McDonald’s Fired Its AI. Now It’s Back With Google’s.

McDonald’s is back in the artificial intelligence drive-thru business, and this time it’s bringing Google.

At its Worldwide Convention in Las Vegas last week, the company unveiled ArchIQ, a Google-powered AI ordering system already nicknamed Archy by franchisees. It also launched tests at five U.S. locations, ABC News reported Monday (June 8).

The system has processed more than 1 million orders, with roughly 90% completed without employee intervention, according to a June 3 post on social platform X from a franchisee account.

Meet Archy IQ – no, we are not new to AOT. In fact, we have been in this AI field for about 8 years. We sold our in-house model to IBM and moved on as it wasn’t good enough for our needs.

As mentioned below, I wanted to hire Google (who uses NVIDIA) to service our AOT 3 years… https://t.co/JR8QHQNyKJ pic.twitter.com/e0syxiQwre

— McFranchisee (@McFranchisee) June 3, 2026

The debut comes two years after McDonald’s ended a nearly three-year automated ordering partnership with IBM. It pulled the technology from more than 100 restaurants in 2024. McDonald’s framed the exit as a learning exercise, saying at the time that it remained confident voice ordering would be part of its future.

Viral videos showed the system adding nine sweet teas to a single order, inserting butter into an ice cream order and generating at least one charge running into the hundreds of dollars, the New York Post reported at the time.

The system also struggled to interpret different accents and dialects, CNBC reported at the time, citing unnamed sources.

The Drive-Thru Is Too Valuable to Get Wrong

Drive-thru accounts for 70% of McDonald’s U.S. sales, making order accuracy and throughput speed direct levers on revenue at scale.

QSR Magazine’s 2025 Drive-Thru Report found that drive-thru traffic ran negative month over month throughout 2025, ranging from minus 5% to minus 8%. Getting more out of existing traffic, through faster times, fewer errors and fewer employee interventions, carries more weight in that environment than adding new customers.

ArchIQ is not only an ordering tool. It also serves as both an ordering and management support system, capable of helping operators identify bottlenecks and manage day-to-day performance, AI news reported Wednesday (June 10).

A demonstration video shared by a franchisee on X shows the system taking orders in English and Spanish and recognizing repeat customers by their usual order.

McDonald’s CEO Chris Kempczinski said in a June 1 statement that customers shouldn’t have to choose between hospitality and speed, framing automation as complementary to service rather than a replacement for it.

Archy Does More Than Take Orders

The test sits inside McDonald’s broader growth strategy, called McDonald’s > NEXT, which Kempczinski unveiled alongside ArchIQ at the convention. The plan covers menu upgrades, restaurant design and operational efficiency, DesignRush reported Monday.

ArchIQ is the operational spine, and the company is not waiting for the pilot to conclude before preparing for wider deployment. Every U.S. McDonald’s location is receiving Google Edge Cloud blade installations in preparation for a broader rollout, ECIKS.org reported June 5.

McDonald’s digital business gives the infrastructure push additional weight. In a February earnings announcement, the company reported that systemwide sales to loyalty members across 70 markets rose 20% to nearly $37 billion in 2025, with 90-day active loyalty users up 19% to nearly 210 million at year-end.

An AI ordering layer that connects to loyalty data, recognizing a customer and surfacing their usual order, extends that digital relationship into the physical drive-thru lane.

McDonald’s has not said when ArchIQ will expand beyond the five test locations.

DoorDash introduced AI-powered tools for merchants in May, helping operators manage onboarding, inventory and order flow as the industry moves toward end-to-end automation.

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