5 Subs To Order At Subway And 5 You Might Want To Skip
Subway is one of the biggest fast-food chains in the world, so there's a good chance that the company has a few locations in your area. For many, the chain's freshly-made sandwiches offer preferable alternatives to the greasy cheeseburgers and salty french fries that tend to dominate the fast-food scene. The company has over a dozen classic subs to pick from, in addition to its Subway Series line of sandwiches. Considering there are so many subs to pick from, you might find yourself feeling a bit indecisive when it's time to order. The good news is that we're here to steer you in the right direction.
We've compiled a list here based on our experiences and preferences, the general consensus of other reviews, and recurring customer social media comments. Combined with other matters like nutritional value and potential health concerns regarding ingredients, we've created some recommendations worth considering when hunger strikes. Here are five subs to order at Subway and five you might want to skip.
Order: Elite Chicken Bacon Ranch
There's something extra delicious about the combination of chicken, bacon, and ranch. There's no doubt that the blend of smoky bacon paired with tender slices of chicken drizzled in creamy ranch dressing is highly flavorful and satisfying. These same ingredients are often used in salads, wraps, and sandwiches in countless restaurants across the country. Subway capitalizes on this popular flavor combo with its Elite Chicken Bacon Ranch sub, which comes with rotisserie-style chicken, hickory-smoked bacon, peppercorn ranch, extra Monterey cheddar cheese, shredded lettuce, sliced tomatoes, and red onions.
The beauty of this sub is that it's so good it doesn't need any customizing, which makes the ordering process extra easy. The tomatoes add a touch of fruity sweetness to the smoky and salty bacon, and the lettuce adds some refreshing crunch. The red onions give a subtle but pleasant pungency that complements the roasted chicken, and the melted cheese and ranch dressing tie everything together in savory harmony. This sub comes toasted, making the bread and the bacon crispy and heating the cheese so it melts onto the meat. If you're at Subway and in the mood for a hearty sub that's filling and delicious, it's hard to beat the Chicken Bacon Ranch sub.
Skip: Tuna
After a lawsuit was filed questioning the ingredients in Subway's tuna salad, suspicion and speculation have been building for years. In July of 2023, the lawsuit was dismissed by a district judge. In response to the controversy and increased scrutiny, Subway launched a website to provide consumers with facts and information about its tuna. Subway reports that it uses high-quality wild-caught tuna.
That said, we're still not biting into one of the company's tuna subs anytime soon. This mostly comes down to preference — tuna salad is typically easy and affordable to make from scratch, making it hard to justify buying it for lunch elsewhere. It also doesn't help that, according to a video that surfaced on Reddit, Subway's tuna salad is made with a large amount of mayo.
But even beyond the amount of mayo, tuna is still something that we try not to eat in mass quantities due to its mercury content. The good news is that Subway uses skipjack tuna, which tends to have much less mercury than white albacore. The Environmental Defense Fund reports that it's safe for adults to eat canned light skipjack tuna once a week, so it's best to keep your portion size in mind.
Order: All-American Club
A classic club sandwich is a well-rounded lunch option offered at Subway. Typically made with ham, turkey, and bacon, club sandwiches offer a spectrum of lunch meat flavors. Subway's All-American Club version stays within the confines of tradition, and offers the expected trio of meats along with lettuce, tomato, red onions, and mayo. The All-American Club comes toasted with double American cheese, creating a gooey layer that fuses into the sandwich.
Club sandwiches tend to come prepared triple-decker style on sliced white bread or sourdough, but the hoagies at Subway offer a more convenient kind of vessel. As much as we love club sandwiches, we've all had them fall apart on us before, watching in helpless disappointment as the bread and meat dislodge into chaos. The beauty of Subway's All-American Club is that the hoagie houses everything together in one piece, which makes it easier to eat than a few different slices of bread pinned together by a few toothpicks.
Skip: Roast Beef
Let it be known that despite our recommendation is to skip the roast beef sandwich at Subway. While we happen to enjoy roast beef at other sandwich shops, what we take into account is the overall quality of the roast beef. Roast beef is best when it's still tender and juicy after being cooked — with a touch of pink in the middle — and then sliced thin. Subway's roast beef is basically the polar opposite of that. It's cooked through until it's well-browned and it's often sliced a bit too thick for our liking.
Between its level of doneness and general texture, we find Subway's roast beef to be a little too chewy. For these reasons, we think this sub is worth skipping. Of course, you could always try and balance out the potential chewy dryness with some extra cheese and condiments, but in our opinion, this is a lost cause. There are better options on the menu to enjoy here, so it's better to aim for those instead.
Order: The Champ
The Champ is featured on the Subway Series menu and contains rotisserie chicken, a double portion of Monterey cheddar cheese, green peppers, red onions, and peppercorn ranch dressing. It's somewhat similar to Subway's Chicken Bacon Ranch sub, but there's a few noticeable differences. Since bacon is rather salty and assertive, the absence of bacon in this sandwich allows the flavor of the chicken to shine though more.
When it comes to veggies, this sub only comes with onions and peppers. Once again, the lack of other ingredients, such as lettuce and tomato, puts more focus on the meat in this sub. This option can also be compared to a chicken Philly sandwich, since it only includes chicken, cheese, onions, and peppers. The addition of ranch gives the sandwich a creamy twist that works in harmony with every ingredient. If you're in the mood for a filling, creamy chicken sandwich that's simple but delicious, The Champ is a good call.
Skip: Meatball Marinara
There are a lot of factors at play when it comes to judging a meatball sub. Of course, the quality, taste, and amount of meatballs and marinara are the most crucial. However, the bread is also important, considering that the meatball subs can easily fall apart without enough structural integrity. To be clear, we're not expecting Subway to contend with mom and pop shops that make their meatballs and sauce from scratch. But we definitely wish the meatballs at Subway were a little less salty. To put it frankly, they have a processed taste that's kind of hard to get past.
Even beyond the taste of the meatballs, this sandwich feels extra messy. Granted, meatball subs aren't exactly the tidiest of sandwiches, but for some reason Subway's meatball subs seem extra precarious to eat. The sub gets overfilled by the meatballs, which can lead to some awkward, sloppy fumbling. This sub also packs quite the punch, with a full sub racking up nearly 900 calories. Adding some cheese and other ingredients could easily tip this puppy well over 1,000 calories, which is about half of what's recommended for an entire day. All things considered, we're not convinced this sub is really worth it.
Order: Steak & Cheese
We're of the mind that Philly cheese steaks are one of our favorite sandwich options. Even subpar cheese steaks can be a satisfying delight. In the same way that any pizza hits the spot, cheese steaks are typically somewhat enjoyable even in its most basic form. Subway's Steak & Cheese is one of the most satisfying sandwiches on the chain's menu, because the combination of steak and cheese is balanced and delicious.
Is Subway's Steak & Cheese good compared to other cheese steaks at better sandwich shops with higher quality ingredients? Absolutely not. But working within the parameters of Subway's menu, this is one of the better sandwiches available. The only downfall here is that the cheese isn't chopped and mixed in with the meat. Instead, the cheese is draped over the sandwich and melted in the toaster.
This may seem like a trivial detail, but cheese steaks are much better when the cheese is melted and evenly distributed through the meat, rather than only melted on top. Subway's Steak & Cheese sub would be better if the company cooked them fresh on a griddle instead and mixed the cheese into the beef. That said, this sub is still tasty and you also might be surprised to learn that this has fewer calories than the meatball sub.
Skip: Turkey Cali Club
Subway's Turkey Cali Club is well-intentioned, but under-delivers. The combination of turkey, bacon, mozzarella, and avocado seems promising, but one of the ingredients here can be a bit disappointing. The mashed avocado seems to vary based on region. Some stores carry whole avocados that are sliced in-house, others have pre-mashed avocado that comes in frozen bags, and a few occasionally carry an avocado purée that's more paste-like.
As you can imagine, there's a big difference in texture between all of these options, which can lead to variations of quality in Subway's Turkey Cali Club. Basically, ordering mashed avocado at Subway is like a roll of the dice, since stores might carry different versions of it. If you have preferences over this kind of thing, you might want to ask your local sandwich artist about the store's mashed avocado situation.
Another thing to consider is the fact that this sub clocks in at over 1,200 calories, making it one of the heaviest sandwiches on the menu — even heavier than the Meatball Marinara sub and the Cheese Steak sub. At the end of the day, you can easily score a tastier and healthier sandwich option at Subway.
Order: Black Forest Ham
It's difficult to go wrong with the humble ham sandwich. For those who like to keep it simple once in a while, almost nothing else will suffice. There's something undeniably delicious about ham's sweet and savory smokiness. Subway's Black Forest Ham sub comes on hearty multigrain bread with lettuce, spinach, tomatoes, cucumbers, green peppers, and onions. As it stands without any customizations, the six-inch version of this sub is only about 330 calories, which is considerably less than many other subs on this list.
That said, we like to add provolone cheese to this and get it toasted. The ham's flavor tends to deepen when it gets heated up, and the provolone cheese adds some melted creaminess to the mix. As far as condiments go, we'd recommend mayo or mustard. For a simple sub that's dependably tasty, Subway's Black Forest Ham is always a safe bet.
Skip: All-Pro Sweet Onion Teriyaki
We're always open to new fusions and flavor combinations, but Subway's All-Pro Sweet Onion Teriyaki sub just doesn't hit the mark for us. The company's teriyaki sauce slathered on its bread ends up tasting overly sweet, which is a bit weird for a sandwich. Call us old-fashioned, but we'd much rather have teriyaki chicken over a bowl of steamed white rice. Alas, rice bowls aren't exactly Subway's forte.
There's also the fact that this sub comes with a hefty smothering of melted American cheese. We definitely dig melted American cheese in the right context — on a grilled cheese or melted over a smash burger – but mixing it with teriyaki sauce almost feels obscene. The flavors in this sub are just outright bonkers, and we feel like Subway should come up with a better concept than this. If the company wants to try something bold, why not roll out something more exciting like a fried chicken tender sub with a barbecue sauce and melted cheddar? That would make a lot more sense than this. As far as chicken subs at Subway go, this one is bottom of the barrel.