The 58 Best Vegan Frosting Options in Stores

As a young vegan, I used to buy frosting from the store and just dip Ritz crackers in it. In recent years, I’ve cleaned up my diet quite a bit… But frosting still has a special place in my heart. And it’s amazing that most people don’t realize how often it’s vegan.

Some of the best vegan frosting products are from Betty Crocker, Duncan Hines, Miss Jones, Pillsbury, and Simple Mills. Note that some of these brands also make non-vegan frostings that contain ingredients like cream.

For this blog post, I’ll review the vegan frosting products from each brand. I’ll answer some overall questions about what ingredients and kinds of pie crusts to look for.

Vegan Frosting Options

Let’s start by taking a quick visual tour of vegan frosting options available in stores. Then we can dig deeper into “how to check if a frosting is vegan”.

1. Is Betty Crocker Frosting Vegan?

About 68% of Betty Crocker frosting products are vegan. Specifically, 13 are vegan and 6 are not. There is no simple delineation of which Betty Crocker frostings are vegan. It just depends on the individual flavor.

Here is the full breakdown of which flavors of Betty Crocker frosting are vegan:

Frosting	Is It Vegan?
Rich & Creamy Frosting: Cherry	Vegan
Rich & Creamy Frosting: Chocolate	No (Contains Milk)
Rich & Creamy Frosting: Coconut Pecan	No (Contains Milk, Egg)
Rich & Creamy Frosting: Cream Cheese	No (Contains Milk)
Rich & Creamy Frosting: Creamy White	Vegan
Rich & Creamy Frosting: Dark Chocolate	Vegan
Rich & Creamy Frosting: Lemon	Vegan
Rich & Creamy Frosting: Milk Chocolate	Vegan
Rich & Creamy Frosting: Rainbow Chip	No (Contains Milk)
Rich & Creamy Frosting: Vanilla	Vegan
Whipped Frosting: Butter Cream	Vegan
Whipped Frosting: Chocolate	No (Contains Milk)
Whipped Frosting: Cream Cheese	Vegan
Whipped Frosting: Fluffy White	Vegan
Whipped Frosting: Milk Chocolate	No (Contains Milk)
Whipped Frosting: Strawberry Mist	Vegan
Whipped Frosting: Vanilla	Vegan
Whipped Frosting: Whipped Cream	Vegan
Hershey’s Milk Chocolate Frosting	Vegan

2. Is Duncan Hines Frosting Vegan?

About 71% of Duncan Hines frosting products are vegan. Specifically, 10 are vegan and 4 are not. The four non-vegan flavors are Creamy Chocolate Buttercream, Creamy Strawberries ‘N Cream, Creamy Milk Chocolate, and Cream Cheese Whipped Frosting.

Here is the full breakdown of which Duncan Hines frosting products are vegan:

Frosting	Is it Vegan?
Creamy Dark Chocolate Fudge	Vegan
Creamy Cream Cheese	Vegan
Creamy Vanilla	Vegan
Creamy Lemon Supreme	Vegan
Creamy Chocolate Buttercream	No (Contains Milk)
Creamy Buttercream	Vegan
Creamy Strawberries ‘N Cream	No (Contains Milk)
Creamy Chocolate	Vegan
Creamy Coconut Pecan	Vegan
Creamy Milk Chocolate	No (Contains Milk)
Whipped Frosting: Vanilla	Vegan
Whipped Frosting: Chocolate	Vegan
Whipped Frosting: Cream Cheese	No (Contains Milk)
Whipped Frosting: Fluffy White	Vegan

3. Is Miss Jones Frosting Vegan?

Miss Jones frosting is confirmed vegan. All five flavors are 100% plant-based, containing no dairy, egg, gelatin, or other animal ingredients.

Here are the exact products I was able to check:

Frosting	Is It Vegan?
Miss Jones Vanilla Frosting	Vegan
Miss Jones Chocolate Frosting	Vegan
Miss Jones Cream Cheese Frosting	Vegan
Miss Jones Confetti Pop Frosting	Vegan
Miss Jones Peppermint Frosting	Vegan

4. Is Pillsbury Frosting Vegan?

About 58% of Pillsbury frosting products are vegan. Specifically, 28 are vegan and 20 are not vegan due to containing confectioner’s glaze. All flavors of Pillsbury Creamy Supreme, Fluffy Frost, and sugar-free frosting are vegan. Some flavors of Funfetti are vegan, but most are not.

Pillsbury has a ton of frosting products—more than any other brand I checked—so I’ve split them into separate tables by product line.

Here is the breakdown for Pillsbury Creamy Supreme Frosting:

Frosting	Is It Vegan?
Creamy Supreme Buttercream Flavored Frosting	Vegan
Creamy Supreme Chocolate Frosting	Vegan
Creamy Supreme Chocolate Fudge Flavored Frosting	Vegan
Creamy Supreme Chocolate Hazelnut Flavored Frosting	Vegan
Creamy Supreme Coconut Pecan Flavored Frosting	Vegan
Creamy Supreme Cream Cheese Flavored Frosting	Vegan
Creamy Supreme Dark Chocolate Flavored Frosting	Vegan
Creamy Supreme Lemon Flavored Frosting	Vegan
Creamy Supreme Milk Chocolate Frosting	Vegan
Creamy Supreme Strawberry Flavored Frosting	Vegan
Creamy Supreme Vanilla Flavored Frosting	Vegan
Creamy Supreme White Frosting	Vegan
Creamy Supreme Salted Caramel Flavored Frosting	Vegan
Creamy Supreme Cinnamon Bun Flavored Frosting	Vegan
Creamy Supreme Peppermint Flavored Frosting	Vegan

Here is the breakdown for Pillsbury Funfetti Frosting:

Frosting	Is It Vegan?
Funfetti Aqua Blue Vanilla Flavored Frosting	No (Confectioner’s Glaze)
Funfetti Bold Purple Vanilla Flavored Frosting	No (Confectioner’s Glaze)
Confetti Funfetti Chocolate Fudge Flavored Frosting	No (Confectioner’s Glaze)
Confetti Funfetti Vanilla Flavored Frosting	No (Confectioner’s Glaze)
Funfetti Hot Pink Vanilla Flavored Frosting	Vegan
Funfetti Neon Yellow Flavored Vanilla	No (Confectioner’s Glaze)
Funfetti Orange All Star Vanilla Flavored Frosting	No (Confectioner’s Glaze)
Funfetti Radiant Red Vanilla Flavored Frosting	No (Confectioner’s Glaze)
Funfetti Vanilla Flavored Frosting	Vegan
Funfetti Vibrant Green Vanilla Flavored Frosting	No (Confectioner’s Glaze)
Funfetti Galaxy Space Blue Frosting	No (Confectioner’s Glaze)
Funfetti Unicorn Vanilla Frosting	No (Confectioner’s Glaze)
Funfetti Llama Vanilla Flavored Frosting	No (Confectioner’s Glaze)
Funfetti Mermaid Strawberry Flavored Frosting	No (Confectioner’s Glaze)
Funfetti Vanilla Frosting with OREO Cookie Pieces	Vegan
Funfetti Halloween Vanilla Flavored Frosting	No (Confectioner’s Glaze)
Funfetti Holiday Vanilla Flavored Frosting	No (Confectioner’s Glaze)
Funfetti Spring Vanilla Flavored Frosting	No (Confectioner’s Glaze)
Funfetti Stars & Stripes Vanilla Flavored Frosting	No (Confectioner’s Glaze)
Funfetti Valentine’s Vanilla Flavored Frosting	No (Confectioner’s Glaze)
Funfetti Holiday Red Vanilla Flavored Frosting	No (Confectioner’s Glaze)
Funfetti Slime Frosting	Vegan
Funfetti Winter Blue Vanilla Flavored Frosting	No (Confectioner’s Glaze)

Here is the breakdown for Pillsbury Fluffy Frost:

Frosting	Is It Vegan?
Fluffy Frost: Funfetti Vanilla Marshmallow Flavored Fluffy Frosting	Vegan
Fluffy Frost: Vanilla Marshmallow Flavored Fluffy Frosting	Vegan

Here is the breakdown for Pillsbury Sugar-Free Frosting:

Frosting	Is It Vegan?
Creamy Supreme Sugar-Free: Chocolate Fudge Flavored Frosting	Vegan
Creamy Supreme Sugar-Free: Vanilla Flavored Frosting	Vegan

Here is the breakdown for Pillsbury Filled Pastry Bags:

Frosting	Is It Vegan?
Filled Pastry Bag: Chocolate Fudge Flavored Frosting	Vegan
Filled Pastry Bag: Cream Cheese Flavored Frosting	Vegan
Filled Pastry Bag: Vanilla Flavored Frosting	Vegan
Filled Pastry Bag: Halloween Funfetti Frosting	Vegan
Funfetti Filled Pastry Bag: Holiday Frosting	No (Confectioner’s Glaze)
Funfetti Filled Pastry Bag: Vanilla Frosting	Vegan

5. Is Simple Mills Frosting Vegan?

Simple Mills frosting is confirmed vegan. Both the vanilla and the chocolate flavor are 100% plant-based, containing no dairy, egg, gelatin, or other animal ingredients.

Again, here are the exact products I was able to check:

Frosting	Is It Vegan?
Simple MIlls: Vanilla Frosting	Vegan
Simple MIlls: Chocolate Frosting	Vegan

So Is Store-Bought Frosting Vegan?

My study showed that most store-bought frosting is vegan. Out of 88 frosting products checked, 58 products (66%) were vegan. The most common animal ingredients found were dairy and confectioner’s glaze (in Funfetti frosting). One frosting product also contained egg.

These results would probably surprise a lot of people! In fact, while doing some preliminary research for this post, I found a blog post that specifically said most store-bought frosting contains butter. However, that is decisively not true. And I’ll prove it!

Does Frosting Have Dairy?

Most store-bought frosting does not contain dairy. Out of 88 frosting products I checked, only 10 products (11%) contained dairy ingredients. Usually, the specific dairy ingredients were nonfat dry milk or cream.

This was a very interesting result because most people assume that frosting contains butter. But while it is common for homemade frosting to contain butter, it is not common at all for store-bought frosting to have butter.

There are even multiple examples I found of store-bought frosting products with flavor names like “Milk Chocolate” and “Butter Cream” that are actually dairy-free and vegan (!).

In fact, the following frostings are all (surprisingly) vegan and dairy-free, despite their names:

• Betty Crocker Rich & Creamy Frosting: Milk Chocolate
• Betty Crocker Whipped Frosting: Butter Cream
• Betty Crocker Whipped Frosting: Cream Cheese
• Betty Crocker Whipped Frosting: Whipped Cream
• Duncan Hines Creamy Cream Cheese Frosting
• Duncan Hines Creamy Buttercream Frosting
• Miss Jones Cream Cheese Frosting
• Pillsbury Creamy Supreme Buttercream Flavored Frosting
• Pillsbury Creamy Supreme Cream Cheese Flavored Frosting
• Pillsbury Creamy Supreme Milk Chocolate Frosting

Note: I’m not saying that all “Milk Chocolate” or “Buttercream” frostings are vegan. Certainly, a few of them actually do contain dairy. Check the full tables below for details.

Does Frosting Have Eggs?

Store-bought frosting rarely contains eggs. Out of 88 frosting products I checked, only 1 contained eggs: Betty Crocker’s Coconut Pecan Rich & Creamy Frosting. It is much more common for frosting to contain dairy or the insect-based “confectioner’s glaze,” rather than eggs.

Does Frosting Have Gelatin?

Store-bought frosting does not typically contain gelatin. Out of 88 frosting products I checked, none contained gelatin.

What Is Confectioner’s Glaze?

The animal ingredient that showed up a lot more than expected in my research was confectioner’s glaze. This ingredient is sometimes called “shellac” or “lac resin” instead. It’s actually a product made by lac beetles. So it’s an insect product.

Confectioner’s glaze is typically used as a coating on pills or candies. And unfortunately, it’s found on the “Candy Bits” in many of the Pillsbury Funfetti flavors. Note that not all Funfetti flavors have confectioner’s glaze—but most do. See the full list below.

“Gray-Area” Ingredients in Frosting

Personally, I only really worry about the dairy, eggs, and confectioner’s glaze in frosting as a vegan. However, some vegans have a more strict view than I do. So I wanted to address some of the “iffy” ingredients found in frosting, too:

• Sugar: Non-organic cane sugar is often filtered through animal bone char to make it whiter. We don’t know from ingredient labels whether the sugar in a particular brand of frosting was filtered with bone char or not. If this concerns you, choose Miss Jones or Simple Mills frosting. Miss Jones is confirmed vegan by the company, and Simple Mills uses organic sugar.

• Palm Oil: Palm oil doesn’t contain animal ingredients, but it is sometimes harvested in an unsustainable way, destroying the habitat of orangutans and other animals. However, it seems that efforts like the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) have made significant progress in this area in recent years.

• Artificial Colors: These are made from petroleum, not animals. However, due to ongoing safety concerns, artificial color dyes are still being tested on animals on an ongoing basis. I wrote more about this in my blog posts on Red 40, Red 3, Yellow 5, Yellow 6, Blue 1, and Blue 2.

And if you wanted to get even pickier, you’ll also find ingredients like mono- and diglycerides, which the Vegetarian Resource Group (VRG) reports as being “Typically Vegan” (but not always).

My view with all these ingredients is that boycotting them will not do much to help the animals, but it will make veganism much harder. So my advice for new vegans is to just focus on the main ingredients that we know are animal based. Cut those out, and call it good.

If you want to do more for animals after cutting out the main animal ingredients, then I recommend donating or volunteering with a vegan org such as Vegan Outreach. That will make a bigger impact than obsessing over tiny ingredients that are only possibly tied to animals.

For a longer explanation of my view on this issue, see my blog post on why I don’t worry about the vitamin D3 in cereal.

How Can Frosting Be Vegan?

Some people are confused about what vegan frosting would contain. If not butter, then what makes it so creamy and good?

Store-bought vegan frosting is typically made primarily of sugar, palm oil, and corn syrup. Homemade vegan frosting is often made with sugar and vegan butter, margarine, or vegetable oil.

Really, frosting is mainly going to be sugar and fat. And the majority of the calories usually come from the sugar, rather than the fat. So really, the top ingredient in most frosting is sugar or some form of sweetener.

More Guides to Vegan Brands

If you’d like some food ideas to help you on your vegan journey, here are links to some of my Vegan Food Brand Guides:

• Vegan Pasta Sauce Brands
• Vegan Crouton Brands
• Vegan Salsa Brands
• Vegan Hamburger Bun Brands

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