10 Store-Bought Bao Buns, Ranked

Just like dumplings, bao buns are a major trend — and one that isn't going anywhere anytime soon. Pronounced "bow" (like "wow" but with a B), the buns have rolled their way over from Chinese cuisine and right into our hearts and stomachs. They're simple when you get right down to it: just a wheat flour-based bun that's steamed and stuffed with ingredients. They're beloved because of their fluffiness and versatility. Known as cha siu bao, filling them with barbecue pork is a popular style, yet plenty of other options exist out there, packed with chicken, beef, tofu, veggies, and even duck.

Ordering bao buns fresh at a restaurant is hands-down the best way to experience their supple texture and savory flavors. When those bao cravings call at home, you can also reach for a store-bought option. I recently did just to see what brands are dominating in this space and, more importantly, which ones set themselves apart in terms of taste. I ended up finding 10 different bao buns to try — mostly from the freezer aisle — from seven distinct brands.

Once I got them home, I cooked them up as per the instructions on the bag or box and judged them based on a few key criteria. These included the texture and taste of the outer bun (the softer the better), the amount of inner ingredients, and, of course, the quality and taste of the inner filling. I wound up with a lineup that stretched from the worst to the absolute best buns.

In most cases, Target's Good & Gather brand wins me over with its quality. Not only are its products free from synthetic colors, high fructose corn syrup, artificial sweeteners, and artificial flavors, but many of them also offer great taste. The line's Himalayan salted dark chocolate almonds and Chicken & Vegetable Potstickers from the freezer aisle are even personal favorites of mine.

That being said, it came as a real shock that the Good & Gather pork bao buns were the most distasteful option I tried. The biggest issue I had was with the pork itself. It's supposedly roast pork seasoned with sugar and soy sauce, but it turned out to have a chewy, beef jerky-like texture and slightly gamey, almost acrid taste that threw everything off. To make matters worse, there's also a lot of bun here, so the whole thing comes across dry and unbalanced. The choice of supporting ingredients didn't help, either. You have basics like soy sauce, sesame oil, sesame paste, onion, sugar, and garlic powder. Additions like chili pepper, sweet potato powder, and other spices created an odd-tasting profile that just didn't mesh. At times, it even reminded me of curry with its warm spices.

I do appreciate that Target's bao buns are easy to prepare — just pop them in the microwave for a minute-and-a-half under a damp towel. However, the convenience doesn't make up for their overall lack of appeal, and didn't save them from my last-place spot.

This bao bun set from Kroger is the only one in the taste test that can be found fresh rather than frozen. It bears the store's premium private label brand name, Private Selection, but it's also a Snow Fox product. Snow Fox sushi is the brand behind the sushi kiosks in various grocery stores, like Kroger, and the sushi kiosk is exactly where I found this two-pack carton of pork buns.

I assume you could eat these straight out of the package, as you do with grocery store sushi or any other grab-and-go food item. However, I heated them up for a minute in the microwave when I got them home, just as the lid instructed. When they came out, they were steaming yet far from doughy soft, as I expected. The bun resolves to a crumbly texture, and there's no escape from it because it's massive with minimal fillings. The small amount of pork mixture that is inside has a bit of a chew to it and comes in an artificial orange hue. All of this is a shame because the sauce portion does have some decent flavor to it. Soy sauce, hoisin sauce, oyster sauce, brown sugar, and even ketchup are all incorporated to give the buns that Asian flair. You just can't enjoy it because of the unfortunate textures and dryness of the rest. These buns are here to prove that bigger doesn't always mean better. They ended up as one of my least favorites, beating only Target's pick.

Owned by the sustainability platform Green Monday, OmniFoods is a company dedicated to making plant-based foods. It sells meat and fish alternatives like its OmniPork and Omni Ocean Burgers, as well as other plant-based dishes, like bao buns. Several flavor options are available, and I found two, including Teriyaki and these Korean-style BBQ buns, at my local Fresh Thyme market, though they're also available at some Walmart locations. 

They come frozen, but all you have to do to make them is wrap them in a damp paper towel and microwave them for about 45 seconds. A steaming option is also provided. They come out looking cute as a button, though the taste isn't quite as appealing. Even though the dough portion follows a fairly standard recipe, including wheat flour, cane sugar, water, yeast, and rice bran oil shortening, it's very dense and even artificial-tasting despite its natural sweetness.

Since it's plant-based, the filling is made up of tiny bits called "pork-style strips," which are actually soy protein-based. They're accompanied by veggies like carrots, onions, and bell peppers, and flavored by soy sauce, chili, garlic, ginger, and paprika. Altogether, the blend isn't too bad with main taste notes of sesame and spice. However, it simply doesn't mimic the savoriness of real meat, and there's just something off about the textures throughout. Even though there is more filling to work with compared to the Target and Kroger buns and the spiciness brings it up a notch, it could still use some work.

What started as one woman's love for dumplings has now turned into a multi-million-dollar brand. Nadia Liu Spellman founded Dumpling Daughter in 2014 in order to share a pocket of Chinese comfort food with the world. Now, her recipes are not only a hit at Dumpling Daughter restaurants, but also sold at thousands of stores on the East Coast and in the Midwest. Plus, they can be shipped anywhere in the country. Dumplings are obviously the brand's core focus, though it sells a handful of other Chinese-style favorites as well, like Spicy Sweet Soy sauce, crab rangoons, and these frozen roasted pork buns.

On paper, the buns sound just as well thought out and delicious as the dumplings. They're filled with a simpler list of ingredients compared to other options, including staples like hoisin sauce, sesame seed oil, soy sauce, salted chili, garlic, and white pepper. They also use Duroc Heritage pork — a specific kind known for its tenderness, marbling, and deep flavor. The problem is that there isn't a whole lot of this pork mixture tucked inside the buns, and what is included is pretty bland. It looks like a clump of hamburger meat; it's mushy and lacks bold umami notes. It left me wishing a package of the brand's soy sauce had been included in the box. Even though there is some quality here that pulls these buns above several other store brands, I was still disappointed. I expected more from the infamous Dumpling Daughter.

Which came first, the restaurant or the retail bao? In Wow Bao's case, it was the restaurant. The company opened its first Chicago location in 2003, serving the steamed Asian buns it's now famous for, along with potstickers and soup dumplings. It has since expanded to multiple locations and more than 700 delivery kitchens, but the easiest way for most people to experience the brand is through its store-bought frozen products.

Based on the inventory at my local Columbus, Ohio, grocery stores, Wow Bao appears to have a strong retail presence compared to other competing brands. I found its boxes at Target, Kroger, and BJ's Wholesale, plus regional chains like Giant Eagle, Meijer, and Lucky's Market. With multiple flavors available, I went with two of the most popular: Chinese-Style BBQ Pork and Teriyaki Chicken.

What I got from the teriyaki chicken box were pretty average bao buns. The insides — mostly chicken thigh, onion, red pepper, green onion, teriyaki sauce, ginger, garlic, and tamari — taste like any standard stovetop stir-fry, the kind of PF Chang's-style meal that tastes okay as a stopgap supper but doesn't really satisfy like you thought it would. The meat is tender enough, but the peppers dominate, and the biggest issue is the dryness in both the filling and the bun. The wrapper needed more moisture (it even turned a bit crusty in spots), and the filling could use far more sauce. The bones are there; it just needs some pop to rise in the rankings.

The Chinese-style BBQ pork bao from Wow Bao landed a bit better for me. This flavor seems rooted in a more traditional recipe, and that tribute to a classic helps it stand out against the chicken teriyaki version — even if the improvement is a small one. It does come with a much longer list of ingredients, but they're apparently better curated because they result in a richer, more cohesive taste. You get hoisin sauce, plum sauce, soy sauce, vegetarian sauce, brown rice syrup, chili garlic sauce, and even organic ketchup thrown in — not to mention, a wealth of other additions like honey, cane sugar, molasses, and various spices. It sounds like a lot, but it ultimately comes together to create that familiar Chinese BBQ sauce profile with a balanced mix of sweet, salty, and savory. I still think it could use more juiciness inside, the shredded bits of pork shoulder are a bit on the tough side, and the bun remains more stiff than fluffy — just as it was with the teriyaki version — but this one is an overall improvement.

I also want to give the brand some grace here. These buns could likely be significantly better if I steamed them on the stovetop, rather than heating them quickly in the microwave. That method might help solve the problem of dryness on the outer bun, at least. Even with that adjustment, though, I think a few other brands would still have ranked higher on my list.

I gave Omni a second chance with its teriyaki bao buns, and I'm glad I did. They somehow fare much better than the brand's Korean-style BBQ variation, despite their similarities. The two share the exact same roll casing and plant-based pork made mostly from soy protein is also once again the "meat" of choice. The difference is that, here in the Omni teriyaki buns, it all comes together in a more appetizing manner. The buns are thicker and on the more compact side, yet they seemed to have more softness and give. They're also stuffed with a more generous amount of fillings, so they don't seem as overbearing. The insides are what really caught my attention. Instead of pork-style strips, this version uses a ground pork alternative mixed with cabbage, onion, spring onion, soy sauce, ginger, and sesame oil. While the other Omni bag leads with spice, this one leans more into earthiness with just a hint of sweetness.

The result is surprisingly convincing. It tastes much closer to a true Asian-style pork dish, and the balance of flavors and textures almost makes you believe real meat is tucked inside. Honestly, if I had tried these in a blind taste test, I don't think I would have been able to tell they were plant-based. Because of that believability and the quality ingredients, these ranked high in the taste test, landing just behind a few options packed with even more filling and standout flavor.

When it comes to frozen bao buns, if you're ever in doubt, go with Laoban. Like the Dumpling Daughter, the brand does tend to prioritize frozen dumplings. However, it also dabbles in buns, and two of its signature flavors are buy-again tasty — some of the best store-bought buns I've come across.

The sesame chicken box earned some points before I even pulled out the buns to microwave. The adorable dumpling blobs on the packaging let you know that the contents are made with free-range, antibiotic-free chicken, as well as made from scratch with no artificial ingredients or preservatives. Then, I took a bite and liked them even more. They're the first brand to really nail the consistency of the bun. It's cushiony with an oh-so airy texture and a great mild flavor with just the slightest hint of sweetness, making it the perfect neutral vessel for what's hiding inside.

It's also teeming with ingredients. You have chicken paired with shiitake mushrooms. Then, you get a little crunch from the green cabbage, and just a touch of pungency from the yellow onion. Hoisin really takes center stage here, yet it's nuanced with ginger and a subtle sugary sweetness. Add in a scattering of roasted sesame seeds, and it becomes a delightful little hodgepodge of flavors and textures. While I did happen to like the other Laoban flavor and one other brand slightly more, it doesn't detract from the fact that this is a solid pick.

These are the only bao buns I tried that came with a split top, so you can see the deep orange-red pork filling at the core. This feature makes them look exactly like buns that I have received before in a takeout order, and not only do they look restaurant-quality, but they taste like it, too.

Wei-Chuan is known for its line of authentic Chinese frozen foods, and its steamed buns come in a traditional Hong Kong Cha Shu style. That means they're loaded up with roasted and chopped pork that's been marinated in a sticky-sweet combination of garden condiments like hoisin, soy sauce, oyster sauce, garlic, chili, and mushroom sauce. Pillowy with a light chew and sweetness, the outer bao checks all the boxes. What's waiting on the inside, though, is what's really worth talking about. The pork pieces are abundant and exceptionally tender and juicy. As a meat tucked inside a freezer product, it really had no business being that succulent. The saucy mixture that surrounds the pork is also rich with plenty of umami and what tastes like a brown sugar sweetness.

This feels like a very classic and quality bao bun adaptation. My only qualm is the mile-long ingredient list and the food dyes included in this list. That's right, that vibrant color you see is actually compliments of caramel color, yellow 5, and red 40. This is one of the largest reasons these buns miss out on the top spot.

These buns from Laoban are unlike any other bao buns I've encountered, and I simply couldn't get enough of them. They jump the brand's chicken alternative, and the Wei-Chuan offering, rising to the top as my favorite take on store-bought bao buns.

The buns come with similar accolades to the Laoban sesame chicken rolls. Their ingredient list is nearly half the size of other options, they're made from scratch with no artificial ingredients or preservatives, and they're made with Angus beef. I can admit, they weren't the most attractive buns coming out of the microwave. What looked like orange grease stained the bottom of the buns, and inside looked like a simple clump of finely chopped ground beef — but trust me, the flavor more than made up for these appearance faults. It ends up tasting like spicy chorizo tucked into a golden roll. There's a good amount of fluff in the bao, and it's exploding with flavor. You can tell the beef is high grade, and there's just enough seasonings and spice to go around, dressed up with soy sauce, sesame oil, cumin, garlic, ginger, red chili flakes, and both onions and green onions.

These clearly deviate from the more familiar BBQ pork bao buns that many brands default to, but I like the originality here. It brings a fresh twist to a time-honored recipe and an unexpected freshness to the freezer aisle. I will be reaching for Laoban again.

​​For this ranking, I purchased 10 different packs of store-bought bao buns, including two flavors each from prominent brands like Laoban, Wow Bao, and OmniFoods. Once I brought them all home, I opted to use the microwave as my cooking method of choice for its convenience and quickness, though many boxes also provide steaming or even air-frying instructions. In the microwave, most buns needed only about a minute of warming, even straight from frozen.

From there, I sampled each one and judged them on several key criteria, starting with the outer bun. Because this is the signature element of bao, it had to be undeniably bouncy and soft — no exceptions. I also assessed the ratio of bun to filling. While the dough is important, you still want a fair amount of inner ingredients, including enough sauce to keep each bite balanced rather than dry.

Next came the medley of ingredients. I reviewed every label and taste, looking for quality meats, thoughtful blends of sauces and seasonings, and savory — sometimes slightly sweet or even spicy — flavor profiles. Buns with quality components, shorter ingredient lists, or claims like "no artificial ingredients or preservatives" received extra favor, but I ranked primarily on overall taste and texture.