12 Best Selling Soft Drinks in the World

If you like soft drinks you would surely be interested in our list of 12 best selling soft drinks in the world. You might be a great fan of Pepsi and that’s what you see on TV adverts all day, but you would be surprised to know that Pepsi is not the top selling soft drink in the world. It is there in the list but doesn’t hold the top spot. Now when we talk about the best selling soft drinks in the world, the research is not an easy one, primarily because the unit price of all the popular soft drinks differ (not by a large difference but they do). So, simply stating their sales revenue would not give us the correct estimate of the best selling soft drinks in the world.

What we have done is we have selected a couple of criteria, which we think are the most suitable for creating a list of 12 best selling soft drinks in the world. The first one is the market share that each soft drink captures and the second one is the value of the soft drinks. Market share can be defined as the percentage of the total soft drink market captured by any particular soft drink (this is analyzed in great detail by the Beverage Digest). Similarly, the value of the soft drink refers to how much consumers want a particular product, and in our case it is soft drinks. One of the methods of calculating the value of any brand or product is through “the blind analysis.” Consumers are called to check and taste a number of products; they are not told the name of the product but are asked to decide which one of the products they would favor over the other. In the latest blind analysis, the majority of the people chose Coke over Pepsi. We have used Statista’s ranking of the world’s most valuable soft drinks as our resource in this case.

Before we continue, it is important to define what soft drinks are. Soft drinks are simple artificial drinks that are made from sugar, water, flavors & artificial sweeteners. Soft drinks also include, ready to drink tea & coffee, juice, energy drinks, etc. Some of the drinks in the list are extremely sugary and if you want to know more about those check out our post on the 17 most sugary drinks in the world.

Insider Monkey has picked the top-performing names in both the categories and then averaged out the result to conclude the unique ranking. So, let’s go down to numbers and discover which soft drink is at number 12 on our list of 12 best selling soft drinks in the world.

12. Diet Mountain Dew

Average Ranking: 9

There are many that do not favor the color of the drink, but you can’t deny the fact. Diet Mountain Dew is top selling soft drinks in the world as it occupies the 9% of the total market share.

11. Nespresso

Average Ranking: 9

If you’re a coffee lover you would be delighted to see Nespresso in our list. The drink is 9^th most valuable drink available in the market and thus makes it to number 11.

10. Mountain Dew

Average Ranking: 9

With some great marketing strategies, Mountain Dew is the 4^th in the list when it comes to market share and also amongst the top 15 of the most valuable soft drinks in the world.

9. Dr. Pepper

Average Ranking: 9

Dr. Pepper is an American company which is headquartered in Plano, Texas. The brand might not be world’s most popular drink, but it is really famous in America and some other parts of the world.

8. Fanta

Average Ranking: 7.5

There is hardly anyone who doesn’t like the strong and sweet taste of Fanta. It is amongst the top 10 in both our categories.

7. Sprite

Average Ranking: 7

Sprite has the 6^th biggest market share in soft drink world and is also considered the 8^th most valuable soft drink of the world. Sprite is also known for its great marketing campaigns.

6. Tropicana

Average Ranking: 6

When it comes to juices, nothing can beat Tropicana. Sold in almost every part of the world, Tropicana is the 6^th most valuable soft drinks in the world.

5. Nescafe

Average Ranking: 5

Another coffee brand in our list, Nescafe is renowned for its amazing taste and quality. It is owned by the world’s biggest food brand Nestle and backed up by some coolest adverts.

4. Red Bull

Average Ranking: 3

“Red Bull gives you wings” is so popular line that it has infiltrated our daily language. Red Bull is all about great, strong taste and innovative marketing ideas. The soft drink falls in the category of energy drinks and is the 3^rd most valuable soft drinks in the world.

3. Pepsi

Average Ranking: 3

Probably the world’s most talks about soft drinks, Pepsi is third on our list mainly because it is amongst the top 4 in both categories.

2. Diet Coke

Average Ranking: 2.5

According to Time, team Obama’s favorite drink is Diet Coke and there must be a reason behind it. Besides a great taste, it is the 2^nd most valuable soft drink in the world and also the 3^rd biggest when it comes to market share.

1. Coke

Average Ranking: 1

Topping our list of 12 best selling soft drinks in the world is Coke. It beats Pepsi but some margin as it enjoys a 17.6% market share.