This eggless vanilla cake recipe is so soft and moist, full of vanilla flavor, and could not be easier to make (even without a mixer!). It can be made fully vegan by subbing in dairy-free milk. I did tons of recipe testing to find an extremely versatile vanilla cake recipe that you can use to celebrate your friends and loved ones with egg allergies, dairy sensitivities, and those that are vegan by choice. I’m so excited to offer this one, especially since many of you have been asking for egg-free cake recipes for years!
One Reader, Kate, says: “Just wanted to say thank you for this recipe (and your eggless chocolate one). I’ve returned to it time and time again for birthday cakes and school birthday cupcakes for my kids, to cater for all the kids who are egg, nut and dairy free. I routinely get comments about how delicious the cakes are – even from people who usually complain about having to eat a “….-free” cake!” ★★★★★
The Recipe Tests
One of the things that kept me from starting this eggless vanilla cake testing journey was that I was a bit overwhelmed. There are quite a few different egg replacer options out there (flax seed, aquafaba, vinegar, actual egg replacement products) and I didn’t know where to start. My vegan vanilla cake already uses aquafaba, but I wanted to create a recipe that’s even easier with ingredients that are super accessible. So that led me in the direction of using vinegar, which ended up being my preferred egg replacer! The vinegar in this recipe reacts with the baking soda to create a beautiful rise while helping maintain a velvety soft crumb.
Once I nailed the eggless vanilla cake recipe base, here are some things I tried to make it even more versatile:
- I replaced the whole milk with soy milk, which ended up being my preferred method of making this cake vegan
- I replaced the whole milk with oat milk. The result was a bit too soft and fluffy and didn’t have enough structure.
- The previous test led me to replace the cake flour with all purpose flour when subbing the whole milk for oat milk. This added a lot more structure but the cake was too dense.
- I tried making the cake gluten-free and it turned out too gummy. I’m going to come up with a separate gluten-free vanilla cake in the future though, so stay tuned!
The Easiest Egg-Free Vanilla Cake Ever
This eggless vanilla cake is extra moist with a velvety soft crumb and has the perfect vanilla flavor. It could not be easier to throw together, even if you don’t have a stand mixer! You’ll essentially mix the dry ingredients together, mix the wet ingredients together in a large liquid measuring cup, then pour them into the dry ingredients and mix until combined. That’s it! In my recipe testing I found that you can do this by hand with a large bowl and whisk, or let your stand mixer do the work for you. The result is the same in the end, and I love how accessible that makes this recipe.
In addition to being simple, the recipe only uses eight ingredients that you can easily find in the baking aisle of your local grocery store. They work together to create a vanilla cake that is so soft and moist, perfectly structured, and packed with vanilla flavor. You wouldn’t even know the eggs were missing!
Eggless Vanilla Cake Key Ingredients and Substitutions
Here are the key ingredients that make up this eggless vanilla cake + the substitutions you can make:
- Cake Flour. This helps yield a super soft crumb and I can attest that subbing this for all-purpose flour will make the cake a lot more dense. You should be able to find cake flour in the baking aisle at your local grocery store, but just in case you can’t, I have a recipe for homemade cake flour that will work as a substitute.
- Granulated Sugar. Not just responsible for sweetening the cake, this ingredient also contributes to the soft texture. You can use half granulated sugar and half brown sugar if you want to give the cake an even richer flavor.
- Baking Soda. The baking soda helps this cake rise, particularly when combined with the vinegar. This chemical reaction will only happen with vinegar and baking soda, so I don’t recommend any substitutions with this one.
- Whole Milk. The fat in whole milk gives this cake a rich texture and flavor while helping bind the ingredients together. After substituting lots of milk alternatives, my favorite recommendation for making this recipe dairy-free is to use soy milk in place of the whole milk.
- Vanilla Extract. Responsible for the beautiful vanilla flavor in this cake. You could also substitute half of the vanilla extract with almond extract, or really any other extract you’d want to use as a flavoring!
- Vegetable Oil. This gives the cake tons of moisture and my favorite oil to use is plain vegetable oil since it doesn’t affect the overall flavor at all. You can substitute this for canola oil or any other clear baking oil as long as you don’t mind the flavor.
- Distilled White Vinegar. Not only does it contribute to the velvety crumb of this cake, the white vinegar reacts with the baking soda to make it rise in the baking process. If you don’t have distilled white vinegar on hand, you can substitute it for apple cider vinegar.
Making this a Vegan Vanilla Cake
I love how simple it is to make this cake fully vegan! I did lots of testing to figure out which non-dairy milk would work best in place of the whole milk in this recipe. Soy milk was by far the best substitute, as it most closely mimics the protein content and makeup of whole milk.
If you need a soy-free option, you could try oat milk or almond milk. These both have significantly lower protein content though, so the final result of the cake will technically work, but just be careful with the layers because they end up extremely soft. Without the extra protein, the structure of the cake isn’t as strong. To combat this, you could try using a homemade version of cake flour in place of the actual cake flour. Since it’s made with all-purpose flour as a base, it makes up for a lot of the extra protein and thus will give the cake more structure.
Can this Cake be Made Gluten-Free?
Unfortunately, this cake didn’t work when I substituted gluten-free baking flour in for the cake flour. It ended up super gummy! BUT I’ve added some gluten-free recipes to my baking list because that gets requested all the time, so stay tuned for those coming to the blog in the (hopefully) near future! For now, if you’re looking for great GF baking recipes, check out my friend Butternut Bakery.
What Frosting to Pair with Eggless Vanilla Cake
I chose to pair this cake with my favorite vanilla frosting and rainbow sprinkles to make it celebratory. The double vanilla flavor is so delicious and my kids absolutely devoured it! A couple details about the decorating: I frosted the cake with a smooth buttercream finish, used these rainbow sprinkles around the bottom border (and sprinkled on top) and used Wilton Tip 4B to pipe swirls on top.
The best thing about vanilla cake is that it goes with literally any frosting you can think of. I have a few of my favorite suggestions below, but keep in mind you’ll need to double the recipes below to have enough buttercream for filling and frosting the cake:
- Vegan Vanilla Buttercream (if you’re making this cake dairy-free)
- Whipped Cream Cheese Frosting or Whipped Mascarpone Frosting (if you want a light, not-too-sweet frosting)
- Chocolate Buttercream
- Strawberry Buttercream
- Raspberry Buttercream
- Funfetti Buttercream
- Lavender Buttercream
Here’s a video of the baking process for this eggless vanilla cake. Enjoy!
If you love recipe videos like this one, be sure to check out my YouTube channel! I’ve got a growing collection of cake recipes, decorating tutorials, and Cake Basics over there. Hit the subscribe button on my page so you never miss a new video.
Eggless Vanilla Cake
Ingredients
Eggless Vanilla Cake
- 2 1/2 Cups (265g) sifted cake flour* DIY recipe in notes
- 1 1/2 Cups (300g) granulated sugar
- 1 1/2 tsp baking soda
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1 1/2 Cups (360ml) whole milk*, room temperature substitute this with soy milk if you need a vegan cake
- 1 Tbsp pure vanilla extract
- 1/2 Cup (120ml) vegetable oil
- 1 1/2 Tbsp white distilled vinegar
Vanilla Buttercream
- 1 1/2 Cups (339g) unsalted butter, room temperature see notes for vegan version
- 5 Cups (600g) powdered sugar
- 1 Tbsp pure vanilla extract
- 3 Tbsp whole milk, room temperature see notes for vegan version
- 1/4 tsp salt, or to taste
Garnish (Optional)
- 1/2 Cup rainbow sprinkles
Instructions
Make the Eggless Vanilla Cake
- Preheat the oven to 350ºF/177ºC and prepare three 6-inch or two 8-inch light-colored* cake pans by spraying the sides with cooking spray and fitting the bottoms with a parchment paper circle.
- In the bowl of your stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment (you can alternatively use a large bowl and whisk), add the cake flour, granulated sugar, baking soda, and salt. Mix together on low speed to combine.
- In a large liquid measuring cup, whisk together the whole milk, vanilla, vegetable oil, and white vinegar.
- With the mixer on low speed (or while whisking by hand), add the liquid ingredients in a slow steady stream. Mix until just combined, then scrape down the bowl and paddle and give it a few stirs by hand to make sure there are no large lumps.
- Divide evenly between the prepared cake pans and bake for 24-28 minutes, until a wooden toothpick inserted comes out clean. Cool completely before frosting.
Make the Vanilla Buttercream
- With a hand mixer or paddle attachment on your stand mixer, cream the butter on medium-high until it’s creamy and light (almost white) in color. About 7 minutes.
- With the mixer on low, add the sifted powdered sugar a few cups at a time, scraping down after each addition and making sure each cup is fully incorporated before adding the next one.
- Add the vanilla, milk, and salt and mix on low for another minute until fully incorporated.
Assembly
- Once the eggless vanilla cakes are cooled throughout, level and torte the layers to your desired height. Place a cardboard cake circle on top of your cake turntable, add a swipe of buttercream (to act as glue), and place the first cake layer on top of it. Fill and stack the cake with vanilla buttercream.
- Crumb coat the cake with vanilla buttercream and place it into the refrigerator for at least 20 minutes to let the crumb coat firm up before frosting with a smooth layer of vanilla buttercream.
- To create the design pictured, while the frosting is still tacky to the touch, add rainbow sprinkles to the bottom third of the cake by pressing them on with your palm. Add the remaining buttercream into a piping bag fitted with Wilton Tip 4B and pipe swirls on top of the cake before garnishing with more rainbow sprinkles.
Notes
- The eggless vanilla cake layers can be baked, cooled, wrapped in plastic wrap, and left out at room temperature up to two days ahead of decorating. Unfrosted cake layers can be wrapped tightly in plastic wrap and stored in the freezer for up to two months before thawing and frosting.
- The vanilla buttercream can be made ahead and stored in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to two weeks. When you’re ready to use it, bring it back to room temperature and re-whip in your stand mixer to bring back to smooth buttercream consistency.
Did you make this cake? I want to know how it went. Let me know in the comments section below or tag @sugarandsparrowco on Instagram to show me a photo. I love to see what you make!
Love this simple recipe! Experimented with some ingredients and the cake was a big hit! Baked it for my kid’s 14th birthday
Substitutions I made
Cake flour – Kodiak pancake mix
Vegetable oil – coconut oil
To mask coconut oil flavor and 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon powder
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar – 3/4 cup maple syrup + 1/2 cup turbinado brown sugar
Added some butterscotch chips as topping . Cake was so moist and fluffy. I used one 9 inch square pan and poured the leftover batter into a bread pan (for a flatter brownie like cake).
This was such a big hit served with simple whipped cream! Definitely making this recipe again!!
I just made this for the first time the other day! Absolutely incredible- the flavor is perfect. I made this for my daughter’s birthday party, as she can’t have egg so she had to have a separate option from her friends. Truly, I liked this better than the “real” cake her friends were eating!!!! Will definitely make this again and again! Thank you!!!!
Yay, Marina! I’m so happy you were able to celebrate your daughter with this cake recipe AND that it tasted delicious. That makes my day 🙂
I made this for a customer using Oat milk and plant based butter it turned out amazing. I am going to try this recipe sugar free.
Hi
Can we use two 7 inch pans for the same measurement s? Please let me know
Thankyou so much for amazong receipe..i have tried your eggless chocolate cake which turned out sinfully amazing
Hi Sneha! You may have a little extra batter with two 7-inch pans, but I recommend keeping these measurements the same. Just be sure to fill the pans no more than 2/3 full and you should be good to go with the baking time listed in the recipe. Enjoy!
Just wanted to say thank you for this recipe (and your eggless chocolate one). I’ve returned to it time and time again for birthday cakes and school birthday cupcakes for my kids, to cater for all the kids who are egg, nut and dairy free (I substitute either oat or south milk for whole milk, whatever I have on hand). I routinely get comments about how delicious the cakes are – even from people who usually complain about having to eat a “….-free” cake. Also, it’s such a simple recipe with easy on hand ingredients, and cheap when fresh eggs cost the same as diamonds!!
*soy* milk, not south, oops! For the buttercream, I sub Nuttelex Buttery (vegan vegetable-oil based butter in Australia), along with whatever plant milk I have (usually a little less than the recipe, as the Nuttelex contains water and it can get too thin otherwise), and it’s delicious too.
Cake tasted very good, but when I took it out of the cake pans, they had cracks on the bottom and on the sides. Not sure why that happened.
Hi Ana! Did the cakes stick to the pans? Cracking like that usually only happens when the cake pan isn’t greased enough and the bottom/sides stick.
If I make cupcakes instead of a cake, how many minutes do you think it would be? Perhaps 15-20 minutes due to reducing the baking time by one third… Fingers crossed I do not burn them.
Hi Jersey! I haven’t tried this recipe as cupcakes yet but I would bake them at 350F for 14-18 minutes, until a toothpick inserted comes out clean or with just a few moist crumbs. Let me know how it goes!
I love this cake. We have made it about 7/8 times. Thank you
Yay, Sarika! I’m so happy this recipe has been such a hit!
I want to make a butterscotch cake eggless. Is there a recipe for that or can I substitute vanilla with butterscotch Essence?
Hi Shruthi! You could absolutely substitute some of the vanilla in this recipe with butterscotch essence. Since butterscotch essence is usually quite strong, I’d try subbing half of the vanilla extract (1 1/2 tsp) with butterscotch essence. Hope that helps!
I followed the recipe with the gram measurements and it says 1 1/2 of sugar and 300grams and the flour is 2 1/2 cups and 265grmas. So my cake was far too sweet and I was pretty annoyed because I followed the recipe but the gram measurements were don’t incorrectly
Hi Sophia! Sugar weighs more than flour (1 cup of sugar weighs 200g while 1 Cup of flour weighs 132g), so 1 1/2 Cups of flour will weigh more than 2 1/2 Cups of sugar. This cake isn’t too sweet with these measurements in my opinion, but if you’d like to try reducing the sugar by 1/2 Cup (100g) next time, feel free to experiment! Sugar acts as a tenderizer as well as a sweetener, so the cake may not be as soft if you reduce the sugar.
I used this recipe to make a unicorn cake for my 4 year old’s birthday. I used your basic buttercream and added strawberry to make pink rosettes on top. I was so happy with how it turned out! I just made this recipe again and modified it to make lemon cupcakes ( 1T vanilla, 2T lemon extract plus 2 TBSP lemon zest, everything else the same). I made blueberry frosting to go with them. I’m excited to have an awesome base cake recipe. I also want to say thank you for including a vegan version!
Yay, Colleen! I’m so happy this recipe is a hit and that you’re able to use it as a base for other flavors!!
Could I make this cake and freeze it for 3 days by any chance ?
Hi Mandy! Yes, you can make the cake and freeze it. Here are my instructions for freezing cakes: https://sugarandsparrow.com/making-cakes-ahead/
Hi…I tried this recipe today. I added 1 cup sugar instead of 1 1/2 cup. Except for this, I made no changes to the recipe. But unfortunately my cake turned out to be dense and not fluffy.. I wonder what could be the reason. Need your expert opinion. I am looking for good eggless vanilla sponge which is a 10/10..
I really appreciate your efforts and time you have invested in each recipes. Kudos to you! Take care
Hi Nethra, the sugar in the recipe accounts for the texture of the cake in addition to the sweetness. Reducing the sugar will result in a more dense cake, as sugar is responsible for softening the crumb. If you’d like to try this recipe again I would recommend making it as the recipe is written.
This looks amazing! Can I use All purpose flour instead of cake flour? If yes what would be the proportion be?
Hi Sonia! It will be more dense with all purpose flour, but you can make a homemade version of cake flour (using all purpose!) that would work better. The instructions are in the notes section of the recipe and can also be found here: https://sugarandsparrow.com/homemade-cake-flour-recipe/
Thanks for sharing this wonderful recipe. Can’t wait to try it. Love that you’re providing bakers with recipes that can be enjoyed by all. Such an inclusive approach. Would love to see a small batch version of this recipe in the future. Thanks in advance!
Hello! Thank you for sharing your recipe. I’m interested in trying it out. I have a few questions for you. I bake eggless as we do not consume eggs. I have a similar recipe that calls for the same amount of cake flour but 1/2 cup of softened butter instead of oil. It uses the creaming method. I have tried my recipe with all cake flour but it just crumbles and structure is a bit lacking so have started making the cake with half cake flour and half plain flour. It comes out a bit dense but can hold up better. Have you ever experimented with that at all to help with structural issues? Have you ever tested this recipe with softened butter instead of oil to give it more flavor? Also, instead of whole milk in your recupe have you ever tried store bought buttermilk? I’m going to give your recipe a try because the texture looks very good. I have flavor down in my recipe but the structure is a bit lacking in my opinion. Thank you so much for the recipe.