Estimated reading time: 9 minutes.
Key facts
- Case: Thomas v. McDonald's USA, LLC and McDonald's Corporation, No. 1:26-cv-12149.
- Filed: October 2, 2026, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois.
- Allegation: A shared pricing system allegedly helped independently owned restaurants coordinate menu-price increases.
- Company position: McDonald's says its tool only recommends prices, franchisees make their own decisions, and AI does not set prices.
- Proposed groups: U.S. restaurant purchasers and an Illinois purchaser subclass.
- Requested relief: Class certification, monetary damages and an order stopping the alleged practice.
- Current stage: No certified class, approved settlement, consumer claim form or payout is established in the reviewed record.
In this article
- What the new McDonald's lawsuit alleges
- Who is involved and how the restaurant system works
- The alleged pricing mechanism
- What McDonald's says about its pricing tool
- The legal claims and requested remedies
- The timeline and proposed purchaser groups
- What the reviewed evidence does not establish
- What purchasers can do and what comes next
- Frequently asked questions
What the new McDonald's lawsuit alleges
A McDonald's customer filed a proposed consumer class action on October 2, 2026, alleging that the company's pricing system helped coordinate higher menu prices across restaurants that should compete independently. The complaint names McDonald's USA, LLC and McDonald's Corporation and was filed in federal court in Chicago.
Plaintiff Michael Thomas alleges he regularly bought food and beverages in DeKalb, Illinois, and paid more than he would have in a competitive market. The complaint calls the alleged excess "supracompetitive" prices, meaning prices above the level competition would produce. It does not establish a dollar loss for every meal or every purchaser.
The case focuses on alleged coordination through pooled business data, computer-generated recommendations and franchise-system incentives. It is not simply an allegation that prices rose. A price increase alone does not show an unlawful agreement.
McDonald's disputes the central characterization. In an October 1 statement published before the complaint was filed, the company said its tool provides recommendations but does not set prices and that franchisees independently choose their prices. Both the allegations and that explanation matter when evaluating what the new case does, and does not, establish.
The court has not determined that price fixing occurred
The filing is a proposed class action. Requested damages and the plaintiff's description of the pricing system are not an approved refund program or a judicial finding.
Who is involved and how the restaurant system works
McDonald's Corporation is the global parent company. McDonald's USA, LLC is its wholly owned subsidiary responsible for its U.S. business. The complaint identifies both as Chicago-based defendants and attributes operation of the challenged system to them.
Much of the U.S. restaurant network is franchised. A franchisee is an independent business that licenses the McDonald's brand and operates restaurants subject to franchise agreements and standards. A franchisor is the company that provides that brand and system. Company-owned restaurants, by contrast, are operated within McDonald's own business structure.
The complaint describes approximately 14,000 U.S. restaurants, about 95% of them independently owned franchises. Those are the pleading's scale figures. The distinction between independently owned restaurants and a common brand is important because the lawsuit alleges coordination between separate business operators, not merely internal price decisions by one restaurant owner.
Thomas is the named plaintiff seeking to represent other customers. The independent franchisees discussed in the complaint are alleged participants in the challenged arrangement, but they are not the two named corporate defendants. Technology advisers mentioned in the pleading's account also are not named defendants.
The alleged pricing mechanism
The complaint alleges that, since at least 2019, McDonald's has used a centralized pricing system that gathers restaurant-level sales information and generates item-specific recommendations. It describes use of machine learning, computer methods that find patterns in data to support predictions or recommendations.
The allegedly pooled information includes nonpublic transaction, menu-price and product-mix data. Product mix means which items customers buy and in what proportions. A point-of-sale system is the checkout system that records a restaurant's purchases; according to the pleading, that sales data feeds the pricing tool.
Thomas alleges restaurants' price changes influenced recommendations for other restaurants. The complaint describes a "30% rule" under which prices could be recommended for an increase when enough comparable stores had raised theirs. It argues this could spread price increases across the network rather than leave each operator to assess its own costs, customers and competitors.
The plaintiff also alleges McDonald's monitors deviations from recommendations and uses business incentives and franchise-system standards to encourage adoption. The pleading discusses January 2026 standards requiring constructive engagement with pricing consultants or tools and alleges consequences connected to expansion or renewal opportunities.
These allegations try to connect information sharing to coordinated conduct. A recommendation that an operator can freely reject differs from an arrangement that effectively pressures operators into aligning prices. Whether the recommendations, standards and incentives had the alleged effect is a disputed question requiring evidence.
The alleged injury is coordinated pricing
The complaint challenges how prices were developed across restaurants. It does not establish that an individual customer's price changed because of that customer's personal willingness to pay.
What McDonald's says about its pricing tool
McDonald's October 1 statement, titled "Separating Fact from Fiction: AI Does Not Set Prices at McDonald's," says the tool provides recommendations and franchisees choose their own prices. It says pricing consultants and tools give operators local information, and franchisees are not required to accept a pricing recommendation.
The company also says its tools do not use AI to tailor a menu price to an individual's willingness to pay and do not use dynamic, real-time or time-of-day pricing. Dynamic pricing means changing a price in response to conditions such as demand rather than maintaining an ordinary posted price.
Those statements address a different concern from the complaint's alleged network-level coordination. The absence of personalized surge prices would not, by itself, resolve whether operators coordinated ordinary prices. Likewise, the plaintiff's claim does not establish that personal or real-time dynamic pricing occurred.
McDonald's says its value standards look at a wider set of factors and pricing is only one element. The complaint, meanwhile, alleges that formal independence did not prevent practical pressure toward aligned increases. This report does not choose between those competing accounts as if the court had resolved them.
The corporate statement predates the lawsuit by one day. It is a first-party public explanation, not an answer filed in this case. No formal court response or substantive judicial decision was available in the primary materials reviewed.
The legal claims and requested remedies
The first two counts invoke Section 1 of the Sherman Act, the federal law prohibiting certain agreements that restrain trade. The complaint alleges both a price-fixing conspiracy and an unlawful exchange of competitively sensitive information. Information may be competitively sensitive when it is nonpublic business data that rivals could use to coordinate decisions.
The plaintiff characterizes the alleged price agreement as unlawful under a "per se" rule, a legal approach treating certain proven categories of restraint as inherently unlawful. He also pleads alternative analyses, including a rule-of-reason approach that examines competitive effects and possible justifications. The complaint's labels do not determine which legal standard the court will apply.
The Illinois counts invoke the Illinois Antitrust Act and the Illinois Consumer Fraud and Deceptive Business Practices Act. The former addresses prohibited restraints of competition under state law; the latter concerns deceptive or unfair business conduct. Thomas alleges inflated prices and misleading representations about independent pricing harmed Illinois consumers.
The requested relief includes class certification, damages, attorneys' fees and an injunction against the alleged conduct. Certification is the court's decision whether a case can proceed on behalf of a defined group. An injunction is an order requiring or prohibiting conduct rather than simply awarding money.
The complaint seeks treble damages under the antitrust theories. "Treble" means three times qualifying proven damages when the applicable law permits that remedy. It does not mean every customer is already entitled to triple the price of a meal. Liability, recoverable loss and the group entitled to relief remain unresolved.
Requested relief is not an individual award
The pleading does not establish a refund formula or a settlement fund. Its demand for treble damages depends on legal entitlement and proof of qualifying harm.
The timeline and proposed purchaser groups
The complaint places the alleged coordinated system's operation as early as 2019. It cites later public statements and reporting about pricing, including a May 2024 company price explanation, January 2026 franchise standards and September 2026 reporting on the system.
McDonald's published its pricing-tool explanation on October 1, 2026. Thomas filed the complaint on October 2 in the Northern District of Illinois, the federal trial court where the case will proceed unless transferred or otherwise resolved.
The proposed nationwide class covers people in the United States who bought at company-owned or franchised McDonald's restaurants. The proposed Illinois subclass covers Illinois residents who made purchases at Illinois restaurants. A subclass is a smaller group with a separate legal or factual basis within the proposed case.
The printed class definitions do not specify exact start and end dates for eligible purchases. The allegation that conduct began no later than 2019 is not a substitute for a court-approved class period. It would be misleading to present a fixed 2019–2026 refund window.
The complaint excludes the defendants and specified affiliated people and entities, including officers, directors and assigned judges. These are proposed definitions, not certification orders. The court can change the scope or decide the case should not proceed as a class action.
What the reviewed evidence does not establish
The complaint relies in part on public reporting and statements about the pricing system. Class Action Pulse reviewed the filed pleading and McDonald's first-party explanation, not internal source code, franchise contracts, individual operators' records or a complete discovery record. Discovery is the process through which parties obtain evidence during a lawsuit.
The reviewed documents do not establish that every restaurant adopted recommendations, that every price increase came from this system, or that every purchase produced a recoverable overcharge. They also do not establish an approved class, settlement, payment amount, claim form or consumer deadline.
No next hearing date is established by the sources reviewed. The lack of that information should not be filled with a predicted settlement timetable or an assertion that a consumer must register now to preserve a payment.
What purchasers can do and what comes next
Keep receipts, app order records, purchase dates and restaurant locations if you want a record of your purchases. Those details may be relevant if a future certified class or settlement notice defines covered purchases, but saving them does not establish present eligibility.
The next legal developments may include the defendants' response, challenges to the claims, evidence gathering and any request for class certification. A settlement could occur, but it is not promised. Any future notice should be checked against the court record and an official administrator before personal information is submitted.
Class Action Pulse's case directory distinguishes open settlements from pending lawsuits and investigations. This story is reporting on a filed case, not an intake form or an offer of compensation.
Frequently asked questions
What is the McDonald's lawsuit about?
The complaint alleges that shared nonpublic data, pricing recommendations and franchise-system pressure helped coordinate higher menu prices across restaurants. McDonald's disputes that its tool sets prices.
Is McDonald's using personalized surge pricing?
The company says it does not use AI to set prices based on an individual's willingness to pay or dynamic real-time or time-of-day pricing. This complaint concerns alleged coordination across restaurants, not an established finding of personalized surge pricing.
Who is in the proposed class?
The complaint proposes a nationwide restaurant-purchaser group and an Illinois resident purchaser subclass. The reviewed record contains no order approving those groups or exact purchase-period dates.
Can I submit a settlement claim now?
No approved settlement or claim form is established in the reviewed sources. A proposed class action is not a refund program.
Does the demand for treble damages mean triple refunds?
No. Treble damages means three times qualifying proven damages if the applicable law permits recovery. The complaint does not award customers three times their spending.
Has a court found price fixing?
No such ruling appears in the primary materials reviewed for this article. The complaint's allegations and McDonald's public explanation remain distinct from court findings.