Olipop Shirley Temple

Olipop’s Shirley Temple, a good-ish-for-you, pink-hued classic drink.

The Drink

The Shirley Temple began, like many great American soft drinks, as a performance. In the 1930s, bartenders at Hollywood restaurants were asked to create something festive and grown-up-looking for child star Shirley Temple, a nonalcoholic drink she could hold alongside the adults. That’s right, a drink meant to mirror a cocktail, made for children. The original versions were built with ginger ale and grenadine, finished with a maraschino cherry, bright, bubbly, and just serious enough to feel like an occasion.

Over time, the drink loosened. Lemon-lime soda often replaced ginger ale, especially in diners and home kitchens, trading spice for a cleaner citrus snap. The formula became less about rules and more about the idea: something pink, sweet, fizzy, and a little theatrical. Eventually, of course, the Shirley Temple grew up. Add vodka and it becomes a Dirty Shirley, a drink that surged back into popularity in the early 2020s, turning a childhood treat into a nostalgic cocktail with the same neon charm.

What’s stayed consistent is the expectation. A Shirley Temple should be bright and lively, built on either ginger ale’s gentle bite or lemon-lime’s citrus lift, with grenadine adding sweetness, color, and just enough fruit.

Mandatory maraschino cherries, not included.

The Review

Olipop’s Shirley Temple arrives in a can that understands the assignment. The color is exactly right, a glossy, nostalgic pink that feels at home next to the recent wave of bottled and canned Shirley Temple releases. 7UP’s seasonal version landed first in 2024, followed by a brief boom: Bloom, then Poppi and Olipop, all appearing as the drink’s revival moved from bar menus to the functional soda aisle.

Flavor-wise, Olipop takes a different path than the classic templates. It doesn’t read clearly as ginger ale, and it doesn’t quite land in lemon-lime territory either. Instead, the first sip brings something unexpectedly familiar: vanilla. In fact, the profile is strikingly close to Olipop’s own Cherry Vanilla, to the point where you could be forgiven for wondering if the base formula is doing most of the work here.

That vanilla gives the drink a soft, rounded sweetness that’s pleasant on its own but shifts the whole experience away from what a Shirley Temple usually promises. Instead of bright citrus or gentle spice, there’s a warm, almost creamy note that sits on the tongue longer than expected. The cherry is there, but it reads more like cherry cream soda than grenadine’s sharp, syrupy pop.

To be clear, it’s good. Easy to drink, nicely balanced, and far less sugary than the neon versions that inspired it. But the warmth of the vanilla changes the mood. A Shirley Temple is supposed to feel crisp and sparkling, all fizz and brightness.

The result isn’t quite ginger ale–based, not quite lemon-lime, and not entirely its own thing either. It’s a pink soda that tastes very much like Olipop, dressed in Shirley Temple colors. Enjoyable, but less a revival of the classic than a reinterpretation, one where the vanilla shows up early and is the last guest to leave.