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
- 1/3 cup (80g) plain Greek yogurt or full-fat sour cream, at room temperature
- 1 and 1/2 cups (345g) mashed bananas (about 3–4 ripe bananas)
- 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 yogurt, vanilla, and mashed bananas 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 cool it directly on the rack until ready to slice and serve.
- 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
10/10. I’ve remade this recipe twice, and it’s the best banana bread I have ever tasted homemade or not. Despite being an amateur baker, this always comes out perfectly. If you are browsing recipes for the perfect banana bread, do not skip this one! You’ve found the one you need.
Very moist and tasty!! I added about a 1/4 cup honey, extra banana, and a little extra sour cream.
This turned out so beautifully. It is my all-time favourite baking recipe! It’s just as advertised: it was super moist and buttery in texture with a strong banana flavour, and soft crumb. We left out the nuts (darn!). I only needed 60 minutes in my oven. Now my problem is I want to eat the whole loaf at once! This is especially good when you have too many bananas to eat all at once. What can I do with the frozen pineapple chunks in my freezer?
Can I use Greek yoghurt in this recipe? Since that is what I have on hand.
Yes, absolutely!
It’s in the oven right now. I can’t wait to try it I put a wack of walnuts init. Going to be so yummy
Absolutely delicious
I forgot to add that my first time making this amazing bread I was lacking about 3/4 c bananas so I used up some applesauce I had in the fridge. Just as wonderful as all the other times I’ve made this with the 2 cups of bananas! Thank you Sally!
No doubt about it: THE best banana bread, and I’ve tried about all! I almost always add walnuts as well as Costco’s chocolate chips!! This bread is so moist!
can i use gluten free flour instead of AP flour?
Hi Vanessa, we haven’t tested that in this recipe, so we’re unsure of the exact results. Let us know if you do!
Great banana bread. First time I made it realized I was fresh out of yogurt. Used cottage cheese and it was delicious!
That sounds so good with cottage cheese. The next time I will try this
This is my new go-to banana bread recipe, and I have tried so many over the years. My entire family loves it, and sometimes I add about 1 cup of chocolate chips. Just so moist and heavenly! Thank you!
Hi just wondering if you have the nutrition facts for these? I made them in mini muffin tins so I have a bunch of little mini muffins. Froze them after they cooled so I haven’t tried them yet..
Hi Kouri, We don’t usually include nutrition information as it can vary between different brands of the same ingredients. Plus, many recipes have ingredient substitutions or optional ingredients listed. However, there are many handy online calculators where you can plug in and customize your exact ingredients/brands. Readers have found this one especially helpful: https://www.verywellfit.com/recipe-nutrition-analyzer-4157076
I followed the recipe to the letter, but my banana bread camout out quite dense. How can I make it more airy inside. Btw, my first ever attempt at baking
Hi Perry, was your batter over mixed by chance? That’s often the culprit for overly dense cakes and breads. Be sure to mix until the ingredients are just combined. Thank you for giving this one a try!
This was my first ever try to make banana bread! I had overly ripe bananas, so instead of throwing them out I decided to make banana bread. It came out wonderfully, and boy did it taste great with a light spread of margarine! I substituted a few ingredients as I was not prepared to make this, so I just used whatever I had. I substituted plain yogurt for Activia vanilla yogurt; buttter for margarine, brown sugar for agave syrup and i chopped dark chocolate covered almonds as the optional. My picky son loved this! I especially loved how mildly sweet this was as I do not have a sweet tooth at all! This will be my go to banana bread recipe. Thank you so much!
Never once had a failed Sally recipe, this came out AMAZING !! Love !!
What a great banana bread !!! This banana bread was delicious, and not so overly sweet like some recipes out there !!! The natural earthy flavor of the bananas really comes through in this recipe !!! I followed the recipe exactly but I added just one teaspoon of almond extract along with the vanilla extract just because I love that taste and boy, was that good, yum !!!
Somehow, with the sour cream and the butter, this bread basically boiled in the fat than leaked out of it. Incredibly greasy, very dense inside, and the exterior was tough as old boots. Not sure what I did wrong…
I agree. I’ve made multiple amazing banana bread recipes and usually love recipes from this site. I changed up my normal bread recipe to try this, because I figured it would be extra delightful. NOPE! I agree with LB. I just wasted a bunch of ingredients and extra time, since this recipe is more time consuming than others.
We love this banana bread! I also came here to say that all my favorite recipes lately have been from this site!
I’ve tried about 5 different banana bread recipes over the last few months and this one has held up as the best, true to the name.
Best banana bread I’ve ever eaten. So moist and delicious
The golden crust gives way to a tender crumb, making each slice a perfect balance of textures. Whether enjoyed as a morning pick-me-up or a comforting afternoon snack, this banana nut bread is sure to leave you craving for more.
I had to sub a few ingredients – didn’t quite have enough flour so I had to sub some 1:1 gluten free flour which worked really well, didn’t have brown sugar so I used same amount coconut sugar and about 1/4 cup maple syrup to make it sweeter because coconut sugar isn’t very sweet, and ghee in place of butter (I really was lacking ingredients lol but was dying to make it!). The bread had a wonderful texture but tasted a little sour. I’m assuming it could be from all my ingredient changes and them not masking the greek yogurt flavor – is that possible? Is the original Sally version just a tad sour tasting from the sour cream/yogurt or was it just me? Other than that, loved it and will make sure to follow the recipe to a T next time.
Hi Alexis, we’re glad you enjoyed it! The bread shouldn’t have a sour taste, so it’s possible the substitutions caused the overall change in taste.
Love this recipe! Bread will be done at bedtime. Is it necessary to leave it in the pan for an entire hour afterward? Last time I did that and it was perfect, but it was also earlier in the day!
Hi Danielle, we find that about an hour is best for making sure the bread has cooled enough that it releases seamlessly from the pan. You can certainly try earlier, being extra careful to ensure the bread doesn’t break in spots. So glad this is a favorite for you!
Love, lovve, love! I added walnuts and had 5 frozen black bananas! I almost wanted 6…. I did this all with a wired whisk and it turned out great!
Best banana bread I’ve ever made! Thank you!
Can we get the nutritional facts?
We don’t usually include nutrition information as it can vary between different brands of the same ingredients. Plus, many recipes have ingredient substitutions or optional ingredients listed. However, there are many handy online calculators where you can plug in and customize your exact ingredients/brands. Readers have found this one especially helpful: https://www.verywellfit.com/recipe-nutrition-analyzer-4157076
Mr said, ‘Best banana bread ever Ever!’
Fabulous recipe. Thank you so much for providing a weight for the bananas, it’s so helpful. I was actually about 100g short on the bananas but it still came out great. Will definitely make again.
This is the only banana bread recipe I use. Today is the first time I measured the bananas by weight. It’s the best bread yet. I wasn’t using enough in previous breads.
What would happen if you used a banana flavored yogurt? Would you have to adjust the sugar? Loved the recipe as is just was thinking
Hi Cooknight, we haven’t tried it but some readers have used banana yogurt in place of plain yogurt and reported success. The flavor may change slightly. Let us know if you give it a try!