The Top 25 Restaurant Chains in America by Sales

Last year was a tough year for traditional fast food burger chains, though you wouldn’t necessarily notice that by looking at a list of the top 25 largest restaurant chains in America. Every year, Nation’s Restaurant News prepares its proprietary ranking of the Top 100 Restaurants based on sales. For 2017’s list (which uses 2016’s data), McDonald’s, as expected, tops the list. In fact, Mickey D’s had $36.4 billion in sales last year, making it “larger than Starbucks, Subway and Domino’s combined,” as NRN points out.

But while limited-service burger chains were one of six segments that NRN identified as losing market share, the beverage-snack segment and pizza segment were two areas that saw growth – buoyed by brands like Starbucks and Domino’s respectively. Chicken was another segment that saw growth in its overall market share, driven in part by Chick-fil-A which “was the biggest mover among the 10 largest restaurant chains in terms of total sales.”

If you’re wondering how the rest of the top 25 played out, here’s the complete list along with their sales from 2016…

1) McDonald’s ($36.4 billion)

2) Starbucks Coffee ($17.9 billion)

3) Subway ($11.3 billion)

4) Taco Bell ($9.4 billion)

5) Burger King ($9.3 billion)

6) Wendy’s ($9.1 billion)

7) Dunkin’ Donuts ($8.2 billion)

8) Chick-fil-A ($7.9 billion)

9) Pizza Hut ($5.8 billion)

10) Domino’s ($5.3 billion)

11) Panera Bread ($4.9 billion)

12) Sonic Drive-In ($4.5 billion)

13) KFC ($4.5 billion)

14) Applebee’s Neighborhood Grill & Bar ($4.4 billion)

15) Olive Garden ($3.9 billion)

16) Chipotle Mexican Grill ($3.8 billion)

17) Buffalo Wild Wings ($3.7 billion)

18) Arby’s ($3.7 billion)

19) Little Caesars Pizza ($3.7 billion)

20) Dairy Queen ($3.6 billion)

21) Jack in the Box ($3.5 billion)

22) Chili’s Grill & Bar ($3.5 billion)

23) IHOP ($3.1 billion)

24) Papa John’s Pizza ($2.9 billion)

25) Cracker Barrel Old Country Store ($2.9 billion)