The Best Thousand Island Dressing (Now with the Best Light Thousand Island, Too)

Hot take: Thousand island dressing is really underrated. It doesn’t quite achieve ranch-dressing levels of versatility—ranch will always be the eat-it-with-everything king—but it’s just as good as a salad dressing as it is as sandwich spread or burger sauce. Honestly, burger sauce might not even exist if thousand island hadn’t paved the way. And have you ever dipped a fat-ass steak fry in thousand island? An unmatched experience.  

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What we looked for in the best thousand island dressing

• Rich, creamy consistency. It’s a mayo-based dressing, so it needs to be rich to work. We want that stuff to really cling to some iceberg lettuce.
• Lots of chunks. Good thousand island is laced with lots of bits—pickle, onion, and peppers are all welcome in the mix. 
• A little something extra. This is what sets great thousand island dressing apart from good thousand island dressing. Like, yes, it should taste like mayo and ketchup and pickles, but a little bit of paprika or onion powder can add tons of depth to the flavor profile. 

In our first taste test, we found all the best full-fat, full-calorie thousand island dressing (including a vegan variety we love). In our second taste test we focused on fat free and low-cal thousand island dressings, and found a winner in that category, too. Here’s all the best thousand island dressing at the grocery store. 

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Best Vegan

Follow Your Heart Thousand Island

Amazon

I’ve liked a lot of the Follow Your Heart vegan salad dressings and I like this one, too. It’s so tasty! Just like the best non-vegan thousand island dressings, this is creamy, zesty, and has a hint of sweetness. To be honest, I don’t even know if I’d be able to tell this was plant-based in a blind taste test. I’m absolutely begging you to make a vegan Reuben sandwich with this vegan thousand island dressing and our pick for the best vegan corned beef. Begging! —Jordan Myrick

Credit: Liv Averett / Amazon

Rating:

8/10

Sporks

Best Fat Free Thousand Island Dressing

Kraft Fat Free Thousand Island Dressing

Walmart

This fat free thousand island is VERY sweet pickle forward, but there are some other nice flavors in there too that make it taste convincingly like thousand island, even if it lacks some of the richness of our pick for the number one best thousand island dressing. It’s tart and tangy and there are additional ingredients like mustard flavor (like, not mustard but mustard flavor) and dried onion in the mix to give it a little zest. If you’re using this as a burger sauce, I don’t think you’d notice that it lacks richness, but it’s definitely sweet. It sort of over compensates in that respect, but it’s still good and it has yummy bits of pickle in it, too. A lot of the light dressings we tried had tang but lacked actual pickle texture. This one does it all. —Gwynedd Stuart

Rating:

8/10

Sporks

Best Thick

Bob’s Famous Thousand Island

Walmart

Bob’s Thousand Island Dressing & Dip is definitely more of a thousand island dip or spread than a dressing and I love that. It’s thick. This is the kind of sauce that you slather onto something. This would be a great sandwich spread or vegetable dip. I’m going to be real with you: I dipped pizza into this. It was delicious and I will do it again. When it comes to the best salad dressing, Bob’s will always be a safe bet. —Jordan Myrick

Credit: Liv Averett / Walmart

Rating:

9/10

Sporks

Best Store Brand

Kroger Thousand Island

Ralph’s

Okay, Kroger! Good job! This thousand island dressing was one of the best store bought thousand island dressing brands we tried. It’s sweet, tangy, and thin enough to drizzle over a salad. This big bottle is less than $3 and will last you for a while. We tried tons of store-brand thousand island dressings and this blew the others out of the water. Next time you’re at Kroger, grab a bottle of this and give it a shot. You will like it. I promise! —Jordan Myrick

Credit: Liv Averett / Kroger

Rating:

9/10

Sporks

Most Surprising

Wish-Bone Thousand Island

Walmart

I had literally zero expectations for Wishbone salad dressing since most Wishbone salad dressings I have tried have been underwhelming. This thousand island salad dressing is smoother and more liquidy than some of the other versions we tried, but that’s one of the things we love about it. If you’re not looking for big chunks of pickle in your salad dressing, buy this! —Jordan Myrick

Credit: Liv Averett / Walmart

Rating:

9.5/10

Sporks

Best of the Best

Ken’s Steak House Thousand Island

Walmart

Pardon if this sounds hyperbolic, but this stuff is perfect. This is thousand island dressing. It’s thin enough to still be considered dressing but thick enough that you could use it as a burger sauce (which I already have). The taste is perfectly (again, perfect) balanced. It’s tangy, sweet, creamy, and salty. Ken’s thousand island dressing dances on every taste bud on my tongue and that’s why it’s the best thousand island dressing brand we tasted. —Jordan Myrick

Credit: Liv Averett / Walmart

Rating:

10/10

Sporks

Other thousand island dressings we tried

Kraft with Bacon, Market Pantry, Litehouse, 365, Annie’s, Kraft, Signature select Lite, Wishbone Lite, Walden Farms Thousand Island dressing, Walden Farms Zero Calorie

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