I Tried 7 Fast Food Ice Creams and There Was One Clear Winner

Plenty of fast-food restaurants offer ice cream on their dessert menus, but which one is the best?

I set out to find out which fast-food ice cream offered the best taste for the best price so you can get the best treat for your buck. 

To keep the comparison apples-to-apples, I sampled only vanilla ice creams from national chain fast-food restaurants. Here are the findings from this delicious experiment.

Editor's note: Prices and availability are subject to change and may vary by location.

Culvers definitely had the creaminess I would expect from a place that touts frozen custard. It was noticeably richer than some of the other ice creams I tried. However, the ice cream had several small ice chunks in it, which detracted from the experience.

The one-scoop size was generous (I saw the lady preparing it, and it was a generous one-and-a-half scoop). However, the price for a single vanilla cone was higher than most of the other spots on this list ($3.25 with tax). 

Culvers also gives you the option of a cake cone or a waffle cone, an upgrade from most fast-food ice cream joints.

I was pleasantly surprised with my McDonald's cone. I didn't have high expectations — the McDonald's broken ice cream machine is the butt of quite a few online jokes. But the taste was as good as Culver's, with a solid vanilla flavor. It wasn't quite as creamy, but it was smooth and didn't have ice chunks.

The cone was definitely smaller, but it was only $1.07 with tax, which can help keep more cash in your wallet. It was around half as big as the Culver's cone, but it was less than half the price, so McDonald's gives a much better value for the money.

Most of the time, you think of vanilla ice cream as pretty plain. But the vanilla flavor came through the Dairy Queen ice cream noticeably more than the others. Its creaminess was a slight cut above that of most other restaurants.

But what impressed me most was the cone. The other cones I got were standard-issue cake cones that tasted like air and bland carbs. Not bad, but they were clearly the mere vessel to hold the ice cream, not really part of the dessert. At Dairy Queen, the cone was much more flavorful and actually part of the experience.

The price was the highest of the bunch ($3.59). The cone was larger than the one from McDonald's, though a little smaller than the one from Culver's.

After sampling Burger King's ice cream cone, I am hard-pressed to come up with a difference between it and the one offered by McDonald's. 

The flavor, texture, and size were nearly identical. It came with good creaminess and vanilla flavor profile but a lackluster cone.

The only difference was the price, as the Burger King cone was $1.99, and the McDonald's one was only $1.07.

Next to its more famous chocolate cousin, Wendy's vanilla Frosty seems a little, well, vanilla. But despite its lack of fame, this version of the Frosty is worth your time. The vanilla flavor is on par with McDonald's and Burger King — solid but not overwhelming.

The texture of the Frosty is more icy, but given the name, we can safely assume that this is by design. It's more liquid than solid, which makes it impossible to serve a Frosty in a cone. 

The lack of a cone could be a plus or a minus, depending on your preference. The price was in the middle of the road at $2.80.

Chick-fil-A's Ice Dream Cone is a smidge larger than Burger King's and McDonald's offerings, though the taste is quite different. The vanilla flavor isn't as rich, and the texture isn't as creamy. 

In fact, the mouthfeel is icy — closer to that of a Wendy's Frosty, even though it holds its shape. (This is probably why they call it an Ice Dream Cone instead of ice cream. At least they're honest.)

While Chick-fil-A's cone is not quite as flavorful as Dairy Queen's, it is an improvement over most and adds to the experience. It's priced at $2.29.

There's no cone option for the Sonic vanilla soft serve ice cream — it's only served in a dish, though previous social media posts hint that this wasn't always the case. 

Sonic definitely gives you the most ice cream for your buck out of the chains that I tried. The serving size was notably larger than Chick-fil-A, Burger King, or McDonald's (probably because cups can hold more ice cream than cones), and the price was $1.29.

The most unusual feature of Sonic's ice cream was the texture. "Fluffy" was the first descriptor that came to mind. It was akin to the feel of Cool Whip, though thicker. 

I enjoyed it initially, but I got tired of it about halfway through. The vanilla flavor was okay — not amazing, but not absent, either.

Which fast food joint has the best vanilla soft-serve ice cream? If you want the most ice cream for your buck, Sonic is the most economical choice by far. It gives you a large portion for just $1.29, though the flavor and texture fall behind other options.

If you're after the best flavor for both ice cream and cone, opt for Dairy Queen. Just know that the price will be steeper than at other places.

But the clear winner that offers a great taste at an affordable price is (drum roll, please) McDonald's. I was a little surprised to discover this, but the Golden Arches is where I'd go again if I had to pick.

And if you're concerned about your local McDonald's ice cream machine not working as you go out to eat more, take heart. There's actually a website you can use to check your local store before you go.