Gwynedd Stuart
I saw a survey the other day that claimed 70% of Americans are trying to consume more protein. Whether or not that’s true (that’s a huge percentage!), brands are certainly treating it as gospel truth. You can currently buy protein mac and cheese, protein waffles, and protein hummus, among other things. And since we started covering the protein soda trend earlier this year, the market has absolutely exploded. For this taste test I bought a smattering of flavors from five different protein soda brands. A few months ago, I was only aware of one brand!
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What we wanted from the best protein soda
This is the part of the article where I’d typically catalog what makes a product the best version of that product. But protein soda is rough, man. A lot of it tastes REALLY bad. So in the end, we were just looking for sodas that:
- Contain protein (duh)
- Don’t taste like ass
As I said, there are a lot of ways to get more protein nowadays. Protein shakes are delicious! Protein bars are like candy! But if you absolutely insist on getting protein via a can of soda, here are the only ones to buy.
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- Waay Orange (10g)
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The worst thing about protein soda isn’t the weird creaminess or even the fact that it kind of coats your mouth—the worst thing is really the aftertaste of whatever sweetener they’ve used. It varied from brand to brand, but Waay specifically touts that it doesn’t use sucralose, opting for monkfruit and stevia instead. Usually, stevia is my least favorite sweetener because the saccharine aftertaste tends to linger, but it was tolerable in this orange protein soda.
Credit: Liv Averett / Instacart
- Don’t Quit Grape (15g)
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This tastes a lot like Welch’s grape juice, but carbonated (and also weird). It has the same drying, tannic effect that a lot of other protein sodas have, but it kinda works since that’s typical of grape juice. You could do worse!
Credit: Liv Averett / Instacart
- Waay Lemon Raspberry (10g)
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Waay has leaned into flavors with some citrusy brightness and it’s working for them. This is a very palatable lemon-raspberry soda, despite that stevia-monkfruit lingering aftertaste. And it aligns with a theme we’ll talk about more in the next blurb: It’s not a traditional soda flavor, so you’re not totally expecting it to taste like soda. It’s bright and tangy and tastes like its own thing.
Credit: Liv Averett / Instacart
- Barebells Pineapple Sunrise (10g)
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I know pineapple soda exists (who doesn’t love the yellow Fantana?), but this still works better than a lot of other protein sodas since it’s a relatively unusual flavor. This Barebells soda also has less of that drying after taste. Granted, it also doesn’t taste much like pineapple, but it gets its point across. And hey, you get 10g protein, too.
Credit: Liv Averett / Instacart
- Barebells Wild Strawberry (10g)
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Tastes like strawberry milk but fizzy. Oh, does that not sound good? Well, it’s better than most of these. This has 10g protein and 200mg of caffeine. It’s like delicious amoxicillin soda. Yum!
Credit: Liv Averett / Instacart
- Waay Grapefruit (10g)
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This has a pithy sort of grapefruit flavor. It’s a little bitter, but all in all, this was the best protein soda we tried. There’s definitely mouth filmage, but it’s by far the least offensive protein soda we tried. Sweetened with stevia and monkfruit (sigh), but it’s less cloying than a lot of these thanks to the zesty grapefruit flavor.
Credit: Liv Averett / Instacart
Protein Soda!
Protein Soda!
Protein Soda!
Protein Soda!
Protein Soda!
Matt Crowley
Jordan Myrick
Thoughts? Questions? Complete disagreement? Leave a comment!