In a 1-octanol/phosphate buffer system, saccharin was much more lipophilic than would be inferred from its dissociation constant which, however, determined the partition behavior of acesulfame and cyclamate. The uptake of saccharin into Streptococcus mutans led to a 30 to 40-fold higher concentration of this intense sweetener within cells than in the incubation medium. Acesulfame and cyclamate were distributed between cells and medium essentially in a diffusion-controlled manner. The uptake of saccharin into S. mutans was found to depend strongly on simultaneous sugar fermentation, and in addition, on external pH, sweetener concentrations, and cell densities. Without glycolysis, caused, for example, by an exhaustion of added sucrose, too acidic external pH, or the addition of glycolysis inhibitors, the uptake of saccharin was diffusion-controlled as in the case of acesulfame and cyclamate. The uptake of saccharin was inhibited by a reversal of the direction of the lactate gradient from in----out to out----in. The activation energy of saccharin uptake into glycolyzing S. mutans was near 18 kJ/mol, while glycolysis itself required 82-98 kJ/mol as activation energy, depending somewhat on experimental conditions. Up to 100 attomol of saccharin per bacterial cell was observed. It was concluded that the cytomembrane of S. mutans was involved in mediating the inhibitory effects of saccharin by an antiport of saccharin into cells in exchange for lactate.