A single slice of cooked pork bacon contains about 3.5 grams of fat and 44 calories. That number can shift depending on thickness, cut, and cooking method, but it’s a reliable baseline for standard pan-fried or baked strips. Here’s what that fat is made of and how different types of bacon compare.
Fat Breakdown Per Slice
Of the roughly 3.5 grams of total fat in one cooked slice, about 1.15 grams is saturated fat. The rest is a mix of monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats. Looking at bacon’s overall fat profile, monounsaturated fat actually makes up the largest share, followed by saturated fat, with polyunsaturated fat a distant third. In a typical serving, you’re looking at roughly 47% monounsaturated, 41% saturated, and 12% polyunsaturated fat.
Most people eat two to three slices at a time, which puts a typical breakfast portion at 7 to 10.5 grams of total fat and 2.3 to 3.5 grams of saturated fat. For context, federal dietary guidelines recommend keeping saturated fat below 10% of your daily calories. On a 2,000-calorie diet, that’s about 22 grams of saturated fat per day. Three slices of bacon uses up roughly 15% of that budget before you’ve added butter to your toast.
How Cooking Changes the Fat Content
Raw bacon is significantly fattier than what ends up on your plate. During cooking, a large portion of the fat renders out, meaning it melts and separates from the meat. A pound of raw bacon typically yields about a cup of liquid fat once fully cooked, which works out to roughly a teaspoon or more of rendered fat per slice. The crispier you cook your bacon, the more fat drips away.
Baking bacon on a rack tends to render more fat than pan-frying because the strips aren’t sitting in their own grease. If you’re trying to reduce fat intake, baking on a wire rack over a sheet pan and blotting with paper towels afterward will give you the leanest result. That said, the nutrition data above already accounts for cooked bacon, so the 3.5 grams per slice reflects what you’re actually eating after rendering.
Turkey Bacon vs. Pork Bacon
Turkey bacon is often marketed as a healthier swap, and the fat numbers do drop noticeably. In a 2-ounce serving (roughly 4 slices), turkey bacon has about 14 grams of total fat compared to 22 grams for pork bacon. That’s a 36% reduction.
Saturated fat also falls, from 8 grams in pork bacon down to 4 grams in turkey bacon for the same serving size. The tradeoff is that turkey bacon tends to carry similar sodium levels. Brands like Oscar Mayer Gluten Free Turkey Bacon come in at 280 mg of sodium per two slices, which is comparable to many pork bacon products. So turkey bacon is genuinely lower in fat, but it’s not a free pass on the sodium front.
Canadian Bacon Is a Different Animal
Canadian bacon (also called back bacon) comes from the loin rather than the belly, which makes it dramatically leaner. A 3-ounce serving of Canadian bacon contains just 2.2 grams of total fat and 0.77 grams of saturated fat. That same weight of regular pork bacon would have roughly 10 to 12 grams of fat. If you like the salty, smoky flavor of bacon but want to cut fat significantly, Canadian bacon is the most effective substitution.
Sodium Varies Wildly by Brand
Fat isn’t the only number worth checking on a bacon label. Sodium content swings enormously depending on the brand, from as low as 120 mg per two slices for some uncured options up to 560 mg for others. Lower-sodium brands like North Country Smokehouse Uncured Sugar-Free (120 mg per two slices) and Hormel Black Label Lower-Sodium (200 mg per two slices) sit at one end of the spectrum. At the other end, brands like Nature’s Rancher Uncured Applewood Smoked hit 560 mg for two slices, nearly five times higher.
Thick-cut varieties tend to run higher simply because there’s more meat per slice. A single slice of Wright Thick Cut Hickory Smoked contains 250 mg, while a single slice of Kunzler Thick Cut reaches 465 mg. If you’re watching both fat and sodium, reading the nutrition panel on your specific brand matters more than relying on general averages.
Where Bacon Fits in Your Diet
The Dietary Guidelines for Americans specifically flag bacon as a high-fat processed meat and suggest replacing it with seafood or leaner proteins to help keep saturated fat and sodium within recommended limits. Processed meats in general are associated with less favorable health outcomes when consumed frequently, and the guidelines emphasize keeping them relatively low in your overall eating pattern.
That doesn’t mean bacon needs to disappear entirely. Two or three slices a few times a week adds roughly 7 to 10 grams of fat per sitting, a manageable amount if the rest of your meals aren’t also heavy in saturated fat. Pairing bacon with vegetables, whole grains, or eggs rather than layering it onto a cheeseburger keeps the overall meal in better balance. The fat in bacon isn’t uniquely dangerous. It’s the cumulative effect of saturated fat and sodium across your whole diet that matters.