By Best Pet Picks Daily • September 02, 2026 • Contains affiliate links
Walk down any pet aisle in 2026 and you'll face the same fork in the road: a bag of air-dried or dehydrated meat jerky, or a bundle of single-ingredient bully sticks. Both are marketed as "high protein," both cost more than they did three years ago, and both have loyal followings. But they solve completely different problems — jerky is a training and topper treat, bully sticks are a time-killing chew — and pretending they're interchangeable is how people end up wasting $40 a month.
To make this a fair fight, we didn't just review one brand. We looked at Gnarly Pet (jerky and protein chews), Best Bully Sticks (the volume leader in odor-free bullies), Jack&Pup (premium thick bullies and collagen chews), and Full Moon (USDA human-grade jerky sold in most big-box stores). We compared cost per ounce, ingredient sourcing, chew duration, calorie load, and — importantly — how each performs for real jobs like leash training, crate time, and heavy chewers.
Before buying bully sticks, check the ingredient list to ensure they're made from single-source beef without additives or preservatives, as some lower-quality options may contain fillers that reduce their nutritional value compared to pure jerky alternatives.
Spoiler: there's no universal winner. There's a winner for your dog's mouth, your schedule, and your budget. Here's the honest breakdown.
Gnarly Pet — Best for training, picky eaters, and jerky-first households
Gnarly Pet's core strength is its jerky and protein-packed chew line: short ingredient decks (typically a single meat protein plus minimal binders), soft-to-semi-dry textures, and pieces that tear down easily into pea-sized training rewards. That last point matters more than most buyers realize — a chew you can break into 40 rewards is functionally cheaper than the price tag suggests. Gnarly Pet generally sits in the mid-premium band (roughly $15–$30 per bag depending on protein and size), which is above grocery-brand jerky but below boutique freeze-dried. The brand also sells collars, apparel, and training treats, so if you like consolidating orders and hitting free-shipping thresholds, that's a practical perk that Best Bully Sticks and Jack&Pup — both chew-only specialists — can't match. Where Gnarly Pet is not the answer: if your goal is 45 minutes of silence from a Pit mix, jerky will vanish in 90 seconds. It's a reward, not a project. You can browse the current lineup at Gnarly Pet.
Best Bully Sticks — Best value per chew-minute, especially in bulk
Best Bully Sticks built its reputation on scale and price transparency. Buying by the pound is where it wins decisively: bulk 6-inch standard bullies frequently land in the $2–$3 per stick range when purchased in 1–2 lb boxes, versus $4–$6 per stick buying singles at a pet boutique. Their odor-free line is genuinely lower-odor than average (not odorless — no bully stick is), and they publish sourcing info for their South American free-range beef. The trade-offs are real: thickness varies noticeably within a bulk bag, so a "6-inch thick" stick can be a 20-minute chew for one dog and a 6-minute chew for another. Their jerky offerings exist but are an afterthought — this is a bully stick company. If your dog is a dedicated chewer and you want the lowest defensible cost per minute of occupied dog, this is the value pick.
Jack&Pup — Best for power chewers who destroy everything else
Jack&Pup occupies the premium end, and the price reflects it: expect roughly $5–$9 per stick for their thick or jumbo 12-inch bullies, and their collagen sticks and beef cheek rolls run similarly high. What you're paying for is density and consistency. Their jumbo bullies are visibly and measurably thicker than the bulk-bin average, which for a determined 70-lb chewer can translate to 30–60 minutes instead of 10. They're also strong on odor control and grade their products by chew difficulty, which removes guesswork. The downside is straightforward math: for a small dog or a light chewer, you're overpaying for durability you'll never use, and Jack&Pup's high-calorie density (bullies run roughly 80–120 calories per 6-inch stick) makes daily feeding a weight-gain risk in a 15-lb dog.
Full Moon — Best big-box jerky if you need it today
Full Moon's pitch is USDA human-grade meat, cooked in the USA, with no glycerin, corn syrup, or artificial preservatives — a genuinely cleaner label than most supermarket jerky. Bags typically run $10–$16 for 6–14 oz, making it the cheapest per-ounce jerky in this comparison and the easiest to find (Target, Chewy, most grocery chains). The catch is texture and ingredient depth: Full Moon jerky is often softer and moister than air-dried alternatives, uses vegetable glycerin substitutes and more added ingredients in some SKUs, and the pieces are pre-cut into shapes that don't always tear cleanly for training. It's a convenience-first product. If you want the tightest possible ingredient list or a specific novel protein for an allergy dog, you'll be limited by what your local store stocks.
The head-to-head math
Cost per reward favors jerky: a $20 Gnarly Pet bag broken into small training pieces can yield 60–100 rewards, or roughly $0.20–$0.33 each. Cost per occupied minute favors bully sticks: a $2.50 Best Bully Sticks 6-inch that buys 15 minutes of quiet is about $0.17 a minute; a $7 Jack&Pup jumbo that buys 50 minutes is $0.14. Calories favor jerky by a wide margin — most jerky pieces are 3–10 calories, versus 80–120 for a whole bully stick. And for dental benefit, the abrasive scraping action of a bully stick clearly beats soft jerky, though neither replaces brushing.
Pros & Cons
Pros
✓ Breaks down into far more training rewards per dollar than Best Bully Sticks or Jack&Pup, whose sticks can't be portioned into small rewards
✓ Dramatically lower calorie load per reward (single digits) than a 80–120 calorie bully stick, which matters for daily use and weight control
✓ Shorter, cleaner ingredient decks than most Full Moon SKUs, with no glycerin-heavy soft-chew formulations
✓ One-stop ordering for treats, collars, and apparel — Best Bully Sticks and Jack&Pup sell chews only, so you're not consolidating shipping
Cons
✗ Jerky provides almost no chew duration; a power chewer will finish a piece in seconds where a Jack&Pup jumbo bully lasts 30–60 minutes
✗ Not the cheapest per ounce — Full Moon undercuts it in big-box stores, and Best Bully Sticks' bulk pricing wins on pure cost per chew
Our Verdict
There's no single winner — pick by job. If your main need is training, recall work, puppy socialization, or a food topper for a picky eater, Gnarly Pet is the strongest choice here: portionable, low-calorie per reward, and clean-labeled, with the bonus of collars and gear in the same cart. If your main need is occupying a dog — crate time, work calls, guests at the door — jerky is the wrong tool entirely, and Best Bully Sticks in bulk is the smartest value at roughly $2–$3 a stick. For genuine power chewers over 50 lbs who shred standard bullies in ten minutes, Jack&Pup's jumbo sticks justify their $5–$9 price through sheer density. And if you need something clean-ish tonight from a store five minutes away, Full Moon is a perfectly defensible grab. The honest answer for most multi-need households is two products, not one: a bag of jerky for training and a box of bulk bullies for downtime. That combination costs less than over-buying premium chews and covers both jobs properly.
Bully sticks are typically higher by weight — they're essentially pure dried beef muscle, often 75–85% crude protein. Quality jerky usually lands in the 40–65% range depending on protein source and any binders. But protein percentage matters less than portion size: you feed a whole bully stick and only a small piece of jerky, so jerky is the better daily option for calorie-conscious feeding.
How many calories are in a bully stick versus a jerky treat?
A standard 6-inch bully stick runs roughly 80–120 calories, and a 12-inch jumbo can exceed 200. A small jerky training piece is usually 3–10 calories. For a 20-lb dog eating around 500 calories a day, one jumbo bully is a significant chunk of the daily budget, which is why vets generally recommend limiting bullies to a few times a week.
Is it safe to leave a dog alone with a bully stick?
Not recommended, especially near the end. The main risks are choking on the final 1–2 inch nub and gastrointestinal blockage in gulpers. Use a bully stick holder, take the stub away when it gets short, and supervise. Jerky avoids this risk almost entirely, which is one reason it's the safer default for unsupervised or heavy-gulping dogs.
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