With its super-moist and buttery texture, banana and brown sugar flavors, soft crumb, and 1,300+ reviews, this is a delicious AND undeniably popular banana bread recipe. You need 4 medium or 3 large ripe bananas.
I originally published this recipe in 2013 and have since added new photos and a few more success tips. It’s one of the most popular recipes I’ve published on this website, out of over 1,200. This recipe is such a fan favorite, that it deserved a spot in print! You’ll also find this recipe in my cookbook, Sally’s Baking 101.
One reader, Michele, says: “Perfectly delish every time! Absolutely foolproof. Nuts, no nuts, smidge more or less of sour cream—no problem… bigger bananas, smaller—no worries, perfect, beyond delicious EVERY time. ★★★★★”
This is my favorite banana bread recipe, one that I’ve cherished for years. It’s one of those classic recipes that you start to know by heart, just like a good pie crust or chocolate chip cookies recipe. This bread comes to mind first when I have leftover spotty bananas on the counter, and it’s the bread that’s on constant rotation in my freezer stash.
One reader, Tricia, commented: “I have this recipe on speed dial. LOL. It is so tasty and is always a crowd pleaser. My kids and entire family love it!!! ★★★★★”
Yes, I have this recipe on speed dial too!
I’ve tried dozens of banana bread recipes over the years, and when I baked and originally published this recipe many years ago, I never looked back.
Why You’ll Love This Banana Bread Recipe Too
- Mega banana flavor
- Not overly sweet, so banana flavor shines
- Dense, but still quite tender & soft
- Buttery & stays moist for days (tastes best on day 2, just like peanut butter chocolate chip zucchini bread)
- Straightforward, simple recipe
- Freezes wonderfully
- Excellent plain or with nuts or chocolate chips—or a swipe of cinnamon butter
How to Mash Bananas
Did you know you can use your electric mixer to mash bananas? Break or slice the spotty bananas into large pieces and place in the bowl of your stand mixer—or use a regular mixing bowl and your hand mixer. Begin beating on low, then gradually increase to medium-high speed as the bananas break down into mashed banana. Transfer the bananas to another bowl and use the mixing bowl for the butter and sugar. (No need to clean it—some mashed banana remnants is fine.)
I do this when I mash bananas for banana muffins and banana chocolate chip breakfast cookies too.
Other Banana Bread Ingredients
- Butter: Use softened butter for a soft texture and irresistible butter flavor.
- Brown Sugar: Use all brown sugar in this recipe. In the headnotes for this chocolate chip cookies recipe, I explain that brown sugar yields soft and moist cookies. Well, brown sugar works that same magic in banana bread, too. It also adds wonderful flavor.
- Eggs: Eggs supply cakes, cupcakes, breads, doughs, and cookies their stability and structure, as well as a tender texture. You’ll need 2 large eggs for this.
- Sour Cream or Yogurt: Sour cream or yogurt adds even more moisture to this banana bread. (You can use the 2 interchangeably in most baking recipes.)
For banana nut bread, add 3/4 cup of chopped nuts to the banana bread batter; I like using either pecans or walnuts. If you’re nuts for nuts (LOL), you’ll enjoy the toasty slight crunch nestled inside the soft crumbs. If you’re not a nut person, feel free to leave them out or replace with chocolate chips. For a whole wheat version, try my whole wheat banana bread. Or for a chocolate version, try my double chocolate banana bread.
Can I Use Frozen Bananas?
Yes and I do this often. Thaw the frozen bananas at room temperature. Drain off any excess liquid, mash, then use as instructed in the recipe below. See How to Freeze & Thaw Bananas for Baking. Try not to mash too much or else you’ll be left with 1 and 1/2 cups of banana-y liquid; some chunks are great.
Can I Turn This Into a Banana Bundt Cake?
I recommend using my extremely similar, scaled-up recipe for chocolate marble banana Bundt cake instead. You can leave out the chocolate swirl in that recipe.
How to Freeze Banana Bread
Freeze banana bread using these instructions to preserve its fresh flavor and texture for months:
- Cool baked banana bread completely.
- Tightly wrap the loaf or slices (individually or grouped) in 2–3 layers of plastic wrap or aluminum foil.
- Place wrapped banana bread in a large freezer-friendly storage bag or reusable container.
- Date the bag and freeze for up to 3–4 months. Thaw wrapped or unwrapped in the refrigerator or at room temperature. All methods work like a charm!
I like to freeze the quick bread in slices because slices thaw much quicker than a whole loaf.
Overall, this is an easy recipe for classic banana bread. The batter takes about 10 minutes to throw together, the bread stays moist for days, and nothing beats the smell of fresh banana bread in the oven. (Except for, maybe, zucchini bread or pumpkin bread… try those next!)
Other Favorite Banana Recipes:
- Banana Cake & Banana Cupcakes
- Cinnamon Swirl Banana Bread
- Banana Cream Pie & Banoffee Pie
- Banana Muffins or Healthier Chocolate Banana Muffins & Blueberry Banana Muffins
- Banana Chocolate Chip Streusel Muffins
- Baked Banana Oatmeal
- Peanut Butter Banana Muffins
My Favorite Banana Bread
- Prep Time: 10 minutes
- Cook Time: 65 minutes
- Total Time: 3 hours
- Yield: 1 loaf
- Category: Bread
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: American
Description
With its super-moist and buttery texture, banana and brown sugar flavors, soft crumb, and 1,000+ reviews, this is a delicious AND undeniably popular banana bread recipe. You need 4 large ripe bananas. This recipe is also in my cookbook, Sally’s Baking 101.
Ingredients
- 2 cups (250g) all-purpose flour (spooned & leveled)
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1/2 cup (8 Tbsp; 113g) unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
- 3/4 cup (150g) packed light or dark brown sugar
- 2 large eggs, at room temperature
- 1 and 1/2 cups (345g) mashed bananas (about 3–4 ripe bananas)
- 1/3 cup (80g) plain Greek yogurt or full-fat sour cream, at room temperature
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- optional: 3/4 cup (90g) chopped pecans or walnuts, or 1 cup (180g) semi-sweet chocolate chips
Instructions
- Adjust the oven rack to the lower third position and preheat the oven to 350°F (177°C). Lowering the oven rack prevents the top of your bread from browning too much, too soon. Grease a 9×5-inch loaf pan with nonstick spray. Set aside.
- In a medium bowl, whisk the flour, baking soda, salt, and cinnamon together. Set aside.
- In a large bowl using a handheld or stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, beat the butter and brown sugar together on medium-high speed until light and creamy, about 3 minutes. (Here’s a helpful tutorial if you need guidance on how to cream butter and sugar.) With the mixer running on medium speed, add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Scrape down the sides of the bowl as needed. Beat in the mashed bananas, yogurt/sour cream, and vanilla until combined.
- Add the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients and beat on low speed just until combined. Do not over-mix. Fold in the nuts/chocolate chips, if using. The batter should be thick.
- Pour and spread the batter into the prepared baking pan. Bake for 60–65 minutes, making sure to loosely cover the pan with aluminum foil halfway through, to prevent the top from getting too brown. The bread is done when a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean with only a few small moist crumbs. Cool the bread in the pan set on a cooling rack for 1 hour. Remove the bread from the pan and place it directly on the rack to cool completely before slicing and serving.
- Store wrapped tightly at room temperature for up to 3 days or in the refrigerator for up to 1 week.
Notes
- Special Tools (affiliate links): 9×5-inch Loaf Pan | Electric Mixer (Handheld or Stand) | Glass Mixing Bowls | Whisk | Silicone Spatula | Cooling Rack
- Update in 2025: With enough reader feedback stating the bread can often be too moist and dense, and therefore not bake properly, my team and I retested the bread multiple times over the past 2 years; we slightly reduced the amount of mashed bananas from 2 cups to 1 and 1/2 cups.
- Butter: If needed, you can use salted butter in this recipe with no other changes needed. I’ve also successfully reduced the butter down to 6 Tablespoons (85g) with no issue (just as tasty).
- Brown Sugar: This is not an overly sweet quick bread. If you want a sweeter banana bread, increase to 1 cup (200g) brown sugar. Feel free to replace some or all of the brown sugar with regular white granulated sugar.
- Cream Cheese Frosting: This banana bread also tastes fantastic with cream cheese frosting on top! To make it, beat 4 ounces (112g) of softened cream cheese and 1/4 cup (60g) of softened unsalted butter together on medium speed until smooth. Beat in 1 cup (120g) of confectioners sugar, 1/2 teaspoon of pure vanilla extract, and a pinch of salt until combined. Spread on cooled loaf.
- Banana Bread Muffins: Use this banana bread recipe to make 15 banana bread muffins. Spoon the batter into a lined or greased muffin pan (fill each to the top with batter) and bake for 5 minutes at 425°F (218°C); then, keeping the muffins in the oven, reduce the oven temperature to 350°F (177°C). Bake for an additional 16–17 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. The total bake time for the banana bread muffins is about 21–23 minutes. The initial burst of hot air helps those muffins rise nice and tall! Or try my quick & easy banana muffins.
- Brown Sugar: Feel free to substitute the same amount of regular white granulated sugar or coconut sugar. I do not recommend any liquid sweeteners.
- No Sour Cream or Yogurt? Feel free to use 1/3 cup mashed banana (in addition to what is called for in the recipe), unsweetened applesauce, or even canned pumpkin puree.
- Frozen Bananas: You can use frozen bananas here. Thaw the frozen bananas. Drain off any excess liquid, mash, then use as instructed in the recipe. See How to Freeze & Thaw Bananas for Baking. Try not to mash too much or else you’ll be left with banana-y liquid; some chunks are great.
- Chocolate Chips: I love this bread with chocolate chips, too. Feel free to add 1 cup of your favorite chocolate chips. No need to leave out the nuts if you add the chocolate chips. Chocolate chips and nuts are both optional.
- Can I Turn This Into Banana Bundt Cake? There isn’t enough batter. I recommend using my extremely similar, scaled-up recipe for chocolate marble banana Bundt cake instead. You can leave out the chocolate swirl in that recipe.
Reader Comments and Reviews
Oh my goodness this banana bread is soooo good!!! I’m never buying the boxed kind again! I made it with the cream cheese frosting and it’s so delicious! The only substitution I made was because I ran out of cinnamon so I substituted a pinch of nutmeg and it’s still awesome! This is now my go to banana bread recipe.
Delicioso!! This is my new go to recipe! A slice of warmed banana nut bread, a spread of butter and a cup of coffee = a perfect morning! So moist and delicate! I DOUBLED the recipe to make 2 loaves and added 2 additional bananas, just because I had extra and didn’t want them to go to waste. I also divided up the brown sugar with Splenda brown sugar (3/4 c each). This cake is not overly sweet which is perfect for me, however, if you’re looking for sweet then I’d add 1/4 c to 1/2 c of sugar. Looking forward to making this again for the holidays with a cream cheese frosting!
Hi Anita, I doubled the recipe to make 2 loaves and used 3/4 brown sugar and 3/4 Splenda brown sugar and it was perfect! I love that this is not an overly sweet cake. Warmed with a little bit of butter is perfect for me and my family! 🙂
I made these today…. I doubled it because I had so many ripe bananas!
Because of supplies, I made jumbo muffins, small muffins, and the small loaf is cooking now. I ate one jumbo already. I started then at 425°F like it says and then left them until 16… I kind of think they would’ve been done at 14 or 15 because of the brown sugar they got a little too dark on the part touching the pan. I have the heavy type muffin tins though. Am I supposed to modify depending of my tins are heavy or light? Also I think th e double batch puts you at risk for over blending, so for those doing two I’ll recommend getting an extralarg bowl, but a shallow one of possible… Or just reiterating to turn off the mixer to stir more often to avoid overmixing. Just thoughts…. The edges of mine were a tad too chewy and I’m thinking that’s what happened with mine. More experienced bakers I’m sure anticipate this!
All that aside….they’re amazing! Enjoy, everyone!
made a double batch best recipe ever!!! thank you
OMG!!!! So delicious! I doubled the recipe, added an extra banana, added 3 tablespoons of applesauce, a container of yogurt, 1/4c sour cream, 2T cinnamon, and kept everything else as is and used pecans!!! I lined the pans with parchment and baked for 70 minutes and this bread is absolutely moist and tasty!!!!!
So yummy! I topped mine with a mix of powdered sugar, pumpkin pie spice, and some extra cinnamon. Then drizzled it with melted semi sweet chocolate. Was a huge hit!
Hi Sally
My banana bread deflated after I took it out of the oven. What could be causing this?
Hi Amanda, If the bread is deflating, double check the freshness of your baking soda. (I find it loses strength after just 3 months.) Additionally, try baking for a few extra minutes. Sinking is usually because the baked good is under-baked.
This recipe is wonderful. It was my first time baking banana bread, and my husband, who has claims to “the best banana bread” has declared my bread the winner!
My mom’s banana bread tasted exactly like this and after she moved a few times we couldn’t find the recipe. I am so glad I tried this recipe because I have tried 4 other recipes now and I was ready to give up on ever finding one like hers. This was so delicious and moist it’s really the perfect recipe.
It turned out to be the best I’ve ever made!
This banana bread recipe was easy and the best my husband loved it I did cut down on the brown sugar and it was perfect bread to me shouldn’t be sweet if was perfect thank you for sharing
Great recipe!!! I cook a ton and bake often – this recipe was simple and absolutely Delicious!!! I doubled it – used salted butter, and added chocolate chips (because the 18 and 20 year old son’s whom are currently home love chocolate:)) I did add an extra banana for each recipe in “chunk” form… also was out of brown sugar – HOW DOES THAT HAPPEN??? so used white sugar with a bit of molasses… I have a few regular recipes and this one will be added near the top of the list!
Thank you for sharing your recipe.. The bread is so good, super moist and flavorful. It’s a keeper!
First time using this recipe and we LOVE it. Used a bundt pan and in 39 minutes it came out PERFECT. Fluffy and moist. Yummy.
This is the 1st time I baked banana bread and it was such a success, thank you very much!
Made this with Siggi’s (super thick, Icelandic style) Vanilla yogurt instead of plain and a dash of cardamom… This might be my new favorite banana bread recipe.
This bread is so good. I also added nuts and chocolate chips. They did not sink to the bottom. They are distributed nicely throughout the bread.
Best banana nut cake EVER. Added semi sweet chocolate chips and walnuts. I didn’t have yogurt or sour cream so I added 2 tablespoons of Lebne which is a middle eastern yogurt. Also, did not cover. Left it in over for 40 minutes at 350° and it came out so fluffy and yummy! Thank you for this awesome recipe.
I followed the recipe to a T and it turned out delicious. I love that it is not overly sweet. It is a perfect coffee companion.
Update: I followed this recipe exactly but used 2 cups of Gluten Free flour (Bob’s Red Mill brand) and it came out GREAT! Still tasty and moist. So yes you can use GF flour!
Love, love, love this! I was short on time, so I used an 8 x 8 inch pyrex to bake my banana bread. It took about 40 minutes and I used a toothpick to ensure it was done baking. Added benefit – I didn’t need to cover it with tinfoil. Instead of chocolate chips, I cut up 2/3 of a 75% dark chocolate bar, which worked great, as there were small bits of chocolate throughout. This is now my go to banana bread recipe! Thanks so much!!!
Hi! I made this early during the quarantine lockdown and it came out BEAUTIFULLY! I was wondering if I could substitute regular flour with almond flour or gluten free flour? Would the measurements be the same? I recently learned that I have a gluten allergy.
Hi Alexandra, I don’t recommend almond flour as it has very different properties. We haven’t tested an all purpose gluten free flour but let us know if you try!
Thank you! This turned out great! Made it quickly before a small family gathering and everyone loved it and wanted to take some home haha!
I can’t wait to try this recipe out! What will change in the bread if I use brown sugar instead of white sugar? Which do you prefer?
Hi Naomi, This recipe is written for brown sugar 🙂
AMAZING! This is my first attempt making banana bread and this recipe is the BEST! so soft, moist, and fluffy!!!!! perfect amount of sweetness! Amazing website
Perfect recipe – 2nd time using this recipe and I love it – thanks for sharing! Never knew making banana nut bread was so easy. I used Honey Greek Yogurt for added sweetness.
Really loved it- I put Nutella on it it was the ultimate treat. I think I might have over mixed but I felt they were just a little too tough/springy.
So Soft and moist… Perfect amount of sweetness… My new go to recipe for banana bread
Absolutely my fave banana bread recipe!! Always turns out perfectly!
Thanks so much! This was my first attempt at a banana bread and it turned out so wel! <3