Fast-Food Calories by Country
ChatGPT 
Claude 
AI Mode 
Perplexity We read the published nutrition data of 79 fast-food and fast-casual chain menus across six countries in October 2026. This page compares what one menu item costs you in calories in the United States, Germany, France and the rest of the set. Every figure comes from a chain's own nutrition page or PDF. No app user data is used.
Key findings
| # | Finding |
|---|---|
| 1 | A Burger King Whopper lists 710 kcal in the US, 629 kcal in France and 613 kcal in Germany (Burger King nutrition pages, read 2026-10-14 and 2026-10-21). |
| 2 | A McDonald's Big Mac lists 580 kcal in the US, 545 kcal in Germany and 530 kcal in France (McDonald's nutrition pages, read 2026-10-11 and 2026-10-21). |
| 3 | The McChicken runs the other way: 390 kcal in the US, 451 kcal in Germany and 434 kcal in France. |
| 4 | Across 4,290 food items on 56 US chain menus, the median item lists 470 kcal and 13.7% of items list 1,000 kcal or more. |
| 5 | Across 511 food items on 7 German chain menus, the median item lists 482 kcal and 4.5% of items list 1,000 kcal or more. |
| 6 | Across 753 food items on 9 French chain menus, the median item lists 413 kcal and 7.2% of items list 1,000 kcal or more. |
| 7 | On the three chains present in all three countries (McDonald's, Burger King and KFC), the median item lists 390 kcal in the US, 383 kcal in Germany and 385 kcal in France. |
Calories per item, by country
Food items only. "Middle half" is the range from the 25th to the 75th percentile.
| Country | Menus | Food items | Median kcal per item | Middle half (kcal) | Items at 1,000 kcal or more | Share at 1,000 kcal or more |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| United States | 56 | 4,290 | 470 | 280 to 756 | 587 | 13.7% |
| Germany | 7 | 511 | 482 | 347 to 710 | 23 | 4.5% |
| France | 9 | 753 | 413 | 267 to 585 | 54 | 7.2% |
| United Kingdom | 4 | 427 | 381 | 275 to 531 | 12 | 2.8% |
| Canada | 2 | 217 | 400 | 250 to 590 | 12 | 5.5% |
| Belgium | 1 | 59 | 322 | 214 to 455 | 0 | 0% |
| India | 0 | 0 | No chain menu in the set yet | |||
| All countries | 79 | 6,257 | 450 | 280 to 700 | 688 | 11.0% |
The country medians mix different chain types. The US set includes sit-down chains such as The Cheesecake Factory, Chili's and Olive Garden, and the German set includes two table-service burger chains. The like-for-like table below is the fairer comparison.
Same chain, three countries
McDonald's, Burger King and KFC publish separate nutrition data for the US, Germany and France.
| Item | United States (kcal) | Germany (kcal) | France (kcal) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Whopper (Burger King) | 710 | 613 | 629 |
| Big Mac (McDonald's) | 580 | 545 | 530 |
| McChicken (McDonald's) | 390 | 451 | 434 |
| Cheeseburger (McDonald's) | 300 | 307 | 300 |
| Hamburger (McDonald's) | 250 | 259 | 253 |
| Cheeseburger (Burger King) | 300 | 307 | 305 |
| Hamburger (Burger King) | 260 | 267 | 266 |
| Medium fries (Burger King) | 370 | 313 | 309 |
| Medium fries (McDonald's) | 320 | 329 | 328 |
Median kcal per food item, by chain and country:
| Chain | United States | Germany | France |
|---|---|---|---|
| McDonald's | 410 (46 items) | 383 (59 items) | 328 (53 items) |
| Burger King | 420 (105 items) | 408 (84 items) | 421 (64 items) |
| KFC | 200 (42 items) | 271 (42 items) | 381 (48 items) |
| All three | 390 (193 items) | 383 (185 items) | 385 (165 items) |
KFC US lists chicken by the piece, while KFC Germany and KFC France list more boxes and burgers. Part of the KFC gap comes from that difference in serving unit, not only from the recipes.
Methodology
| Item | Detail |
|---|---|
| Dataset | NutriScan chain-menu dataset: 77 menu files plus the McDonald's US and Domino's US menus that power the NutriScan restaurant calculators. Each file names its source page or PDF and the date it was read. |
| Date read | Chain pages read between 2026-10-11 and 2026-10-21. Domino's US values come from its January 2026 nutrition guide. Page compiled 2026-10-31. |
| Raw size | 79 menus, 12,708 listed items. |
| Kept | 6,257 food items. |
| Left out | Drinks, coffee, shakes and smoothies; sauces, dips, dressings, toppings and add-ons; build-your-own components (Chipotle and Qdoba proteins, CAVA bases, Five Guys patties and buns); whole pizzas, family boxes, party packs, buckets, items labelled "serves 2 to 4" and nugget or wing boxes of 15 pieces or more; combo meals; items under 20 kcal. |
| Unit | kcal per item, per serving exactly as the chain lists it. No values are recalculated. Pizza is per slice where the chain publishes slices. |
| Statistic | Median and 25th to 75th percentile per country, so a few very large items do not drag the figure. |
| Limits | Menus are not weighted by sales. Chains do not publish grams for most items, so kcal per 100 g is not shown. Country medians depend on which chains are in the set. Each chain sets its own rounding rules. |
| Conflict of interest | NutriScan makes a calorie tracking app and links to it from this page. All figures here are public menu data. |
Chains by country
| Country | Chains |
|---|---|
| United States | Applebee's, Arby's, Baskin-Robbins, Bojangles, Buffalo Wild Wings, Burger King, Carl's Jr., CAVA, The Cheesecake Factory, Chick-fil-A, Chili's, Chipotle, Cinnabon, Culver's, Dairy Queen, Del Taco, Denny's, Domino's, Dunkin', Dutch Bros, El Pollo Loco, Firehouse Subs, Five Guys, Hardee's, IHOP, In-N-Out, Jack in the Box, Jersey Mike's, Jimmy John's, Jollibee, KFC, Krispy Kreme, Little Caesars, McDonald's, Olive Garden, Panda Express, Panera Bread, Papa John's, Pizza Hut, Popeyes, Qdoba, Raising Cane's, Shake Shack, Smoothie King, Sonic, Starbucks, Subway, Sweetgreen, Taco Bell, Texas Roadhouse, Tropical Smoothie Cafe, Wendy's, Whataburger, White Castle, Wingstop, Zaxby's |
| Germany | Burger King, Coffee Fellows, dean&david, Hans im Glück, KFC, McDonald's, Peter Pane |
| France | Brioche Dorée, Burger King, Del Arte, KFC, La Mie Câline, McDonald's, PAUL, Pomme de Pain, Quick |
| United Kingdom | Costa Coffee, Greggs, Pret A Manger, Wagamama |
| Canada | Nando's, Tim Hortons |
| Belgium | Exki |
| India | None yet |
Dataset
Download the item table (CSV). It has one row per kept food item (6,257 rows): chain, country, menu category, item name, kcal, grams where the chain prints a serving weight, the source page or PDF, and the date it was read. NutriScan releases the table under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 (CC BY 4.0); reuse it with credit and a link to this page. The calories themselves are the chains' own published values.
To cite this page: NutriScan, "Fast-Food Calories by Country", nutriscan.app/research/fast-food-calories-by-country, published 2026-10-31. The charts carry a credit line and can be reused with a link back.
How NutriScan computes this for your own meal
A menu lists the standard build. Your tray often differs: a larger fries, no sauce, an extra patty. In the NutriScan app you photograph the meal, check the items and portions it finds, and get calories, protein, carbs and fat for what you actually ate. Each meal also gets an A to E meal grade, so you can compare a Whopper meal with a grilled chicken wrap at a glance. The free plan includes 5 AI scans a week. Premium costs about $59 a year and removes the weekly limit.
For a single chain, the menu calculators let you build an order before you go: