Quest bars have been around for years and they’ve built a bit of a cult following. Some flavors are amazing, some are just okay, and a few are the kind you only buy once and never again. Over time the recipes have changed, new flavors have come and gone, and everyone seems to have their personal favorite. In this post I’m going through the whole history of Quest bars, ranking every flavor I’ve tried, and giving my honest take on which ones are actually worth eating. If you’ve ever wondered which bar to grab or just want to look back at how Quest has evolved, this review covers it all.
I have picked up Quest bars in every way possible. I have grabbed variety packs to try a little bit of everything, singles when I see them at the store, and big boxes when I know a flavor is good. I plan to keep this post updated as I come across new releases or circle back to older ones so it stays a useful guide for anyone wondering which Quest bars are worth it.
1. Overload: Cookie Commotion
First, unfortunately, the package doesn’t do it justice: this bar isn’t as filled as it’s advertised! The pieces in it are less abundant.
Still, the embedded cookie parts in the center give some nuance to the already soft texture by providing light, soft crunches (mostly from the darker cookie pieces). Together, the bar as a whole tastes like a fake cookie dough—it’s still tasty, but not the “I’m eating cookie dough” type of thing.
What this does have is an appreciable chocolate coating around it, which helps give it some creaminess that many of the non-overload Quest bars don’t have. It also adds a light chocolate flavor, which works really well with the cookie dough-like taste of the bar as a whole.
Overall, this bar tastes a step above many of its counterparts, especially its non-Overload Quest brothers, which feel more stiff and hard. Even more so, this feels like an upgraded version of the regular Quest Cookie Dough bar in every aspect. This one looks and tastes much more premium, like you’re eating a thick, chewy candy bar. Of course, while it doesn’t taste precisely as such, it’s nonetheless a wonderful protein bar and one of my favorites from Quest.
Quest released three Overload flavors: Cookie Commotion, Chocolate Explosion, and Sunday Funday on March 7, 2025. Found at Target in June 2025.
2. Overload: Chocolate Explosion
Chocolate Explosion is just that: like two or three slightly different chocolates together. It does taste artificial, but for a protein bar, oh boy, it is still tasty and super duper chocolaty. It comes across as moderately sweet, kind of like a candy bar that leans towards semi-dark chocolate and with reasonably soft, thick innards. The composition as a whole behaves like a creamy shell wrapped around a thick, solid ganache.
So, let’s address something: I love chocolate; however… there is no nuance here! To me, there isn’t much differentiation in the flavor or texture; it’s almost kind of boring in a way. However, if you seek chocolate—and only chocolate—give this a go. However, notably, it’s several steps ahead of its regular Chocolate Brownie counterpart in every regard. Overall, it’s perhaps one of the most chocolaty protein bars I’ve ever had!
Quest released three Overload flavors: Cookie Commotion, Chocolate Explosion, and Sunday Funday on March 7, 2025. Found at Target in June 2025.
3. Overload: Sunday Funday
These feel softer than regular Quest bars, as you can bite through them with much less resistance. It also has a noticeably less traditional protein bar taste and instead leans towards a candy bar type of flavor. It’s very creamy, moderately sweet, and rocks a chocolatey vanilla-like taste.
Unfortunately, I’m not sure if the lodged inner bits did too much. Perhaps I wasn’t paying enough attention; I’m not sure. Overall, while it is definitely better and feels more premium than your average Quest bar. Then compared to some of the other Overload flavors, it falls more flat in the taste department, sadly. Simply put, not only doesn’t it really taste like a sundae, but its vanilla and chocolate compete with one another, essentially making the bar less flavorful and punchy than its Overload friends.
I would suggest getting this bar if you want something more tame or are picky but still want a protein bar more on the higher-end side.
Quest released three Overload flavors: Cookie Commotion, Chocolate Explosion, and Sunday Funday on March 7, 2025. Found at 7-Eleven in May 2025.
4. Pumpkin Pie
These protein bars have a mild, surprisingly authentic pumpkin taste, which is complemented by the creamy shell and few embedded crunchy pieces, which do carry this bar quite a bit.
Unfortunately, it’s not nearly as tasty or punchy as a normal pumpkin pie or what you’d expect from pumpkin-flavored anything. Simply put, many of the traditional seasonings, while present, are just present—they aren’t as bold as they should be. Overall, it feels like it was made for someone who is either sensitive to pumpkin pie or strong flavors.
It’s still a good fall-based protein bar but simply falls shorter than it needs to due to lack of flavor. Nonetheless, I think a wide range of people will still enjoy its versatility and appreciate it enough because it isn’t too sweet and is more mild tasting.
Found on the Walmart website in July 2025.
5. Peanut Butter & Jelly Crispy Hero
Okay, so how do I describe this? Firstly, the texture is similar to that of a wafer—think KitKats, but thicker and a smidge more chewy. It has a good mouth and bite feel due to this composition of a creamy peanut soft shell, a thin layer of jelly, and a peanutty wafer inside. Basically, it all comes together really nicely.
Taste-wise, it’s between mild and moderately sweet. Unfortunately, however, while this advertises itself as PB&J flavored, it absolutely swings towards its peanut side—after all, that layer of jelly is really minuscule—it’s noticeable in flavor, but not nearly as equal as the peanut. Don’t get me wrong either; the peanut isn’t super punchy or anything like that; it reminds me of an authentic and generic sugary peanut butter you might find on store shelves—a little less sweet than those, however. Then, lastly, the wafer does provide the “bread”-like taste.
Overall, if you love peanut butter and jelly like me, you’ll enjoy these. Granted, I do wish the jelly flavor was more pronounced.
Found on the Walmart website in July 2025.
6. Birthday Cake
I don’t know why, but I found it really cool that this entire bar, from the outside to the inside, is ghostly white. Similarly, the flavor is uniform too: a moderately sweet vanilla white chocolate-esque from the shell to the center, however, with some noticeable artificialness. It’s not enough to throw it off too much, but it’s clearly there and does detract from the flavor somewhat.
Birthday cake, though? As I said, not quite. This bar’s taste reminds me of a white chocolate candy bar—which is something many companies fall into—they advertise “birthday cake,” but it’s instead either a sweet vanilla or white chocolate. Still, it’s tasty despite the mismatch of flavors and artificialness; I personally like it, and I especially like the creamy shell and how semi-thick it all is.
Found at Stop & Shop in early August 2025.
7. Apple Pie
This genuinely feels like I’m almost eating a moderately sweet apple pie but in protein bar form. Granted, the sweetness level is less than a typical apple pie, but it’s still fairly sweet, and it has an almost fully authentic apple and crust flavor.
There are also a few embedded pieces, which add a mild soft crunch to the already soft texture. The composition of the bar overall is soft and a little artificial—I’d like to see some more crunchy parts somewhere to help. Overall, a good fall-based bar if you want something more fruity and different.
Found on the Walmart website in July 2025.
8. Lemon Cake
I like the flavor; it’s nuanced, like you can taste the lemon and even some cake flavor, but something about it feels artificial. I’m not sure if it’s the lemon precisely, but something about it—that mild punch of odd-tasting lemon—I can’t quite work out what’s going on there. It just feels off, I guess.
Overall, this bar’s overall sweetness level ranges between mild and moderately sweet, so nothing really sticks out too much. What I do enjoy are the small, semi-crunchy embedded pieces that seem to give it a slight buttery, crunchy crust taste and texture.
That aside, the entire bar is quite creamy and soft, from the shell to the inside, kind of resembling a light white chocolate bar mixed with a lemon. Not bad, but its artificialness at times is off-putting.
Found at Stop & Shop in July 2025.
9. Cookie Dough
This seems like it wants to be cookie dough, and for the most part, it sort of accomplishes it, albeit at the expense of being artificial.
This artificialness extends to both its composition and flavor. First, the feel of this seems rubbery and sticky, as if it was rolled up and meant to survive for years without going stale. Its mouthfeel is okay—it’s soft enough and thick; it’s just that rubberiness throws it off. And then secondly, while it has a cookie dough flavor, it simply tastes like an artificial version of it—not terrible by any means, but it could be better, or, well, less fake tasting.
What I do like is how there are chunks of chocolate pieces throughout this soft-ish bar, which do somewhat help alleviate the odd stiff texture. It’s a decently sweet bar if you’re into cookie dough, although at the same time, I feel like you could be equally disappointed because it isn’t quite as authentic as it ought to be.
10. Strawberry Shortcake
I’m not fully convinced this is a strawberry shortcake-flavored bar, as they would require some graham cracker, crust, or doughy taste, all of which are absent here. This more so should have been called strawberry milkshake instead because it fulfills that role well. It has a creamy, moderately sweet strawberry taste with what seems to be a side of vanilla.
The composition contains a creamy, a bit thin, shell with a thick, chewy inside. Throughout the entire bar is the same flavor, and while I personally did notice a few added bits to the filling, I didn’t think they contributed anything other than making the bar look better.
In summary, this is a pleasantly tasting creamy strawberry-tasting bar.
Found on the Target website in August 2025.
11. Birthday Cake Crispy Hero
Tastes like I’m biting into a Rice Krispies Treat, although not quite as thickly chewy or gooey. It has the Rice Krispies crunches and sweetness down, though, while also having what seems to be a mix of sweet artificial flavor combinations of something between vanilla, white chocolate, and birthday cake. Not super artificial; however, it’s enough to notice and raise an eyebrow at—and to note, no, it’s not that typical “protein bar” artificialness; it more so feels like they just screwed up the flavors.
The bars are noticeably a bit large, slightly thick and chewy, and soft enough to bite through—again, think Rice Krispies Treat. The shell on the outside does provide a smooth, slightly soft feel before you reach the large center of jumbled-together krispies, which is great, though I wish the shell was thicker to help really solidify it.
Lastly, as a birthday cake fan, I am a bit let down by the small amount of artificialness that seems to hold back a lot of the experience. And of course, the fact it isn’t quite birthday cake is disappointing—like, it’s close but is clearly not the flavor. At the very least, it’s a sufficiently sweet protein bar.
Found on Amazon in August 2025.
12. Cookies & Cream
What I like about this, aside from its sticky, almost rubbery feel, is how much thicker and larger it is compared to others. Maybe I just got lucky? I’m not sure. Either way, it’s noticeably larger and just as thick and chewy as other regular Quest bars!
The bar resembles the look of what you get when you mix dough and crushed-up Oreo pieces. It’s slightly dark from the ground-up cookie pieces. There are also little black and white cookie and chip pieces throughout of different sizes, which do provide itty bitty crunches to contrast the chewy texture.
The taste, to me, resembles an artificial cookies and cream protein flavor that leans towards its more chocolatey side. It has that traditional creamy-like taste from cookies and cream as well as an essence of dark chocolate cookie flavor. However, something about its artificialness drags it down and dilutes its cookies and cream flavor. It’s not a bad bar overall; it just feels held back.
13. S’mores
Much of the bar has a sticky, almost rubbery artificial feel, but it’s offset by the large amount of chocolate chips and graham pieces that offer a nice light crunch to the soft, thick, pliable texture. Interestingly, this bar has a lot more of these tasty pieces inside compared to most other Quest bars; it really feels loaded! Lastly, this bar reminds me of their Cookie Dough in many regards, although the taste is a bit different.
For the most part, the bar is between mild and moderately sweet with a light chocolate taste and a hint of creamy white chocolate or marshmallow. It’s like a very tame s’more that needs more pronounced graham and marshmallow as well as a dash more sugar.
Overall, it’s a decent Quest bar and feels especially loaded compared to several of the others. The big drawbacks are the lack of pronounced flavors and its artificial composition.
14. Oatmeal Chocolate Chip
Like many of their regular Quest bars, this has a sticky, artificial, rubbery feel and, weirdly, seems flat for some reason. Still, it’s thick and chewy enough to be enjoyable. Also to note about the texture, there are a few ingrained chocolate chip and oat pieces that add a slight addition to the texture (not so much the flavor)—it’s still all mostly soft, but those pieces are just a smidge different enough in their textures to notice.
Biting into this without reading the package, I think I’d have guessed some type of oatmeal or oat flavor, though I’d question myself because it’s quite artificial and tame. It definitely has that protein bar taste found in many bars, unfortunately, and it seems to taint the oatmeal flavor enough to raise an eyebrow.
This bar is moderately sweet with an artificial oatmeal-like flavor. I would have liked more chocolate chips and for the oat flavor to be more pronounced because as it is, it’s more mild than I’d like.
15. Peppermint Bark
Okay, I could see a lot of people saying they feel this bar tastes somewhat like toothpaste, and I think it’s actually because the flavor and sweetness is too light! Think about it: how often do you get a toothpaste with a super powerful mint or peppermint? Not often! That’s reserved for candy! So, with this light peppermint flavor comes a reminder of, well, toothpaste.
It’s not all bad though. It is noticeably creamy and has some white chocolate vibes from its thick shell, which does offset that toothpastey flavor and makes it somewhat tolerable.
Overall, this bar is mostly mildly sweet alongside its equally toned-down flavors. It’s kind of like they heavily diluted a white chocolate peppermint patty candy. Lastly, flavor aside, the texture is soft and feels premium and thick due to that white frosting covering. Not a bad Christmas-based bar, although I feel they need to add more sugary sweetness to make it taste more enjoyable.
Found on the Walmart website in July 2025.
16. White Chocolate Raspberry
The texture of this is so odd—it feels rubbery and sticky, very artificial to say the least. It’s the biggest downside of the bar, along with the fact that the embedded white chocolate chips don’t even seem to help because most of the texture throughout this artificial bar is soft, thick, and rubbery. At the very least, there are a few specks of what appear to be raspberry that do give it a miniscule amount of crunch every now and again—it’s nice, but it doesn’t make up for the fact that this thing really feels like it was meant to sit years without expiring.
Taste-wise, it does fare better. It’s a moderately sweet sugary raspberry with no signs of that fruity punchiness you might expect—then again, perhaps that’s something you enjoy. And it definitely isn’t as fake-tasting compared to its makeup.
So, aside from the glaring issue regarding the texture, this could absolutely benefit from a thick white chocolate shell to help complement the flavor. Also, personally, I wouldn’t mind a little extra kick from the raspberry because as it is now, it’s more sugary sweet than raspberry.
17. Chocolate Brownie
As advertised, this tastes like a mildly sweet semi-dark chocolate brownie. The big caveat is that it does taste artificial, almost annoyingly so—just something about the taste seems off.
Taste aside, the composition is uniform throughout. It does feel like a thick, semi-chewy, prepackaged brownie that was made to last a long time, but that’s it. There’s no shell, cream, or any nuance to come by. Overall, it’s kind of boring and plain.
18. Mint Chocolate Chunk
That weird, sticky, rubbery texture really throws me off. At the very least, it feels a bit thick and chewy, but that artificialness is off-putting and is reminiscent of many traditional Quest bars.
Anyway, this bar seems to be 75% semi-dark chocolate and 25% actual mint. It doesn’t taste like toothpaste or anything like that, and I can definitely thank the moderate sweetness and creamy crunchy pieces littered throughout the bar that give it enough flavor to balance with the mint. There is a light, artificial protein bar taste throughout, just to note.
However, if you’re a big mint fan and want something strong, this isn’t it. This bar’s flavor feels like it was to appease the general audience. At the same time, I don’t think it’d be a smash hit either because, again, of that artificial texture and its more mild flavors. Ultimately, why would I get this when their other flavored bars are much more pronounced and tasty?
Overall, this, in a way, resembles their Peppermint Bark flavor but doesn’t have the super thick and creamy shell or taste—and maybe that’s what this needs, a minty shell to cover its mostly chocolate-tasting inside! This would at least give it a more noticeable and appreciable mint flavor and discourage its mostly chocolate flavor.