If you want the highest protein per 100g dry, masoor dal wins by a hair. If you want the cheapest protein per rupee, chana dal wins comfortably. If you want the fastest weeknight dal, masoor again. If you want the dal that sits lightest on a long day, moong. If you need idli batter or dal makhani, urad dal is not optional. The six most common dals on an Indian shelf are not interchangeable, but the differences are not where most people look for them.
This is the head-to-head, grounded in IFCT 2017 protein values and April 2026 Bengaluru kirana prices — the same numbers used across the rest of this cluster so your math stays consistent from article to article.
The comparison table
All protein values per 100g dry (IFCT 2017). Prices from Bengaluru mid-tier kiranas, April 2026. The ₹/g column derives from ₹/kg divided by grams of protein per kg, which is the per-100g figure times ten.
| Dal | IFCT code | Protein g/100g | ₹/kg | ₹ per g protein | Cook time (pressure) | Everyday use |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Masoor dal (red lentil, split) | B013 | 24.35 | 130 | ₹0.53 | 10-15 min, no soak | Fastest weeknight dal |
| Moong dal (split, dhuli) | B010 | 23.88 | 140 | ₹0.59 | 12-15 min, no soak | Khichdi, simple dal |
| Urad dal (black gram, split) | B003 | 23.06 | 170 | ₹0.74 | 20-25 min, short soak | Idli/dosa batter, dal makhani |
| Toor / arhar dal | B021 | 21.70 | 160 | ₹0.74 | 20-25 min, short soak | Sambar, everyday south Indian dal |
| Chana dal (split bengal gram) | B001 | 21.55 | 90 | ₹0.43 | 25-30 min, 30-60 min soak | Dal tadka Punjab-style, dhokla |
| Rajma (red kidney, whole) | B020 | 19.91 | 180 | ₹0.90 | 35-45 min after overnight soak | Rajma chawal, Sunday lunch |
The spread in protein density across the five splits is only 2.8g per 100g dry — from chana’s 21.55 to masoor’s 24.35. At a realistic 40g dry serving, that is a 1.1g difference. Real, but not decisive. The differences that matter more week-to-week are cost, cook time, and how the dal behaves on the plate.
Cheapest per gram of protein: chana dal
Chana dal at ₹0.43 per gram of protein is the cheapest everyday pulse on the list. At 40g dry per serving it delivers 8.6g of protein for roughly ₹3.60. A 70kg adult on a cereal-dominant diet (1.0 g/kg target per ICMR-NIN RDA 2020) hitting a 70g daily protein number from chana dal alone would spend ₹30. That number does not reflect a realistic meal, because nobody eats 325g of dry chana dal in a day, but it is the floor the rest of this list sits above.
The protein per rupee pillar has the full table and the derivation formula if you want to run the math on whatever your own kirana is charging this week. Chana dal’s edge has held for the last decade and is not an accident — it is the cheapest whole food on the pulse shelf and the methionine-limited complement to rice that is built into most regional plates.
Fastest cook: masoor dal
Masoor dal cooks in 10-15 minutes at pressure with no soak, and it breaks down to a soft consistency that forgives rough technique. This is the dal that survives a tired Tuesday. Moong dal (split, dehusked) is a close second at 12-15 minutes.
Toor, urad, and chana all benefit from a short soak and a 20-30 minute pressure cook. They are not slow foods — 30 minutes in a pressure cooker is not an ordeal — but on a workday when the stove is already doing two other things, the 15-minute dal wins. Rajma is an entirely different budget: overnight soak, 35-45 minutes of cooking, and the wrath of an undercooked batch if you shortcut either step.
Easiest digestion: moong dal
Moong dal is the default for light eating in most Indian households. It is what you cook when a child is unwell, when someone has been fasting, and when the plate needs to sit easy. The standard khichdi uses it for that reason. Masoor is also on the easy end and slightly heavier than moong.
Toor is mid-weight. Chana dal carries the most fiber of the split dals and sits heaviest on the chest; a full bowl of chana dal is not a pre-bed meal. Urad dal has a mucilaginous character that is exactly why dal makhani is rich and exactly why urad is rarely eaten as a simple daily dal. Rajma, properly cooked, is fine; under-cooked rajma is the textbook example of why whole pulses need time.
The literature on pulse digestibility has real inter-person variance. The ranking above is household-typical, not a prescription.
Amino-acid profile: don’t over-optimize inside the dal family
All the dals on this list are lysine-rich and methionine-limited. Rice and wheat are the reverse — methionine-present, lysine-limited. The dal-rice or dal-roti plate is the complete-protein combo that has carried Indian home cooking for generations, and the cereal plus pulse pairing matters more than which pulse you pick.
Masoor is slightly lower in methionine than chana among the splits; urad is marginally higher. These differences round off once you put rice or a roti alongside the dal. If the question is “which dal has the better amino profile” and the answer is supposed to change behavior, the honest answer is: eat dal with grain, rotate the dal across the week, and stop optimizing a decimal. The complete-protein breakdown has the longer version of that reasoning.
When to pick each one
This is the part of a comparison article that is supposed to commit. Committing.
- Default weeknight dal: moong or masoor. Fast, light, forgiving. Either works.
- Budget priority for protein: chana dal. The cheapest pulse on the list by a meaningful margin. Run it twice a week.
- Sambar: toor dal. No substitute. The other dals can make something soup-adjacent; toor is the backbone of sambar and behaves differently.
- Idli / dosa / uttapam batter: urad dal. The mucilage is the ingredient. Other dals do not ferment the same way.
- Dal makhani: urad plus rajma. The combination is the point; neither on its own replaces the other.
- Rajma chawal Sunday lunch: rajma. Not an everyday dal. Batch-cook ahead if the plan is a weeknight.
Notice the split: moong, masoor, and chana are the rotation. Toor is the south-of-the-Vindhyas default. Urad and rajma are specific-meal dals, not everyday ones. Most Indian kitchens already run this pattern without calling it one.
I tested this — one week, six dals
I ran a rotating-dal week from April 11 to 17, 2026. Single adult, ~70kg, Koramangala kirana prices.
| Day | Dal | Dry weight | Protein from dal | Meal |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mon | Masoor | 40g | 9.7g | 12-minute weeknight dal tadka + rice |
| Tue | Moong | 40g | 9.6g | Simple dal with ghee-jeera tadka |
| Wed | Chana | 40g | 8.6g | Chana dal tadka Punjab-style |
| Thu | Toor | 40g | 8.7g | Sambar with vegetables, rice |
| Fri | Urad (small katori) | 30g | 7g | Small dal makhani attempt |
| Sat | Moong | 40g | 9.6g | Khichdi, one-pot dinner |
| Sun | Rajma | 60g | 11.9g | Rajma chawal lunch |
Total dal-protein across the week: ~65g. Dedicated dal spend: ~₹65. One katori of dal per day, at this rotation, single-handedly delivers ~9g of protein. Doubled across lunch and dinner on most days and you are past 15g of dal protein alone, before the rice, roti, and anchor sabzi add anything.
The pattern that matters is that no single dal had to carry the week. The rotation captured chana dal’s ₹/g advantage twice, moong’s easy-digestion slot twice, masoor’s fast cook, toor’s sambar spot, and urad’s one-meal role. If I had eaten chana dal every day to chase the ₹0.16/g savings over moong, I would have saved ₹10 and broken the routine by Wednesday.
Pairing dal with grain and anchor
The dal katori alone is not the full protein picture. A realistic plate of one katori dal (9g) plus rice (3.5g for 50g) plus two rotis (10g) plus a small paneer or soy chunks side (9-13g) lands at 30g of protein — one plate, no heroics. The high-protein Indian foods pillar is the map for building the rest of that plate. For the one-anchor-swap decision, paneer vs tofu is where to look. For the grain question, bajra vs jowar vs ragi covers the millet side. The full nutritional profile of urad dal including why the mucilage matters is in the urad dal breakdown.
When cooking time is the real constraint and dal-from-scratch is not happening on Wednesday night, the honest homemade-versus-ready comparison is in the convenient high-protein meals bridge.
Final takeaway
The default pick for an everyday dal is moong or masoor — fast, light, forgiving. The budget pick is chana dal, run twice a week to keep the ₹/g advantage without the heaviness. Toor is the south Indian default and the sambar base. Urad and rajma are specific-meal dals. Rotate across the week and you capture most of the cost, protein, and texture advantages without over-thinking any of them.
The dal that wins is the one you will actually cook on Tuesday night.
