There’s something universally comforting about a crispy, golden french fry. It’s hard to imagine any fast-food meal without them. Honestly, sometimes the fries are more anticipated than the burger itself.
The fry game has evolved over the past few years. Chains are constantly tweaking recipes, introducing new cuts, and experimenting with coatings to achieve that perfect crunch. From skinny shoestrings to thick crinkle cuts, every chain has its own take on this beloved side dish.
Dairy Queen: The Ice Cream Giant’s Fry Fumble
Let’s be real, nobody goes to Dairy Queen for the fries. According to rankings assessing dozens of fast-food chains, Dairy Queen landed at the very bottom, with fries that are limp, cold, and under-salted at their worst, and forgettable at their best. On the Dairy Queen subreddit, customers pointed out they’re awful and lowest tier, taking roughly three minutes to get cold and aren’t even that good fresh. The chain built its empire on Blizzards and soft serve for good reason. If you’re craving a sweet treat, DQ is a solid choice, but fry lovers should look elsewhere.
Burger King: Middling Monarchy
Burger King’s fries have the reputation of being boring, soggy, and not nearly as crispy or as flavorful as their biggest rival. During recent taste tests, Burger King’s fries were extremely underseasoned and definitely needed a big sprinkle of salt to make them worth the calories, and while they had the slightest hint of crisp, the inside was so thick and potatoey that the whole textural balance was off. The chain has tried multiple recipe overhauls over the years, but consistency remains a persistent issue. Under pressure from healthy living advocates, McDonald’s changed its French fry recipe in 1992, replacing the beef tallow traditionally used to fry the fries with vegetable oil and “beef flavoring”, a story that highlights how even giants struggle with fry perfection.
Chick-fil-A: Waffle Hype Versus Reality
The waffle fry is the most ordered item on Chick-fil-A’s menu since debuting in 1985, which honestly surprised me. Recent taste tests showed the chain frequently misses the mark on execution, with fries that were tragically undersalted, and without enough salt or sauce to boost their flavor, they just fell flat and were totally forgettable. The waffle cut creates plenty of surface area for dipping, sure, but the actual flavor often disappoints.
Chick-fil-A recently added pea starch to their recipe, claiming it offers the same great taste while making fries stay crispier longer, but these fries don’t taste the same as they used to, with the buttery, earthy flavor of the original now gone. That’s a major change for a menu item people thought they loved.
Five Guys: Generous Yet Inconsistent
Five Guys fries are cooked boardwalk-style, hand cut and cooked twice in peanut oil before getting doused in Cajun spices, and the extra scoop of fries in the bag is always a nice surprise. Chad Murrell, one of the five sons of founder Jerry Murrell, explained the generous portioning is meant to ensure nobody leaves wishing they had more fries, saying “we always give an extra scoop” and “load ’em up and make sure they get their money’s worth”.
The volume is impressive, I’ll give them that. While plenty of people swear by the quality and quantity of Five Guys fries, the biggest complaint is that they’re served in bags and in such a big quantity that by the time you get partway through that bag, they’re starting to be less perfect and more soggy. Five Guys fell from a customer satisfaction score of 78 to 75 in 2025, with the chain always known for its high prices but maintaining a loyal fanbase willing to pay a premium for high-quality fast food.
McDonald’s: The Golden Standard
When CivicScience ran a 2024 survey to discover which fast food French fries Americans prefer, McDonald’s received a whopping 46% of the vote. The original is still king, apparently. In a massive 2023 survey, roughly half of all fast food customers polled said that McDonald’s crispy, salty, shoestring fries were the best of the best.
In 1990, McDonald’s began using vegetable oil rather than beef tallow to fry its fries, and since then, most devoted customers have been able to tell the difference, with the real weakness being lack of consistency – when they are fresh they are the best fries in fast food, but most of the time you’re going to get an order that has been sitting under the heat lamp a bit too long. The quality of McDonald’s fries really depends on execution, and when they’re fresh, hot, and perfectly salted, they could easily seize the number one spot, but when they’ve been sitting out a while, haven’t been cooked long enough, or aren’t properly seasoned, they’re one of the worst fast-food fries.
So where does that leave us? The fry rankings show that nostalgia and consistency matter just as much as taste. What’s your take on this eternal fry debate?
