Fast food isn’t just quick meals. It’s history you can eat. Long before viral trends and delivery apps, a handful of menu items became global icons, sold not in millions but billions.
These burgers, fries, and chicken changed our childhoods and fueled our road trips, all while becoming some of the most successful food items in history. Without further ado, here are the 10 best-selling fast-food items of all time.
McDonald’s French Fries
McDonald’s fries are by far the king of fast food dishes. Many people visit McDonald’s just to eat their world-famous fries. Once McDonald’s made the switch to frozen, shoestring fries in the 1960’s, sales skyrocketed because every fry was guaranteed to taste the exact same.
Today, the restaurant serves approximately 9 million pounds of fries PER DAY. Because fries are included in almost every value meal, they are considered to be the most purchased fast-food item of all time. No other snack has come close to selling more than McDonald’s fries.
McDonald’s Big Mac
Did you know you can measure how expensive it is to live in foreign countries by using McDonald’s burgers? The Big Mac is so popular and ubiquitous that economists actually track the price of them around the world using something called the “Big Mac Index”.
In 1967, a Pennsylvania franchise owner invented the signature McDonald’s burger. Featuring two patties and “special sauce”, the burger became a national sensation by 1968. Americans alone eat approximately 550 million Big Macs per year. That comes out to about 17 burgers per second.
Burger King Whopper
If the Big Mac is the king of popularity, the Whopper has been the king when it comes to burger customization. Burger King actually beat McDonald’s to the punch by 10 years, introducing the hamburger in 1957.
The secret to its success is the burger’s famous “flame-grilled” flavor, which has given Burger King a noticeable barbecue taste that stands out from regular fried burgers.
Burger King sells over 2 billion Whoppers worldwide every year. Its signature “Have It Your Way” slogan made it a phenomenon because it allowed customers to adjust the ingredients to their liking.
McDonald’s Happy Meal
Arguably the most genius fast-food idea of all-time. Happy Meals were invented with children in mind, combining food with a toy. Introduced in 1979, the circus-wagon themed boxes were the first “child-friendly” meals to offer toys built right into them.
This ensures that once kids learn how to talk, McDonald’s will be the first place they demand to eat. Selling over 1 billion meals per year, the Happy Meal has actually made McDonald’s the largest toy distributor in history, outselling even places like Hasbro or Mattel.
KFC Original Recipe Bucket
When Colonel Sanders began selling food, he marketed his product as a “Sunday Dinner” you could get in a bucket. The idea of a “bucket” of chicken changed fast food history because customers were no longer just buying lunch for themselves on the go, but an entire family’s worth of food to eat at home.
The secret “11 herbs and spices” was the most famous secret recipe in world history all throughout the century. KFC was also one of the first fast food chains to successfully expand all over the world.
Wendy’s Frosty
Dave Thomas started Wendy’s with only 5 things on the menu, and Frosty was one of them. At the time, Frosty was unique because it wasn’t a milkshake. It also wasn’t soft-serve ice cream. It was thick enough that you could eat it with a spoon, but soft enough to dip your French fry in.
Throughout the 80s and 90s, Frostys were some of the highest-selling desserts in the world. It’s historical because it hasn’t changed at all in decades, while competitors were changing their recipes yearly.
Dairy Queen Blizzard
When the Blizzard was introduced to the world in the mid-80s, it was a cultural phenomenon. Never before had someone successfully “mixed” candy and cookies into soft serve.
In year one alone, Dairy Queen sold over 175 million Blizzards. The bandana that came with every Blizzard covered the cup so you couldn’t see how thick it was inside. Servers then flipped the cup upside down at your table to showcase the inventor’s insanity and creativity.
Taco Bell Crunchy Taco
When Taco Bell started, Americans didn’t know what tacos were. Glen Bell took the traditional taco and squared it off like a hamburger. Taco Bell fried their shells so they would stay crunchy without softening, allowing the restaurant to crank out tacos as quickly as burgers.
For decades, you could get a taco shell and filler for 19 cents (later 59 cents). They became the gold-standard of budget meals.
Pizza Hut Original Pan Pizza
Pizza Hut revolutionized pizza during the ‘80s when it created the “Pan Pizza.” Before this era, the majority of pizzas you could get were thin-crust.
Pizza Hut figured that if they fried their dough in the pan before adding sauce, it would create a texture more similar to a “sit-down pizza.” Pizza Hut was the largest pizza chain during the 90s because of this crave-able crust.
McDonald’s Chicken McNuggets
Chicken McNuggets may be the single-handed greatest invention in fast food. Before McNuggets, if you wanted chicken at fast food, you ate it on the bone, just like KFC.
However, McDonald’s hired a scientist to create the perfect “boneless” nugget you could dip in sauce and eat with your hands. By the end of the decade, McNuggets were so wildly popular that they changed how the world butchered chickens and ate chicken.
Arby’s Classic Roast Beef
Arby’s was founded on the idea that Americans were getting tired of hamburgers. He decided that his restaurant would serve something that felt a little “classier” than a solid burger.
For as long as it was on the menu, Arby’s roast beef sandwich sold extremely well. The thinly sliced roast beef on a sesame seed bun was a hit because of how different it was. They discovered a massive niche of customers who wanted “fast” food that wasn’t tacos or hamburgers.
The following sources were consulted in the preparation of this article:
