• I compared chicken nuggets from Chick-fil-A, KFC, Burger King, Wendy’s, McDonald’s, and Taco Bell.
• Chick-fil-A and KFC’s nuggets were similarly sized but had distinctly different textures.
• Taco Bell’s crispy chicken nuggets stood out for their crunch and innovative sauce flavors.

Before the chicken tender became the hottest fast-food must-have, there was the humble and hearty chicken nugget.

Its small size made it the perfect side dish, post-work snack, or, as millennials will recall, the perfect drunchie (drunk munchie).

One way fast-food brands are attempting to capitalize on chicken’s popularity, especially among Gen Z diners, is by adding — or upgrading — chicken nuggets on their menus.

Most recently, on September 1, Burger King released an updated version of its classic chicken nugget in response to customer feedback that its originals were “rubbery,” “dry,” and “disappointing.” The same day also saw the return of McDonald’s Spicy Chicken McNuggets, which will be available for a limited time.

Here’s how six fast-food chain chicken nuggets ranked, from worst to best.

My least favorite nuggets came from Wendy’s.

Cost: $7.49 — excluding tax and tip — for a 10-piece serving at a Wendy’s in New York City.

All prices listed here may vary in different markets.

The chicken nugget was crispy, but instead of being juicy, the chicken tasted a little chewy.

Like Burger King and McDonald’s, Wendy’s is primarily a burger chain. So, it should come as no surprise that its chicken nuggets are pretty unremarkable, in my opinion.

They were decently seasoned, and the breading had a lot of flavor, but they were also pretty small. Wendy’s nuggets definitely act more as a side dish than a reason to go to the chain.

KFC’s nuggets were a little bare-bones.

Cost: $7.31 — excluding tax and tip — for a 10-piece serving at a KFC in New York City.

KFC’s nuggets were the least breaded out of the ones I tried.

They were a little bland, but I thought the chicken itself tasted higher quality than the nuggets from Wendy’s, Burger King, and McDonald’s. It was more shreddable and paired well with the chain’s comeback sauce, but I would have liked more breading to give it that crunch.

I’d probably recommend the chain’s chicken tenders or fried chicken over its nuggets.

McDonald’s nuggets were a classic.

Cost: $2.39 — excluding tax and tip — for a four-piece serving at a McDonald’s in New York City, or $5.79 for a 10-piece serving.

The nuggets from McDonald’s were predictably good.

McDonald’s chicken nuggets are the stuff of legend. They’ve been around since the early ’80s, and there’s something about the tempura-style fried chicken nuggets that keeps me coming back for more.

They’re always crispy, always salty, and always consistent — I know what to expect with a McDonald’s nugget. That being said, I thought they were a touch too salty.

Burger King recently upgraded its chicken nuggets.

Cost: $5.19 — excluding tax and tip — for a 10-piece at a Burger King in New York City.

The nuggets were crispy and paired well with the chain’s sauces.

Released September 1, the new chicken nuggets are crispier than the original nuggets, and were updated to include a more flavorful marinade and new packaging, Burger King said.

I thought the nuggets had just the right amount of crunch and flavor, and held their own as a stand-alone entrée on the Burger King menu.

While they were very similar to McDonald’s nuggets, they were slightly cheaper, giving them the edge.

Chick-fil-A

Cost: $9.19 — excluding tax and tip — for an eight-piece serving at a local Chick-fil-A in New York City.

The nuggets were flavorful and juicy, with just the right amount of seasoning in the breading.

While some of the other nuggets leaned on the drier side, these nuggets were moist and would likely pair well with practically any dipping sauce.

Each nugget was on the smaller side — despite being the most expensive of the ones I tried — but packed a lot of flavor into a small bite.

Taco Bell’s nuggets may not be on menus right now, but they were my favorite.

Cost: $3.99 — excluding tax and tip — for a five-piece order and one dipping sauce. However, I was invited to taste the chicken nuggets at an early preview hosted by Taco Bell in New York City in December 2025, and I received complimentary samples.

The exterior felt hard. However, when I bit in, the chicken was extremely juicy and flavorful.

These chicken nuggets, coated in a blend of breadcrumbs and crunchy tortilla chips, stood out from the competition with their well-balanced flavor.

They were salty, with a subtle corn taste from the tortilla-chip breading. They reminded me more of a boneless wing than a chicken nugget.

Paired with the chain’s Hidden Valley fire ranch sauce, a standard creamy ranch sauce with a slight hint of heat, and jalapeño honey mustard, an unusual combination of tangy mustard and strong yet balanced jalapeño flavor, these nuggets blew me away.

The nuggets were initially rolled out as a limited-time offering, but Taco Bell continued to bring them back in 2025 and 2026 as it expanded its crispy-chicken menu.

Here’s hoping they’ll be back again soon.

• Media industry insiders have criticized ESPN’s reporting on the LA Clippers scandal.
• ESPN’s soft framing of the investigation was widely seen as contradicting that of Pulitzer winner Pablo Torre.
• The NBA’s harsh ruling created a PR fiasco for ESPN, though the outlet hasn’t issued any corrections.

The NBA’s landmark ruling against the Los Angeles Clippers for salary cap circumvention is causing a PR headache for the Worldwide Leader in Sports.

ESPN has drawn widespread criticism from media industry insiders for its coverage of the Clippers’ salary cap scandal.

ESPN’s reporting included an August 17 story that cited three unnamed sources who said the NBA had “no evidence” that Clippers owner Steve Ballmer funneled money through team sponsors to pay Kawhi Leonard. The story also quoted an anonymous source who said an argument that sponsorship introductions amounted to salary-cap circumvention would be “dead on arrival.”

That ESPN story, published before the ruling came down, set up an industry narrative pitting ESPN against Pablo Torre, the investigative journalist who won a Pulitzer Prize for reporting about Leonard’s ties to Clippers sponsors.

ESPN and Torre, a former ESPN employee whose podcast is part of The Athletic, were widely seen as presenting opposing narratives of the Clippers saga.

Online, it was “ESPN vs Pablo.”

The NBA announced on Wednesday, after a nearly yearlong investigation, that it found the Clippers and Ballmer had broken league rules by facilitating sponsorship deals with Leonard. NBA Commissioner Adam Silver issued the team a $30 million fine, fined Leonard $700,000, and suspended Ballmer, the former Microsoft CEO, from league activities for a year.

The LA Clippers said in a statement that they “vehemently reject the NBA’s findings,” which it said were “the result of a heavily biased investigation” by the NBA. Leonard said in a statement that he accepts “full responsibility for lapses in judgment by people within my inner circle.”

The NBA’s findings validated Torre’s reporting and framing while putting ESPN under the microscope. ESPN hasn’t issued any corrections to its reporting, but public relations pros say the overall framing of the story missed the mark. That’s because it strongly suggested the Clippers would avoid a severe penalty, shortly before the NBA handed down its biggest penalty ever.

“While it might be accurate in the wording, the substance of the story was very misleading,” said Brian McWilliams, the VP of LA-based public relations firm Spelling Communications.

ESPN has bet its future on its direct-to-consumer streaming product and prides itself on having strong relationships with its audience on TV and across social media. Hiccups like this could undermine that trust if fans think ESPN is taking it easy on leagues or teams, especially those with powerful owners, like Ballmer.

The sports giant now could “risk a lot of damage to the brand,” McWilliams said, adding that after the investigation, “fans see the outcome, which is starkly in contrast with ESPN’s reporting.”

“The audience just needs an explanation,” said Sam Gauchier, a New York-based brand and communications consultant.

An ESPN spokesperson said the company stands by its mid-August Clippers story and declined to comment further.

Weathering a PR storm

ESPN said in the August 17 story that it didn’t receive a response from the NBA before publishing.

NBA spokesman Mike Bass later said on social media that ESPN’s story “contains numerous and significant inaccuracies,” which would “be made clear once the investigation is concluded.”

The ESPN story, which was framed in a way that seemed to contradict Torre’s reporting, included snippets of his findings but no statement from him. Torre said on Thursday that he gave ESPN a statement for the story that said he stood by his reporting and was looking forward to seeing the NBA’s findings. He said ESPN didn’t publish it.

After the NBA’s investigation and Torre’s public commentary about the situation, ESPN’s PR team must convince the public that the organization’s reporting practices reflect “not only the technical accuracies, but the overall expectation of truth that their readers have,” said Bradley Akubuiro, a partner at PR firm Bully Pulpit International.

ESPN also made waves when top NBA reporter Shams Charania — known for his scoops on player moves — said on TV Thursday that Leonard “did not have any knowledge” of the salary cap circumvention, before adding that Leonard “pocketed tens of millions of dollars” from Clippers sponsors.

Torre responded on X to a clip of Charania’s comments with a screenshot of Leonard’s signature on a purported copy of a contract with former Clippers sponsor Aspiration Partners.

McWilliams said insiders like Charania, who regularly break NBA news, walk “a very fine line between wanting to be first, wanting to be accurate, and also wanting to maintain access, which can be revoked.”

Javits Center CEO Joyce Leveston says standing out at work isn’t always about having the biggest title or the most impressive résumé. It’s about giving 100%.

Leveston shares the career advice she swears by: show up, build relationships, and navigate the unexpected turns that come with work.

• A federal watchdog found that former Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer presided over an office run amok.
• Witnesses described to investigators an office that was “toxic, intimidating and humiliating.”
• Among other things, the report detailed Chavez-DeRemer’s “inappropriate relationship” with a member of her security detail.

Former Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer had an inappropriate relationship with a member of her security detail, pressured subordinates to drink, and relied on her staff to do everything from organizing laundry to translating her instructions to a moving crew.

Those are the findings of a bombshell investigation into Chavez-DeRemer, a Trump Cabinet member whose nomination was greeted with initial enthusiasm from some Senate Democrats but whose tenure ultimately ended in a cloud of scandal.

The Labor Department’s inspector general, Anthony D’Esposito, wrote in a 44-page report that 38 witnesses described to investigators an office that was “toxic, intimidating and humiliating.”

Chavez-DeRemer’s attorney did not respond to Business Insider’s request for comment. In a statement to NBC News, he said that she had not broken the law.

“Secretary Chavez-DeRemer did not violate any law,” Nick Oberheiden, the former secretary’s attorney, said in a statement to the outlet. “That’s important to point out and contrast to the premature and incorrect speculation of some. Beyond this, Ms. Chavez-DeRemer has successfully pursued new projects as a private citizen.”

Here are some of the report’s biggest findings.

A “toxic culture”

Two of Chavez-DeRemer’s top aides, chief of staff Jihun Han and Office of the Secretary deputy chief of staff Rebecca Wright, violated department policy by routinely engaging in “threatening, demeaning, and abusive verbal and written communication,” according to the report.

The watchdog concluded that the secretary “was seemingly aware of this behavior and failed to take action to stop this behavior.”

In some instances, the report says Chavez-DeRemer herself engaged in the behavior.

“Witnesses stated that Chavez-DeRemer, Han, and Wright openly discussed employee performance matters in the presence of other staff, including details of performance-related meetings and whether those employees had cried during the meetings,” the report reads.

In violation of department policy, the report said that the trio regularly consumed alcohol during work hours and pressured other workers to join them.

“Witnesses reported that when other employees attending these meetings declined alcohol, Chavez-DeRemer, Han, and Wright pressured them to participate or ridiculed them for abstaining,” the report says.

Han and Wright were later terminated.

Chavez-DeRemer had an “inappropriate relationship”

Before she resigned in April, Chavez-DeRemer faced multiple reports that said she had a relationship with a member of her security detail

D’Esposito wrote that the direct evidence his team reviewed did not sufficiently establish that the pair “engaged in a romantic or sexual relationship.”

That being said, the inspector general goes into detail about the evidence he uncovered, down to hotel door-lock records and video of the agent, who the report does not name, entering Chavez-DeRemer’s building.

D’Esposito wrote that in two instances during trips to Las Vegas, the door lock records “reflected activity that appeared to indicate the two subjects spending at least portions overnight in the other’s room.”

The agent in question ultimately resigned.

Chavez-DeRemer pressured a security agent to give money to a nude dancer

During private travel back home in Oregon, the report said Chavez-DeRemer asked her security detail to take an unscheduled trip to what appears to be a strip club. The report describes it as “an establishment that was determined upon entry to feature partially nude dancers.”

The report states that Chavez-DeRemer entered the establishment with the agent she was having an inappropriate relationship with and another member of the security detail.

According to the report, Chavez-DeRemer asked the driver to give money to one of the performers. Unsure of what to do, the driver asked the agent who the secretary was having an inappropriate relationship with for guidance.

“Chavez-DeRemer then took additional money from her purse and asked the agent to drop the bills one by one onto the partially nude woman,” the report says.

Chavez-DeRemer relied on her staff for personal errands

Despite department policy to the contrary, the report includes multiple instances in which the secretary asked staffers to help her with personal errands during work hours.

“These tasks were outside the scope of these employee’s official duties and included having employees organize Chavez-DeRemer’s personal belongings, retrieve her packages, make personal purchases for her, oversee her movers, and communicate with household service providers during official duty time,” the report states.

On one occasion, Chavez-DeRemer directed a staffer to “hang her laundry and dry cleaning and organize her clothing, shoes, and purses.” Investigators obtained evidence of what happened because the staffer provided a video to the secretary showing her the job was done.

During the 2025 government shutdown, the report says Chavez-DeRemer asked an employee to retrieve packages from the mailroom of her residence.

Chavez-DeRemer also asked employees to buy “picture frames, holiday ornaments, gifts, and alcohol” on her behalf.

A Hispanic federal employee, the report states, was asked to “translate during interactions with Spanish-speaking workers at her personal residence.”

You can read the report in full here.

• Tesla’s Cybercab robotaxis launched in Austin on Thursday. The company is already facing an NHTSA probe.
• The US auto safety agency is looking into Tesla’s self-certification of its autonomous, steering-wheel-less car.
• It doesn’t mean the Cybercabs are stopping or unsafe. Federal rules just might not have caught up.

Tesla’s Cybercab is live in Austin. Now, regulators in Washington are asking to check the EV-maker’s homework.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, or NHTSA, opened an audit inquiry late Thursday into Tesla’s Cybercab certification.

The move came hours after Tesla’s commercial deployment of a small number of Cybercabs in Austin, which joined its robotaxi network. Texas DMV records list 45 Cybercabs registered to Tesla. The vehicle has yet to be made available to purchase to consumers.

“NHTSA fully supports the safe development and deployment of automated vehicles,” Jonathan Morrison, the agency’s administrator, wrote in a statement sent to Business Insider. “But as the federal regulator, we need to ensure that all of our laws are followed.”

NHTSA’s announcement doesn’t order Tesla to halt Cybercab deployments — the agency hasn’t made any comment on the vehicle’s safety or compliance. Instead, NHTSA will examine Tesla’s technical data and the processes behind the automaker’s self-certification.

Automakers typically certify their own vehicles’ compliance with federal rules. Tesla told NHTSA that the Cybercab complies with applicable federal safety standards.

The certification could pose thorny questions for Tesla, given today’s vehicle rules. The Cybercab doesn’t have conventional human controls — such as a steering wheel, pedals, or side mirrors — that are required by current federal safety standards.

NHTSA will examine whether Tesla was correct in determining that some of those requirements do not apply to its automated vehicle.

Tesla is not the first company to confront the full-autonomy regulatory challenge. In July, NHTSA gave Amazon-owned Zoox a temporary exemption to deploy its own steering-wheel-free robotaxis commercially.

Tesla is taking a different route: It certified that the Cybercab meets all applicable federal rules, even as NHTSA is still working to update standards, including one governing brake pedals, for driverless vehicles.

Tesla did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.

• Midshipmen at the US Naval Academy learn seamanship on training vessels called yard patrol craft.
• After classroom instruction, midshipmen take trips where they manage every aspect of the journey.
• Yard patrol craft YP 700 features a pilothouse, racks, a galley, and a common area.

At the United States Naval Academy, every midshipman learns to drive.

Their driver’s ed curriculum doesn’t involve slow circles in empty parking lots or parallel parking tests. Instead, the future naval leaders learn how to drive, steer, and navigate a ship by going out on the water and doing just that.

After midshipmen learn the basics of navigation, boat handling, man-overboard maneuvers, and standard commands in the classroom, they put their knowledge into practice on training vessels known as yard patrol craft.

During my visit to the Naval Academy in August, I got to climb aboard the yard patrol craft YP 700 to see how midshipmen learn shiphandling and navigation on the job. Take a look.

Midshipmen at the US Naval Academy practice their seamanship skills on yard patrol boats.

Training is held both in the classroom and aboard yard patrol craft during the school year. In the summertime, midshipmen embark on longer trips where they manage every aspect of the journey, from navigation to cooking.

While underway, midshipmen are supervised by experienced craftmasters, who are responsible for the safe operation of the vessels but largely take a hands-off approach to the training.

I got an exclusive look inside one of these training vessels.

YP 700 measures 108 feet long and can hold around 30 people. With two diesel engines, it can reach a maximum speed of about 12 knots (about 14 mph). It has a range of 1,800 nautical miles and can remain underway for up to five days without refueling.

In July, midshipmen sailed four yard patrol craft to Baltimore and New York City as part of the International Naval Review for America’s 250th anniversary. Aside from special events such as Fleet Weeks, yard patrol craft aren’t usually open for public tours.

My tour started at the bow, where the wildcat, a toothed wheel that grips and moves the anchor chain, helps raise and lower the anchor.

The wildcat is the one piece of machinery that midshipmen don’t operate themselves since doing so incorrectly can, as one craftmaster told me, result in losing a finger. However, midshipmen do practice other aspects of anchoring, such as positioning the boat correctly.

The pilothouse functions as the control center of the ship, housing the main helm, or steering wheel, and navigational equipment.

The main helm controls the ship’s rudder.

Midshipmen also learn to steer the ship using just its port and starboard engines, which are controlled by separate levers.

Midshipmen learn how to maneuver the vessel using the engines if normal rudder steering is lost.

The navigation table houses the Voyage Management System, or VMS, which midshipmen learn how to use during their youngster, or sophomore, year.

The table itself is a holdover from an era when paper charts were central to maritime navigation. Midshipmen today train extensively on electronic navigation systems, though they also learn traditional chart plotting.

The VMS shows a live feed of other vessels in the area using data from the Automatic Identification System, or AIS.

Through AIS, vessels broadcast their name, call sign, speed, course, and other key information that can help other ships contact and navigate around them.

AIS complements radar by providing identification information on vessels transmitting a signal. The VMS displays that data, as well as useful chart information, including shallow or shoal water that could pose a grounding risk.

The boat’s sound tube is a relic from the days before handheld radios, but it still serves an amusing purpose as midshipmen learn the ropes.

The craftmaster serving as my tour guide said he offers the sound tube to midshipmen as a place where they can scream out their frustration and relieve some stress before returning to their duties. He said it works very well.

Below deck, the ship’s craftmaster and other crew sleep in dedicated berths during trips.

Midshipmen stay in bunks, known as racks, on another level further below deck, with six to 12 people to a room.

Midshipmen are in charge of planning and preparing meals in the ship’s galley.

A midshipman designated as the supply officer creates the meal plan and assigns cooking duties.

The galley features all of the basics, including a stove, oven, toaster, and microwave. Sometimes, crews will also bring an air fryer or a grill.

Meals are eaten in seating booths near the galley or out on the deck in cooperative weather.

The galley is the coldest space on the ship in the summertime, so midshipmen often eat their meals downstairs.

A multipurpose common space occasionally serves as a classroom, briefing room, and lounge, but most of the instruction happens on the job.

When the boat is underway, midshipmen learn to expect the unexpected.

Craftmasters will throw a life ring overboard and see how long it takes them to notice, or suddenly declare “Man overboard!” to test their reaction time and knowledge of the correct procedures.

The classroom space on board, it turns out, is barely used at all.