by Sam Stalley, Senior Research Consultant
July 2026
For Quick Service Restaurants, breakfast has become a key source of growth as brands compete in an increasingly crowded market. Across 22 brands where orders are tracked in detail by Fonto, breakfast incidence has climbed from less than 5% to greater than 8% in the last 12 months alone.
For a long time, McDonald’s and Hungry Jack’s owned the breakfast timeslot in QSR, as competitors either focused elsewhere for growth or struggled to get their operating platforms to fit breakfast menus and timeslots. Restaurant by restaurant, Australian brands have targeted the breakfast timeslot as new entrants, aggressive store opening targets and a saturated market have forced them to search harder for sales growth.
Guzman Y Gomez’s (GYG) foray into breakfast was well publicised, with its breakfast menu growing by almost 20% during 2025, representing 7% of total sales for that financial year.
More recently, restaurants where it would have seemed quite contradictory to launch breakfast menus have been lining up to take their offering to Australian consumers. Notably, KFC, which has long held 2nd place in market share for QSR brands despite not having a breakfast offering, announced its intentions this week to expand its breakfast offer which will be watched closely by both customers and investors alike.
The breakfast customer
Fonto's tracking of more than 50,000 purchase occasions over the last 12 months shows that the breakfast customer defies the "young, on-the-go" stereotype, in fact skewing older and male. The 50+ age group represent more than 60% of breakfast share alone, and even more in Queensland and South Australia.
Traditionally, it's a solo, routine occasion where the need is shifting from speed or service toward craveability of the meal. This is a key factor in drawing new customers to the timeslot and factors into menu and operational considerations.
Additionally, breakfast timeslots are no longer just about a hot coffee as some might imagine; 80% of occasions include food, with hash browns and breakfast rolls leading the way.
The secret sauce, so to speak? If able to solve for the operational challenges that come with a breakfast menu, having a menu that customer crave is now more important than making their breakfast stop cheap and easy.
About Moments in QSR
Fonto’s Moments in QSR monitors daily transactions from its members and directly surveys them after purchase to understand customer satisfaction and the overall customer experience with every major brand in the Australian QSR market.
For more information on how to access the data, reach out to the team.
