Protein Cost per Gram: Whey vs Paneer, Eggs and Soya in India

Why does the same 25 g of protein cost about ₹80 in one pack and about ₹10 in another? Because the price on the pack says very little about protein. What matters is the price of each gram of protein inside it. On the prices we could find, 25 g of protein costs about ₹80 as Amul whey, ₹41 as high-protein paneer, ₹32 as four eggs and roughly ₹10 as soya chunks. That is about an 8-times gap between the top and the bottom, and about ₹25,550 a year if you have a 25 g serving every day.

This is a price comparison and nothing more. It does not say which food is better for you. Protein quality, digestion and how much you need are separate questions, and we have not compared them.

The rule: price divided by total protein

Every protein product has two numbers that matter: what you pay, and how many grams of protein you get for it. Divide the first by the second and you get the price per gram of protein. That one number lets you compare a sachet, a block of paneer, a tray of eggs and a packet of soya chunks, even though they look nothing alike.

The catch is that pack weight is not protein weight. A 32 g sachet does not hold 32 g of protein, and 100 g of paneer holds far less than 100 g. So the method has three steps:

1. Find the total protein in the pack: grams per serving × number of servings, or pack weight × protein percentage.
2. Divide the price by that total to get ₹ per gram.
3. Multiply by the protein you want, say 25 g, to get the cost of one serving.

Worked example: Amul whey

The Amul Whey Protein pack has 30 sachets of 32 g each, with 25 g of whey protein per sachet, at a listed MRP of ₹2,400.

• Total protein: 30 × 25 g = 750 g
• Price per gram: ₹2,400 ÷ 750 g = ₹3.20
• One 25 g serving: ₹3.20 × 25 = ₹80

Skipping step one gives a misleading answer. Thirty sachets of 32 g is 960 g of powder, and ₹2,400 ÷ 960 g is ₹2.50 per gram. That looks cheaper, but it is the price of powder, not of protein.

The same sum for paneer, eggs and soya chunks

• High-protein paneer. Amul High Protein Paneer comes as 2 × 400 g (800 g) for an MRP of ₹330, with 12.5 g of protein per 50 g, which is 25%. So 100 g gives 25 g of protein. That 100 g costs ₹330 ÷ 8 = about ₹41, or roughly ₹1.65 per gram of protein.
• Eggs. Retail is about ₹8 an egg, and a large egg has about 6.29 g of protein (USDA data). Four eggs give about 25 g of protein for about ₹32, or around ₹1.27 per gram.
• Soya chunks. A Nutrela entry on Open Food Facts shows 53 g of protein per 100 g. For 25 g of protein you need 25 ÷ 0.53 = about 47 g of chunks. At ₹160 to ₹240 per kg, that is roughly ₹7.50 to ₹11.30, so the reel uses about ₹10, or about 40 paise per gram.

The reel gives yearly totals only for whey and soya. The paneer and egg totals are our own multiplication of the rounded daily cost by 365.

Read the table as ratios. Whey costs nearly twice as much as the paneer, about 2.5 times the eggs and 8 times the soya chunks. Even the high-protein paneer costs about four times as much as soya chunks for the same 25 g.

Who this affects

The gap matters most to people who buy protein every day, regular gym-goers for example, because a small difference per serving is multiplied by 365. At one 25 g serving a day, whey comes to ₹29,200 a year and soya chunks to about ₹3,650, a difference of about ₹25,550.

That yearly figure shows scale, not a forecast. It assumes the whole 25 g comes from one source every day at today's prices, and most people mix foods.

How firm are these numbers?

• Whey. Both Amul whey pages we checked showed “sold out”, so ₹2,400 (30 sachets) and ₹4,500 (60 sachets) are listed MRPs, not confirmed selling prices.
• Eggs. The ₹8 is an approximate retail price. A Tamil Nadu report put the NECC rate, a procurement price, at ₹6.55 on 11 July 2026, and retail varies by city and season. The 6.29 g is for a large egg; the eggs you buy may differ.
• Soya chunks. The price comes from a price tracker for a 1 kg listing: ₹239, with a 12-month low of ₹157. The date is unclear, and about ₹10 per 25 g is a mid estimate. The 53% protein figure is from a Nutrela entry while the price is for a Saffola listing, so check the pack in your hand.

Common mistakes

1. Comparing price per kg. Soya chunks at ₹200 a kg look like 20 paise a gram, but only 53% is protein, so protein costs about 38 paise a gram. The same trap hides in whey: 32 g of powder is not 32 g of protein.
2. Assuming “high protein” means cheap. The phrase describes the product, not what a gram of protein costs.
3. Annualising a need you may not have. The ₹25,550 assumes you want an extra 25 g every day. Whether you do is a question for a doctor or dietitian, not a calculator.

What you can do

The reel boils it down to three questions to ask the next time you pick up a pack:

1. How much protein is in the whole pack?
2. Price ÷ protein = ₹ per gram.
3. High protein is not the same as cheap.

In practice, read the protein per serving on the label, multiply by the number of servings, and use the price you would actually pay today, after any discount. Then divide on your phone. Try it on a second whey pack: Amul Chocolate Whey has 60 sachets of 34 g with 25 g of protein each, at an MRP of ₹4,500. That is 60 × 25 g = 1,500 g of protein, so ₹4,500 ÷ 1,500 g = ₹3.00 per gram, or ₹75 per 25 g. Moving to a pack with twice the sachets lowers the serving cost only from ₹80 to ₹75, which is small next to the gap between whey and the other foods.

Once you have the number, weigh it against what the sum leaves out: convenience, taste, cooking time, your digestion and your diet. A higher price per gram can be a fair trade if it makes your routine easier. The point is to choose knowing the cost.

Key takeaways

• The cost of protein is the pack price divided by the total grams of protein in the pack, not the price per kg or per pack.
• On the prices we found, 25 g of protein costs about ₹80 as whey, ₹41 as high-protein paneer, ₹32 as four eggs and about ₹10 as soya chunks.
• Taken daily for 365 days, that is ₹29,200 for whey against about ₹3,650 for soya chunks, a gap of about ₹25,550.
• “High protein” on a label does not mean a low price per gram.
• The prices are listed MRPs and rough estimates, and the comparison ignores protein quality, absorption, convenience and personal needs.