Mixue Ice Cream & Tea

In recent years, several aggressively expanding discount cafe chains from China have been opening their first U.S. locations in New York City and Southern California, hoping to multiply beyond their roots in areas with significant Asian populations. While mega-franchisors Cotti Coffee (10,000 stores) and Luckin Coffee (26,000 stores) have been this fad’s poster children, Mixue Ice Cream & Tea dwarfs them: Now boasting nearly 60,000 locations spread across 20 markets, Mixue spent its first decade in obscurity before adopting an aggressive discounting and franchising model, selling soft serve ice cream for the Chinese yuan equivalent of 13 cents, then stacking up tens of thousands of locations – enough to become “the world’s largest food service chain by number of stores” – in under 20 years.

After opening nearly three New York City stores and a Hollywood location in Los Angeles, Mixue soft-launched its first Orange County store in Irvine between May and June 2026. The menu isn’t identical in either specific items or prices to locations we’ve visited in Asia, but close enough to stand out locally: Soft serve ice cream cones go for $1.19 (vanilla) to $1.69 (cocoa or matcha), lightly topped “sundaes” from $3.49 to $3.99, and drinks (fruit tea, milk tea, coffee, cocoa, lemonade, or orange punch) from $1.99 to $4.99; most drinks are $3.99 to $4.99, with only basic jasmine, black, or oolong tea at the lowest price, and milk-free dark roast coffee for $2.49.

Guests can also add four additional toppings (taro balls, coconut jelly, boba pearls, or pudding) for 49 cents each, choose less or regular ice, and select sugar levels from 0% to 200%; sundae flavors can be “upgraded” for 99 cents more. As discount tea and ice cream places go, Mixue is even more aggressively priced than Taiwanese chain ALittle Tea (aka 50 Lan), which starts drinks at $4 but generally includes any chosen toppings at no charge.

Unfortunately, the caveat with Mixue is that all of the drinks and ice cream items we tried fell short of the “fine to pretty good” standard set by ALittle Tea. Opinions amongst our small group ranged from “sucks” to “meh” depending on the item, with everyone agreeing that the price savings at Mixue was not enough to compensate for the weak flavors and unimpressive execution of what we’d ordered.