My well-loved Banana Muffin recipe makes incredibly soft, moist muffins with tall, bakery-style tops, sweet banana flavor, and an optional streusel topping. Recipe includes a how-to video!
Your New Favorite Breakfast Muffin
Today I’m re-sharing one of my favorite muffin recipes on the blog, and apparently, it’s one of your favorites too! With nearly 500 five-star ratings, this banana muffin recipe is so well-loved–and for good reason. These aren’t bland, boring, or basic banana muffins; they’re fluffy, moist, and loaded with banana flavor! And if that’s not enough, I recommend topping them with a crumbly, buttery streusel topping…yum.
It took a lot of tries and tweaks to get this recipe just perfect, but it was well worth the trial and error. This recipe makes the softest, most flavorful banana muffin I’ve ever tasted–with or without the streusel on top–and I’m so proud to share it with you!
What Makes My Banana Muffin Recipe the BEST:
- It produces big, beautiful muffin tops, thanks to a nifty oven trick.
- They truly taste like banana muffins, not banana bread in muffin form.
- No mixer needed–these come together easily by hand!
- They take just 30 minutes from start to finish.
What You Need
I found I needed several key ingredients for super flavorful banana muffins:
- Three ripe bananas. Ripe bananas mash easier and impart a stronger banana flavor, so save this recipe for those dark brown bananas lingering at the bottom of your fruit basket (unlike the ones pictured above!).
- Butter and oil. We’re using a blend of both for the best flavored and textured banana muffin (same reason I use a blend of the two in my vanilla cake!). Stick with a neutral oil like canola, vegetable, or grapeseed, and make sure your butter is unsalted.
- Sugar. Using some brown sugar gives the muffins a rich flavor that granulated alone wouldn’t provide.
- Buttermilk. This keeps the muffins nice and moist. If you’re low on buttermilk, give my easy buttermilk substitute a try!
SAM’S TIP: Overmixing your batter can lead to muffins that are too tough and dense. To avoid this, I strongly recommend stirring your banana muffin batter completely by hand. Luckily, we’re using melted butter in this recipe, so mixing by hand is a breeze!
Remember, this is just an overview of the ingredients I used and why. For the full recipe please scroll down to the bottom of the post!
How to Make Banana Muffins
- Mash your bananas, then add the oil and melted butter.
- Stir in the sugar, then add the eggs, vanilla, and buttermilk.
- Combine your dry ingredients in a separate bowl, then gently fold them into the wet ingredients.
- Portion the batter into a paper-lined muffin tin, filling each liner is ¾ of the way full.
- Prepare your streusel, if using, and portion over each muffin.
- Bake your muffins for 8 minutes, then reduce the temperature and bake for another 7-8 minutes until done.
SAM’S TIP: While I personally love and recommend the streusel topping, I know not everyone wants the extra sugar or dishes. As you can see, the “naked” banana muffin pictured below baked up beautifully with an even tidier, higher muffin top. So feel free to skip it!
Frequently Asked Questions
Yes, although I do have a separate banana nut muffin recipe you might want to try (it uses browned butter too 🤤). You can add between 1-1½ cups of add-ins (chocolate chips work well!) to this banana muffin recipe. I recommend adding them when you’re almost done incorporating the dry ingredients.
Yes! To do this, you’ll follow the same instructions I provide for my bakery-style chocolate chip muffins:
Bake at 425F for 8 minutes, then reduce the oven to 350F (don’t open the door!) and continue baking until the muffins begin to turn golden brown. This can take anywhere from 7-15 minutes, so keep an eye on them!
This banana muffin recipe freezes very well! In fact, I did this in preparation for Luke’s arrival so I always had a quick breakfast handy during his newborn phase.
If you want want to freeze yours, allow them to cool completely, wrap individually in plastic wrap, place in a Ziploc bag, and freeze. To thaw, either set your muffins out at room temperature or microwave them (just use the defrost setting or they’ll become hard).
So, do you agree? Is this the BEST banana muffin recipe? Let me know in the comments!
Enjoy!
Let’s bake together! I’ll be walking you through all the steps in my written recipe and video below! If you try this recipe, be sure to tag me on Instagram, and you can also find me on YouTube and Facebook
The Best Banana Muffin Recipe
Ingredients
- 1 ½ cups well-mashed ripe bananas (385g) This is typically 3 large bananas for me
- ¼ cup canola oil (may substitute vegetable oil) (60ml)
- ¼ cup unsalted butter melted and cooled at least 5 minutes (60g)
- ½ cup sugar (100g)
- ½ cup light brown sugar tightly packed (100g)
- 2 large eggs room temperature preferred
- 1 Tablespoon vanilla extract
- 2 cups all-purpose flour (250g)
- 1 ½ teaspoons baking powder
- ½ teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ¼ cup buttermilk (60ml) room temperature preferred
Streusel (optional)
- ½ cup all-purpose flour (65g)
- ½ cup brown sugar (100g)
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- ¼ cup unsalted butter, cold (60g)
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 425F (220C) and line a muffin tin with paper liners*
- Place peeled bananas in a large bowl and use a fork or a potato masher to mash them – bananas should be well-mashed.
- Add canola oil and melted butter and stir well.
- Stir in sugars until well-combined.
- Add eggs and vanilla extract and butermilk and stir well. Set aside.
- In a separate bowl, whisk together your dry ingredients — flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.
- Add dry ingredients to your wet batter and gently fold in until ingredients are just combined (don’t over-mix the batter!).
- Portion batter into prepared muffin tin, filling each liner ¾ of the way full. Set aside and prepare your Streusel topping.
Streusel Topping (optional)
- Combine flour, brown sugar, and salt in a medium-sized bowl and use a fork to stir the ingredients together.
- Using a pastry cutter, cut in your cold butter until the butter is well-worked in and your mixture resembles coarse crumbs.
- Sprinkle streusel topping evenly over each muffin.
- Bake muffins on 425F (218C) for 8 minutes and then reduce the oven temperature to 350 (175C) (do not open the oven door or remove the muffins, just leave them in and reduce the temperature) and bake another 7-8 minutes on 350F (177C). A toothpick inserted in the center of the largest muffin should come out clean or with few moist crumbs (no wet batter) to test for doneness.
- Allow muffins to cool before enjoying.
Notes
Nutrition
Nutritional information is based on third-party calculations and should be considered an estimate only. Actual nutritional content will vary based upon brands used, measuring methods, cooking method, portion sizes, and more.
This recipe was originally published 01/05/2018. Updated with more information and better photos 10/17/2019.
Gina
Oh my gosh! I cook a lot, and this is the BEST recipe for banana chocolate chip muffins! Easy to make, I made them with my 4 year old grandson, and they were sooo delicious! Forewarning: these muffins disappear quickly!
Louise
This was SO yummy. It really is a fluffy muffin and not banana bread in muffin form. I so enjoyed the lighter texture, and it seemed to be a milder banana flavor vs. banana bread. Perfect! Thanks for your great recipes:)
Emily @ Sugar Spun Run
That is exactly how they were designed–so glad you liked the outcome, Louise!
Delia
Amazing result! Love it! I did not bother to make the toppings , just added some pecan nuts still came out very good!
Idalia
Wow!!!!! I made these today and I am blown away. This is hands down the best banana muffin I’ve ever tasted. The family loved them too! The flavor, and don’t get me started on the streusel, my goodness, the butter sweet crunchiness on top… wowza. There are no words. This is going to be my recipe forever. No longer will I worry about overripe bananas!! Thank you for sharing this amazing recipe with us. ❤️
Donna
Best muffins ever….the family is really enjoying this banana muffin treat.
Dawn
I made these three days ago and they are absolutely delicious! My son usually prefers banana bread, but I thought I’d shake things up and make muffins. He went crazy over them. He just asked me to make more today, but to make sure they were exactly the same as the first batch. I tend to deviate once I try a recipe that is successful. LOL. He is making sure they are exactly the same! He wants to take them to football practice in the morning for his team. I guess I’ll try the brown butter banana muffins another time, off to make another batch of the best banana muffins ever. 🙂
Jeanmarie
Made these a week ago and my family adored them. I have loved baking for 50 years, and am so excited to try all your recipes. So far every recipe has been wonderful!
janis krechter
Delicious! I didn’t see anything about doubling the recipe, but I had so many very ripe bananas that i went ahead and tried it. Perfect!
Meg
I just made these muffins and they are delicious! Light and fluffy much better than banana bread. Excellent recipe. Great flavor and very easy to make.I halved the recipe but should have made the whole recipe as my son just came home and inhaled 3 muffins.
Jen
Fantastic recipe! Any chance you’ve tried it as a cake? I’d love a cake form of these that’s less like banana bread and more like cake. I wonder if it would translate? Anyone try it?
Emily @ Sugar Spun Run
Hi Jen! We have not made these as a cake and would recommend using our banana cake instead. 🙂
Nancy
Absolutely the best banana muffins I’ve made in 30 years! The streusel topping is indescribably amazing. The streusel topping is indescribably amazing. Stop reading reviews and get in your kitchen and make these. Like, now. Disregard instructions to “allow muffins to cool before enjoying”. Don’t wait for them to cool. Eat them warm. Life is short.
Emily @ Sugar Spun Run
Sounds like these were a huge hit for you! Thanks for letting us know how you liked them, Nancy 😊
Connie Etzkorn
Over 50 years baking, this has to be the best muffin ever!
Connie
Amy
Really yummy