10 Store Bought Lemonades, Ranked According To Customer Reviews

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Like sunshine in a bottle, the perfect lemonade can taste like distilled summer — if you happen to grab the best one, that is. In a world where there's a lot going on in the realm of beverages, lemonades are no exception. Flavored with berries, filled with colors, carbonated — there's no limit to how lemonades are adjusted to suit evolving consumer trends.

However, when it comes to ranking lemonades, we want the OGs. That means, in this list of store-bought lemonades, we went simple, stripped down. An acoustic set versus a Taylor Swift Eras Tour show, if you will. These lemonades are the real deal. That means there's no carbonation, no probiotics, no added flavors like strawberry, raspberry, or whatever "pink" is meant to be. There are also no zero sugar options, because that can skew palates in opposing directions. No powders, no instant mixes — just the good stuff in cans, bottles, jugs, or cartons.

We looked at commonly available brands of lemonade in this ranking, relying on Walmart, Target, and Amazon for compilation. Multiple reviews from all sites were taken into consideration for this ranking, with the exception of store-brand only products. If you're looking to quench your thirst with all things tart and sweet, read on to learn which ones should have the honor of making it to your cart.

If you're like me, you probably associate Tropicana with orange juice. However, in addition to juices, the Florida-based company that was founded in 1947 has branched out to dabble in lemonades, too. The brand offers both a Strawberry Lemonade and a Classic Lemonade, the latter of the two being the one we're looking at today.

Advertised on the bottle as being the perfect balance of sweet and tart, the Classic Lemonade is made with simple ingredients: just filtered water, cane sugar, lemon juice, lemon pulp, and natural flavor. Clearly, this minimal list of ingredients has won customers over, with one writing, "From the very first sip, I felt the heavens part and a choir of citrus angels sing." However, it's not always a home run for Tropicana. Some reviews say that the lemon isn't prominent enough for something claiming to be lemonade, with the bottle tasting more like poorly flavored water.

For those unfamiliar with Market Pantry, it's one of Target's store brands, designed to offer customers a quality product at a lower price. Think, what Great Value is to Walmart or Kirkland Signature is to Costco. One such product under the Market Pantry banner is lemonade.

Sold in a 64-ounce bottle, there's one major differentiating factor between this classic lemonade and Tropicana's Classic Lemonade: high fructose corn syrup. Compared to Tropicana's ingredient list, Market Pantry's is a lot more artificial, which makes us wonder if its slightly higher rating is due to brand affinity rather than actual product quality. After all, we all know someone (or maybe we're the someone) who will sing Target's praises no matter what.

This lemonade is made with water, high fructose corn syrup, lemon juice concentrate, natural flavor, citric acid, and yellow 5. A few reviewers enjoyed the budget-friendly price and refreshing quality of this lemonade, but others complained about the artificial, chemical flavor and the unnecessary addition of food dye. While not the worst on this list according to reviews (indeed, all lemonades merited at least a 4.1-star rating), Market Pantry's Classic Lemonade isn't the best, either.

Speaking of Costco, up next we have the wholesale store's Kirkland Signature Organic Lemonade. If you don't have a Costco membership, you can give this flavor a taste by ordering it on Amazon, where it has a 4.3 rating.

Made with just four ingredients (filtered water, organic lemon juice from concentrate, orange sugar, and organic lemon flavor), this lemonade looks like a pretty good choice. Free from unnecessary additives (looking at you, Market Pantry), it's easy to see why this lemonade does so well among customer reviews.

Sold in a duo of supersized jugs, some reviewers were pleased that the lemonade tasted homemade, with a bit of body from the lemon juice that helped with the overall mouthfeel. Others, however, took issue with the strength of the lemonade, ironically finding it to be too lemony. Unlike other bottles on this list, with being under the Kirkland Signature brand, it's a lot of lemonade to invest in, especially if you're unsure of the overall flavor. We say it's worth trying, especially if you want to try a new drink this season to use it up: espresso with lemonade.

Another store brand to make it on our list comes from none other than Walmart. While the big box store has a few banners under its name, we're looking specifically at the Great Value label, and the Classic Lemonade it sells. Walmart also sells a Great Value Original Lemonade, which did not make our ranking, as well as a wide variety of flavored lemonades including blueberry, mango, raspberry, and strawberry.

Interestingly, this Classic Lemonade doesn't just contain lemon as the citrus fruit; it has orange, too. The full list of ingredients is filtered water, sugar, lemon juice concentrate, orange juice concentrate, citric acid, orange pulp, and natural flavors. If a clean list of ingredients is of concern to you, be sure to get the Classic Lemonade versus the Original Lemonade, which is the same hue as an all-purpose cleaner and has a laundry list of preservatives and artificial ingredients.

Happy customers love this lemonade for its flavor and thirst-quenching qualities, with some reviewers recommending blending it with ice for a slushy-style drink or using it as a mix with margaritas. Maybe Walmart was onto something, because we recommended adding orange juice to your margs for an instant flavor boost.

A brand you may not be quite as familiar with as the previously mentioned varieties is Milo's. Originating as a family-owned restaurant in 1946, Milo's has since made a name for itself selling iced sweet teas and lemonades in grocery stores across the country. While Milo's carries strawberry lemonade, raspberry lemonade, and sweet tea and lemonade (also known as an Arnold Palmer), we're looking at plain old lemonade for the purposes of this article.

Prepared with filtered water, cane sugar, fresh lemon juice from concentrate, and natural flavors, Milo's lemonade gets rave reviews on the brand's website. For many happy customers, this lemonade strikes the perfect balance between being sweet and tart, but doesn't stray too far in either direction. The price is also pretty delicious, too: a mere $4.47 for a gallon at Walmart. For those who really love lemonade (or have a household of people who will help you finish it), Milo's seems like a stellar choice in the lemonade game.

If you're familiar with the brand Calypso, you probably know it for having a rainbow of lemonades in heavy glass bottles. In addition to the Original Lemonade (which is what we're looking at today), Calypso also offers lemonades in flavors strawberry, southern peach, triple melon, paradise punch, kiwi, tropical mango, tropical tango, and ocean blue (a blue raspberry flavor). The company also has limeades and zero sugar varieties.

In addition to the standard water, sugar, and lemon juice that makes up lemonade, Calypso's version also has citric acid, modified food starch, natural flavor, beta carotene, and EDTA, which is added to protect the color. While we don't love the presence of these added ingredients, reviewers tend to be pretty positive about their feelings for Calypso's Original Lemonade. Over on Amazon, reviewers like the original version, with even more praise appearing for the flavored varieties. However, unlike some other beverages on this list, some customers did complain that it was a bit more difficult to find in stores, which is why they had to resort to ordering it online.

The final store brand in our ranking of store-bought lemonades cracks the top half of this list and belongs to none other than Whole Foods. The high-end grocery store has a reputation for stocking organic, high-quality foods, often with an equally steep price tag (although it's not the most expensive grocery store in the country). 365 is the chain's store brand and sells everything from organic animal crackers to hair spray.

Of course, we're looking at lemonade here. Simply named "Lemonade" with no qualifiers like "classic," "traditional," or "homestyle," Whole Foods Market keeps its product as plain and simple as the name, with filtered water, cane sugar, lemon juice from concentrate, and natural flavor as the only ingredients. On Amazon, where it has a 4.6 rating, reviews are generally quite positive, with customers complimenting the natural flavor of the lemonade and remarking that it doesn't taste too sweet or have a chemical aftertaste like some other brands. Is it the best of the best? Not quite, but we're getting there.

If you've ever in your life purchased a bottle, carton, or can of juice, there's a good chance that it's been Minute Maid at least once. The brand is one of the many under the Coca Cola family, which helps explain its proliferation in everything from grocery stores to gas stations.

Minute Maid Lemonade is a pretty ubiquitous product, and comes in multiple sizes, including a frozen can you can mix up at home with water. Being that it's from Coca-Cola, perhaps, then, it shouldn't be a shock that instead of using cane sugar like most of the lemonades on this list, Minute Maid Lemonade is sweetened with high fructose corn syrup. The rest of the ingredients list is fleshed out with the help of lemon juice from concentrate, lemon pulp, natural flavors, pectin, sucralose, and acesulfame potassium. If you're looking for a natural lemonade, this is not the one to go for.

That being said, it is highly rated across multiple websites including Amazon, where a 12-pack of cans earns an impressive 4.8 stars. Many customers say the lemonade is refreshing, strikes the perfect balance between sweet and tart, and tastes like homemade, even if it does have ingredients you wouldn't find in the average home kitchen. Maybe it's just that Coca-Cola has mastered the secret recipe for lemonade as well as its most famous product.

We'll be honest with you: We didn't know that Country Time offered a ready-to-drink lemonade. We have always associated the brand with the powdered mix that little kids whip up for neighborhood lemonade stands rather than an actual drink. We in for a shock, then, when we discovered that not only does Country Time offer a lemonade beverage (or "Lemonade Flavored Drink", per the package description), but that it's actually highly rated.

On both the Target and Walmart websites, this drink receives top marks. However, a caveat has to be made here: Country Time has to call this a "lemonade flavored drink" because it does not, in fact, contain any actual lemons. A combination of chemicals like citric acid, potassium citrate, natural flavor, and glycerol esters of wood rosin (whatever that is) join forces to mimic what could be done by simply using real lemons.

Somehow, it seems to work, because customers rave about this drink, with the Capri Sun-like pouches scoring bonus points for their portability which is great for kids. Is it lemonade? Not technically, but if these reviews are anything to go by, it is in spirit.

The jewel in the crown, the highest rated lemonade of them all, is none other than Simply Lemonade. Another product under Coca-Cola's umbrella, Simply Lemonade does away with the high fructose corn syrup of its Minute Maid compatriot in favor of cane sugar. Joining it are filtered water, lemon juice, lemon pulp, and natural flavor. The ingredient list is, well, simple. The Simply brand also scored well in our orange juice taste test.

The product states right on the label that it's all natural and it is also made without GMOs, so if you're looking for quality ingredients at a reasonable price, Simply Lemonade has your back. The lemonade scores well on both Walmart and Target websites, with customers praising that it's not made with lemon juice from concentrate, unlike other brands. This allows for a nice tartness that isn't too sour or, conversely, overshadowed by sugar. Thirst-quenching, refreshing, and "the best lemonade on shelves," if you have a yearning for a dose of liquid sunshine, Simply Lemonade is the one to choose.