How Many Burgers Does McDonald's Actually Sell Each Day?

With over 40,000 stores operating globally, McDonald's is possibly the world's most popular and recognizable fast food chain. The Golden Arches serves nearly 70 million customers every single day, raking in a total revenue of $25.9 billion in 2024. A more specific question is: How many of those daily customers are ordering burgers off of the menu?

According to Investing, McDonald's reportedly sells almost 6.5 million burgers every single day, with 5.4 million purchased in the United States alone. The total burger sales in a given year totals to approximately 2.5 billion. These stats lead to an estimation that every McDonald's employee who mans the griddle flips a burger patty every ten seconds. That is a whole lot of beef!

One of the most popular burgers at McDonald's is, without a doubt, the Big Mac. This famed sandwich was first introduced to customers by Pennsylvanian franchise owner Jim Delligatti in 1967. Another highly popular menu item for those who want less bun and more meat is the Quarter Pounder with Cheese — the only McDonald's burger that is cooked fresh, not frozen. And if you swing by locations outside of the United States, you can try a Butter Chicken Grilled Burger from India, a Big Brekkie Burger with eggs and hash browns from Australia, and even a "McVegan" from Sweden. With multiple variations of the beloved hamburger available on menus worldwide, it's no wonder why McDonald's sells so many every day.

With millions of burgers sold at McDonald's per day, it is hard to believe that any item would outsell classics like a Big Mac or McDouble. However, there is one offering that most customers snag alongside their Chicken McNuggets and Filet-O-Fish: the chain's famed golden, thin-cut French fries. 

McDonald's sells nine million pounds of its fries every day (that's over three billion pounds per year), making it the best-selling item on menus worldwide. While the fast food chain now uses special oil for its fries instead of beef tallow — in fact, only a few restaurant chains still use tallow nowadays — the fried potato side is still immensely popular amongst customers. Their versatility may also be the reason why they beat out the burgers by a landslide.

Another one of the most popular products at McDonald's isn't food at all: It is actually Happy Meal toys. Not only is the fast food chain a top seller of burgers, fries, and more, but it is also one of the largest toy distributors worldwide. Thanks to the iconic kids' meals that were first introduced in 1979, McDonald's now distributes approximately 3.4 billion toys each year.