Fast food in Belgium: local heroes gain ground, while global chains gain momentum among loyal consumers
Fast food remains a deeply embedded part of Belgian consumption habits.
Between 2024 and 2025, millions of visits were spread across international fast food chains — such as McDonald’s, Burger King and KFC — and a dense network of locally rooted players, each competing for share and loyalty.
Using Accurat’s AI-powered market research, we analysed fast food visits across Belgium over time, looking at both all fast food consumers and a purpose-built customer segment of fast food lovers. This segment was created by Accurat to identify regular fast food consumers, defined as people who visit a fast food restaurant at least once per month.
By combining a total market view with this dedicated behavioural segment, the analysis makes it possible to distinguish between overall market dynamics and developments within the most engaged part of the market.
A key methodological differentiator is that thousands of independent local chip shops are grouped into a single store group. Together with Belgian-rooted chains such as Quick and Belchicken, this allows us to analyse the collective performance of local heroes alongside international players — something that is not visible in traditional brand-by-brand analysis.
Local heroes gain share overall, international chains lose ground
At total market level, international fast food chains still account for the majority of visits in Belgium. Over time, however, their combined visit share shows a gradual decline.
At the same time, local heroes — consisting of local chip shops, Quick and Belchicken — steadily increase their share of visits. This underlines the continued importance of locally anchored fast food concepts within Belgian consumption patterns.
Rather than a sudden shift, the data points to a structural and incremental change, where locally rooted players collectively gain relevance in the overall market.
Fast food competition in Belgium is not only about international brand presence. When you group local chip shops together with Belgian chains like Quick and Belchicken, you see how strong local players remain at market level.
Fast food lovers show a different dynamic
When focusing on fast food lovers, the picture changes — not in absolute levels, but in direction of change.
Within this highly engaged audience, international chains gain share over time.
Local heroes, by contrast, see their share gradually decline among fast food lovers, even as they gain ground in the total market.
This contrast highlights a key structural difference: growth for local heroes is driven primarily by the wider, less frequent consumer base, while international chains increasingly strengthen their position among the most regular fast food consumers.
Brands: scale versus local relevance
At brand level, McDonald’s remains the single largest fast food player in Belgium, both in overall visits and among fast food lovers.
Among Belgian-rooted chains, Quick continues to play a central role, while Belchicken remains a clearly recognisable local alternative within the competitive landscape.
What stands out structurally is the collective weight of local chip shops. When grouped together, they rival the largest international brands in visit share — a reality that would remain hidden if each independent location were analysed in isolation.
Other international fast food concepts account for smaller individual shares, but together contribute to the diversity of the Belgian fast food market.
Visit frequency in 2025: differences at brand level
Looking specifically at visit frequency in 2025, clear differences emerge between individual fast food brands.
McDonald’s and Quick stand out as the brands with the highest average visit frequency per visitor, indicating a stronger concentration of repeat visits at brand level.
Local chip shops, analysed at individual location level, follow closely behind, ranking among the brands with relatively frequent repeat visits despite their fragmented and independent structure.
Other brands show more moderate frequency levels, reflecting a mix of repeat and more occasional visits.
Overall, these differences illustrate that visit share and visit frequency are not the same: some players build strength through repeated visits, while others rely more on broad reach across many consumers.
What this tells us about fast food competition in Belgium
Three structural insights stand out:
- Local heroes gain share in the total fast food market, driven by broad consumer reach
- International chains gain momentum within the fast food lover segment, despite losing ground overall
- Behavioural segmentation and smart grouping are essential to understand how market dynamics differ across audiences
By grouping thousands of independent chip shops into a single store group and analysing a purpose-built segment of fast food lovers, this study shows how AI-powered behavioural insight reveals competitive dynamics that brand rankings alone cannot capture.