Dunkin's New Berry Clementine Refreshers Don't Deliver On Either Fruit

Well, it must be a day that ends in "y," because Dunkin' has released new drinks ... yet again. The summer of 2026 has been a big season for America's favorite coffee-and-donut chain, but not necessarily because it's blown us away with some explosive new drops. In truth, Dunkin' has been favoring quantity over quality a lot lately, and it shows. Still, it wasn't all boring bevvies and sad sips this season; some of Dunkin's Fourth of July menu items sparkled, and we've been lucky to see plenty of that fan-favorite strawberry cold foam, one of the chain's best new additions. But lately, when Dunkin' announces a new drink, I can't help but feel a little pang of nervousness.

Now that summer's winding down, Dunkin' launched some new, ephemeral, autumn-ish Refreshers, and I got my hands on both. The Berry Clementine Refresher and the Berry Daydream Refresher both combine citrus and berry for, ideally, the perfect sweet treat for that special late-summer-early-fall time. I'm hoping these will be the go-to drinks at Dunkin' when it's way too hot out to reach for pumpkin, but the cool breeze and hoodie weather mean beachy strawberry lemonade is out of the question. So let's see if Dunkin' just dropped the panacea for the can't-wait-for-autumn jitters, or if these drinks are destined to fall into the "please, Dunkin' — just stop" camp.

To review these drinks fairly and accurately, I tried each one in-store when it was fresh. After trying each drink fresh, I let them sit for a few minutes to see how they fared after a little bit of the ice melted and the temperature changed slightly. The Berry Clementine Refresher comes with a choice of drink base (tea, lemonade, and so on), and I ordered mine with green tea. I didn't alter either drink in any way via additions or substitutions, nor did I eliminate any ingredients.

I judged each of these drinks primarily on the freshness of their flavor and how likely I thought Dunkin' superfans would be to fawn over them. I didn't factor in any personal bias toward flavor. I also didn't include their nutritional content or price in my judgments; this was purely about taste, freshness, and perceived quality.

I was looking for drinks with plenty of complexity, a nice balance of sour, sweet, and creamy flavors, and something that distinguished them from Dunkin's vast lineup of Refreshers. After being disappointed by so many artificial-tasting Refreshers at Dunkin', I was also hoping these drinks would come with a real-fruit taste and fresh, crisp mouthfeel that made them refreshing in the heat but also comforting on a cool day.

The Berry Clementine Refresher features its two namesake fruit flavors plus your choice of green tea, black tea, lemonade, oatmilk, protein milk (which is featured in Dunkin's polarizing protein milk drinks), or sparkling water. I originally planned to order mine with sparkling water, but I was only given a choice between green tea or lemonade while I was ordering, so I opted for green tea. I was hoping the unsweet tea would give me a clearer picture of what the Berry Clementine Refresher flavor was like. It did — but for this reason, I kind of wish I had chosen lemonade.

I picked up on plenty of nondescript fruit notes, like the kind of flavors you find in cheap fruit juice designed for kids. There were also lots of weirdly funky, tangy flavors, which I could probably safely assume were meant to taste like clementine. If I hadn't known ahead of time that Dunkin' was going for a citrus theme here, I probably would have thought the sour, tangy taste was a mistake; it didn't mesh well with the berry flavor at all.

The icing on this overly complex flavor disaster was the green tea, which gave the sweet, tart, funky flavors in the Refresher syrup an earthy backdrop that couldn't have been less fitting if it tried. Remember mixing all the sodas together at the soda fountain as a kid to create one weird, brownish-orange drink that tasted like everything and nothing all at once? The only difference between that childhood concoction and this Refresher is that the former was actually kind of delicious.

The Berry Daydream Refresher includes the same Berry Clementine Refresher syrup as the other drink, plus oatmilk and sweet cold foam. All told, I liked this drink more than the milkless Refresher — but that isn't saying much. The creaminess of the milk and foam tamed some of the too-tart sourness in the trying-to-be-clementine taste, but it still wasn't a good match. Sour and creamy flavors only really go together in specific circumstances (think lemon curd, key lime pie, and the like). When it works, it really works, usually due to ingredient quality. In this case, oatmilk and generic sugary fruit flavor are not on the list of tasty milky-tart treats. Plus, the oatmilk started to curdle after only two minutes.

But it wasn't just the too-sour flavor and curdled texture that threw this drink off: As soon as my first sip hit my taste buds, I was immediately reminded of cough medicine. The flavor of this Refresher specifically reminded me of Get Better Bears — do any of you '90s kids remember those? For those under 30, they were lollipops shaped like teddy bears meant to treat a sore throat. They had a similar flavor to that of NyQuil. If you happened to read my last Dunkin' review, I know you'd be thinking: "Hunter, why do you have some weird affinity for equating Dunkin' drinks with over-the-counter medications from childhood?" Please believe me when I say that Dunkin's Parke Daydream Refresher and its likeness to Pepto Bismol didn't influence my perception here whatsoever.

Both the Berry Clementine Refresher and the new Berry Daydream Refresher (not to be confused with the Mixed Berry Daydream Refresher from Dunkin's fall menu last year, which also tasted a bit like cough medicine) were duds — plain and simple. I'm a big, big fan of clementine anything, but for it to work well with mixed berry, there has to be a special sort of magic at play, and Dunkin' just wasn't able to nail it. But it's not all Dunkin's fault; there's a reason you don't see a lot of clementine-berry-flavored things out there. It isn't a great combo in most cases. And in the case of these drinks, even though they didn't taste like the real fruit whatsoever, the pairing was still a flop.

I'd like to try the Berry Clementine Refresher again, this time with sparkling water, to see what it's like without the earthy green tea backdrop. I think it'd be a lot more palatable and much less loud and overly complex, but I still think there isn't much that can be done to save the artificial-tasting Berry Clementine Refresher syrup.

The only reason I preferred the medicinal Berry Daydream Refresher was the oatmilk and cold foam, which tamed the syrup's overly tart flavor. But watching the milk curdle before my eyes and being transported to the school nurse with a scratchy throat with every sip guaranteed I'd never order it again.

I picked up a small Berry Clementine Refresher for $3.59 before tax. The Berry Daydream Refresher costs a little bit more — $4.59 for a small. I purchased my drinks at a Dunkin' location in rural Pennsylvania, so those in major city centers can expect to pay a bit more for their drinks.

The new Refreshers officially launched on August 19, 2026, along with some pumpkin spice drinks and treats (a little early for pumpkin, don't you think, Dunkin'?), tiramisu-flavored drinks, and some savory autumn-ready snacks. We can't say for sure exactly when the new drinks will be gone, but considering they're seasonal, they'll probably be swept away when the next wave of seasonal Dunkin' drinks hits.

I wasn't able to track down the nutrition info for the Berry Clementine Refresher specifically. However, Dunkin's other Refreshers made with lemonade contain 160 calories, no fat, 10 milligrams of sodium, 39 grams of carbs, and 37 grams of added sugar for a small size, so it's safe to assume this Refresher (when made with lemonade) is roughly or exactly the same. A small Berry Daydream Refresher contains 210 calories, 4.5 grams of fat (2 grams of which is saturated fat), 80 milligrams of sodium, and 30 grams of added sugar.