The 6 Best And 6 Worst Fast Food Chicken Tenders

I don't think I can think of a single meal that reminds me of childhood more than chicken tenders. They are strips of deep-fried nostalgia on a plate, often served with french fries, and are a comfort food to trump all others. But that burning passion doesn't blind us to the reality that some places make better chicken tenders (or fingers, or strips — they go by many names) than others. When it comes to fast food, the difference between a good and a bad chicken tender is of great importance. That's why we've put them to the test and determined the six best and six worst fast food chicken tenders.

There are a few factors that take a chicken tender from mediocre to memorable. These include the crispness, spice, flavor, and quality of the chicken meat. There's a big difference between a tender that tastes like it's from a freezer bag and one that was hand-breaded in-house.

I've established these criteria using my own personal fast food dining experience as well as relying on the expertise of other Daily Meal writers. Based on our firsthand experience, we're here to tell you which chicken chains have the best tenders in town and which to avoid altogether.

The nights my dad came home with KFC were nights I treasured in my childhood. As an adult, though, I've had increasingly tepid experiences dining at Kentucky Fried Chicken. As established, I'm quite a big fan of tenders; I tend to choose them over bone-in fried chicken when I have the choice, especially when eating fast food. At KFC, however, I almost always regret this decision.

The tenders at KFC only come in the Extra Crispy variety. Original Recipe tenders were trialed in some markets in 2023, but at most KFC locations, you're only getting one option. The Extra Crispy tenders have a crispy exterior texture, but due to the lack of the original spice recipe, they taste a bit bland and don't have that special KFC flavor. The ones I've tried from my closest locations most recently have tasted like they've been sitting under a heat lamp for a number of hours instead of being hot out the fryer. 

If you go to KFC, I recommend sticking with the Original Recipe fried chicken pieces and a side of mashed potatoes — maybe a biscuit if you're feeling frisky.

As a rule, we stick to frozen treats at this chain. Dairy Queen's chicken isn't as bad as its burgers; we'll give DQ that, but when you compare the soft-serve chain's tenders to other fast food chicken, they literally and figuratively pale in comparison.

The Chicken Strips (as they are called at Dairy Queen) are served in a basket, which comes with fries, toast, and your choice of sauce. This was a go-to meal for me from childhood until the time I graduated high school, and I can tell you from experience that these tenders are middling at best. I'll even stand by Dairy Queen's barely toasted toast or the perfectly okay fries, but when it comes to the strips themselves, I can't recommend them.

DQ's chicken has decent crisp, but not a lot of flavor, and leaves you desperately in need of a dipping sauce. The salt levels are pretty intense, too, which is perhaps a reason to recommend the chain's BBQ or Honey Mustard sauce over the salty Country Gravy that I always used to choose. 

You'll sometimes be surprised at the quality of the chicken at a burger place. Take Shake Shack, for instance, which I think makes an excellent chicken sandwich. At Whataburger, however, this is not the case. Despite having a unique branding, the Whatachick'n Strips taste generic, like they came right out of a freezer bag.

The time I tried Whataburger's chicken strips, they were dry, moderately crisp, and seasoned only with salt. There wasn't any one element that made them stand out, and ultimately, I ended up wishing I'd ordered a burger instead.

Since sauces are both moist and have flavor, the chicken is improved upon quite a bit by Whataburger's Spicy Ketchup or its barbecue sauce. And, being from Texas, the chain's Texas toast is pretty good and comes in a combo with the Whatachick'n Strips or if you specifically ask for it on the side. Unfortunately, that's the best thing I can say about the chicken tender basket at Whataburger, and it's not even about the chicken.

Bone-in wings are the move at this chain; you don't go to Wingstop for boneless chicken, or at least I don't. Not even Wingstop's famous ranch dipping sauce can save the chicken tenders from being bottom-tier, right next to the boneless wings. Wingstop's inherent advantage is that every order of tenders comes dipped in a wing sauce of your choice. However, this turns out to be a double-edged sword that obfuscates the quality of the chicken and instead highlights the chain's most basic failures. 

For starters, the tenders themselves are pretty salty. The addition of Wingstop sauces like Spicy Korean Q or Mango Habanero doesn't improve that factor but worsens it. In fact, the sodium levels of the chicken are elevated to an unappetizing degree by most of the sauces and rubs. If you get the plain tenders, though, you are likely going to get bored by the run-of-the-mill breading and dry chicken.

In our experience at Wingstop, consistency isn't really a thing. That means you might get some tenders with way more sauce than others, even in a small order. For all these reasons, it's hard to recommend the tenders over the wings at Wingstop. C'mon, it's right in the name.

On paper, Checkers should have some of the best tenders in fast food. The chain (also known as Rally's in some regions) offers its Fry-Seasoned Tenders tossed in the same mix of spices as its french fries. The fries in question are amazing and bursting with savory delight, so what's the problem? Well, a chicken is not a potato, for one. The best ratios of seasoning for the two foods are very different, and the quality of what's inside that batter matters a lot more when you are working with chicken.

In my experience with the chain, Checkers isn't knocking it out of the park in terms of ingredient quality. The chicken in both its tenders and Chicken Bites isn't especially juicy and has something of an artificial bounce to it. The tenders themselves are also pretty inconsistent in terms of size, which can be an issue when you are going to a chain for its value and not the quality of the product, like we do at Checkers. If it's the only thing open at 1 a.m., maybe stop by. Otherwise, pass right on by. 

Last, and quite possibly least, we have Sonic. As a kid, I used to love the corn dogs and tater tots from the drive-in chain, but I haven't eaten at Sonic too much in recent years. When I have, the results have been disappointing to my nostalgia. When I've been traveling and curious enough to stop at a Sonic, I've figured the chicken tenders were a safe bet. Boy howdy, was I wrong.

The tenders at Sonic are subpar and, to be honest, pretty wimpy. These strips of breaded white meat chicken are at least using decent-quality meat. However, you wouldn't be able to tell with all that breading. Even though they're thin tenders, the exterior makes up half of each tender, which makes it seem like Sonic is skimping on the chicken. While they are nice and golden brown and crisp, there isn't much flavor aside from the basic salt and chicken. There's not much else to remark upon — if I were you, I would stick to a chili dog, tots, and a limeade and call it a day.