The Best Cake Pans, According to Our Tests

No baker’s kitchen is complete without a round cake pan. We pull one out for all of our favorite cake recipes, from classics like chocolate cake and red velvet cake to towering layer cakes and the always-adorable Easter bunny cake. A round cake pan is no one-trick pony, though, pulling double duty for baking things like fluffy cinnamon rolls, dinner rolls, or even potato gratin.

But when it comes to nailing that perfect cake — tall and fluffy, with a moist, tender crumb and even browning — you need a great cake pan. In order to find the best of the best, we spent hours putting some of the most popular cake pans on the market to the test, baking several different types of cakes, and judging how each pan’s material, texture, and design features impacted its performance. Here’s how they stacked up.

Amazon Fat Daddio's Anodized Aluminum Round Cake Pan

PHOTO: Amazon

Pros

The Fat Daddio’s pan is made from 16-gauge anodized aluminum, so it distributes heat evenly, cools down quickly, and is safe to use with acidic ingredients.

Cons

Since anodized aluminum heats faster, some recipes baked in this pan may need to be adjusted slightly, such as baking at a lower temperature for a few minutes longer.

It’s easy to see why Fat Daddio’s is the cake pan of choice for many professional bakers and pastry chefs across the country. This pan was consistently a top performer in our tests, turning out tall, fluffy, and evenly baked cakes with little to no doming that were just as moist around the edges as in the center of the cake. The anodizing process sets this pan apart from the competition, as it helps the pan heat evenly and cool down quickly, so you don’t have to worry about a cake overbaking once it’s out of the oven. Anodizing also makes the cake pan safe to use with acidic ingredients like lemons, tomatoes, or buttermilk, so you can use it in recipes like our Buttermilk Cake with Blackberries without breaking a sweat.

The Fat Daddio’s pan isn’t nonstick, but simply greasing and lining the pan with parchment paper makes it easy to release cakes, breads, and cinnamon rolls, ensuring picture-perfect baked goods and an easy cleanup to boot. While the Fat Daddio’s pan may lack some of the bells and whistles of its competitors, we found its simple construction still checked all the boxes. The pan has a flat bottom and straight sides — a must for layer cakes — and a thick rolled rim that makes it easy to grip with oven mitts when transferring the pan in and out of the oven or flipping onto a cooling rack. At less than $15 each, this pan is a downright steal, and it’s also available in a range of widths and depths for all your baking needs.

Dimensions: 9 x 2 inches | Material: Anodized aluminum | Dishwasher–safe: No | Scratch–Proof: No

Amazon USA Pan Nonstick 9-Inch Round Cake Pan

PHOTO: Amazon

Pros

The pan’s nonstick coating is free of potentially toxic ingredients like PTFE, PFOA, and BPA and makes it easy to release recipes and clean.

USA Pan’s round cake pan is another reliable option to add to your kitchen, particularly if you’re seeking out a nonstick pan. Made from heavy gauge aluminized steel, this pan features a ribbed, fluted surface that helps increase air circulation, leading to more even heat distribution and, in turn, cakes that are baked uniformly from the center to the edges. In our tests, the pan repeatedly baked evenly browned cakes that avoided significant doming. Thanks to the brand’s patented Americoat silicone coating — which is free of PTFE, PFOA, and BPA — baked goods like cake and focaccia effortlessly popped out of the pan, which is also easy to clean.

Dimensions: 9 x 2 inches | Material: Aluminized steel | Dishwasher–safe: No | Scratch–Proof: No

PHOTO: Caraway

Pros

This stylish pan is available in several eye-catching colors, like marigold, sage, and perracotta, making it great for gifting.

Cons

At $40, the Caraway circle pan is the most expensive of the pans we tested, though a number of features help justify its higher price tag.

The Caraway circle pan was one of the most attractive cake pans we tested, but we were more impressed with how well the pan performed, baking cakes with a tender crumb and little to no doming. Made from aluminized steel, the pan features a flat bottom, straight sides, and a thin flat rim. The pan’s ceramic coating, which is free of potentially toxic materials including PTFE, PFOA, PFAs, and heavy metals, makes the surface nonstick, so baked goods effortlessly release from the pan, and it’s also easy to wash by hand. While nonstick coatings are famously easy to scratch, the coating on the Caraway pan held up surprisingly well throughout our tests. The pan can also withstand higher temperatures than many other pans — it’s oven-safe up to 550°F — making it a worthy investment for a range of recipes.

Dimensions: 9 x 2 inches | Material: Aluminized steel | Dishwasher–safe: No | Scratch–Proof: Yes

Cuisinart 9-Inch Chef's Classic Nonstick Bakeware Round Cake Pan, Silver

PHOTO: Amazon

Throughout our testing, cakes baked in the Cuisinart round cake pan, which is made from heavy gauge aluminized steel with straight sides and a rolled rim, avoided the dreaded dome. The pan has a Whitford Xylan nonstick coating on both its interior and exterior, which both easily releases baked goods and makes for easy cleanup. The downside? This pan didn’t distribute heat as evenly as some of the other pans in our tests, leading to unevenly browned — and in some cases, overbaked — cakes, which were also slightly denser due to the pan’s shorter sides. That said, its lower price tag still makes it a solid option for home bakers looking to purchase several pans at once to make layer cakes.

Dimensions: 9.49 x 1.69 inches | Material: Aluminized steel | Dishwasher–safe: Yes | Scratch–Proof: No

Our Favorite Cake Pan

Fat Daddio’s cake pans are often named-checked by professional bakers and pastry chefs and our testing helped illustrate why. Whether baking pillowy focaccia, fluffy cinnamon rolls, or light and airy cake layers, this pan rose above the competition — often literally. With its superior anodized coating and affordable price tag, we’d recommend the Fat Daddio’s Anodized Aluminum Round Cake Pan to bakers of all skill levels.

Factors to Consider

Material

Material is arguably the most important factor to consider when picking out a round cake pan. Many professional bakers opt for aluminized steel due to its durability and even heat conductivity, which helps to prevent hot spots and ensures baked goods that rise evenly, avoiding the dreaded dome. Pastry chef and More Than Cake author Natasha Pickowicz says to avoid glass cake pans, as the material tends to conduct heat more slowly. “I never bake in glass because I just don’t think you’re gonna get as even or strong of a bake,” she says.

Like many pastry chefs, Pickowicz prefers cake pans made with anodized aluminum, a finishing process that makes these pans more durable and resistant to scratching. The anodizing process also gives pans a level of nonstick quality, helping baked goods release easily from the pan and making cleanup a breeze, and keeps the metal from reacting to acidic ingredients like lemons or tomatoes and leaching into your food.

“With something like anodized aluminum, it’s lightweight, and the batter is coming into contact with the heat of the oven more efficiently, and all around it too — not just on top, but underneath,” Pickowicz says. “Anodized aluminum is really what you’re seeing in every single bakery, restaurant, kitchen. They’re baking hundreds of cakes a day — they know what works.”

Nonstick

Pickowicz recommends steering clear of nonstick cake pans, as the nonstick finish can easily be nicked when removing the cake from the pan. “I always tell people not to invest in nonstick anything, but especially for baking cakes,” Pickowicz says. “When you’re trying to remove the cake or baked good from the nonstick pan, it’s really easy to nick or chip the finish, and then it’s really just trash at that point. It’s hard to take care of them and there’s nothing that a little cooking spray or butter in the pan won’t do for you.”

If you do opt for a nonstick cake pan — which are, it’s worth noting, convenient and easy to clean — make sure to follow the manufacturer’s instructions to preserve the nonstick finish as long as possible. Regardless, you should still avoid nonstick pans when baking recipes like chiffon cake or angel food cake in which the batter needs to grip onto the sides of the pan to rise properly. “That’s why for a chiffon or genoise sponge, you might not even grease the pan because you don’t want to reduce the friction; you want to increase it so it’s grippy,” Pickowicz says. “With nonstick, you really lose that opportunity.”

Size

Round cake pans come in many sizes, but 8- and 9-inch pans are standard for home bakers. “I think it’s important to have both an 8-inch and a 9-inch round cake pan, and a quarter sheet pan for sheet cakes,” says baker and cookbook author Joy Wilson of Joy the Baker. Whichever size you choose, make sure to look for a cake pan with straight sides to ensure uniformity when assembling layer cakes.

Surface

Some cake pans have textured surfaces, which are said to increase air circulation, aiding in heat distribution and evenly baking cakes from the centers out to the edges. In our tests, we noticed pans with textured surfaces, such as grooves or ridges, also cleanly released baked goods and were particularly easy to hand wash.

How We Tested Cake Pans

Food & Wine / Heather Riske

After researching the market, we narrowed our tests down to six popular 9-inch cake pans, which we evaluated based on their performance, durability, and ease of cleaning. We looked at factors including the pan’s material, texture, design features, and, if applicable, nonstick surface, and then evaluated how these factors impacted the pan’s performance in a series of tests.

To judge each pan’s performance next to the other, we baked the same recipes in each pan — both cake, including a basic white cake, a boxed yellow cake, and our Best-Ever Birthday Cake — and non-cake, such as our pillowy focaccia. We looked closely at how each pan baked those recipes, judging whether or not the interior of the cake was baked thoroughly and evenly, if the outside of the cake was an even golden-brown color, and if the cake had a pronounced dome, indicating uneven heating throughout the pan.

To test the durability of each pan, we considered factors like the highest oven temperature the pan is compatible with and looked at whether or not running a metal utensil across the surface damaged the pan’s surface or, if applicable, its nonstick coating. We also judged how easily the cake and focaccia released from the pan, noting if any part of the baked goods stuck to the pan, and how easy the pan was to clean.

Other Cake Pans We Tested

The cake pans highlighted above performed the best throughout our tests, but we found a few others also worth a mention. Although they fell short in a few of our tests, these pans would still be solid options in your kitchen. Here’s what we liked — and where we saw room for improvement.

Great Jones Patty Cake Pan ($30 at Great Jones)

Great Jones’ Patty Cake pan is easy on the eyes — it’s available in three bold colors (raspberry, broccoli, and blueberry) and has a wavy, corrugated surface that helps easily release baked goods. We found this pan to be a bit inconsistent, though, baking a beautifully browned round of focaccia but also slightly underbaking cakes in several tests. While the nonstick coating made for an easy cleanup, it did not hold up well against metal utensils and quickly got nicked.

Williams Sonoma Traditionaltouch Round Cake Pan ($25 at Williams Sonoma)

Made with aluminized steel, the Traditionaltouch Round Cake Pan from Williams Sonoma is a classic option, with a flat surface, straight sides, and a thick rolled edge. This pan also proved a little unreliable, performing well in some tests but yielding underbaked or domed cakes in others. The pan does not have a nonstick coating and, even when greased and lined with parchment paper, a few recipes stuck to its surface in spots.

Frequently Asked Questions

Should you grease cake pans?

While there are a few exceptions — and we’ll get to those — greasing cake pans is generally good practice. “Always grease the cake pan,” Wilson says, “unless you’re making a souffle that needs to crawl up the edges. If not, grease the cake pan.”

Make sure to follow the recipe’s instructions for greasing the pan, which will indicate if more or less preparation is needed. Pickowicz says you can skip greasing the pan when making custard- or liquid-based recipes, like cheesecake, flan, crème caramel, or anything with Jell-O, for instance. But for classic white, yellow, or chocolate cakes, greasing and lining the pan is a no-brainer.

“For any kind of flour-based bake, it usually is a nice extra step — it’s insurance,” Pickowicz says. “So much of baking is just, are you setting yourself up for success? Are you doing everything that you can do to make the process feel pleasurable and not stressful? If you can take two seconds to grease a pan so you’re not stressed about it coming out later, why wouldn’t you do that?”

What’s the best way to make a cake pan nonstick?

Whether or not a cake pan has a nonstick coating, it’s typically a good idea to still grease it to help baked goods release easily from the pan and make for an easier cleanup. “I grease the pans with vegetable shortening and dust it with flour — or cocoa powder if making a chocolate recipe — and that does the trick,” Wilson says.

When deciding what to grease your pan with, Pickowicz says to remember that whatever you use will impart flavor into the cake. You can opt for something neutral, like vegetable shortening or a nonstick spray such as PAM, or choose an ingredient that will further build upon the flavor of the cake.

“I think greasing the pan is a really cool opportunity to build even more flavor into your bake,” Pickowicz says. “If I’m making a butter-based cake, I try to grease the pan with butter, and if it’s an olive-oil based cake, I might just rub the sides of the pan with a little bit of oil. Because of its fat content, butter helps create a really flavorful crust around the edges that I think is super delicious, and it will act like glue if you want to add in even more things to build on a flavor or a texture or a look — maybe it’s turbinado sugar, a blend of different seeds, like sesame and poppy seeds, or chopped herbs. All those things will adhere to a buttered pan but also infuse whatever you’re baking with that flavor and texture. Then, when you invert and remove the cake from the pan, it will magically become a part of the cake.”

Lining the surface of the pan with parchment paper after greasing creates an added level of insurance for cakes that easily release from the pan. Pre-cut parchment paper rounds are widely available, but you can also make your own by simply tracing the bottom of your pan on a sheet of parchment and cutting it out.

Pickowicz says it’s not necessary to line the sides of the pan and recommends skipping the parchment paper altogether when making an upside-down cake, as the paper tends to wrinkle, which will show through in the surface of the cake. “For something like an upside-down cake, you’re putting so much sugar and fat down at the bottom of the pan anyway, there’s no chance of the cake sticking, so you’ll be fine,” she says.

How do you get a cake out of a cake pan?

Before removing a cake from the pan, make sure to let it sit in the pan for a few minutes after it’s finished baking — around 5 to 10 — in order to give the crumb a chance to set. But don’t wait too long, either. “You don’t ever want to try to remove a cake from a pan immediately fresh out of the oven,” Pickowicz says. “I find that bakes are easier to remove when they are a little bit warm. If it’s cooled all the way, it can get a little bit trickier to remove.”

“The trick to getting a cake out of a cake pan successfully is to not let the cake cool completely,” Wilson adds. “The sugars will harden around the sides of the pan as the cake cools, so let the cake rest on the counter for 15 to 20 minutes tops.”

After the cake has cooled a bit, grab a flat kitchen tool, such as a small offset spatula or butter knife, and run it along the edge of the cake to loosen it inside the pan. Then, grab the surface where you plan to transfer the cake — such as a plate, platter, cooling rack, or cardboard round — and place it on top of the cake with one hand. “Like I’m putting a hat on top of the cake pan,” Pickowicz says. With one hand on top of the surface, slide your other hand under the bottom of the cake pan and flip it upside down. If the pan has been properly greased, the cake should pop easily out of the pan, and you can peel any parchment paper back and discard before transferring to your favorite cake stand.

How do you wash cake pans?

Although some cake pans are dishwasher-friendly, most manufacturers recommend hand washing to keep them in tip-top shape, particularly if the pan has a nonstick finish. Make sure to let the pan cool completely first, as putting a hot pan in cool water can cause it to warp. Avoid abrasive cleaners and scouring pads, which can damage the surface of the pan, in favor of a simple sponge or soft cloth and warm, soapy water.

How can doming be avoided?

Doming occurs when the edges of a cake bake faster than the middle of the cake, causing the center to, well, dome. A slight dome can easily be trimmed off after the cake cools to create nice, flat layers, but there are a few ways to try and prevent doming in the first place. “I find that if you don’t overmix the cake batter, and especially avoid overmixing the eggs, which can lead to incorporating too much air into the cake batter, that helps to avoid doming,” Wilson says. “Baking cakes in the middle of the oven can also help them bake more evenly. Sometimes I find that cakes baking too close to heating elements can dome.”

Our Expertise

Heather Riske is a St. Louis-based writer and editor with over a decade of experience in food and lifestyle content. For nearly eight years, she worked as an editor at Feast Magazine, a regional culinary publication covering the state of Missouri, southern Illinois, and eastern Kansas, where she was honored with a “Top Women in Media” award by Folio. She has dedicated much of her career to highlighting local chefs and restaurants and sharing helpful cooking knowledge for publications such as Better Homes & Gardens, Men’s Health, Feast Magazine, and St. Louis Magazine. For this piece, she tested ten of the best cake pans in side-by-side testing.
For more insights, Riske also spoke with baker and cookbook author, Joy Wilson, of Joy the Baker.

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