7 Grocery Store Maple Donuts, Ranked

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Cozy season is upon us and everyone is taking notice. Even grocery store bakeries seem to have gotten the fall memo. Apple and pumpkin pies have popped up, dredging up the age-old debate over which is better. The two decidedly fall flavors have taken over other baked goods, like cookies, scones, muffins, and breads. But in the donut case, it's a different flavor having its moment in the autumn sun: maple.

Now, it's not inconceivable that you'd find a maple donut outside of fall. I've spotted them at other times of the year. But they just feel so much more fitting and taste that much better during the months squeezed between summer and winter. This is the timeframe I chose to try a few maple donuts for myself. I wouldn't say they're my favorite kind of donut. Donuts with nuts or sprinkles tend to catch my eye first. But I'm also easily swayed by seasonal trends. It's the same reason I take a brief hiatus from my usual vanilla lattes and somehow end up with a pumpkin spice one in my hand every fall.

With that in mind, I paid a visit to the donut cases at four different grocery stores and nabbed every maple ring and bar I could find. Although every donut is beautiful in its own way, I pitted them against one another, judging them primarily on maple flavor and the donut's texture, all to find the best, most autumn-worthy donut.

Prices are as of the date of publication and may vary based on region.

$0.99 gets you a ticket to any donut in Kroger's bakery case. It's usually pretty well-stocked too, especially if you go earlier in the morning. The chain will start to shut it down later in the day, leaving only the pre-packaged options up for grabs.

I wasn't surprised to find a few maple options among the selection. I did spot a tiny plaque for a Maple Long John, but unfortunately, those were all sold out. There were still plenty of these maple rings left, though. And after trying one for myself, I could see why they might not be flying off the rack.

Underneath its seemingly normal appearance is a yeast donut that's dense and chewy, and not necessarily in a good way. It lacked the slight elasticity you'd expect from a yeast donut. It was difficult to bite off a piece, and its texture made each mouthful more of a chore than it should have been. Then on top of it (literally) is an icing that tasted like it had been burnt at some point in the process. There's a light maple flavor hiding in there somewhere, but it mostly tastes like sugar that sat a little too long on the bottom of a hot pan. Needless to say, this donut wasn't for me. So, off to the next grocery store bakery I went.

If it was a beauty contest, Meijer's donuts would have landed much higher in the rankings. The store really leaned into the fall theme with sprinkles and icing swirls in orange, purple, and green — the colors of Halloween. Each donut is still reasonably priced at $0.99, like Kroger's donuts. So you're getting those extra adornments at no extra charge.

Unfortunately, the taste of its Maple-Glazed Long John really isn't on par with the festive look. The icing doesn't taste much like maple at all. It's more of a sugary shell with no real defining flavor beyond sweetness. The donut itself is decent. It's pretty neutral and doesn't taste particularly good or bad. But by far the most disappointing part is that there's no filling! I usually expect a long john donut (one of my favorite donut types) to be stuffed with cream or custard. But I took several bites into this one and nada. I should have known based on the fact that there were no telltale signs of filling at either end. I guess I was just hoping Meijer found a sneakier way to get it in there somehow.

All things considered, this was still a better donut than Kroger's maple ring. But it may have also been the biggest letdown.

Since there was no cream in Meijer's Maple-Glazed Long John, this is essentially just the same donut in a different shape. But I will say it's slightly better, partly thanks to the sprinkles (because sprinkles make everything better) and partly because it never made any promises of a cream-filled center. So, it was off the hook in that regard.

This was also probably the tallest donut in the taste test. It's a thick, fried ring with a bready flavor that carries little to no sweetness. The donut itself actually reminded me more of a yeast dinner roll than a sweet breakfast pastry. I also noticed a bit of a strange aftertaste that didn't do it any favors.

As for the icing, it suffers from the same problem as Meijer's Maple-Glazed Long John. It's a pretty thin layer, and it just doesn't taste very maple-y. Instead, I actually picked up on something closer to the flavor of Froot Loops. It had that kind of sugary, fruity cereal flavor that I was certainly not expecting from a maple donut. Strange, to say the least. But hey, at least the sprinkles added a satisfying little crunch.

When I did a taste-test of all kinds of Walmart bakery donuts, these maple-iced rings somehow slipped through the cracks. Now, I'm regretting everything because they would have been at the top of the list. Hindsight is always 20/20.

They're sold in variety dozens, but also in convenient two-packs for $1.97. That works out to just under $0.99 per donut, making them the cheapest in the ranking. While they don't come straight out of a display case, they aren't lacking in freshness. It's your typical yeast donut that's fluffy and squishes down as you go to take a bite. It's also a really good size. And the maple icing on top is exactly what you'd want. When warmed up ever so slightly, it's almost creamy, and those richer, buttery maple flavors really start to come through. It was a sweet surprise after Meijer's donuts, which were misleading on multiple fronts.

Really, my only complaint with them was that as I worked my way through it, the donut itself started to get the slightest bit dry toward the bottom. That's the only reason another grocery chain's maple ring managed to top it.

Like Meijer, Giant Eagle also puts some effort into the appearance of its donuts. But instead of color-splashed sprinkles, it opts for white swizzles across the top. It's pretty classy-looking, if you ask me, and the taste follows suit.

The maple icing has a deep, almost butterscotch-like flavor that I really enjoyed. It tastes a little more gourmet than the other icings I've tried so far, and it's applied in just the right amount. There's not so much that it becomes overwhelmingly sugary, but there's enough to balance out the donut underneath. Speaking of the donut itself, it's dense with a stronger yeasty flavor. But it's also incredibly soft and fluffy, somehow even more so than Walmart's. It's a nice combination that makes each bite feel a little more substantial without being too heavy.

You do pay a bit more of a premium for this one at $1.49 apiece. But in my opinion, it's worth every penny. A donut that's both picture-perfect and perfectly delicious? That's admittedly harder to come by, but Giant Eagle makes it happen.

Walmart's Maple Iced Fluff-Filled Bar Donut also comes in a two-pack for $1.97. But it shares a box with a chocolate-iced bar as well. I like that little bit of flavor diversity, though I also would have been perfectly fine with two of the maple.

Ignore the fact that this donut isn't the easiest on the eyes. Its icing was smeared from its chocolate box mate resting on top of it. But it's what's on the inside that really matters. And in this case, that's a delicious, fluffy filling. The taste lands somewhere between sugary marshmallow Fluff and cinnamon roll icing. I also heated the donut up for just about 10 seconds in the microwave, and the filling melted into a smooth, gooey cream that made it even more indulgent. I would definitely recommend trying this at home.

That filling alone was enough to rank this donut above the filling-less maple rings. But the rest of it is just as good. It's essentially a copy-and-paste version of the store's Maple Iced Ring, with a similar-tasting donut and the same rich, maple-flavored icing. I did think the frosting on top tasted just a tad less sweet here, but that could have simply been because I was comparing it to the molten Fluff center.

Now, this is a long john. It's cream-filled as promised (Meijer's sad, unfilled long john can't relate), and it's just that much better than Walmart's similar donut.

Right off the bat, it has Walmart beat in terms of looks. It didn't come squished, for one, and it stood out with those classy white icing stripes, just like its maple ring counterpart did. It also has all the same attributes as that other Giant Eagle donut as well, from the elevated, perfectly applied maple icing to the donut itself, which strikes just the right balance between a soft chew and an airy texture. Then comes the pièce de résistance: the cream inside. It's not just one of those stark-white, sugary creams, either. This filling has a little more depth and thickness to it — somewhat similar to a custard. It's really good, but it never overpowers the maple icing on top. Instead, the two work together.

It feels like a donut you would get at the fall festival or at a mom-and-pop donut shop, not a supermarket bakery. So thank you, Giant Eagle, for adding a little extra charm to the autumn season.

For this taste-test, I stuck with grocery stores known for their in-house bakeries. I made trips to four stores in total, including Walmart, Kroger, Giant Eagle, and Meijer, picking up every maple donut I could find at each bakery. With the exception of Walmart's donuts, all of them came straight from a serve-yourself donut case. Walmart's came in prepackaged boxes. After picking up these grocery store bakery donuts, I brought them home to try while they were as fresh as possible. I also gave each one a quick pass in the microwave to see how that might elevate the flavors.

I ranked them first and foremost on their maple icing. It had to actually taste like maple. That should be a no-brainer, but it wasn't always the case. The icing also needed to be sweet but not overly sugary and applied in just the right amount. Additionally, it had to be balanced out by a soft, doughy donut base. I didn't want anything overly chewy or too dry.

I also considered extras like cream fillings or sprinkles on top, adornments that almost always make a donut better. Price briefly factored into my thinking, too. But since all of them are priced similarly, it didn't affect their final placements.