Are cereal bars significantly healthier and more natural than chocolate bars? A preliminary assessment in the German market

•Cereal bars have a higher nutritional quality as compared to chocolate bars.•There is a great variation in the nutritional quality of cereal bars.•Cereal and chocolate bars are in general not very natural.•In snack bars, nutritional quality and food naturalness are weakly correlated.•There is plenty of room to improve healthiness and naturalness of snack bars.