The value face-off
Your dollar enters the ring.
Guess which menu, item, or city gives more back. Then lift the hood: every reveal shows the exact value, the comparison unit, the supporting rows, and the observation window.
Food illustrations show item type, not the restaurant’s exact product. Restaurant logos identify the chain.
Matchup scope
- Tracked store-item listings
- 1.4M
- Tracked locations
- 21.2K
- Canonical items
- 996
- Eligible cities
- 160
Latest displayed-item evidence: Aug 1, 2026 · 12 chains in the tracked snapshot
Today’s five-round Value Showdown
Trust your gut. Then read the receipt.
Five deterministic matchups for 2026-09-09. There is no timer and no forced auto-advance; every answer remains visible until you choose the next one.
Round 1 of 50 correct
Item against item
Which item gives you more calories for one dollar?
Canonical-item averages across tracked locations where the selected metric is available.
No timer. Choose A or D on the keyboard, or activate either side. The exact values stay visible after the reveal.
Generated receipts
The catalog keeps giving us strange little truths.
These are deterministic statements calculated from the displayed snapshot—not generated explanations and not claims about why a price differs.
$8.50
01
12 pc. Chicken Only has the widest validated store-price range in this displayed catalog.
The middle 90% of KFC clean-price listings range from $24.99 to $33.49 across 2,809 tracked locations. Flagged observations and statistically isolated endpoints are excluded; this is not a nationwide availability promise.
17%
02
Dave's Single® returns more calories per dollar than Big Mac in their tracked-location averages.
97 calories / $ versus 83 calories / $. The two canonical items can have different location coverage.
Source: Calories per Dollar maintained place aggregates and bounded exact retained item evidence. Displayed item-evidence window: Feb 28, 2026–Aug 1, 2026. Individual comparisons disclose their own metric support.
Build your own
Start with intent, not the catalog.
Choose the kind of question first. We narrow the national catalog into familiar, well-covered choices—then keep full search and exact stores one step away.
Start with an exact item family
Type an item or restaurant name. Use arrow keys to browse matches.
Type an item or restaurant name. Use arrow keys to browse matches.
Full-catalog search will replace the second side.
Search the full item catalog
First side
Big Mac
McDonald's · 1,218 tracked locations
Second side
Dave's Single®
Wendy's · 4,147 tracked locations
Read the verdict by
Dave's Single® leads by 17%.
Canonical-item averages across tracked locations. Each metric excludes locations where that metric is not reported.
Big Mac
83 cal / $
Dave's Single®
97 cal / $
| Metric | Big Mac | Dave's Single® |
|---|---|---|
| Calories per dollar | 83 cal / $ 1,218 calorie-ready locations | 97 cal / $Leads 4,147 calorie-ready locations |
| Protein per dollar | 3.6 g / $ 1,218 protein-ready locations | 4.8 g / $Leads 4,147 protein-ready locations |
| Average listed price | $7.11 1,218 price-ready locations | $6.07Leads 4,147 price-ready locations |
| Reported calories | 580 cal | 580 cal |
| Reported protein | 25.0 g | 29.0 g |
Big Mac spread: $4.79–$10.19
Dave's Single® spread: $3.59–$8.49
Observation windows: Big Mac: Mar 2, 2026; Dave's Single®: Feb 21, 2026.
Source and unit: Calories per Dollar latest retained display-eligible location-item read model. Quick picks are coverage-ranked and familiar; they are not consumer-popularity rankings.
The paper trail
Fun on the surface. Auditable underneath.
A good comparison can be playful without hiding its denominator. The interface treats scope as part of the answer.
- Snapshot schema
- compare.v1
- Serving source
- Database aggregates + exact item evidence
- Cache state
- miss
- Snapshot generated
- Sep 9, 2026
Place averages come from maintained display-eligible aggregate read models. Exact metric-support counts and observation windows are shown only where the serving layer can provide them without an unbounded national scan.
01
Name the grain
An exact store listing, a canonical item across locations, a matched city basket, or a listing-weighted menu mix. The two sides must use the same grain.
02
Keep metrics independent
Price, calorie value, and protein value each use their own eligible rows. Unknown nutrition is omitted from that metric, never replaced with zero.
03
Show the receipt
Every verdict exposes its numbers, support count, aggregation language, and available observation window. No blended or opaque value score is used.
04
Cache the slow story
The comparison catalog reuses the twelve-hour Explorer snapshot. Exact city and nearby questions use bounded, targeted lookups instead of shipping the national store catalog.
Item averages: Canonical-item metrics are unweighted averages across tracked locations where each metric is available.
Places and chains: Chain and city metrics are listing-weighted averages across the current tracked menu mix; menus and coverage can differ.
Catalog guidance: Quick picks are selected for coverage and familiarity. They do not measure orders, searches, or popularity.
Editorial facts: Generated item rounds and ledger facts use editorial-price-evidence-v1: minimum clean-price support plus median and tail checks. Price-range facts use the middle 90% of clean observations; flagged observations and statistically isolated endpoints are not featured.