Only 3 cafes have it so far.
Fewer than 5 Gold Coast cafes have it, or the first cafe post or review we have is under 120 days old, or creators are posting it before any cafe has it. It also covers anything on a small share of cafes that is holding steady.
The stages run Emerging, Rising, Peaking, Mainstream, Fading. A trend can skip a stage or move back.
Iced coffee or a latte with protein added, as a scoop of protein powder or a ready-made protein milk: thicker and a little sweeter than a plain iced coffee.
It's emerging: early days yet.
This is a small sample: 338 Gold Coast cafes with an Instagram post or a menu in the last 90 days, so a few cafes can move a figure.
Gold Coast searches a month
First Gold Coast cafe post or review in our data.
170 searches, the busiest month.
Tap a number for what changed then.
Share of each city's own cafes with it, last 90 days.
Of the cafes in Gold Coast that posted anything that month, how many posted protein coffee, per 1,000 of them.
It is a share, not a count, so it does not grow just because we follow more cafes. It only grows when more of the cafes we follow take it up.
The month in progress shows here once it is complete, so a part month never reads as a drop. A month with too few cafes posting is left out.
0.0 per 1,000 in Oct 2026
Cafe menus listing it now, Gold Coast.
1 cafe menu
We started reading cafe menus in late 2026. Cafes adding and dropping it each month show here once the first whole month of menu reads is in.
Searches in Oct 2026, circles sized to match.
3suburbs with cafes posting it
By Nov 2026 (so far)
Each bar is the Gold Coast cafes with a post or customer review of it that month; Nov 2026 is not over yet, so its bar is so far.
1 suburb is known only from a menu, which we can't date, so it counts in the last month.
Data updated 15 Nov 2026.
Too early to quote: 3 cafes have had it so far. A quote will appear here once 5 cafes have.
Iced coffee or a latte with protein added, as a scoop of protein powder or a ready-made protein milk: thicker and a little sweeter than a plain iced coffee. A typical protein coffee, drawn from Gold Coast cafes' own posts, is built from the top down with straw (through the lid), espresso (a double shot over the top, about 20 g of protein all up), ice (fills the cup before anything is poured) and protein shake (a scoop of vanilla or chocolate protein blended with about 250 ml of milk). Each cafe makes its own version, so this is a typical build, not one cafe's recipe. In all our data to 15 Nov 2026, The Froth has seen it at 3 Gold Coast cafes across 3 suburbs, in posts, customer reviews and menus. The 1 in "Where to get one" are the cafe with it on its current menu.
It is on 1 Gold Coast cafe menu right now, including Little Barista Espresso Bar in Labrador. The "Where to get one" list on this page has every one, with the price where the menu gives one, links to the menu or post, and directions. Menus change, so check with the cafe before you go.
Gold Coast cafes also sell protein coffee as "protein". The Froth counts every one of these names as the same trend, from cafes' own posts and menus.
It is on a bigger share of Darwin cafes: 3.6% against Gold Coast's 0.3%, over the last 90 days.
There were 140 searches for protein coffee in Gold Coast in Oct 2026, with all its names added up. Across the 23 months we have, from Dec 2024 to Oct 2026, it ranged from 30 searches (Dec 2024) to 170 (Jul 2026). These are monthly estimates of search demand in Gold Coast.
The earliest Gold Coast cafe post or customer review about protein coffee that The Froth has is from 6 Apr 2026. We only see what we collect, so that is when we first saw it, not when it started: it may have been sold earlier, here or elsewhere.
A cafe counts for protein coffee from the first public post or customer review we found about it, the cafe's own post or a customer's, and while it is on the cafe's current menu. Shares are of the cafes we see well: those with an Instagram post or a current menu in the same 90 days, a chain counting once. A change compares the same cafes in the last 90 days with the 90 before, only among cafes we have followed through both, so newly added cafes never look like growth. The 90 days end on the latest day with cafe posts or reviews (15 Nov 2026), not today. Searches are monthly search demand in Gold Coast with all of a trend's names added up. Captions stay private; we only link to public posts. The full method is on our "How we track cafe trends" page.