While the Golden State continues to cement its place on the international food scene, with restaurants earning all kinds of accolades, the region is also facing a wave of closures.
This time, it’s KFC. From July 15, 2025, through July 6, 2026, the chain closed at least 312 locations nationwide, representing 7.64% of its U.S. footprint, according to a recent analysis by AI search visibility platform Local Falcon.
California saw the most KFC closures
The state had the highest number of closures in the country, with 44 KFC restaurants disappearing during the period analyzed. Utah, Rhode Island and New Hampshire, meanwhile, did not record any closures.
That doesn’t mean the fried chicken chain is disappearing from California. As of Friday, the state still had 375 KFC locations, just one fewer than the previous week. Nationwide, 3,761 locations remained.
Local Falcon also compared KFC with seven other major chicken chains and found that its U.S. locations had the lowest average Google rating among the group, at 3.42 stars across 2,885 rated restaurants. Chick-fil-A had the highest average, at 4.3 stars across 3,306 rated locations.
KFC isn’t the only chain closing California restaurants
KFC is far from the only major chain scaling back in California. Jack in the Box announced plans to close 150 to 200 restaurants nationwide, while a major Carl’s Jr. franchisee planned to shutter 10 of its 59 California locations.
Five Guys has also closed four California locations in 2026, including restaurants in City of Industry, Whittier, Merced and Hanford. Meanwhile, Papa John’s has shuttered several California restaurants as part of a broader effort to reduce its underperforming locations nationwide.
