We Found a Perfect Dupe for Sonic Tots in the Freezer Aisle

Not many fast food restaurants serve tots. Sure, Burger King has those little, round hash browns on their breakfast menu and Domino’s offers a messy mass of Loaded Tots in a few flavors, but the main destination for people who eschew fries in favor of tots is Sonic. But what do you do if a craving for those golden brown potato cylinders strikes and you don’t live near a Sonic? You turn to Sporked. Because we’ve tasted pretty much every frozen tater tot on the market, and we found the perfect dupe for Sonic tots.

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This frozen tater tot is a Sonic tot dupe

Bag of Sonic frozen tots in front of blue background with sparkles and hands on bottom delicately praising the bag of sonic frozen tots — Credit: Liv Averett / Sonic

The best frozen dupe for Sonic tots is…Sonic Tots! Confusing, I know. But Sonic makes frozen tots. And while it might seem like a no-brainer that these frozen tots are dupes for Sonic’s in-restaurant tots, it actually wasn’t always the case.

We tasted Sonic’s frozen tots when they first came out in 2023. And we were less than impressed. We cooked them up, popped them in our mouths, and tasted…extremely mid. The original frozen Sonic tots tasted just like all the other mediocre frozen tots on the market. Snore. And they didn’t even get crispy. So, when we re-tasted these frozen tots recently when we were working on an update for our frozen tater tot ranking, our expectations were low.

But something has changed at the Sonic tater tot factory, because these new-and-improved frozen tots absolutely slap. And they don’t just taste like good frozen tater tots. They specifically taste like frozen fast food tots from Sonic. They get super crispy on the outside and are outrageously creamy on the inside. They’re perfectly seasoned—they taste like they were freshly fried in tasty fast food oil.

How to upgrade your frozen Sonic tater tots

If you want to truly have that Sonic experience at home, you can air fry up some frozen Sonic tater tots and then top them like the drive-in does. Cover them in chili (try one of our favorite canned chilis) and melty cheese for chili-cheese tots. Or try DIY Totchos with nacho cheese sauce (we’ve ranked the best you can buy), crispy bacon bits, diced onions, and jalapeno slices. Bonus: Since you don’t have to drive you can pair your tots with a Sonic Hard Seltzer (the Citrus Variety Pack is our pick). Now that’s a Thursday at-home happy hour if we ever heard of one.

About the Author

Hi! I’m the editor-in-chief of Sporked. I will never turn down a fresh-shucked oyster but I’ll also leap at whatever new product Reese’s releases and I love a Tostitos Hint of Lime, even if there is no actual lime in the ingredients. Why you should trust me: I have been writing about food and beverages for well over a decade and am an avid at-home cook and snacker. I began my career writing about fine dining and recipes, moved into cocktails and spirits, and now I talk about groceries. If you can eat it or drink it, I’ve probably written about it. What I buy every week: Trader Joe’s dried okra. Appleton Farms prosciutto from Aldi. Some sort of Trader Joe’s cheese (I’m into the aged gouda at the moment). Frozen waffles (usually the Eggo Cinnamon Toast Minis). Spindrift water (loving the Cosmopolitan right now). Favorite ranking: Smoked salmon. Imagine me as Scrooge McDuck but instead of coins I’m diving into a vault of slippery smoked salmon slices. Pure joy. I also found some real steals in that taste test! Least favorite ranking: Canned oysters. I had such high hopes for this but it quickly became a chore. The kitchen smelled like an uncleaned aquarium.