Love Arizona Iced Tea? Here's How 24 Flavors Stack Up After More Than 3 Decades

As inflation hikes the price of seemingly everything at the grocery store skyward, one thing has remained 99 cents for over three decades: big cans of Arizona iced tea and fruit drinks. "I’m committed to that 99-cent price," Don Vultaggio, Arizona's founder, told the Los Angeles Times. "Consumers don’t need another price increase from a guy like me."

But how do the dozens of Arizona iced tea flavors hold up, decades after the first cans rolled out in 1992? I got my hands on 24 of the big 23-ounce cans — they're only 80 cents at my grocery store! — and tasted them all side by side. What I found was that I had moved on from the familiar flavors of my childhood to some new and interesting favorites.

Related: Best Teas for People Who Don't Drink Tea

Arizona has a carbonated drink? Who knew! That alone didn't rocket this one to the top of the list, but it sure helped. Those little bubbles add an extra layer of refreshment on top of a tart, brisk, fruity base. Imagine ordering a Sonic cherry limeade on the hottest day of the summer — but this one's only $1, way cheaper than even happy hour prices. It's got 10% juice, which explains the legit lime and cherry flavors, plus look at that gorgeous can! Can someone pass the gin?

Related: I Tried 9 Spindrift Sparkling Water Flavors, and These Were the Best (And Worst)

This is the no-frills, slightly sweetened iced tea I've been looking for my entire adult life, and I had no idea Arizona made something like this. It's made with cane sugar and honey — no artificial sweeteners or high fructose corn syrup, either. The simple list of ingredients lets the earthy, complex tea flavor shine through. It tastes more like a tea brewed from actual leaves than one made from a powder, which is what some of my old Arizona favorites resemble. If you're looking for a lower calorie drink (110 calories in the entire can) but aren't into unsweetened tea or seltzers, this one's for you, too.

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This is the platonic ideal of fruit punch, at least if you're not a 6-year-old who's really into Kool-Aid. It won't transport you to some remote beach in Fiji, but its vaguely tropical flavor will take you back to that really rad waterpark you visited on family vacations sometimes. There's actual fruit juice in it — 10% to be exact! The fruit juice and puree comes from six different fruits! It's all very exciting when you're drinking it! 

The fact that this one has mango puree as an ingredient bodes well, but it somehow tastes more like mango candy than anything that came from a tree. In fact, it's like drinking a bag of those creamy mango gummy candies from Trader Joe's, which isn't exactly a bad thing. The tea portion of the drink is practically non-existent (which is the norm with these fruit teas, I'll come to find out), but it does dull the mango, which is necessary.

Poor Orangeade is having an identity crisis. I imagined it'd be like the neon McDonald's orange drink served out of those big red and yellow coolers that had never seen a real orange, but it's more like the little cans of Donald Duck orange juice I hated as a kid. There's 10% juice in here, but it tastes like an unripe orange. Don't try to be something you're not, Orangeade. Pass.

I normally hate peach-flavored things because they taste how stinky feet smell, but I don't hate this! The "natural peach flavor" doesn't taste like peach candy, thankfully, and it lends a light, refreshing quality to the tea. 

They should rename this one to Mangoade, because it just has a gentle, watered down mango flavor that you'd expect from an -ade. Somehow, it tastes even less mangoey than the half and half mango tea. If you must get mango, grab that can instead.

Oh no, the diets! Let's just get this out of the way: Every diet version of these drinks suffers from the same sickly sweet aftertaste that fake sugar lends to everything it touches, and I hate it. That said, this version of peach tea tastes more like peach than the non-diet version, probably because it's made with "peach juice from concentrate" as opposed to just peach flavor. If you can handle loads of sucralose, this is the peach option you want.

The aftertaste of Kiwi Strawberry tastes like crappy strawberry candy, which is the best part about it, unfortunately. It's kind of stinky when you crack it open. It's just weird, except for the can, which is pretty in that "my aunt from Tucson loves macramé" kind of way.

This tastes like if iced tea and piña colada had a baby, which is extra weird considering there aren't any coconut ingredients listed. What there is, though, are pear and pineapple juice and guava puree, lending this a real 60s Hawaii luau vibe, and I'm totally here for it. As usual, the tea flavor is an afterthought — unlike those hot tropical colors on the can. A splash of rum couldn't hurt.

Grape is the best of the "it doesn't actually taste like the fruit it's named after" drinks, otherwise known as -ades. It tastes like childhood, not fruit, and that's perfect. It includes pear and red grape juices, but who cares? Grab a package of Red Vines and a can of Grapeade and you're all set for your next "Goonies" movie night.

I know the can says Watermelon, but I'm not sure I believe it. Give me a glass of this and tell me it's fruit punch, and I'd agree. The ingredient label supports this assumption, too: It lists pear, mango, pineapple, kiwi, and then finally watermelon last. It's not bad, it's just really confusing, and it seems totally unnecessary.

This is the OG Arizona tea. Just look at that iconic can! People love it so much that you can buy puffer jackets and sports bras with the seafoam and pink cherry blossom design. It's the gold standard of adult iced tea choices, and it's really easy to drink by the gallon because it's light, smooth, and refreshing. The 23-ounce can has 200 calories from high fructose corn syrup and honey, though the honey flavor shines. It's simple and as timeless as a drink can be.

On the other hand, what the hell is this, Arizona? I know cucumber drinks have been trendy, but this is just not it. The scent that wafts up immediately after opening is off-putting at best. It tastes like the air inside a Bath & Body Works if all they sold was cucumber melon body spray. Stick with cucumber slices in ice water.

I'm not sure what I was expecting from this one, but I was still pleasantly surprised by cranberry tea. The cranberry juice lends a teeny bit of bitterness that plays really well with the black tea. It's very reminiscent of a really good cranberry mixer, so you can bet it'd be great with a splash of vodka.

So we've come to the golf legend portion of the tasting: the Arnold Palmers. This one, with strawberries, is the best of the bunch, and it's leaps and bounds better than the Strawberry Kiwi, too. The strawberry flavor is right up front and in your face, and that's great because it comes from actual strawberry puree. It's a "lite" version, so it's got HFCS and sucralose, but the fake sweetener taste is masked by the strawberry. You'll notice I haven't mentioned lemon in this Arnold Palmer, and that's because there's hardly any, but I don't care because it's delicious anyway.

This is the only Arnold Palmer that doesn't include sucralose, so it's 280 calories per can. It's probably not worth all those calories, though. Not that it's bad — the lemon flavor is believable, and it's a pretty color when you pour it. But it's just nothing to write home about, especially since the "tea" part is an afterthought, as usual with Arizona's tea + whatever mixes. It's aggressively fine.

I don't like Southern sweet tea, so I was expecting to hate this. Instead, it wasn't nearly as sweet as I was expecting. My partner, who lived in South Carolina for decades, vehemently decried this as an imposter to Southern sweet tea. It's also bland without much tea flavor, and not nearly as complex as my favorite Black & White tea. 

Ah, the iced tea of my childhood. Revisiting it now with a critical tongue didn't do any favors for my nostalgia. To its credit, it has very few ingredients, but actual lemon juice isn't one of them, only "natural lemon flavor." It's also very sweet, and I swear it tastes better in those long-necked glass bottles than cans. I won't turn this one down, but if I have a wall of Arizona flavors to choose from, I'll go for many others first. That's growing old for you.

If, for some reason, you don't like strawberries, this Arnold Palmer is your next best bet. Because it's got HFCS and sucralose, it doesn't taste fake sugary. It tastes more like real, actual lemons than the lemon iced tea, but with this one you get much less tea flavor. You decide whether that's a bug or a feature.

For whatever reason, this one is named after Jack Nicklaus, another famous golfer with the nickname Golden Bear. I didn't even notice the little "strawberry" above the name until I opened it, and then I was walloped with a ton of strawberry flavor. Technically it's a lemonade, and I wish it had more citrus tang and flavor, but it's far from bad. Just don't tell Jack that Arnold's strawberry version is better.

Did someone dissolve a bunch of raspberry hard candies in my iced tea? No, it's just Arizona's raspberry iced tea. You really have to be in the mood for this one, but when you are, nothing can top that cloying sweetness and whisper of tea flavor. I used to drink it as a teenager, thinking I was all sophisticated, but really it's just liquid candy.

This is bad. It tastes like Lemonheads that you fell asleep with in your mouth. Sure, it's only 15 calories, but you really don't want to do this to yourself. 

Notice that the "and Honey" is missing from the name of this version of green tea, because there's no sugar allowed. Turns out that the honey is pretty important to the flavor of the green tea, because this one falls well short of its sugar-filled partner. At least it's better than diet Arnold Palmer? Beautiful can, though.