTNOTE
Peanuts are legumes, not nuts. They still fit — they just behave differently.
WHY PEANUTS SIT HERE
Botanically they grow underground in a pod, like beans — which is why they carry a little more carbohydrate than a true tree nut and why some people find they trigger cravings that almonds don't. Nothing wrong with them; just weigh them and watch the jar.
Buying and using them
01 / READ THE COATING
The nut is rarely the problem — the finish is
Raw and dry-roasted are what the numbers above describe. Anything glazed, candied, honey-roasted, chilli-lime or "flavour dusted" carries sugar or starch on the outside, and it can double the count.
02 / FLOUR SWAPS
Almond flour bakes, coconut flour absorbs
Almond flour swaps roughly one-for-one for wheat. Coconut flour needs about a quarter of the volume and far more egg — treat them as different ingredients, not substitutes for each other.
03 / SEEDS EARN THEIR PLACE
Flax and chia are mostly fibre
Both thicken liquid, both add bulk to a low-fibre diet, and both cost almost nothing in net carbs. Chia in cream makes a pudding; ground flax replaces breadcrumbs.
04 / THE STANDING RULE
Portion into the bowl, never eat from the bag
The single change that fixes nuts for most people. An ounce of macadamias in a small dish is a genuine snack at 1.5g; the same nuts eaten from the packet while cooking is four ounces and 800 calories nobody counted.
Common questions
Are peanuts actually keto?+
Yes, in a measured ounce — 3.2g net carbs is workable on a 20g day. The asterisk is that peanuts are legumes rather than tree nuts, so they carry slightly more carbohydrate, and a fair number of people find them harder to stop eating than almonds or pecans. If peanuts reliably turn into half a jar, the honest answer is that they are keto and still not for you.
What's the best low-carb nut butter?+
Macadamia butter is the lowest at roughly 2g net carbs per two tablespoons, then pecan and almond butter around 3g. Natural peanut butter sits near 4g. The rule that matters more than the nut: two ingredients on the label, the nut and salt. Anything listing sugar, palm oil or "roasted honey" belongs with the limit tier, and the reduced-fat versions replace that fat with maltodextrin.
Which nuts for snacking, which for cooking?+
Snack on macadamias, pecans and brazil nuts — highest fat, lowest carbs, most filling per handful. Cook with almonds and hazelnuts: almond flour for baking, ground hazelnuts for crusts, flaked almonds for texture. Walnuts and pecans toast well and go on salads. Keep brazil nuts to two or three a day, though — they carry enough selenium that a large handful daily is genuinely too much.
Are seeds better than nuts for net carbs?+
Flax, chia and hemp are the lowest-carb items on this entire page, because most of their carbohydrate is fibre your body never digests. Sunflower and pumpkin seeds are ordinary — about the same as almonds. So it isn't seeds versus nuts; it's high-fibre seeds versus everything else. Adding a tablespoon of ground flax or chia to a day is close to free, and it fixes the fibre problem that catches most people in their first month.
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