New Dunkin' Refreshers Are Over Sugared And Under Flavored

Refreshers have become a very popular item at some major coffee chains. In 2020, Dunkin' began offering drinks that felt very similar to Starbucks' fruity creations. Dunkin' Refreshers are largely fruity beverages that offer some caffeine too. When first launched by Dunkin', the summery drinks included green tea, fruit juice, and vitamins. The two flavors released at the time were Strawberry Dragonfruit and Peach Passion. While Starbucks simply calls its line "Refreshers," Dunkin' labels its offerings as Dunkin' Refreshers to set them apart.

Like Starbucks' Refreshers, Dunkin' Refreshers have become a large portion of the Dunkin' drinks menu. Throughout the year, new flavors get added to accompany different promotions or seasons. Dunkin's June release of its summer 2025 menu offered a mix of sweet and savory, and in May 2025, Dunkin' celebrated the launch of summer with a tropical fruit flavor. As back-to-school shopping commences in August, Dunkin' is offering even more flavors to its Refreshers lineup. I set out to try these new flavors to find out if they are a must-sip or a skip.

The newest additions to the lineup are the Golden Hour Refresher and the Blueberry Breeze Refresher. Named for the time of day when the world seems to bathe in rich, amber sunlight, the aptly named Golden Hour Refresher is a combination of the Strawberry Dragonfruit and Mango Pineapple Refreshers juices mixed with lemonade. For something more airy, the Blueberry Breeze Refresher mixes together green tea and Blueberry Breeze concentrate. Like pretty much all options at America's favorite donut shop, these Dunkin' Refreshers are highly customizable, so you could swap that lemonade or tea with pretty much any liquid you want, like water or even oat milk.

When I first ordered these drinks, the staff at this Dunkin' had no idea what I was referring to. In fact, it took me sheepishly gesturing to the menu for them to see what I meant, though I ordered them by name. I was wholly unprepared for them to ask which liquid I wanted with each drink and only found my answer when I looked up the default drink in the app. If these are drinks you'd like to try, learn from my experience and understand what is in these drinks in case you need to help guide the staff. Not knowing exactly what's in your drink may very well be one of the biggest mistakes you can make when ordering at Dunkin'.

For the purposes of this taste test, I tried the medium size of both drinks, so when it comes to the nutritional information breakdown, these numbers are reflective of the same size. A combination of green tea and the Blueberry Breeze concentrate, my Blueberry Breeze Dunkin' Refresher drink contained 130 calories, 32 grams of carbohydrates, and 28 grams of sugar. Not to be outdone in the sugar count, the Golden Hour Dunkin' Refresher drink had 240 calories, 59 grams of carbohydrates, and 56 grams of sugar.

A look at the ingredients list shows that all concentrates used in these drinks (lemonade, strawberry dragonfruit, mango pineapple, and Blueberry Breeze) had water as the first ingredient. It is followed by sugar, natural flavors, and other vitamins, coloring, and flavors. One of the more fascinating of these ingredients was the lemonade, which included orange juice in the mixture.

When I try a new drink, one of my first questions is always how long the drink will be on the menu so I know when to expect Dunkin' drinks to be discontinued. Unfortunately, when I asked the Dunkin' staff how long these drinks would be around, the team member didn't seem to know. He told me that he suspected they would be on the menu until the Pumpkin Spice Latte madness begins to roll in. If you want a sip of these fruity drinks, you'll definitely want to commit to them before the leaves begin to flutter and fall.

Prices vary depending on your location, but the good deals appear to be consistent across locations. For instance, Dunkin' is selling medium Refreshers for $3 through August 19. This includes both of the newest offerings, and while this will certainly save you a few dollars, just how much savings depends on your location. To take advantage of this deal, you'll need to join Dunkin' Rewards, which Dunkin' is just begging you to sign up for. To be sure you are able to get the perk, I recommend ordering over the app.

The first sip of the Golden Hour Refresher revealed an incredibly sugary drink. As someone who enjoys sweet drinks, I am typically not put off by a lot of sugar, but this one had a bit too much. Honestly, the closest thing I can compare it to is the orange liquid people drink during a glucose test during pregnancy. It wasn't quite as sweet as that drink, but it did taste similar, especially where sugar comes into play.

I found that the predominant flavor wasn't really fruit, it was more of just sugar. My mother thought it reminded her of a child's punch drink, so she didn't find it to be at the same sweetness level I did, but still sweet. I found this level of sweetness a little surprising because I didn't order the drink with any additional flavorings or syrups. All that sugary flavor came from the juices and lemonade. After looking at the ingredients list, it now makes sense why it tasted so sugary: it was. While there was plenty of sweetness here, it far overpowered the strawberry, dragonfruit, mango, pineapple, or even lemonade flavors I expected.

Typically, when I order my teas, I like them lightly sweetened, in part to cover some of that baseline tea flavor. I didn't anticipate that I would need extra sweetener here since the Blueberry Breeze concentrate offered so much. Since this drink was just a mix of green tea and this concentrate, I found it lacking in flavor.

This one promised to have a blueberry taste, and if there's a trace of blueberry here, they weren't ripe berries. The flavor wasn't more than flat, out-of-season berries, not the kind of flavor you might want to add to a tea to liven up the situation. I've had blueberry drinks that promise a fruity drink but deliver a fake blueberry taste, but this wasn't that. Instead, it was an indistinguishable berry with purplish-blue coloring to convince the customer that it is blueberry in nature. I imagine some lemonade would liven this up some, but the drink was watery and unflavored otherwise.

The drinks, though both are part of the Dunkin' Refreshers lineup, are very different. For one, the Blueberry Breeze Refresher was a deep magenta color while the Golden Hour option had a bright, sunny coloring. They had pretty different ingredients too, with one using lemonade and the other relying on tea — two significantly differently flavored liquids.

Another significant difference was the sugar content. At 28 grams of sugar in a medium, the Blueberry Breeze Refresher had half the sugar of the Golden Hour Refresher, and it tasted like it. The numbers are consistent across other Dunkin' Refreshers made with and without lemonade. The sugar content is significantly higher in the Refreshers made with lemonade than basic Refreshers made with tea or water.

I love fruity drinks, and I expected to like these, but I just didn't. The Golden Hour Refresher drink was too sweet, and the Blueberry Breeze Refresher wasn't sweet enough. Neither drink felt like it had been through enough testing and had the effect of tasting simply being thrown together. While I can appreciate creativity and using the ingredients that already exist across the menu, more needs to be done to ensure the flavors mesh well.

Now, I acknowledge that there's always a chance my drinks were made incorrectly as I have found that Dunkin' drinks are just wildly inconsistent most times I visit. I believe the chain needs to do more to encourage staff to know exactly how to make the drinks so customers always know their drink follows a consistent process and formula. At the very least, staff should be better informed so they can make better recommendations or at least know what options are available on the menu. Even with more staff training, it's still very likely that these two specific drinks would still be underwhelming in flavor and over-the-top in sugar content.

Ultimately, I decided whether these Dunkin' Refreshers are worth your time based on flavor. I relied on one simple question: are they enjoyable to drink? I wanted something that was refreshing, sippable, and balanced in flavors. There should certainly be some sweetness, but an overwhelming amount of sugar doesn't bode well for the drinks.