Chain restaurants across the U.S. are still dealing with higher labor, food, and operating costs in 2024 and 2025, according to earnings reports from major dining brands. At Applebee’s, public customer reviews and complaint posts show some diners saying those pressures are showing up in the meal, the check, and the overall visit.
Reviews point to recurring complaints at Applebee’s
Applebee’s operates roughly 1,500 restaurants in the United States and internationally, according to parent company Dine Brands Global. Across recent public reviews on Google, Yelp, Tripadvisor, and Better Business Bureau complaint pages, customers repeatedly mentioned slow service, cold food, and orders arriving incorrectly during 2024 and 2025.
Those complaints are not tied to one officially confirmed nationwide incident. Instead, they reflect repeated local experiences posted store by store, with customers naming specific Applebee’s locations in states including Florida, Texas, California, and Ohio. In many of those reviews, diners said wait times stretched past 30 minutes or that food arrived below expectations for items like steaks, burgers, and appetizers.
Dine Brands has not released a nationwide count of complaints by issue type. The public record also does not show one single date when these concerns began, but review patterns posted throughout 2024 show the same three themes appearing often: service speed, food consistency, and value for the price paid.
Local experiences vary, and no full national breakdown is public
Because Applebee’s is heavily franchised, the customer experience can vary by operator and location. Dine Brands has said in company materials that the vast majority of Applebee’s restaurants are franchise-owned, which means staffing levels, day-to-day management, and training can differ from one market to the next.
That local structure helps explain why one restaurant in Missouri may receive strong recent ratings while another in Arizona draws repeated criticism in the same month. Public review platforms show this split clearly, but Applebee’s has not published a comprehensive state-by-state list of locations with the highest complaint volume or the most frequent service issues.
What is confirmed is that negative feedback is often highly specific. Customers commonly cite exact visit dates, named servers, and menu items, which makes many of the complaints more detailed than a broad social media post. What is not confirmed is whether those reviews represent systemwide conditions across all Applebee’s restaurants.
Cost pressure and traffic trends help explain the backlash
Restaurant companies have repeatedly pointed to inflation and consumer price sensitivity as major issues since 2022. Dine Brands executives said on earnings calls in 2024 that Applebee’s has been working to improve value messaging as diners remain careful with discretionary spending, especially at casual dining chains.
That matters because customers often compare today’s check to what they paid a few years ago. In public reviews posted in 2024, some Applebee’s diners said promotions were less compelling than expected or that the meal did not match the final bill. Those comments line up with a broader industry push to offer sharper deals as guest traffic softens.
For customers, the practical takeaway is simple. Applebee’s remains a large national chain with many franchise-run locations, but the experience can differ significantly from one restaurant to the next, and the company has continued emphasizing value offers in its public messaging through 2024 and 2025.
