» More: How much water should I drink a day?

Grape-flavored Vitamin Water Formula 50 touts providing half of the many important “vitamins you need every day.”

Missing from the marketing on the bottle: the 125 calories per bottle and the 32.5 grams of both sugar and carbs also inside the lilac-colored water.

The nutrition facts are there on the back label, but be prepared to do the math if you plan on drinking all 20 ounces — since the serving size is based on 8 ounces.

Those “enhanced” and “enriched” and with “natural and artificial flavors” bottles of water are laced with more than hydrogen and oxygen.

Some contain sugar or caffeine, and sometimes, both.

That’s why health experts urge consumers to consider the free — both in cost and calorie consumption — alternative: tap water.

“Some brands are high in sugar, as much as 13 grams in an 8-ounce serving,” said Bloomington Hospital dietitian Stacey Matavuli. “Others have more than 100mg of caffeine per 20-ounce bottle.”

Matavuli knows this firsthand after one of her children was drinking an orange-flavored Vitamin Water Energy. She checked out the label, surprised by the 125 mg of caffeine inside or the equivalent of more than two cups of coffee.

So with all these nutritional red-flags, why do so many people green-light these drinks?

“People are still looking for the magic bullet. Anything that promotes that possibility is going to be looked at,” Matavuli said. “Some people go for the taste sold under the pretense of water (having) no calories. You can’t make those calorie assumptions when it comes to flavored water.” Another assumption that can’t be made when it comes to any bottled water is that it undergoes the same regulation as tap water.

The FDA requires information from all bottled water manufactuers whereas the EPA oversees water coming from taps and water fountains across the country.

That could change. Advocates are now urging Congress to require bottled water be labeled with the same information municipal water provides.

And what happens to all those bottles after they’re empty is another concern.

Nearly 86 percent of all empty plastic bottles end up in landfills, rivers or oceans, according to advocacy group Food and Water Watch.

*******

LABEL COMPARISION

Vitamins added to water can be consumed by other ways.

“B vitamins are very essential,” said Bloomington Hospital dietitian Stacey Matavuli of the common vitamin family found in water. “You can get them from food you don’t have to get them from supplements.”

Another unknown is whether the body absorbs or uses the vitamins mixed in with water the same way as those found naturally in food.

* Info is per bottle and percentages are daily values based on a 2,000 calorie diet

PROPEL FIT WATER BEVERAGE

vitamins & calcium

Flavor: Mixed berry

Calories: 20

Total Fat: 0

Sodium: 10 mg

Total carb: 5 g

Sugars: 4g

Protein: 0

Calcium: 20 percent

Niacin (B vitamin): 50 percent

Vitamin B6: 50 percent

Vitamin B12: 10 percent

Pantothenic Acid (B Vitamin): 50 percent

SNAPPLE ANTIOXIDANT WATER

Flavor: Strawberry Acai

Calories: 140

Fat: 0

Sodium: 0

Carb: 32g

Sugar: 32 g

Protein: 0

Niacin B3: 50 percent

Vitamin B6: 50 percent

B12: 50 percent

Pantohenic acid (B Vitamin): 50 percent

Vitamin A: 25 percent

Calcium: 4 percent

Vitamin E: 25 percent

Magnesium: 4 percent

Zinc: 6 percent

FRUIT 2 O ESSENTIALS

Calories: 0

Fat: 0

Sodium: 105 mg

Potassium: 350

Carb: 1g

Fiber: 1g

Sugars: 0

Protein: 0

Vitamin C: 20 percent

Vitamin B6: 10 percent

Phosperous: 10 percent

Selenium: 2 percent

Vitamin E: 15 pecent

Pantohenic acid: 6 percent

Zinc: 2 percent

Magnesium: 25 percent

GLACEAU VITAMIN WATER FORMULA 50

Flavor: Grape

Calories: 125

Protein: 0

Total Carb: 32.5g

Sugar: 32.5g

Fat: 0

Sodium: 0 mg

Vitamin C: 50 percent

Vitamin E: 50 percent:

Vitamin B3: 50 percent

Vitamin B6: 50 percent

Folic Acid: 50 percent

Vitamin B12: 50 percent

Vitamin B5: 50 percent