5 Store-Bought French Onion Soups, Ranked From Worst To Best

It's always a good day when French onion soup is the soup du jour. Can you tell it's a personal favorite of mine? There's just something about that combination of buttery caramelized onions in a rich broth that makes my taste buds want to sing a little French melody. Throw on a cap of toasted bread and an ungodly amount of broiled cheese, and it's just unfair how good it is.

The soup is at its best when served fresh at a restaurant, thanks to the use of fancy-schmancy cheese melters and high-quality ingredients like Vidalia onions. Takeout cafes like Panera also hold their own, and with the right French onion soup recipe, it's not too terribly difficult to create a satisfying crock of your own. When you're really having a last-minute craving for a bowlful of the good stuff, store-bought options are also available, though not widely so. I recently went on a hunt to track down cans or jars of French onion soup that might meet my high expectations, but struggled to find even five options from nearby grocers. Store-bought chicken noodle or even chili, you'll find a dozen times over — but locating a French onion is like trying to find a truffle in the wild.

For the options I was able to unearth from classic brands like Campbell's, Progresso, and Rao's, plus a few others, I gave them all a try and ranked them from least to most palatable, judging primarily on the taste of the broth, texture of the onions, and accompanying seasonings and ingredients. Here's the lowdown from my soup scavenger hunt.

Progresso takes up just as much room on the grocery store shelf as Campbell's — maybe even more if you factor in the size of its plump cans. The brand boasts traditional soup recipes, light versions, reduced-sodium cans, and more. But its French onion soup falls into its Vegetable Classics line, among other picks like garden vegetable, green split pea, and tomato basil. It's important to note, though, that it is not a vegetarian soup, since it does have a beef broth base.

For a soup that's just 100 calories per can, I expected something light and perhaps less savory than a traditional French onion. What I didn't expect was a bowlful of watered-down brown gravy. That's essentially what this blend boils down to. It has that same beefy taste as gravy, a decent amount of salt (about 1,570 milligrams per can), and a thicker consistency than most other broth-based soups. There are real slivers of tender onion hiding in the crock, yet they're few and far between. Plus, there aren't many other flavors layered underneath the beef broth. Butter, paprika, toasted onion powder, and even sugar are thrown in, but don't make a noticeable impact.

When it comes down to it, this Progresso can doesn't hit any of the marks I'm looking for in a cozy cup of French onion soup. It would take a heap of nutty Gruyère cheese and multiple crusty baguette slices to get me to pick it up again. Once was enough.

As soon as I saw that Rao's had a slow-simmered French onion soup in its lineup, I thought it was over for other competing brands. From jarred pasta sauces to frozen entrees and pizzas, I used to think that everything the premium brand touched turned to gold. But now, after trying its version of this classic soup, I think it's safe to say it has its weaknesses.

The look of the broth-filled bowl alone was enough to make me question its quality. Instead of the deep brown shade you typically associate with French onion soup, it comes in a lighter brown hue, which unfortunately looks like a murky puddle of dirty dishwater, especially when you factor in the small bits of onion swimming around. The taste is equally uninspiring. It lacks umami and a dominant onion flavor, opting instead for a rush of sweetness from an unexpected source: brown sugar. Garlic, spices, red wine vinegar, and even the beef broth itself get washed out from this addition, and chewy onion pieces don't help the soup's case.

The only reason I have Rao's soup above Progresso's is that some flavor complexity does start to build by the spoonful. I also think that just about anything would top a bowlful of diluted gravy. But when it comes down to it, Rao's French onion soup is still disappointing to say the least. I think the brand should stick with the Italian recipes it knows best and leave the French ones to someone else.

Credited with the invention of ready-to-eat soup (in a beefsteak tomato flavor) and with a history that dates back to 1895, Campbell's is the IT brand in the canned foods aisle. Now, 130 years later, it also has an endless selection, which is exactly how I knew it would have a can to contribute to this taste test, even when most other soup brands don't.

After pulling it from one of the soup aisle's gravity-fed dispensers, I was able to take home this can of French onion soup and give it a try. What I tasted was a very mediocre recipe. It's not necessarily bad, nor is it particularly good. What I noticed first is that it is tremendously salty and soy sauce-heavy. I'm typically not averse to adding a splash of soy sauce to a pot of French onion soup for even more savoriness and a deeper color. But here, it's overpowering. It makes it difficult to enjoy the natural taste of the beef broth, the abundant onions, and other ingredients and flavorings (which apparently include cheddar and semi-soft cheeses, though I picked up no hints of cheesiness).

With such a salt-forward taste, it also comes as no surprise that the sodium levels in this can are off the charts. If you ate the entire 10.5-ounce can — which seems to me a standard bowl size — you would be consuming about 85% of your recommended daily sodium intake. It may be in your best interest to share, or, better yet, ditch it for one of the following choices instead.

Walmart's fresh and prepared foods brand Marketside has a French onion soup on its books. It comes in the form of a soup kit that you can pick up in the supermarket's grab-and-go section. The soup is ladled into a plastic bladder that you pour out right into the provided bowl and microwave until warm. Additionally, it comes with a bag of shredded Gruyère cheese and a separate baggie of seasoned crostini pieces for topping.

These garnishes, along with the fact that this selection is fresh rather than canned, gave it an automatic advantage over others. The Gruyère (a lovely choice, by the way) melts perfectly over the soup, and, if you eat them quickly enough, the bread pieces provide a nice crunch paired with a hint of saltiness. I couldn't judge based on just these add-ons alone, though, and I had a few notes on the soup itself. It does have some decent complexity in the broth with beef stock, red wine, brandy, butter, sherry vinegar, and seasonings all swirled together. The onion slices were also large and plentiful. However, they weren't quite as cooked down and caramelized as they ought to be, giving them a firmer crunch. 

Like the Campbell's soup, it also has a saltiness problem. On top of a heavy pepper problem, it becomes a bit too overwhelming for the taste buds. For these reasons, it didn't top my list. There was one other soup that proved to be better at its core.

I just had a hunch that the Cuisine Adventures French onion soup was going to be good, before I ever even thought about picking up my spoon. And unlike my Rao's assumptions, this one was proven to be true.

I found the soup at my local Costco, though it's also available at some Trader Joe's locations. It's a freezer find and comes with six individually sized servings in the box. All you need to do is take the frozen bouillon-like block out of its wrapper, place it in a bowl with the cheese side up, and microwave it for about five minutes. What I liked about this from the jump is that it's not only filled with slow-simmered fresh onions, but also Swiss cheese and croutons, all in a veggie-based broth. It really goes the extra mile in terms of ingredients, and altogether, it puts all the previous bowls to shame. The stock has almost a creaminess to it and finds a nice balance of sweet and savory — even without beef broth at the foundation. The onions are tender without becoming slimy, and even though the croutons do become rather waterlogged, they add sustenance and a pleasant yeasty taste to the mix. Bites with a bit of crouton and a lot of Swiss specks were undeniably the best.

Even with all its highlights, I wouldn't say Cuisine Adventures' product is French bistro-worthy. Most restaurant variations I've had would still top it pretty handily. But it's one of the best store-bought French onion soups you're likely to find–out of the slim pickin's stocked on the shelves.

For this taste test, I went to multiple grocery stores — five to be exact — and found exactly five different store-bought French onion soup offerings. For some reason, brands really tend to shy away from French onion soup as a ready-made option. But for the ones I did find, I warmed them all in the microwave according to the instructions on the can or packaging. Most took just a few minutes, and then I tried them all one right after another.

I judged primarily on the soup itself. I looked at the consistency of the broth and its ingredients. Most used a beef broth, while Cuisine Adventures used a vegetable-based option. What mattered more than that, though, was how it was balanced out by other add-ins like garlic, vinegar, red wine, or other flavorings so that it wasn't too one-dimensional, bland, or, on the other hand, too salty. Then came the onions. In a French onion soup, they should be caramelized and tender yet not slimy, and I wanted a decent amount thrown in there. The pungent vegetable is supposed to be the star of the show, so brands that skimped didn't fare well.

These were my main criteria, but of course, I also appreciated brands like Walmart Marketside and Cuisine Adventures that went above and beyond with the addition of cheese and croutons. It takes the soup to a whole other level and makes it feel more like a complete meal rather than just a first course.