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Decision Lab, a leading boutique market research and consulting firm in Vietnam, has published the Best F&B Rankings 2026, tracking overall brand health across Vietnam’s top food and beverage brands.
The Index score reflects overall brand health by averaging six key perception metrics: Impression, Quality, Value, Satisfaction, Recommend, and Reputation. The 2026 rankings are based on data collected between 1 March 2025 and 28 February 2026, representative of Vietnam’s online population aged 18+.
This year’s results point to a more competitive F&B brand landscape. While leading brands continue to maintain strong positions, seven of the ten ranked brands recorded lower Index scores compared with the previous year. At the same time, the distance between the first and tenth ranked brands widened from 13.9 points in 2025 to 16.8 points in 2026, suggesting that the gap between the strongest performers and the rest of the ranking is expanding.
KFC remains Vietnam’s top-ranked F&B brand
KFC retains the top position in the Decision Lab Best F&B Rankings for the fourth consecutive year, with an Index score of 27.1, up 0.6 points from 2025. The brand continues to lead the ranking ahead of Jollibee, Highlands Coffee, Trung Nguyên Legend, and Lotteria.
KFC’s continued leadership is notable in a year where most brands in the top 10 saw score declines. From a brand health perspective, this suggests the importance of consistency: maintaining consumer trust, perceived quality, value, and recommendation over time is becoming a competitive advantage.
Mr. Sibojyoti Chatterjee, General Director of KFC Vietnam, commented on this ranking:
“Holding the top position for the fourth consecutive year reflects the trust Vietnamese consumers have placed in us over the years. Every point on the BrandIndex represents a real interaction and a real experience. We are proud of what this result represents, and we remain committed to continuing to earn that trust.”
Top 3 Improvers: Jollibee records the strongest improvement in 2026
Jollibee is the standout mover in this year’s ranking, rising from fourth to second place with an Index score of 23.6, up 6.3 points from 2025. This is the largest score increase among all ranked brands in 2026.
In brand tracking, a movement of this scale is meaningful because the Index score reflects multiple dimensions of consumer perception, not a single campaign or short-term awareness measure. While the ranking does not isolate the exact drivers behind Jollibee’s improvement, the result indicates stronger overall brand health across the year.
Jollibee’s rise also narrows the gap with KFC, suggesting a more dynamic leadership picture within the QSR category. For the wider market, this reinforces a key lesson: brand health can shift when brands build consistent relevance across value, quality, satisfaction, and consumer recommendation.
Download the full report at the Decision Lab’s website.
Mr. Lam Hong Nguyen, President, Jollibee Vietnam shared:
“This result encourages us to keep improving every day. At Jollibee Vietnam, our mission is to serve superior tasting food with great value, bringing happiness and the joy of eating to every family in Vietnam. We believe customer satisfaction is built through consistent experiences, and this recognition motivates us to continue earning the trust and love of Vietnamese consumers.”
The 2026 ranking also shows different momentum across F&B segments.
Among international QSR brands, KFC, Jollibee, and McDonald’s all recorded score increases. Lotteria remained relatively stable, with a slight decline of 0.3 points. Together, these results suggest that QSR brands are showing relative resilience in overall brand health.
Meanwhile, coffee and tea brands in the ranking recorded score declines. Highlands Coffee and Trung Nguyên Legend remain in strong positions at third and fourth place, but both saw lower Index scores compared with 2025. Phuc Long Coffee and Tea and The Coffee House each declined by 2.3 points, while Starbucks declined by 1.2 points despite moving up one place in rank.
The data points to a more demanding environment for beverage-led chains. Established awareness and cultural familiarity alone are no longer sufficient — perceived value, consistent experience, and clear differentiation all require active management.
Download the full report at the Decision Lab’s website.
Decision Lab POV: brand health is a management signal, not just a marketing score
The 2026 rankings show that F&B brands are operating in a market where consumer perception is harder to sustain. As competition intensifies, brands need to understand not only their position in the ranking, but also the underlying drivers of that position.
“The 2026 rankings show that brand health in F&B cannot be taken for granted. Consumers do not evaluate brands on one dimension alone. They form their view through repeated interactions with price, quality, service, experience, reputation, and whether they would recommend the brand to others. For F&B operators, this makes brand health a management signal. It helps brands understand whether their consumer experience and market position are strengthening, weakening, or becoming more vulnerable over time,” said Thue Quist Thomassen, CEO of Decision Lab.
Because the YouGov BrandIndex’s Index score averages Impression, Quality, Value, Satisfaction, Recommend, and Reputation, it provides a structured view of overall brand health. For F&B brands, this is particularly important because growth is rarely driven by communication alone. A brand may need to understand whether movement in performance comes from value perception, quality cues, customer satisfaction, advocacy, or broader reputation.
In a competitive F&B market, the brands that perform consistently are those that monitor these signals early and act before perception gaps become business challenges.
Methodology
The Decision Lab Best F&B Rankings are calculated using data collected from YouGov's online panel in Vietnam daily, from the flagship YouGov BrandIndex solution. The brands were ranked based on YouGov BrandIndex’s Index score, which measures overall brand health calculated by taking the average of Impression, Quality, Value, Satisfaction, Recommend and Reputation.
The Index Rankings chart shows the brands with the highest Index scores between 1 March 2025 and 28 February 2026.
The Index Improvers chart ranks the brands with the highest increase in Index scores, comparing the period from 1 March 2025 and 28 February 2026 with the previous 12 months.
Both scores are representative of the online population of adults 18+.
All brands have been tracked for at least 6 months to be included in the rankings and have been tracked for at least 18 months (as well as being currently tracked) to appear in the Improvers tables