McDonald's Is Closing AI Drive-Thrus After They Kept Making Mistakes

McDonald's Is Closing AI Drive-Thrus After They Kept Making Mistakes

An AI drive-thru test that was first introduced by McDonald's two years ago in partnership with IBM will soon be coming to an end, Restaurant Business has confirmed. News of the McDonald's cancelling the test was shared with franchisees in an email sent last week.

“While there have been successes to date, we feel there is an opportunity to explore voice ordering solutions more broadly,” Mason Smoot, chief restaurant officer for McDonald’s USA, said in the email. “After a thoughtful review, McDonald’s has decided to end our current partnership with IBM on AOT and the technology will be shut off in all restaurants currently testing it no later than July 26, 2024.”

The technology, which was tested at over 100 McDonald's locations, worked by using Artificial Intelligence to take customers' orders. Although it sounded like a simple enough concept, it quickly turned chaotic last year at some drive-thrus.

The mayhem was captured in several hilariously unhinged, viral TikToks. In one video, a woman says the drive-thru screen added nine sweet teas to her order when all she requested was that a Diet Coke wrongly added to her order be taken off.

In another TikTok, a woman can be heard yelling at the drive-thru screen to "stop" as it adds hundreds of dollars worth of McNuggets Meals to her order. The chaos is intensified by the sound of her friend laughing uncontrollably in the background.

Despite these AI mishaps, McDonald's did reveal that “an informed decision on a future voice ordering solution by the end of the year.” This suggests that the restaurant isn't completely closing the door on its AI drive-thru programs, despite all these problems.