Gas Station Chain Coffee, Ranked Worst To Best

You already know that there are foods you should never buy at a gas station — hello, sketchy hot dogs and those ubiquitous gross nachos. But what about gas station coffee? It's a good question, especially for anyone planning a road trip of some distance, because you're definitely going to need a cup of joe in the middle of nowhere, right? Right. Duh. That's why we at Chowhound thought it was a good idea to bring you a ranked list of the best gas station coffee options.

There are several things to note about trying to wrangle on-the-road Java choices into a semblance of order, however. For one thing, gas stations and their associated convenience stores are not standard across the country. The pairing rather depends on many different factors: Whether they use branded or non-branded gas, whether the station is franchised, whether the owner uses a franchised market name or runs their own, and so on. Moreover, while larger travel centers have their own coffee brands and their cups reflect that (as you'll see in the photos below), some use a local or regional brand instead. In short, you've got to take "best gas station coffee" with a grain of salt.

With all that said, my hubs and I carefully tried the options from each stop and can at least give you a starting point for which stations are likely to have comprehensive options. We enjoyed drinking cup after cup as we drove from Oregon to Montana, hitting Washington and Idaho along the way. Hopefully, this little sampling of our Pacific Northwest neck of the woods will give you some inspiration when choosing your morning brew. Best of luck, caffeine seeker!

This was the very first coffee we bought on the road, when our enthusiasm levels were highest. People were literally cheering when we pulled into the station at Cascade Locks, Oregon, so excited were we to be traveling after a year of planning our trip to Montana. So, to wind up ranking this gas station coffee the worst of the lot? You know it was bad, man.

It is hard to explain exactly how bad. It smelled okay, which was misleading. It was shockingly expensive, which was annoying, but Cascade Locks is a popular stopover for fisherfolk and vacationers in the summer, so that stood to reason. They had only a few coffee options — dark, medium, and hazelnut roast — so we picked the hazelnut one, per our methodology (see below), and put regular creamer in it. Unlike many other gas station stops, plain half-and-half in little plastic tubs was the only option.

That cream did little to save the coffee. Simply put, it tasted like burnt water. It did get better the more we drank, like some kind of coffee Stockholm syndrome, but should you really have to trauma bond with your coffee? I think not. Despite the fact that I grew up in a Chevron family (I'm telling you, it's a thing), I cannot, in good conscience, rank this any higher.

Sadly, the Exxon in Three Forks, Montana, was no better. Not feeling personally betrayed by the brand made the experience a little less upsetting, but this coffee was pretty much trash. It was hard to tell what the brand was, because some stops just use standard coffee carafes with a simple label on the front, like "Medium Roast," and nondescript cups like the ones in the photo. I can now officially confirm that writing "Latte" and "Espresso" on a cup does not magically change the substance inside.

Specifically, the coffee tasted flat, burned, bitter, acrid, and watery. The coffee choices were also limited — there was no decaf, for instance, which really matters to some people. The creamer options were similarly poor, and you're not going to find tea or other alternatives at this stop. No thanks. To be fair, they did have a real coffee shop at this Exxon stop. In the interest of comparing apples to apples, we got our brew from the regular coffee bar inside the truck stop, but it's nice to know you can find a real cafe off I-90.

Phillips 66 was a confusing gas station coffee. At first, we ranked it a bit lower, but once we tallied up the results and realized it just hadn't earned the bottom spots, it got bumped up. It wasn't terrible, but it almost wasn't worth drinking (except for the caffeine boost, of course). Keep that in mind if you're going to give this one a shot, at least if you find yourself in Billings, Montana.

Overall, there were a few coffee options, but the creamers were uninspiring, there were no other toppings (like cinnamon or marshmallows, which we genuinely found at one of our stops), and there was no decaf. The coffee itself, while neither acrid nor burnt, was plain and watery and uninteresting in a way that even creamer couldn't save. We were especially disappointed because the coffee cup, which said "My Daily Crave" in pretty blue and white letters on a brown background, made it look like a nice local brand. Upon researching it, however, it turns out this was just a pre-made design intended to look like a brand, of which gas stations and convenience stores of any ilk can avail themselves. Boo.

Love's in Connell, Washington, was a real mixed bag. Their coffee options were extensive, offering dozens of different mixes and matches if you took both carafes and creamers into account. However, they'd been out of decaf for a week, which seems kind of hard to explain, because should it really be complicated to order decaffeinated coffee grounds? On the other hand, anecdotally speaking, my husband and I have definitely noticed more out-of-stock signs in grocery stores and coffee shops lately, so there's that. Plus, many gas stations don't even pretend to have decaf coffee, so we couldn't really hold it against them.

The coffee itself was acidic and less mellow than our top options. However, it wasn't horrible, especially once we added creamer, which smoothed it out nicely. Considering some options couldn't be doctored up to the point of drinkability (I'm looking at you, Chevron), we had to give them credit for that. The coffee bar was utilitarian and easy, and we were in and out quickly.

On a non-coffee note, I must say that Love's sells some pretty amazing gas station pizza, so not all gas station meals are bad. Seriously, these next-level personal pies were cheesy, hot, and well-flavored, with both meat and veggie options. A little veggie pizza with a cup of creamed coffee? It really hit the spot in the middle of nowhere, Montana, so I recommend it highly. Love's would also be a good place to look for a wider selection of food and beverage options, like hot dogs that actually taste good and the energy drinks that Wawa's famous for on the East Coast. Just saying.

As far as gas station coffee goes, this Billings option ranked on the lower end for a reason. The coffee bar immediately disappointed. As soon as we walked in, we could tell that it wouldn't make for a great stop if you had specific needs. There wasn't any decaf or tea, and there were only a few options for coffee type. The creamer selection was decent, though, so we got our required hazelnut flavoring — yes, we are 15 at heart, okay?

With gas station coffee, it all really boils down to the taste, and in this case, the taste just wasn't good. It was both watery and burnt-tasting, even though it claims to be freshly made. It also lacked that rich coffee smell and flavor you expect, ultimately tasting more or less like nothing.

If you're going through Haugen, Montana, you can certainly do worse than stopping at this 76, at least gas station coffee-wise. The coffee bar was well-stocked with a number of coffee and creamer options. There was decaf to be had, as well as other beverages for those who don't partake in the ol' caffeine. The coffee itself was smooth and mild, decently rich without being overpowering.

Depending on where you go, you may even be able to find gas station iced coffee there. There was some at the place we visited, and even frozen blended drinks. If you don't have great air conditioning or are the type who likes the windows down on a road trip, it's nice to know you can get some cool-me-off styles as well.

The joe we got at a Sinclair gas station in The Dalles, Oregon, was the epitome of gas station coffee and therefore ranked right in the middle. It was watery but drinkable, nice and hot, and came with a lot of coffee and creamer choices. They also had decaf, which is important to those of us who can't take the all-day-every-day jet fuel approach. Its lower ranking is more a product of the fact that others came ahead of it than anything the coffee itself did wrong.

One interesting thing to note is that Conoco and Sinclair used the same local coffee. In this case, it was Treasure Valley, which is a coffee roaster in the Pacific Northwest,  specifically, Eastern Washington. It was also the brand served by the Conoco we visited in Idaho the next morning, together representing two of only three gas stations that used local coffee, so far as we could tell (the third being Shell in Cascade Locks). The only reason it was "worse" than its Conoco compatriot was that it was watery, which just goes to show that how coffee is made matters as well.

We were pleasantly surprised to discover that our morning gas station coffee at the Conoco in Kellogg, Idaho, was delicious. It was the first one of the morning, which always makes one a little desperate, so it likely benefited from that. But hey, you can only control variables so much in a taste test.

For gas station coffee, this one ranked highly on its own merits. It was hot, mild, and smooth, the cousin of the prior day's Sinclair buy, but better. There were good creamer options as well as tea, so you could meet the needs of a wide variety of travelers here. Although the gas station was small, it was well-appointed, and we got in and out of there quite quickly, which is never something you can say of places like Love's or TA Travel Center. Speaking of which ...

Missoula has tons of gas station coffee options, obviously, as well as regular coffee. Why you'd get gas station coffee if you were doing anything but passing through is beyond me, though, so we won't compare those options. TA Travel Center is one of them, though, and it's one I highly recommend. It had lots of options for bathrooms, washing up, and eating, and its gas station coffee ranked pretty highly for a reason.

It was smooth, mellow, and a bit bitter, but not in an unpleasant way. It was also nice and hot without being surface-of-the-sun scorching, which was a problem we faced at several of the other stops, where we either had to add a gallon of cream or wait half an hour. We appreciated being able to drink it right away. The stop offered good creamer options, too, and they had tea and decaf.

Shell is one of the American gas stations serving craft coffee — or at least, this location was — and we were 100 percent behind it. As gas station coffee goes, it was delicious: Smooth, mellow, and rich, with lots of creamer options so you can make your drink just the way you want it. There's a good reason it ranked No. 2. Simply, gas station coffee should be cheap and delicious, and this cup was.

It's only fair to acknowledge that we tried Shell in Cascade Locks right after Chevron, our absolute worst option, so it probably benefited from the comparison. Still, this cup of coffee was darn good and much appreciated after Chevron's nigh-undrinkability, so we'd recommend it to anyone ... except decaf drinkers, because you're sadly out of luck.

Huzzah, the No. 1 gas station coffee spot! Circle K in Billings took us by surprise, probably because it was the last one on our list, at a point when we were heartily sick of sampling crummy roadside java. The moment we tasted it, though, we knew that it ranked first. It was nice and hot, but not mouth-melting. This place also had the most creamers and syrups we'd ever seen at a gas station, so you could doctor your drink up pretty much any way you wanted. They even had mini marshmallows, which ... come on. Mini marshmallows!

As for the coffee itself, it was just as pleasing as the overall setup. There were lots of options, including decaf and iced coffee. It was smooth, mellow, mild, and generally delicious, especially once we added our requisite hazelnut creamer. The only thing we didn't appreciate was the fact that the cups are made out of Styrofoam. When every other coffee option on the road came in paper cups, this was an unfortunate black mark. However, we're willing to overlook it, since paper cups are wasteful anyway, and the coffee was just so darn good.

On a final note, don't expect any of the gas station coffee options ranked here to compare to your favorite local brewer. You're looking at cheap options from purveyors whose main selling point is accessibility, so you'll need to cut even our winner a little slack in that sense. Would I recommend any of these over your corner cafe? No. But it sure is nice to know they exist.

As I mentioned in the introduction, "gas station coffee" is an extremely broad category. It's impossible to state definitively that "Chevron has the best joe" because Chevron, the gas brand, may be associated with different markets across the U.S. However, if we assume that each brand has certain standards for what they will accept in a franchisee, we can then assume a certain standard of food and drink options. It's a starting point.

As for how we ranked the coffees against one another, it was a simple matter of taste-testing and discussing the results. My husband and I were the designated taste testers on this coffee-fueled road trip. Although we occasionally allowed the small boy and small girl sips, I didn't include these in the ranking the way I did in past taste tests for chocolate ice cream or store-bought carrot cake.

It's also impossible to standardize such a wide variety of options from such a range of places. To try and create consistency, we chose medium-roast coffee wherever possible and added hazelnut creamer. Almost every place had a similar option, though a few times we did have to swap in French vanilla creamer or put regular creamer in hazelnut coffee. Since most fake coffee creamers taste like sweetened condensed milk with a touch of flavor anyway, this wasn't a big deal. I also noted the variety of available options at each place, just in case you have other needs — iced coffee, decaf, tea, and so on — but these didn't factor into where I ranked each coffee.