I Tried And Ranked 15 Hershey's Chocolate Bars From Worst To Best

What is your favorite candy? This is a question that may inspire quibbles among readers, as everyone's preferences differ. Personally, my choice depends on my mood. When I'm choosing a snack for the movie theatre, for example, I might prefer some Junior Mints or Reese's Pieces. If I'm knee-deep in photo-editing mode, it's going to have to be Haribo Happy Cherries. But if I'm trying to relive my childhood, it would have to be Hershey's. 

Hershey's was the gold standard for making s'mores growing up, as it melted perfectly into the plush marshmallow and made for a sandwich that was as molten as it was delicious. I also have less-fond memories of my dad pillaging my Halloween candy stash for Hershey's with Almonds, but I'll forgive him for that. It's fair to say I'm not the only person who likes Hershey's either, and there's clearly some intense debate over which variety is the best, which is why I decided to settle it once and for all in this not-so-sugar-coated review.

I tried all of the Hershey's candies I could get my hands on, including its classic bars, nut-studded additions, Hershey's Chocolate World exclusives, and even some zero-sugar varieties, before ranking them from worst to best based on their novelty, flavor, texture, and utility. Some are worth the title of "fan favorite," while others are worth giving away if you find them at the bottom of your pillowcase after trick-or-treating.

Some recommendations are based on first-hand impressions of promotional materials and products provided by the manufacturer/distributor/etc.

For someone that has refined a palate as I have, I will admit that I absolutely love birthday cake-flavored things. It's why I liked Great Value's Unicorn Sparkle ice cream so much when I tried and ranked a selection of flavors from the brand, and it's why I always order my ice creams with extra sprinkles and extra cake batter pieces. But in a candy bar? I just don't feel the same way. 

This Hershey's Chocolate World exclusive (which has to be bought from the brand's website) is an oddity. It does taste like birthday cake-flavored white chocolate, as evidenced by its almost fruity notes and crispy sprinkles. I say "crispy" here, as they don't crumble like standard jimmies. They're almost like the tooth-breakingly hard sprinkles you find in an assortment at the grocery store.

The bar itself is generically sweet — much more than the milk chocolates on this list — and it's hard to pick out what the flavors actually are. If you tried it blindfolded, you probably wouldn't call it "birthday cake"; maybe "awful!" would be more fitting. It's fun in a novel way, but it's not a bar that I could imagine myself ever wanting to eat again.

I don't entirely know why the ice cream-inspired Salted Caramel Hershey's Chocolate World exclusive bar tastes more like coconut than salted caramel. The packaging says that it contains toffee pieces, but the only note that I get from this bar is coconut — maybe like if a Samoa Girl Scout Cookie were stripped of its chocolate and cookie and the coconut was left to steep in a vat of caramel. It's significantly sweeter than the Birthday Cake bar, and anything more than a nibble was just too much for my palate. No amount of salt could redeem this bar. 

It sucks that this is like a race to the bottom for these Hershey's World bars, but I do think Hershey's should stick to what it does best and avoid the ice cream-inspired flavors altogether. White chocolate doesn't need to be made any sweeter. While it was more caramel-like than the Birthday Cake bar was birthday cake-like, it still wasn't pleasant.

I had to mentally prime myself to try this candy, as the smell of it was positively noxious. I don't like fake strawberry-flavored things, hence why I despised Ka'Chava's strawberry-flavored nutrition drinks, which I tried for a previous review, and didn't love Trader Joe's strawberry sheet cake. This bar, though, might take the cake as one of the worst strawberry-flavored things I've ever tried. 

The flavor here is like taking a shot of strawberry extract and mixing it in with something crunchy (which I later found out after reading the package was dried strawberry). These crunchy bits at least made the bar a bit more manageable and easier to eat than if it were only strawberry-flavored white chocolate.

Despite the inclusion of actual strawberry pieces in this bar (earning it a slightly higher spot than the two ranked below it), the flavor was so overwhelmingly artificial that I was turned off after a mere nibble. Perhaps you could melt it down and mix it into a strawberry milkshake, but otherwise, I can't foresee a reason to purchase this Hershey's Chocolate World exclusive — let alone suffer through a 24-pack of it.

The zero-sugar candy that I had the most beef with during this ranking was very obviously the Zero-Sugar Cookies 'n' Cream. This may be partly because Hershey's had to not only modify the ingredients in a high-sugar white chocolate base, but also the cookies themselves. The cookie pieces were almost dusty and dry here, similar to other sugar-free cookies I've tried over the years. The white chocolate was lacking creaminess, and something was more evidently "wrong" with this bar than was evident in the other zero-sugar varieties I tried.

Texturally, it couldn't compare to the rich regular-sugar chocolates on this list or the milk chocolate zero-sugar variations I tried. It's not as gag-inducing as the poorly ranked Hershey's Chocolate World bars, but I still wouldn't seek it out.

Now, this candy wins clear novelty points. Where else would you find a milk chocolate candy bar jam-packed with flecks of waffle cones? Prior to this ranking, I hadn't seen a candy like this anywhere, which is why I was so excited to try it. However, I implore you not to get your hopes up, as its texture is underwhelming.

The waffle cone pieces in this bar got almost soggy in a way that none of the bars with "stuff" in them did. The fragments were also almost dusty, kind of like they were put in a bag and beaten with a rolling pin before being added to the chocolate. If I closed my eyes, I couldn't tell it was waffle cone dust because it didn't have any of the underlying caramel-toffee notes I enjoy most when eating ice cream in a whole waffle cone. It probably would have been better if the pieces were bigger. This mealy texture puts the waffle cone-flecked bar toward the bottom of my list, as it clearly diminishes its utility and how pleasing it is to eat.

What an odd candy "bar" this is. Unlike the other ones on this list, it's square, and I think that has something to do with it being intended for s'mores (as this is stamped on the packaging). However, there are a few problems with that design, as the chocolate itself is too thick for a s'more, and I doubt it would soften, should the only heat source be a roasted marshmallow.

The other qualm with the Hershey's Milk Chocolate with Caramel candy is that the milk chocolate competes with the butterscotch flavor of the caramel. It has more brown sugar notes than classic caramel. While this undertone makes the caramel more complex, the chocolate flavor doesn't want to share its spot on the throne. The caramel and the chocolate compete for dominance, and as expected, the latter wins. Aside from that, it's too decadent for a s'more and also too decadent to eat out of hand. While it's not borderline-inedible like some of the other candies on this list, it's not one I'll be coming back to because it's just a lot.

All things considered, the Zero-Sugar Special Dark bite-sized bars aren't that far off from the regular Special Dark ones. However, I do think that Hershey's leaned more into the "dark" component here, being that the flavor I got from it was borderline bitter. It wasn't bittersweet chocolate per se, but it had a more complex chocolaty depth than the standard Special Dark bar, which woefully underdelivered in that department as well.

However, the dark chocolate here was still harsh and underdeveloped. Did it want to be milkier? Probably, as this would have made it more pleasant to eat. Like the other zero-sugar bars, its flavor felt decidedly short and was not as full as the regular-sugar bars. I wouldn't eat this variety out of hand, which earns it a middling spot on this list.

If given the choice between milk chocolate and dark chocolate, I'm probably going to go with dark in most circumstances. It just has a bit more going on, and it complements an array of flavors, like fruit, better than milk chocolate. 

But if given the choice between the regular Hershey's and the Special Dark bar, I'm going to have to stick with the tried-and-true milk chocolate. The flavor of Special Dark is abrasive, and it's clear that it's not super high-quality dark chocolate. There is no complexity, sharpness, or florality; it's just like a de facto dark chocolate because it has more overt chocolate flavor than the milk chocolate bar.

If I'm walking through the candy aisle craving dark chocolate, I'm going to invest in a brand that does dark chocolate well, such as Hu, rather than one that just makes a dark chocolate bar because it feels obligated to. This one could be compelling on a s'more but doesn't warrant eating out of hand, which is the primary purpose of a chocolate bar.

Folks eating a zero-sugar diet don't have to miss out on their Hershey's fix. This Zero-Sugar Milk Chocolate candy, which only comes individually wrapped (like all the zero-sugar varieties), is simple, but it gets the job done. It smells like a Hershey's bar, tastes like a Hershey's bar, and acts like a Hershey's bar — meaning it's primed for s'mores-making. Since there's no weird flavor or aftertaste, I wouldn't be able to tell it is zero-sugar, which is an achievement in itself. 

However, compared to the really enjoyable Milk Chocolate Bar, this one falls just a bit short texturally. The only thing I didn't like about it was that the mouthfeel felt a little gritty toward the end. It's not as bad as most of the Hershey's Chocolate World exclusives, though, and I won't have qualms about eating the rest of the bag. The flavor is all-around pretty spot-on. 

I'm convinced that Hershey's doesn't use the same recipe for its Special Dark chocolate as its Special Dark with Almonds because the latter is much sweeter and milkier. Do I think it's a true dark chocolate? Not quite; it lacks the florality, complex undertones, and depth I want from a top-shelf dark chocolate bar. But when you integrate the complementary nutty pieces, you do get a bar that is a bit more balanced and has more going on than a massive bar of standard, sub-par dark chocolate. 

Maybe it's because the nuts were a distraction here, but I easily enjoyed this bar much more than the regular Special Dark rendition. However, I don't think there were nearly enough nuts. I had to bite towards the center of the XL bar in order to get a couple in my mouth. If Hershey's had chopped these nuts into smaller pieces and used them more liberally, this variety would have easily ranked higher. Its flavor also isn't as universally appealing as my top picks, as "dark" chocolate isn't for everyone.

Okay, okay, my friends at Hershey's Chocolate World series may have redeemed themselves with Cookies 'n' Mint. I almost forgot I was eating white chocolate here, as the mint flavor and the chocolate cookie pieces give this bar a balanced flavor and unique edge that I didn't find with any of the other Hershey's Chocolate World exclusive bars. It's light, refreshing, and a candy I could see myself buying again — even if I'm not the biggest mint stan.

I originally assumed it would be better if it were made with milk chocolate, but after seeing what happened with the Milk Chocolate with Caramel bar, I fear that white chocolate is the way to go. The mint took the wheel here while the chocolate called shotgun. The only reason it didn't place above the next pick was that mint is divisive, and I don't see everyone loving its toothpaste-like flavor.

White chocolate is an ineffective confection because it only tastes like sugar. It's barely even chocolate in the first place, so when you pair it with some of the more complexly flavored bars on this list, you get something that falls woefully short. Should the Hershey's Cookies 'n' Creme bar have just been a stick of white chocolate, I would have placed it dead last on this list. But its saving grace is the copious pieces of cookie embedded in it, which add textural intrigue yet don't contribute to its cloyingness. 

I am so surprised that these cookies keep their snap. They're pleasant to crunch on, and part of this is because they aren't as overtly buttery as an Oreo cookie. Their almost-dryness comes as an advantage when they're enrobed in the milky, sweet chocolate that, as all white chocolate does, lacks any flavor besides generically "sweet." If you're under the age of 10, you'd probably love this candy. But if your palate is more defined, I could see you skipping over this candy in the grocery store checkout line and going for one of the other, higher-ranked options.

I was very impressed by the Zero-Sugar with Almonds bar, and it was one of the few that I ate in its entirety by the end of the review. The almonds in this bar hide the textural faults with the plain Zero-Sugar Milk Chocolate, as the nuts filled each bite with a decadent richness. It's hard to tell it's a zero-sugar candy.

It's not as creamy as some of the higher-ranked candies in this ranking, but I had no major issues with it otherwise, which earned it a respectable spot near the top of my list. I honestly didn't have high hopes for any of the zero-sugar varieties, but I truly was pleasantly surprised by them.

I decided to try the plain Jane Hershey's Milk Chocolate first for this ranking, seeing as it is the original and the candy people most associate with the Hershey's label. This chocolate bar's recipe is simple: sugary, milk chocolate pressed into a rectangular bar with "Hershey's" proudly stamped on each individual piece.

What this candy loses in novelty it makes up for in utility. While the other Hershey's products were dependent on add-ins — like almonds, caramel, or waffle cone pieces — this one only has its basic chocolate flavor to fall back on. And it's not a strong or profound chocolate flavor either. The chocolate notes aren't bitter or well-developed, and the milky sweetness is its sole flavor — perhaps this is why people love it so much and why it's so approachable.

Since there are no add-ins, this variety could easily be stuffed into a s'more or melted and drizzled on something (whether it would melt well is another question entirely). There's nothing whimsical or noteworthy about it, yet I'm okay with its reliability because there's nothing objectively wrong with it.

As I grow older, I see the appeal of eating almonds and chocolate together. I've tried countless chocolate-covered almonds and after a review of M&M's flavors, I realized I had been sleeping on the almond ones. The same can be said here about the Milk Chocolate with Whole Almonds bar. 

Despite Hershey's not being what I think of as a "high-quality" candy company, I'm amazed that it was able to keep its almonds this fresh. I suppose the fact that they were encased in the same creamy milk chocolate as the original bar helped. The almonds in this bar are whole, rather than slivered, which may also help both keep them fresh and amplify their crunch. 

How you feel about whole almonds in a chocolate bar will depend on the candy texture you enjoy. If you prefer to eat chocolate mindlessly, then a standard creamy dark or milk chocolate bar will do you well. But if you, like me, like the surprise of a nutty almond studding a piece of creamy, sweet milk chocolate, then this might be the bar for you. I like its novelty (which was still approachable) a hair more than the plain Milk Chocolate, which ultimately earned it a spot at the top of my list.

I tried these chocolate bars back-to-back on the same day, starting with the Milk Chocolate (as it's likely the most popular flavor and the one that many of the bars were riffed off of). I tried the zero-sugar versions after the originals to discern any flavor differences between them. 

Everyone's chocolate preferences are different, so I tried to rank these as objectively as possible by focusing on the texture of the mix-ins (where applicable), sweetness and flavor of the chocolate, overall novelty (and whether that was a worthy trade-off, as some bars were fun but tasted bad), and ultimately whether I felt that I wanted to come back for another bite or not. A chocolate bar is made for enjoying out of hand, which is why I tried each of these bars solo, though I noted whether they would be useful in other applications, like on s'mores or melted onto fruit.