In three unrelated patients with hereditary fructose intolerance (HFI), but in none of five normal subjects, the experimental administration of fructose invariably induced a reversible dysfunction of the renal tubule with biochemical and physiological characteristics of renal tubular acidosis. During a state of ammonium chloride-induced acidosis, (a) urinary pH was greater than six and the rate of excretion of net acid (titratable acid plus ammonium minus bicarbonate) was inappropriately low, (b) the glomerular filtration rate remained unchanged or decreased modestly, and (c) urinary excretion of titratable acid increased briskly with diuresis of infused phosphate, although urinary pH changed little. The tubular dysfunction, which also includes impaired tubular reabsorption of alpha amino nitrogen and phosphate, persisted throughout administration of fructose and disappeared afterward. The tubular dysfunction was not causally dependent on hypoglucosemia, ammonium chloride-induced acidosis or osmotic diuresis. Rather, it appeared causally related to the fructose-induced metabolic abnormality of patients with HFI. The causal enzymatic defect, the virtual absence of fructose-1-phosphate aldolase, occurs in the kidney as well as in the liver of patients with HFI.