I Tried the 9 Most Popular Pop-Tarts Flavors—This 1 Is Hands Down the Best

As a kid, I would often go grocery shopping with my mom and sometimes I would try to sneak a box of strawberry Pop-Tarts into the cart. If she didn’t notice right away, she’d of course see the box as I was trying to hastily hide it under the bag of apples on the conveyor belt at checkout. On rare occasions, she’d relent and let me have them, but most of the time, I’d have to gloomily stomp my way through the store to put the box back on the shelf. That little square pastry had a hold on my heart. That’s what makes it somewhat ironic that now, as a grown adult, I loaded not just one box of Pop-Tarts into my cart, but nine boxes, for my job. Here’s how the ultimate taste test went.

How I Chose the Pop-Tarts Flavors

A lot has changed about Pop-Tarts since I was a kid, mostly that instead of three classic flavors, they now have over 25 versions. Since my store didn’t have all 25-plus, I primarily chose Pop-Tarts from the “Favorites” line. The only exception was Frosted Strawberry Milkshake Pop-Tarts, which is a newer offering, but seemed to be popular because it was the only box of its kind left on the shelf.

How I Tested

I had my small testing crew help with this task, which included one adult and one middle school-aged kid. We sampled the Pop-Tarts both right out of the package and toasted. The biggest criterion for judging was overall flavor, which included thoughts on the level of sweetness. I also asked them to weigh in appearance and texture, but only if there was something specific they noticed.

The Best Pop-Tarts Flavors, Taste Test Results

And now for the results:

As with any taste test, these are all based on opinion. That means one of our losers might be one of your winners. That’s okay. I respect your opinion, but if you’re new to Pop-Tarts or if you’re looking for a new flavor to try, here are my recommendations.

The non-winners (seemed harsh to call them losers), ranked lowest to highest:

• Frosted Blueberry
• Frosted Chocolate Fudge
• Frosted Cookies & Crème
• Frosted Raspberry
• Frosted Strawberry
• Frosted Wildlicious Wild Berry
• Frosted Strawberry Milkshake

Most of these didn’t win because of their “artificial taste” and “overly sweet” characteristics. These were all what we called, “one-bite wonders.” Meaning, we took one bite and that was enough. Many tasted better toasted (I’m looking at you Frosted Strawberry Milkshake and Frosted Cookies & Creme), but for the most part, weren’t delicious enough to keep my testers interested beyond that initial bite.

The Runner-up: Frosted S'mores

If you like s’mores, then you’ll enjoy this take on the popular campfire treat. The pastry has a subtle graham cracker flavor and it pairs nicely with the fudgy marshmallow filling. It was sweet, but somehow seemed less annoyingly sweet than the non-winners. It was decent right out of the package, but my testers preferred it toasted. That caramelization did just the trick for driving home the true s’mores flavor.

The Winner: Brown Sugar Cinnamon

It’s a classic for a reason. Out of all of the Pop-Tarts, this one tasted the most balanced. Instead of struggling through, my testers happily enjoyed each bite of this pastry. One tester said there was a “nice balance of cinnamon” and another enjoyed the filling texture, which felt like the crispy, yummiest parts of cinnamon-sugar toast. While sweet, it seemed less so than every other Pop-Tart on the list and the smell of a toasted Brown Sugar Cinnamon Pop-Tart is enough to get you out of bed, in the best way.

I guess I've moved on from strawberry, this is the one I'll be sneaking into my own grocery cart from now on.