7 Black Olive Brands, Ranked Worst To Best

If you want to enjoy all the briny earthiness of good olives but you're not a fan of the bitter, sharp flavor that green olives can sometimes have, then black olives are probably perfect for you. They're often milder, with a fruitiness that tastes great on its own but is also excellent when added to salads, dips, and a variety of other recipes. They can even be baked into bread recipes, like this garden art vegetable focaccia, for a bold, salty profile that packs an umami punch.

But before you start adding olives to everything you make (or just snacking on them all on their own), you need to know which brands offer the best-tasting black olives. While that may be subjective, I've tried and ranked several black olive brands to help give you a better idea of the best options on the market. Perhaps you'll find some brands you'll want to try out, or maybe you'll just know what to avoid.

When ranking these olives, I considered flavor first and foremost. Bolder, more flavorful olives ranked higher, while blander and more unpleasant-flavored varieties are placed toward the bottom of the list. Texture also played a role — specifically, I looked for a firm, meaty texture. Softer and mushier olives ranked low. Now, let's take a closer look at what each brand has to offer. 

Prices are as of the date of publication and may vary based on region.

I tried two different types of O Organics black olives: Medium Whole Black Olives for $2.99 and the Sliced Ripe Black Olives for $1.99, both from Star Market. Appearance-wise, they look like any other black olives. But unfortunately, I found that these olives didn't taste good at all. They had an intense bitterness and soapiness unlike what I would expect from black olives. To make matters worse, they tasted less salty than most of the other brands, so there is little to cover up the strange bitterness. The texture of O Organics' olives also disappointed me. Both the whole olives and the sliced olives had a rubbery consistency, which turned mushy as I chewed them.

Honestly, most of the olive brands that appear on this list are passable. Although some may be better than others, I wouldn't be disappointed by the products from most of these brands. However, if I were to buy O Organics olives for a recipe only to discover that they taste like these do, I'd probably be a little bummed.

Lindsay is an olive brand I see often at stores, so there's probably a good chance that a local grocery store in your area carries it as well. I bought two of its black olive products from Star Market for this taste test: the Sliced variety, which was priced at $2.49, and Large Pitted Olives, which sold for $2.99 per can. Both of these olives represent a big step up from O Organics in terms of flavor. While I found they were blander than some of the higher-ranked olive brands, they weren't at all bitter. I did notice a faint, chemical-like flavor in the sliced variety, but for some reason, it was absent from the whole olives.

But both of these products, too, are a textural flop. They have a rubbery, almost-mushy texture rather than the meatiness I look for in quality black olives. Now that I've tasted black olives from so many different brands, I probably won't buy from Lindsay again. But if I just picked these up randomly and didn't try any of these others, I would probably think they were just fine.

Looking for a reliable, store-brand black olive brand? Signature Select has you covered. When I was at Star Market, I picked up the brand's ripe Sliced Olives and its Chopped Black Olives for $1.99 each. I specifically chose the latter because I didn't find any other brands that offered the olives pre-chopped. It would be a convenient option for those without a food processor or who wanted to make something like this tapenade recipe.

This brand was difficult to rank because the two different products I tried had very different flavors. The sliced olives were quite good, with a nice saltiness and bold flavor profile. However, I didn't enjoy the chopped olives as much. Although they may be a convenient option, they have a metallic flavor that I would not want to incorporate into any olive-centric recipes. Unfortunately, this makes it hard to tell what you're getting when you opt for Signature Select's black olives, but I think that the sliced variety is a safer bet.

Musco Family Pearls sets itself apart from other brands by offering not just the typical canned black olives but also black olives in to-go packs for easy snacking. Now, I'm not sure everyone considers black olives to be a snack food per se, but I can appreciate that this brand positions itself in that way. I tried Musco Family Pearls' Sliced Olives to Go! from Stop & Shop, where I paid $4.99 for a pack of four snack-sized containers. However, I also wanted to try the brand's more standard black olives, so I opted for the Large Pitted Ripe Olives for $2.79.

Ultimately, I enjoyed the canned olives more. They had a nice meatiness, although they were also jelly-like, which is not the consistency I was looking for. They really delivered flavor-wise, though, with an intense saltiness and surprising complexity for what looks like an average can of black olives. The sliced variety wasn't as good, since the olives appeared to sweat, which made them feel soft and mushy. I didn't particularly like that they were in plastic either, though disposable packaging may be part of the product's appeal. If I were going to buy from this brand again, I'd stick to the canned olives unless I was specifically looking for olives to pack in a lunch box or snack pack.

If you're a Stop & Shop regular, snag yourself a can of the grocery chain's Sliced Ripe Black Olives the next time you're there. I paid $2.19 for this simple-looking can of olives, which is a bit more expensive than Star Market's store brand. That being said, I do think that Stop & Shop's black olives are tastier, even if the differences between them and Star Market's offerings aren't super noticeable.

The sliced olives have a great texture. They're firmer than most of the other sliced black olives I tried, which makes them a great option to use in recipes where the olives are there for texture, not just flavor, like as a topping on homemade pizza. Although they're not the most complex olives I've ever tasted, they have a nice umami quality and plenty of saltiness, which makes them perfect for general use. Ultimately, it may make sense to pay a few extra cents for this store brand over others.

You may have to travel to a different part of the grocery store than you would for the rest of these brands to find Pastene's Imported Sliced Ripe Olives. I was able to find them at my local Stop & Shop next to all of the other Pastene products, where they sold for $3.29. The taste of these olives made the time it took to find them worth it, as they were the best sliced olives in this lineup. This mostly comes down to texture; they're quite firm, which was not something I found in other brands. This is an especially big accomplishment for pre-sliced olives, since they tend to be softer overall. 

But Pastene's black olives also deliver when it comes to flavor. These olives tasted bright and refreshing, and the umami complexity appeared just a few bites in. Although they're not as delicious as the highest-ranked black olives on this list, I do think Pastene is the best option for canned sliced olives.

Most of the olives I've covered on this list are great for incorporating into recipes or eating as a casual snack. But when you're really serious about your black olives and want them to play a more important role on your plate, Mina's Moroccan Dry Cured Black Olives, which sell for $4.29 at my local Star Market, may just be your best option. Instead of being stored in the typical juicy brine, Mina's olives are instead stored dry, giving them a wrinkly texture. When I took a bite, I quickly realized that these olives are actually rich and fatty, with a meatiness and texture that is somehow pleasantly soft. 

The flavor of these black olives is more complex and concentrated than any of the others I tried. They're not just briny; they're deeply earthy and even nutty, with a lusciousness that makes you feel like you're eating something special. And because these olives aren't pitted, unlike all of the other varieties I tried for this ranking, I think they're more appropriate for eating whole rather than incorporating into recipes (although you can certainly do that if you don't mind pitting olives yourself). If you can find this olive brand at your local grocery store and you want to up your black olive game, it's definitely worth checking out.

I picked all of the black olive brands I could find at two local grocery stores: Star Market and Stop & Shop. I tried all of the olives at the same time, and when I tasted them, I paid close attention to both flavor and texture. I ranked varieties that felt meatier and more substantial higher on the list, while mushy or jelly-like varieties fell to the bottom. The best-ranked brand of the bunch was also quite rich and fatty and had a more pleasant texture. 

I also considered flavor, preferring more complex, more concentrated flavors to milder and less salty ones. Black olives that had bitter or metallic flavors generally fell toward the bottom of the list.