Welcome to the epitome of fall baking! (Well, besides apple cake and apple crisp.) These are my super-moist, deliciously spiced, and extra soft pumpkin muffins. They’re adapted from my popular pumpkin crumb cake muffins and aren’t quite as sweet, making them the perfect “anytime” treat during the fall season. You could even add chocolate chips for extra tasty pumpkin chocolate chip muffins. No mixer required!
One reader, Nicole, commented: “Another winner, of course. We made the mini muffin version and they were so light, moist, and delicious. Perfect breakfast compliment for this crisp fall morning! ★★★★★”
Another reader, Holly, commented: “First time making these. Did half regular and half with chocolate chips, and they came out delicious and very moist. Even my picky daughter loved them… This recipe is definitely a keeper. ★★★★★“
Meet my favorite pumpkin muffin recipe, the sequel to my favorite zucchini muffins and banana muffins. I appreciate “simple” muffin recipes like these because sometimes we don’t crave all the bells and whistles of pumpkin cream cheese muffins… right? Over-the-top muffins are undoubtedly delicious, but I’m certain you’ll want to make today’s easy pumpkin muffins again and again. Why?
Here’s Why You’ll Love My Simple Pumpkin Muffins
- Reliable, easy recipe with basic ingredients
- No mixer needed
- Extra soft & moist
- Deep pumpkin spice flavor (you can use your homemade pumpkin pie spice!)
- Dairy free if using dairy-free milk
- Very adaptable recipe—add chocolate chips, nuts, or dried cranberries; sprinkle with coarse sugar; or leave plain
How are these different from pumpkin cupcakes? My pumpkin cupcakes recipe is a favorite! In that recipe, you use less flour and milk with the same amount of pumpkin, so the cupcakes have a much lighter, airier texture. Today’s muffins are thicker and denser with just as much flavor.
Grab These 11 Ingredients:
- Flour: Use all-purpose flour in this recipe. If desired, you can replace half of the flour with whole wheat flour for a heartier, denser pumpkin muffin.
- Baking Soda: Helps the muffins rise. There’s no need for baking powder and, in fact, I’ve made these pumpkin cream cheese muffins with only baking soda before too. (Just leave out the baking powder in those; truly no noticeable difference in the outcome.)
- Cinnamon, Ginger, & Pumpkin Pie Spice: Pumpkin is tasty, but in order to really bring out its flavor, you need some warming spices like cinnamon, ginger, and pumpkin pie spice. You can use store-bought or try my homemade pumpkin pie spice blend. Pumpkin pie spice already includes cinnamon and ginger, but for the BEST, deepest flavor, I recommend using all 3. See recipe Note.
- Pumpkin Puree: You need 1 and 1/2 cups (about 340g) of pumpkin puree, which is most of a standard 15-ounce can. Do not use pumpkin pie filling. Just like with these pumpkin snickerdoodles, canned pumpkin is best, but you could use fresh puree if that’s what you have.
- Oil: The muffins taste dry and rubbery without some fat. Just as if we’re making pumpkin cake and pumpkin coffee cake, use vegetable oil. You could also use melted coconut oil.
- Brown & White Sugars: Pumpkin adds a lot of volume to the muffin batter, but doesn’t sweeten it at all. Using half white and brown sugars provide enough sweetening, and the brown sugar adds additional flavor.
- Eggs: Provide structure.
- Milk: Like most muffin recipes, the batter needs a liquid. You can use whole milk, buttermilk, or any dairy or nondairy milk you enjoy. I use orange juice in my pumpkin bread recipe, but using orange juice (for the amount of liquid needed here) wasn’t ideal here. The muffins were too citrus-y. You could, of course, replace *some* of the milk with *some* orange juice.
This is optional, but I love adding a little coarse sugar to the tops of the pumpkin muffins before baking. I do this in a lot of my muffin recipes (both online and in my book) because it adds a sparkly crunch—just like real bakery muffins! You can use something like Sugar in the Raw or white sparkling sugar. And don’t forget my high-temperature trick, included in the written recipe and explained in the Notes below.
As instructed in the printable recipe below, grab a large bowl for the dry ingredients, a medium bowl for the wet ingredients, then whisk it all together. Expect a thick batter:
Fill the muffin liners all the way to the top:
Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins
You can turn these easy pumpkin muffins into pumpkin chocolate chip muffins! Simply fold 1 cup (about 180g) of chocolate chips in the batter right before spooning into your 12-count muffin pan.
If you enjoy pumpkin + chocolate together, be sure to try my chocolate pumpkin muffins as well. For extreme chocolate and pumpkin lovers only!
More Pumpkin Favorites
- Pumpkin Pie and Pumpkin Cheesecake Pie
- Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Pumpkin Donuts
- Pumpkin Cake
- Pumpkin Bars
- Pumpkin Pancakes or Pumpkin Waffles
- Pumpkin Bundt Cake
- Mini Cinnamon Sugar Pumpkin Muffins
- Pumpkin Coffee Creamer
- Pumpkin Oatmeal Cream Pies
- Pumpkin Hand Pies
For even more inspiration, here are my 30+ best pumpkin dessert recipes.
Print
Easy Pumpkin Muffins
- Prep Time: 15 minutes
- Cook Time: 21 minutes
- Total Time: 45 minutes
- Yield: 12 muffins
- Category: Muffins
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: American
Description
These muffins are adapted from my popular pumpkin crumb cake muffins and aren’t quite as sweet, making them the perfect “anytime” treat during the fall season. You could even add chocolate chips for extra tasty pumpkin chocolate chip muffins. No mixer required!
Ingredients
- 1 and 3/4 cups (219g) all-purpose flour (spooned & leveled)
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 and 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
- 1 and 1/2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice*
- 1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 cup (120ml) vegetable oil (or melted coconut oil)
- 1/2 cup (100g) granulated sugar
- 1/2 cup (100g) packed light or dark brown sugar
- 1 and 1/2 cups (340g) canned pumpkin puree (not pumpkin pie filling)
- 2 large eggs
- 1/4 cup (60ml) milk (dairy or nondairy)
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 425°F (218°C). Spray a 12-count muffin pan with nonstick spray or line with cupcake liners.
- In a large bowl, whisk the flour, baking soda, cinnamon, pumpkin pie spice, ginger, and salt together until combined. Set aside.
- In a medium bowl, whisk the oil, granulated sugar, brown sugar, pumpkin puree, eggs, and milk together until combined. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients, and then fold everything together gently just until combined and no flour pockets remain.
- Spoon the batter into liners, filling them all the way to the top.
- Bake for 5 minutes at 425°F, 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 time these muffins take in the oven is about 21–22 minutes, give or take. Allow the muffins to cool for 5 minutes in the muffin pan before enjoying.
- Cover tightly and store at room temperature for up to 1 week.
Notes
- Freezing Instructions: For longer storage, freeze the muffins for up to 3 months. Thaw overnight in the refrigerator, then heat up in the microwave if desired.
- Special Tools (affiliate links): 12-count Muffin Pan | Cupcake Liners | Glass Mixing Bowls | Whisk
- Pumpkin Pie Spice & Spices: You can find pumpkin pie spice in the baking aisle of most grocery stores or make your own homemade pumpkin pie spice. If you don’t have either and want to use individual spices, use 1/4 teaspoon each ground cinnamon, ground cloves, ground nutmeg, and ground allspice, and 1/2 teaspoon ground ginger. Do not leave out the 1 and 1/2 teaspoons of ground cinnamon that is also called for in this recipe. Depending how much you like ginger, you can skip or leave in the extra 1/4 teaspoon ground ginger that is also called for in this recipe.
- Can I reduce the sugar or oil? You can absolutely slightly reduce either or both, but understand that sugar and oil help produce moist, tender muffins and the results may be disappointing and your muffins could taste dry. For the oil, feel free to swap *some* for applesauce. You could also try substituting all or most of both sugars with coconut sugar.
- Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins/Other Add-Ins: Simply fold 1 cup (about 180g) of chocolate chips in the batter right before spooning into your muffin pan. Or you can add 1 cup (about 130g) of chopped pecans or walnuts, or 3/4 cup (about 105g) of dried cranberries.
- Mini Muffins: For around 30 mini muffins, line mini muffin pans with liners or spray with nonstick spray. Prepare batter as directed and fill liners to the top. Bake at 350°F (177°C) the entire time (skip the initial high temperature) for 11–13 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
- Why the initial high oven temperature? Like I do for most muffin recipes, bake the muffins for 5 minutes at a very hot temperature. Then, keeping the muffins in the oven, switch to a lower temperature for the remaining bake time. This initial high temperature will quickly lift the muffin tops so they’re extra high, then the centers will bake during the lower temperature bake time. This trick makes beautiful bakery-style muffins every time.
Reader Comments and Reviews
I’ve made these twice in two weeks, my family loves them and it is such an easy way to make fresh muffins with quality ingredients. I look so forward to having one I can hardly wait for them to cool!
This is my absolute favorite pumpkin muffin recipe, but honestly these are the best muffins I’ve ever made! Today was my 4th time making them and they’ve been perfect every time.
I tried this with gluten free baking mix. The spices are just right. It really made the kitchen smell nice and warm and spicy. Thank you.
Amazing pumpkin muffins! They rose beautifully in the oven and came out nice and fluffy! I substituted avocado oil for the vegetable oil and had great results!
I’ve brought these to work several times and everyone always loves them! The great thing about them is you can deviate a bit from the recipe and measure with your heart and they still turn out phenomenal. Thanks!!
I haven’t tried this recipe yet but I’ve tried some of your others so I’m pretty sure this one will be great. In the past I made pumpkin spice muffins from a mix and adding cream cheese frosting. Can I frost these muffins when they are cooled?
Hi Trisha, Yes you can frost them if you wish. Enjoy!
I found them greasy/oily. Used fresh homemade pumpkin puree and only addition was pumpkin spice chips. Not sure I’d make again.. Weighed ingredients per instructions.
I’ve made this recipe several times and it’s always a hit but I do agree – as the baker, these tend to come out greasy and anything the muffins sit on gets an orangey-yellowish residue which I could do without. That said, I’ll keep making it because everyone loves these! Would love to know if there are any tips to manage this issue though. I follow the recipe to the letter but for course sugar on top. I use muffin liners, too.
I have an abundance of bakers bananas….the kids didn’t eat them! This recipe was the best I’ve ever made, so I can I substitute bananas for the pumpkin? Obviously omit the pumpkin spice/ginger.
Hi Mandy! Here’s our reader-favorite banana muffins recipe.
Someone give me the protein, carb, fat breakdown for this recipe?
Hi Kelli! 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
Confused. You have another muffin recipe but add cream cheese frosting. Which will taste the most o like pumpkin pie?
Hi Maureen! This pumpkin muffins recipe is a little less sweet than our pumpkin cupcakes recipe. Both have great pumpkin flavor – just one is a muffin and one is a cupcake 🙂
These were delicious. Added mini chips and walnuts and a little applesauce. Used buttermilk and they were so moist!
Delicious!
For pumpkin puree I used baked butternut squash.
Thanks a lot!
Made these with home made left over pumpkin puree. Added white and Dark choc chips. They rose a mile high and taste absolutely delicious. I feel like a master baker!!!
I love these pumpkin muffins! I added 1/4 c of mini chocolate chips and 1/4 c chopped pecans. They were so delicious! Oh, just as a side note – as I was cleaning up the kitchen I realized that I forgot to add the milk! I can’t believe how that happened, but they turned out super moist and so yummy just like same.
Awesome recipe! They came out super fluffy and moist. I added some crumbled pecan pieces mixed with a little maple syrup for some crunch on the top.
If I remove the milk or reduce the oil, could I add some frozen blueberries?
Side note:the first time I made these, they were good but oily. I misread the 120ml of oil as 120g because everything else in parentheses is a weight measure.
Hi Mário, we don’t see why you couldn’t add blueberries. Let us know if you try.
I usually buy my husband pumpkin muffins from Sam’s Club but since they started only putting 2 in a package of assorted muffins, it was time to learn to cook them myself. Your recipe was the recipe I tried and this is my first time baking pumpkin muffins. Well my husband enjoyed them so much, I had to taste them (not a pumpkin fan). Oh, they are so good! Will be cooking them from here on out. Thanks for sharing this recipe!
I made this recipe using my daughter’s Halloween pumpkin and the pumpkin spice recipe in the notes. The muffins came out gorgeous and delicious. Thank you
This recipe is fabulous, so much flavor and a the right balance of denseness. I ended up making it a 2nd time with fresh pumpkin I had leftover from Halloween. I was worried about the extra moisture from the fresh stuff, so I cut the vegetable oil content in half. The came about basically the same. Thank you thank you!
This is an excellent recipe. They come out high, moist and flavourful. I did not have pumpkin pie spice so just left it out.
Nice recipe, but two questions:
1. why suggest pumpkin pie spice when you add cinnamon and ginger anyway?
2. As one who deplores the addition of chocolate chips to everything, I wonder why you don’t think these are crying out for raisins?
Hi Mary, Pumpkin pie spice already includes cinnamon and ginger, but for the BEST, deepest flavor, we recommend using all 3. You can absolutely use raisins as your add-ins, see the recipe notes for other suggestions like nuts or dried cranberries.
Using only baking soda kills the flavour of spices.
Hey Sally, for this recipe should the eggs and milk be room temp before baking?I have made these muffbefote but can’t remember. I just remember that they were delicious!!
Hi kda, they definitely can be, but it is less important for this recipe because it’s oil based, not butter based.
We really liked these muffins, the flavor was delicious! But unfortunately the time was way off for me. I kept adding 5 mins at a time after the time listed on the recipe and I was up to an extra 20 mins with the centers still raw. Then on the last time extension I forgot to set the 5 min timer 🙁 so about 20 mins and by and I ran to the oven to find that they were a bit dry and overcooked. So I’m not sure what the best cook time will be. I followed the recipe exactly, no changes, and I’m not at a high altitude. Any ideas what happened??
Hi Theresa! Did you do the initial blast of higher heat? Did your mixture look like the photos above? If it was more wet, it would take longer to bake. And we always recommend using an in-oven thermometer for best results! Most ovens are not the temperature they say they are.
Good, not too sweet. Could be sweeter. Nice and soft and moist.
Another great recipe! Not too sweet. These were also very moist, so I think they’d be a really great option for freezing. I did get a couple comments that the ginger came through pretty strong & that they tasted more like gingerbread than pumpkin. It wasn’t an issue for me, but might be a turnoff for some (like kids).
Love these muffins!! Can you post the nutritional value?
Hi Laura, we’re so glad to hear that! 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
Thanks! I did the calculation and compared the amount of sugar from one muffin to an organic baked whole grain bar from Trader Joes and the muffin has less!! I am ready to start sending whole ingredient freshly made muffins to school instead of packaged preservative (so called healthy) bars. And bonus is that these have vegetable in them being that they are pumpkin. Thanks!
Just putting a batch in the oven. The recipe came together very easily and I made no changes. The kitchen smells divine!! I’m sure they will be great, your recipes usually are.
These are exactly what I’ve been craving here as an American in Wales. I added walnuts and used dark brown sugar, not light brown, for once, followed instructions, including the demerrera sugar on top. They are absolutely delicious. Thank you!
I loved the method of getting them to rise really high! These smell amazing and can’t wait to taste them. Definitely easy to follow and make.
I made these with a cup of diced fresh cranberries added, made 18 muffins. They are fantastic! My neighbors (to whom I gave muffins) all want you to know how much they loved them!