Oatly original has 7g of sugar - 1 cup of whole cows milk has 12 g of sugar. So it is still significantly less sugar than cow's milk. I drink planet oat milk, and that only has 4g of sugar and tastes good to me.
Oatly's primary sugar, maltose, has 2.3 times the blood sugar impact as lactose, the primary sugar in cow's milk. Maltose has a glycemic index of 105, compared to 46 for lactose.[1]
Ok, but if Oatly is 100% maltose, it has only a slightly higher glycemic index than cow's milk. But the aforementioned planet oat is still lower(assuming it is 100% maltose)
I double-checked the amount of sugar in milk and in my area, Netherlands, all milk (whole or not) contains less than 5g of sugar per 100g. While Oatly has indeed about 7g per 100g. So it's quite the opposite, oatly has significantly more sugar with higher glycemic index.
The US nutrition label lists sugars per serving, which is 240ml. So according to the US rules it's 7g sugar per 240ml, not per 100g (or 100ml).
The US Oatly label lists "Total Carbohydrate 16 g, Includes 7 g added sugars" per 240ml.
The UK Oatly label lists "Carbohydrate: 6.6 g, of which sugars: 4.0 g" per 100ml. Pretty sure the Netherlands product and label is the same as the UK one.
