Honey is a much-debated food in the plant-based community! Is it vegan? Is it healthy? Find out more about ethical considerations and easy alternatives.
Honey is produced by bees and does not come from plants. However, are bees considered sentient animals? Is there any harm in consuming honey?
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At first glance, the question “Is honey plant-based or vegan?” might seem obvious, but things can quickly get tricky.
Let’s take a look at the bittersweet controversy and find out more about foods like soy, bread, olive oil or eggs next.
Can you eat honey on a plant-based diet?
The short answer is: it depends. If you consider a plant-based diet consisting of mainly but not 100% plant-based foods, then there’s room for honey in your diet.
However, most of the time, plant-based diets are equated with vegan diets. If you consider yourself a vegan, you cannot eat honey!
Plant-based vs vegan
It’s important to differentiate between these two terms although they are sometimes used interchangeably.
Veganism is a lifestyle that encompasses more than just food and seeks to exclude as much harm and exploitation of animals as possible! This includes areas like clothing, cosmetics or entertainment.
The term “plant-based” is usually only applied to food or a dietary pattern that can either consist of only plants or mostly plants. It is often used to emphasize the healthfulness of a diet, too.
A vegan diet can include any food not derived from animals — including vegan cheese, burgers, ice cream and highly processed foods that plant-based dieters usually avoid.
Whole Food Plant-Based Diet Guide →Is honey vegan?
As an animal-derived food, honey is not vegan by definition. To produce honey, bees gather nectar from flowers, partially digest and then regurgitate it.
Bees need honey for their hives where it’s sealed into beeswax to be stored as food to survive through the winter!
Unlike other animal foods like meat, dairy or eggs, honey is the only one coming from insects — a group of animals that some people do not consider in their ethical framework.
Here are some considerations and nuances that can help you decide for yourself!
Why is honey not vegan
Like cows on a pasture, bees can move around and don’t seem to have such bad lives compared to chickens in battery cages.
However, they are used as commodities to earn money, just like other forms of animal farming.
Commercial beekeepers employ harmful practices, such as:
- Clipping the wings of queen bees to prevent them from fleeing the hive
- Destroying entire colonies to prevent the spread of disease
- Replacing harvested honey with nutritionally inferior sugar syrup
- Hurtig or killing bees when harvesting honey
Honey is usually more expensive than other sweeteners and there’s been a problem with fraud and mislabeling in the industry — so that raw, local honey you’ve been buying might actually be diluted with corn or rice syrup.
The underlying question, though, is this: are bees sentient?
Even though research isn’t 100% conclusive yet, it is probably better to err on the side of caution and treat bees and other insects as if they were sentient and reduce any harm towards them.
Does ethical honey exist?
Some people on a plant-based diet feel okay about eating honey if it comes from a humane and sustainable source.
If the process of acquiring honey can be completed without bees being negatively impacted at all, then one could very well consider the resulting honey to be “ethical”.
This probably means getting your honey from a local beekeeper who you personally know. There are even some vegan beekeepers who are dedicated to treating their bees ethically and with care.
Some provide a home to bees to help with pollination and their survival, meaning they put the animals’ wellbeing above any financial incentives and only take small amounts of “leftover” honey which is far from the exploitative nature of commercial beekeeping.
However, such practices don’t provide much honey at all and what’s sold at supermarkets or used in restaurants usually comes from large-scale operations.
Bee products used by humans
- Honey
- Pollen
- Beeswax
- Royal jelly
- Propolis
- Bee venom (medical uses)
If you want to avoid honey and other animal products, read our vegan ingredients checker!
Is honey good for you?
Honey is basically sugar and higher in calories than regular white sugar. It also contains some trace minerals like iron, zinc and potassium.
However, you’d need to eat high amounts of honey to reap any benefits from these nutrients! Honey is not healthier than other sugars when you use it in reasonable quantities and any added sugar should be consumed sparingly if possible.
Best vegan honey alternatives
- Maple syrup
- Rice syrup
- Agave syrup
- Malt syrup
- Date syrup
- Date paste
- Molasses
- Coconut nectar
- Bee Free Honee
- Humble Honee
More vegan guides
We help make a vegan diet approachable and fun! Check out these articles next.
Do you consider honey plant-based or vegan? Do you consume it? Let us know in the comments below, share this article on social media and Pin it here.
Alena Schowalter is a Certified Vegan Nutritionist who has been a vegetarian since childhood and vegan since 2012. Together with her husband, she founded nutriciously in 2015 and has been guiding thousands of people through different transition stages towards a healthy plant-based diet. She’s received training in the fields of nutrition, music therapy and social work. Alena enjoys discussions around vegan ethics, walks through nature and creating new recipes.
Great article! I was just having a debate about this the other day with friends. Nice to get proper and well written clarification. Thanks Alena.
Excellent article, thank you Alena!
A point you make is that humans STEAL honey from bees – they don’t give us their honey. Seeing stealing as unethical is enough to give honey up – without knowing about the exploitation of bees.
Again lack of ethics in testing honey on animals (who have been injured or made unwell…). Madness!
“At its most basic level, beekeeping is really no different to the meat, egg or dairy industry. Along with pigs, cows, chickens and other animals, bees are imprisoned and used for human gain.”
Thank you for this information. I am just changing from a 28+ years of a lacto vegetarian diet to a vegan diet and I wasn’t quite sure where I stood on honey. Now I do.
Thank you so much for creating this amazing and informational article. I’M A 13 YEAR OLD VEGAN AND I WOULD LOVE FOR SUBWAY TO GET RID OF THE HONEY IN THEIR WHOLE WHEAT BREAD!!! Anyone reading this PLEASE GET THE MESSAGE OUT TO SUBWAY AND SHARE THIS NEWS WITH OTHERS TO GET THEM ON BOARD!!!My favorite part of this article was where you talked about how I can help the bees by doing little things. I will definitely show and bring this article up in the future with friends, family, and anyone else who might have questions.
Thanks for bringing a fresh perspective to the bee debate