There was a time, not that long ago, when you could feed your whole family at McDonald’s for what you now pay for one combo meal. That time is over. A viral TikTok video posted in March 2024 showed a Southern California McDonald’s charging $25.39 for a meal bundle — 40 Chicken McNuggets and two large fries. No drink. Not even a medium Sprite. The video hit 2 million views almost immediately, and the comments section turned into a support group for people grieving the death of affordable fast food.
But here’s the thing: that $25 meal bundle isn’t some freak accident. It’s a symptom of a much bigger shift happening at McDonald’s — one that’s been building for a decade and is now impossible to ignore.
The TikTok That Broke the Internet (and People’s Wallets)
TikToker @shannon_montipaya was sitting in a Southern California drive-thru when she saw the price on the menu board and did what any reasonable person would do — she pulled out her phone and started recording. “OK, so it’s $25.39 for 40-piece nuggets and two large fries,” she said in the video. “You couldn’t even throw in the Sprite? You couldn’t even throw in, like, a medium Sprite in there?” With tax, that meal would run about $27 out the door. For McNuggets and fries. At McDonald’s.
The comments were ruthless. “Too much for me. I’m gone,” wrote one viewer. Another said, “Boycott fast-food, they’ll lower prices.” And then there was this gut-punch of nostalgia: “Remember when 40 pieces nuggets was $5 and a large drink was $1.” Someone else dropped this bomb: “I spent $48 there yesterday…my jaw on the floor.”
The California Problem
Some defenders in the comments pointed out that the same meal costs around $16 at other locations. “This is a location thing,” one person wrote, and they weren’t wrong. That video was posted on March 27, 2024 — just four days before California’s new minimum wage law for fast-food workers went into effect, bumping hourly pay from $16 to $20. McDonald’s and other chains had been raising prices for weeks in anticipation.
The fallout from that wage increase has been real. MOD Pizza closed at least five California locations before the law kicked in. Pizza Hut and Round Table Pizza laid off workers. Fast-food operators in the state have been scrambling, and a lot of that scrambling means passing costs directly to customers.
But blaming California’s minimum wage only explains part of the story. McDonald’s prices have been climbing everywhere, in every state, for years.
Prices Have Doubled in a Decade — Yes, Doubled
According to a study by FinanceBuzz, McDonald’s menu prices have increased by an average of 100% since 2014. That’s not a typo. Among all the fast-food chains the study measured, McDonald’s led the pack in price hikes. Four menu items have more than doubled in price over that span.
Let’s look at some specific numbers. The McChicken was a staple of the $1 menu in 2014. By 2024, it costs $2.99 at many locations — and by 2025, that number has crept to $3.10 in some areas. That’s a 210% increase in about seven years. The McDouble went from $1.19 to $4.59. A Quarter Pounder with Cheese meal that cost $5.39 now runs almost $12. The average 10-piece McNugget meal has jumped from $5.99 to $10.99.
For context, the Bureau of Labor Statistics says the general cost of goods has risen 31% since 2014. McDonald’s doubled its prices in the same window. They’re not keeping pace with inflation — they’re lapping it.
The Franchise Model Makes Pricing a Wild Card
Here’s something a lot of people don’t realize: McDonald’s doesn’t set the prices at most of its restaurants. About 95% of McDonald’s locations in the U.S. are independently owned by franchisees, and those owners get to choose what they charge. That’s why you might pay $3.50 for a Big Mac in Oklahoma and nearly $19 for a Big Mac combo at a Connecticut rest stop.
Locations at airports, highway rest stops, and sports arenas tend to charge the most because their operating costs — rent, staffing, supply logistics — are much higher. A customer at Bradley International Airport in Connecticut reported that the $20 they gave their son wasn’t enough to cover a 10-piece Chicken McNugget meal. That same meal costs roughly half at a regular location nearby.
For a family of four in a higher-priced market, a typical McDonald’s run can easily top $40 — a meal that would’ve cost around $25 just a few years ago.
Low-Income Customers Are the Ones Getting Squeezed
McDonald’s built its empire on being the affordable option. The place where a kid could get a full meal for a few bucks. The place where families on a budget could eat out without doing math in their heads at the register. That identity is cracking.
During the company’s Q2 2024 earnings call, CEO Chris Kempczinski acknowledged the problem directly. McDonald’s U.S. same-store sales had dipped 0.7%, breaking a four-year streak. He said the chain was losing its lowest-income customers — people making $45,000 or less — who were cutting back in the most recent quarter. Meanwhile, wealthier customers weren’t changing their habits at all.
“The battle ground is certainly with that low-income consumer,” Kempczinski said. Grocery prices rose just 1.3% in 2023, while dining out surged 5.2%. For a lot of families, staying home and cooking has become the obvious choice. When eating at McDonald’s costs almost as much as a sit-down restaurant, the math doesn’t work anymore. One Reddit user put it perfectly: “At that price, you might as well go to Red Robin and tip to have someone bring it to you.”
The $5 Meal Deal Was Supposed to Fix Everything
Facing a PR crisis and slipping sales, McDonald’s launched a $5 Meal Deal on June 25, 2024. It was supposed to be a limited-time summer promotion, but the chain extended it through December because — let’s be honest — they needed it.
The results were mixed. About 25% of McDonald’s customers ordered it in the weeks after launch, compared to only 10% of Burger King customers who tried that chain’s similar $5 deal. Twelve percent of people who bought the $5 Meal Deal hadn’t been to McDonald’s in the previous three months, so it did bring back some lapsed customers. A woman in her 40s earning less than $25,000 said the deal was the reason she started going back.
But there’s a catch. The data showed that people ordering the $5 meal were also adding other items, resulting in checks that were 12% higher than orders without the bundle. So while the deal itself was cheap, it worked partly as a lure to get people spending more once they were already in the drive-thru. And customer perception on price? Still falling — down 16% year over year as of August 2024.
McDonald’s Is Now Trying to Rein In Its Own Franchisees
By late 2025, McDonald’s corporate had seen enough. The company announced that starting January 1, 2026, it would begin “holistically assessing” franchise pricing decisions to make sure operators are actually delivering consistent value. Over 90% of U.S. franchisees now offer meal bundles for $4 or less, and the company brought back Extra Value meals.
This is unusual territory. Franchise owners have always had the freedom to set their own prices — it’s one of the core perks of the business model. And they’re not thrilled about the new oversight. The National Owners Association, an independent group of McDonald’s franchisees, created a “Franchisees Bill of Rights” that includes the explicit right to set prices without intimidation from corporate. McDonald’s has also been tightening standards for franchise renewals, increasing royalty fees for new operators, and requiring store renovations — all moves that are creating friction.
McDonald’s corporate says the average Big Mac has gone from $4.39 in 2019 to $5.29 now — a 21% increase, not the 100% that gets thrown around on social media. They’re not wrong about the exaggeration, but even their own numbers show prices rising faster than the rate of inflation. And for items beyond the Big Mac — the McChicken, the McDouble, basic fries — the increases are far steeper.
Where This Leaves the Average Customer
The app deals are real, and regular McDonald’s customers say they’re the only way to get something close to a fair price. Multiple people in TikTok comments and Reddit threads have said the same thing — never order at the counter or drive-thru without checking the app first. It’s become almost a requirement to get a reasonable deal.
But there’s something deeply weird about a fast-food restaurant where the only way to afford the food is to use a coupon app on your phone. That’s not how McDonald’s became McDonald’s. The whole point was that you could walk in, order something cheap, eat it fast, and move on with your day. Now you need a strategy.
The broader trend is clear: fast food isn’t cheap food anymore. McDonald’s, Popeyes, Chipotle, Taco Bell, and Jimmy John’s have all raised prices at more than double the national inflation rate. In most areas, you’re paying over $10 per person for a single meal. That’s not a value proposition. That’s just… a restaurant. And when your $10 meal comes in a paper bag with no silverware and no one to refill your drink, people start asking what exactly they’re paying for.
