What foods can you not eat with braces?
Cited to 4 sources. Reviewed 2026-08-25.
Four categories cover almost everything you cannot eat with braces: hard, sticky, crunchy and chewy. That means popcorn, nuts, ice, hard candy, caramel and taffy, gum, hard pretzels, chips, crusty bread and bagels, corn on the cob, whole apples and tough meat. Hard and crunchy foods snap brackets off and bend wires, sticky and chewy foods pull brackets loose, and both create extra appointments that can add time to your treatment. Most other foods are fine if you cut them small and chew with your back teeth.
- Categories to avoid
- Hard, sticky, crunchy, chewy
- How long the rules apply
- The entire time braces are on
- Worst single offender
- Popcorn (kernels and hulls)
- Cost of a broken bracket
- An extra visit, and possible added treatment time
The four categories, and what each one does
You do not need to memorize a list. You need to recognize which of four things a food is doing to your hardware.
| Category | Examples | What it does to braces |
|---|---|---|
| Hard | Ice, hard candy, nuts, hard pretzels, popcorn kernels, olive and fruit pits, hard taco shells | Biting force concentrates on one bracket and snaps it off the tooth, or bends the wire out of shape |
| Sticky | Caramel, taffy, toffee, chewing gum, gummy candy, licorice, sticky granola bars | Grabs a bracket and pulls it off the tooth, and packs into places a brush cannot reach |
| Crunchy | Chips, crackers, popcorn, hard raw carrots, crusty bread | Fragments wedge under wires and between brackets, and the sharp bite pops brackets loose |
| Chewy | Bagels, hard rolls, pizza crust edges, jerky, tough steak, chewy candy | The repeated pulling and tearing motion works brackets loose over time |
The definitive avoid list
The American Association of Orthodontists names these specifically as foods to avoid for the duration of treatment:
- Popcorn, including the unpopped kernels and the hulls
- Nuts and seeds of all kinds
- Ice, whether chewed on purpose or absentmindedly
- Hard candy, mints and suckers
- Sticky candy: caramel, taffy, toffee, licorice, gummies
- Chewing gum
- Hard pretzels, chips and taco chips
- Crusty bread, hard rolls and bagels
- Crisp pizza crust and the hard outer edge of a slice
- Tough or chewy cuts of meat, and jerky
- Corn on the cob and whole apples, unless cut off the cob or sliced first
- Hard raw vegetables like whole carrots, unless cut into thin pieces
Foods that are fine once you change how you eat them
A lot of the avoid list is really a technique problem rather than a food problem. Corn is fine off the cob. Apples and pears are fine sliced. Sandwiches and pizza are fine cut into pieces and chewed on the back teeth. Carrots are fine cooked or shaved thin. Meat is fine when it is tender, cut small, or cooked in sauce.
The AAO makes the same point: cut food into small pieces so you are not biting directly with the front teeth, and chew slowly and gently, because aggressive chewing is what dislodges brackets and distorts wires. The front teeth are where most bracket failures happen, and cutting removes that force entirely.
Drinks belong on the avoid list too
Braces do not break from soda, but your enamel pays for it. Sugary and acidic drinks pool around brackets, where they are the hardest to clean away, and that is exactly where white spot decalcification shows up when the braces come off.
The AAO recommends tap water and milk as the best drinks during treatment and advises steering clear of soda, sports drinks, energy drinks and sweet tea. If you do drink one, rinse with water afterward and brush when you can. The ADA makes the same point: too many sugary foods with braces leads to plaque buildup around the brackets that can permanently stain or damage teeth.
Call your dentist or oral surgeon if
- A bracket that came off, a loose band, or a wire that has come out of a bracket: call your orthodontist for a repair appointment
- A wire end poking your cheek or gum that wax will not control
- A tooth that hurts sharply when you bite after eating something hard, which can mean a bracket has partly lifted off
- White chalky patches appearing around the brackets, which are early decalcification and need a hygiene plan from your orthodontist
- Gum swelling, bleeding that does not settle, fever, or pus and a bad taste
Related questions
What happens if I accidentally eat something on the list?
Usually nothing. Check your braces in a mirror, feel each bracket with your tongue, and make sure nothing is loose or poking. If a bracket has shifted or a wire has moved, call your orthodontist. One slip is not a disaster, a habit is.
Can I chew sugar free gum with braces?
Ask your own orthodontist. Gum is on the AAO and ADA avoid lists because it sticks to brackets and can pull them loose, and offices differ on whether they make an exception for sugar free gum.
Why do the rules last the whole treatment and not just the first weeks?
Because the risk is mechanical, not related to soreness. A bracket bonded for eighteen months is just as easy to snap off in month sixteen as in week one, and a break late in treatment can undo finishing work.
Do clear aligners have the same food rules?
No. Aligners come out to eat, so there is no food list. The tradeoff is that they only work when worn at least 22 hours a day, so eating time is wear time you lose.
Sources
- Braces-Friendly Foods: What to Eat and What to Avoid (American Association of Orthodontists)
- Living With Braces: Food, Oral Hygiene and Care Tips (American Association of Orthodontists)
- Braces (American Dental Association (MouthHealthy))
- What Candy Can You Eat With Braces? (American Association of Orthodontists)
Reviewed against the sources above on 2026-08-25. General information only, not dental advice. Your own provider's aftercare instructions come first.
Keep reading
No to both, and not just during the sore first week. Popcorn and chips are off limits for the entire time your braces are on. Popcorn is the single worst snack for braces: unpopped kernels crack brackets, and the thin hulls wedge under wires and into the gum where you cannot get them out. Chips are hard and sharp enough to pop a bracket loose and fragment into the same spaces. Both come off the avoid list the day your braces come off, not before.
Plan on soft, no-bite foods for the first three days, then work back toward normal braces-safe eating by the end of the first week. Yogurt, eggs, soup, pasta, mashed potatoes, smoothies, soft fish and cooked vegetables cover the sore days. From day four most people can chew normally again as long as food is cut into small pieces and chewed with the back teeth. The permanent braces rules on hard, sticky, crunchy and chewy foods start on day one and last the whole treatment.
No. A loose or broken bracket is an urgent orthodontic problem, not an emergency, so it can wait for the next business day in almost every case. If the bracket is still on the wire, slide it back to the middle of the tooth and hold it with orthodontic wax. If it came all the way off, keep it and bring it to your appointment. Then call your orthodontist, because a bracket that is not bonded is not moving that tooth and every week it stays broken can add time to your treatment.
Partly. Shallow, early white spots can fade over months as enamel remineralizes once the braces are off and plaque control improves, helped by fluoride. Deeper mineral loss is often permanent, though cosmetic treatments can improve how it looks. That is why prevention while the braces are still on matters far more than treatment afterward. White spots start where plaque sits against enamel around brackets, and they can appear within the first months of treatment, so the cleaning habits you build early are what decide the outcome.