Every State’s Favorite Pizza Chain

As arguably one of the most popular foods in the nation (or possibly the world), pizza has become a common comfort food for many Americans. How can you resist toasted bread topped with marinara sauce and mozzarella cheese? There are hundreds, if not thousands, of restaurants that serve the delightful meal, and there are many different types of pizza to choose from—from the classic Margherita to an innovative barbecue chicken pizza.

Among the many pizza restaurants, there are some that are widely known and found in every corner of the United States. These pizza chains are household names and visited often (for some, it’s weekly). Check out our map below to find out which pizza chain is your state’s favorite!

Map Findings

• Chuck E. Cheese came in as the most popular pizza chain in the nation with 18 states declaring it as the favorite
• California Pizza Kitchen, Round Table, and Sbarro were only the favorite in one state each, making them the least popular overall in the United States
• Some states picked the obvious choice as their favorite, as they were the place these pizza chains were founded
  • Little Caesars was founded in Michigan
  • Pizza Hut began in Kansas
  • Indiana is home to the first Papa John’s
  • Marco’s Pizza started in Ohio
  • California is the birthplace of Round Table Pizza

Methodology

We took the top ten pizza chains by gross annual sales (according to Pizza Today’s 2019 report), and analyzed their relative search volume in each state between January 2021 and January 2022 to find every state’s favorite pizza chain. For any states that had a tie between two or more pizza chains, we used the one with the highest search volume according to Ahrefs.