For years, popular pizza chains like Domino's, Pizza Hut  (YUM) , Little Caesars  (CZR) , and Papa John's  (PZZA)  have battled to be crowned the best in the world.

These pizza chains have tried almost everything to gain more clients, including offering various deals, revamping their recipes, developing new menu items, and even creating marketing to target rival brands.

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Whether it be one's taste buds, food preferences, budget, or plain nostalgia, everyone has a favorite pizza chain and plenty of reasons for choosing it.

However, the numbers don't lie, and this pizza chain seems to have won the title by towering over all others.

Domino's is the largest pizza chain in the U.S., with more than 6500 locations here, and a total of 21,002 stores across the globe as of June 2024. The brands sees worldwide retail sales of over $18.9 billion.

Related: Popular pizza chain files for Chapter 7 bankruptcy

Although Domino's ranks as the top pizza chain in the nation due to its reported positive yearly earnings growth, the company shouldn't claim victory just yet.

As shown in its latest quarterly report, the company might be silently struggling: It fell short of analysts' expectations in almost all areas of its business.

Domino's reports positive Q3 earnings, but analysts are hungry for more

According to Domino's  (DPZ)  Q3 earnings report for 2024, total sales grew by 5.1% compared to the previous year, but upon examining the reported numbers closely, the results were not as positive as they seemed.

The pizza chain's international same-store sales showed positive growth, but only by 0.8%, a very small increase compared to analysts' predictions of 2.84%.

Same-store sales in the U.S. increased by 3%, yet didn't meet analysts' expectations of 3.55% and reflected slower growth than the reported 4.8% in the previous Q3.

Retail sales in all Domino's U.S. stores grew by 5.1% compared to the year prior, with company-owned store sales increasing by 3.1% and franchise locations growing by 3%.

However, neither of the U.S. store divisions met analysts' predictions either.

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Domino's reported total revenues of $1.08 billion, which were below analysts' expectations of $1.1 billion.

The slower growth reflected in Domino's earnings may attest to the company's declining net income of 0.5%, which was attributed to higher income taxes.