When you think of America’s biggest brands, tech companies like Apple, Google, and Amazon; retailers like Walmart and Target; and food and beverage giants like McDonald’s and Starbucks usually come to mind.
But every year, those established brands also face the risk of being upended by smaller, faster-growing upstarts. Now, the crowd-sourced review platform Yelp has published its annual list of the fastest-growing brands in America.
Here are the top 10 brands Yelp says are growing the fastest across the country.
Starbucks competitor 7 Brew leads the list
According to Yelp’s data, the fastest-growing brand in America in 2026 is the drive-through coffee chain and Starbucks competitor 7 Brew.
Yelp says that its data showed that the coffee chain saw “244% growth in consumer interest in 2025,” noting that “Americans are increasingly centering their morning routines around caffeinated drive-thru beverages.”
Here is the full top 10 list:
- 7 Brew
- Smoothie King
- Bojangles
- Sprouts Farmers Market
- Paris Baguette
- Boot Barn
- Bob’s Discount Furniture
- Black Rock Coffee Bar
- Nothing Bundt Cakes
- Wingstop
What is perhaps most interesting about Yelp’s findings is that 70% of Yelp’s top 10 fastest-growing brands of 2026 are also food or restaurant-related businesses. Only Sprouts Farmers Market, Boot Barn, and Bob’s Discount Furniture are not food or restaurant brands.
Yelp’s full 2026 list of the fastest-growing brands includes 50 brands, of which 31 are food- or restaurant-related. Of the remaining brands on the list, 18 are shopping brands, and one, Disney Parks, is an amusement park.
Americans are also going crazy for chicken brands
Speaking of food and restaurant brands, Yelp points out that there is a clear winner among the types of food the fastest-growing food and restaurant brands offer: chicken.
“If the drive-thru beverage is the ritual that starts the American day, chicken is the protein that fuels the rest of it,” Yelp’s report reads. “Eight chicken-focused brands appear on this year’s list, making chicken the single most dominant cuisine category on the Fastest Growing Brands list.”
Those eight chicken-focused brands include:
- Bojangles (#3)
- Wingstop (#10)
- Dave’s Hot Chicken (#18)
- Zaxbys (#22)
- Popeyes (#29)
- Krispy Krunchy Chicken (#34)
- bb.q Chicken (#49)
Overall, Yelp says the driver of the fastest-growing brands in America today is not value but personalization.
“[The fastest growing brands] give consumers control, whether that’s countless drink combinations, a bookstore where every shelf feels hand-picked, or a chicken sandwich customized to your exact specifications,” noted Yelp’s head of enterprise, Sarah Chang. “Personalization is what’s driving loyalty today.”
You can check out Yelp’s full list of the top 50 fastest-growing brands here.
