Combine your favorite mix-ins, like chocolate chips, M&Ms, and sprinkles, with the cake mix of your choice to make the easiest cake mix cookies! Only three ingredients and quick to make, this cookie-baking trick is perfect for customizing for any holiday or occasion.
All you need are three ingredients, plus your favorite mix-ins, to make the best cake mix cookies! Using a cake mix is one of my favorite baking hacks (and not just for cookies, if my cake mix brownies have anything to say).
This is my original cake mix cookie recipe that’s inspired countless others on my site. I’ve included some fun variations below, and I love getting creative with different flavors, from funfetti cookies to strawberry cake mix cookies and birthday cake chocolate chip cookies.
The Only Cake Mix Cookies Recipe You’ll Ever Need
- These cake mix cookies are soft, tender, and chewy.
- Using a box of cake mix cuts the recipe down to only three ingredients. Add any mix-ins you’d like.
- The cookie dough comes together in one bowl, without a mixer.
- Mix the dough, spoon it onto a baking sheet, drop cookie-style, and bake.
- There are endless flavor combinations. Switching up the flavor is as easy as switching the cake mix. Use one recipe to make vanilla, chocolate, pumpkin cake mix cookies, or red velvet cake mix cookies.
What You’ll Need
We have delicious cookies to bake, so I’ll keep this quick! If you have a box of cake mix in the pantry, chances are you have everything you need to make a batch of chewy cake mix cookies (see the recipe card for the exact measurements).
- Cake Mix – I like vanilla cake mix best in these cookies, so that’s what I’ve used here. Feel free to swap this for any cake mix flavor you’d like.
- Eggs – Egg size matters! Make sure to use large eggs (not small or extra-large) for this recipe.
- Oil – I use vegetable oil; however, any light colored oil will work, such as canola oil or corn oil.
- Mix-ins – So many possibilities, from M&Ms to sprinkles. See my Mix-ins section for ideas.
How to Make Cake Mix Cookies
Making cookies from cake mix is easy to do in one bowl, and you really only need to measure out the oil. Everything else can be dumped right in. Here are the steps.
- Combine the ingredients. Add your cake mix, eggs, and oil to a large bowl. Mix gently until smooth.
- Add the mix-ins. Next, fold in your chosen extras. I used M&Ms here.
- Portion and bake the cookies. Portion the dough onto a lined baking sheet, leaving about 2 inches in between to account for spreading. Bake these cake mix cookies at 350ºF for 9-10 minutes, until they’re golden at the edges. Cool the cookies on the pan for a few minutes, then move them over to a wire rack.
Adapting to Different Cake Mix Sizes
I’ve found some stores are phasing out 18-ounce boxes of cake mix for 15-ounce boxes. If you can’t find an 18-ounce cake mix, an easy fix is to supplement a 15-ounce box with ¼ cup of all-purpose flour.
Luckily, cake mix is forgiving in this recipe. Don’t mind a thinner cookie? Simply swap the 18-ounce box with a 15-ounce box without any further changes to the recipe. Your cake mix cookies will still turn out fine; they may just spread a bit more.
Tips for the Best Cake Mix Cookies
- Avoid overmixing. Fold the dry cake mix with the wet ingredients just until everything is combined, but don’t overmix. Overmixed cookie dough leads to tough, dense cookies.
- Line the baking sheet. Lining the cookie sheet with parchment paper or a Silpat liner prevents the bottom of the cookies from overbrowning. It also makes clean-up a breeze!
- Use a cookie scoop. I love my large cookie scoop for portioning big, thick, chewy cookies. It makes it super quick and easy to scoop out cookies that bake up to be the same size. One large cookie scoop equals approximately 3 tablespoons of cookie dough.
- Don’t overbake the cookies. Cake mix cookies are done when they’re lightly browned at the edges and soft in the middle. They’ll finish firming up as they cool on the baking sheet. If your cookies are completely set or browned all over when they come out of the oven, they’re overdone.
- There will be some variation in the texture of the cookies, depending on which cake mix you use. For example, a vanilla cake mix vs. chocolate cake mix may yield thicker or thinner cookies, cookies that spread more, etc.
Cake Mix Flavors
I use a vanilla cake mix, but these are more suggestions from the baking aisle.
- Red Velvet
- Yellow Cake
- Funfetti
- Chocolate
- French Vanilla
- Carrot Cake (see my carrot cake mix cookies)
- Spice Cake
- Pumpkin
- Lemon
- Strawberry
Best Mix-ins for Cake Mix Cookies
Cake mix cookies are truly the “choose your own adventure” of cookie recipes! You can leave these plain, like sugar cookies, or mix and match your favorite add-ins with any of the cake mix flavors mentioned above. I suggest keeping the total amount of mix-ins to 1 cup or less, so as to not overload the cookie dough.
- Chocolate chips: Semi-sweet, milk, dark chocolate chips or white chocolate chips.
- Other kinds: Peanut butter chips, butterscotch, toffee bits, or cinnamon chips (love these with spice cake mix!)
- Sprinkles: Add up to ½ cup of sprinkles, and adapt the colors to different holidays! Red and green for Christmas, pink and red for Valentine’s Day, or red, white, and blue for the 4th of July.
- Candies: M&Ms, Reese’s Pieces, peppermint candy, chopped candy bars, like Rolo, and chopped Mini Oreos.
- Fruit and nuts: Chopped pecans, walnuts, almonds, dried fruit, and toasted coconut.
Some of my favorite cake mix and add-in combinations include red velvet cake mix cookies with white chocolate chips, chocolate cake mix cookies with peanut butter cups, and vanilla cake mix with Fruity Pebbles cereal! Drop a comment below with your combinations. 🙂
Storage and Freezing
- At room temperature. Store the cooled cake mix cookies in an airtight container at room temperature for 2-3 days. You can stretch their shelf life by another day or two in the fridge, but I recommend bringing the cookies back to room temperature when serving.
- Freeze. Once cooled, freeze the cookies in a freezer-safe container or a tightly sealed Ziploc bag for 2-3 months. Thaw them in the fridge or at room temperature before enjoying.
More Easy Cookie Recipes
Cake Mix Cookies
- Prep Time: 5 minutes
- Cook Time: 10 minutes
- Total Time: 15 minutes
- Yield: 24 1x
- Category: Cookies
- Method: Oven
- Cuisine: Dessert
Description
This cake mix cookie recipe is a fun, easy way to make soft, chewy cookies with only 3 ingredients. Mix and match cake flavors with your favorite mix-ins, like M&Ms, to make different combinations. My kids LOVE these cake mix cookies!
Ingredients
- 1 (18.25-ounce) box cake mix
- 2 eggs
- 1/2 cup vegetable oil
- 1 cup add-ins like chocolate chips or M&M’s (if adding in sprinkles, use 1/2 cup)
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350°F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and set aside.
- In a large bowl, mix cake mix, eggs, and oil until smooth. Alternately you can do this step in the bowl of your stand mixer with the paddle attachment, mixing the ingredients on low until combined.
- Mix in desired add-ins until evenly incorporated.
- Using a medium (2-tablespoon) cookie scoop, portion the dough onto the prepared cookie sheet, 2 inches apart. Bake for 9-10 minutes, or until lightly golden at the edges.
- Allow the cookies to cool on the baking sheet for 3-4 minutes before transferring to a wire rack.
Notes
- To Store: Store in an airtight container for up to 3 days.
- To Freeze: Freeze the cookies in an airtight container or a tightly sealed Ziploc bag for 2-3 months once they’ve cooled. Thaw them in the fridge or at room temperature before enjoying.
- Use any flavor cake mix you would like and mix and match add-ins!
- If you can’t find an 18-ounce cake mix and can only find a 15-ounce, add 1/4 cup of all-purpose flour to the recipe.
- *Nutritional information does not include mix-ins.
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 1 cookie
- Calories: 119
- Sugar: 7.9 g
- Sodium: 126.3 mg
- Fat: 6.4 g
- Carbohydrates: 14.6 g
- Protein: 1.2 g
- Cholesterol: 15.5 mg
This is a good recipe for an 18oz box of cake mix which I did have. I used half oil and half butter, softened. Made about 30 cookies using a med cookie scoop. I did use the cookie dough at room temp, used bottom of glass to press them down to about 1/2 to 1/4in, bake at 350 for 11min turning cookie sheet half way through. Hubs really enjoyed the coconut flavor cake mix with xxx sugar glaze, a little coconut extract and lemon juice, and toasted coconut on top of glaze. I will make these again!
Cake box mix of 13.25 worked better for me. Soft flatter cookies—larger mix made a mound shaped cookie
The only cookies I make start with a cake mix, but I have never used any of the add-ins suggested here. Instead, I have generally substituted something else for the oil. Mu favorite is a chocolate cake mix with a hugh glob of peanut butter added. I always use chunky because the recipe make enuff to share and I want it visible that there are nuts in these.
Another favorite add-in is a medium can of well-drained crushed pineapple. I drain the fruit in a sieve and press out as much juice as I can before adding the fruit to the mix. Sometimes I’ll also add a small box of orange gelatin, depending on the flavor of cake I’m using, As was pointed out above, cake mix is very forgiving. Go wild and see for yourself!
To good! I love mine soft and chewy but one of my sisters loves them crunchy, for the crunchy just push them down when your scoping the batter so easy,and youget crunchy and chewy cookies.
Hi! I was checking out this recipe for a friend, and would you believe the cake mix she bought was 375 grams which is 13.39 ounces! I guess we would need to add even more than 1/4 cup of flour! Looking for and thanking you for suggestions.
PS I just noticed that another person posted a similar comment. So we’re in this together!
Kathy, there are recipes for cake mix upsizers. i, unfortunately can’t find my go to one with great instructions for chocolate but if using a recipe calling for a chocolate cake, i would use the upsizer mix to equal the larger cake mix then add a bit of cocoa and possible a sprinkle of sugar depending on the frosting. worked every time
Well, now a cake mix is 13.25 ounces – so we have to adjust again
I had someone I knew when I was a kid who had a similar recipe and I loved it. Glad to find it! I tried it as is and tried it replacing the oil with vanilla yogurt. While the dough was stickier with the yogurt, I think the cookies turned out pretty good. But that’s just my taste.
I’ve made these several times in the past, they’re super easy and are always a big hit. This year, I decided to make my add-in slightly crushed Ruffles potato chips. The combo of salty and sweet was awesome!
Wow – this recipe is so easy and so good! I thought these may taste like cake – but they are amazing cookies. I needed a cookie for a cookie exchange and had no time so I tried these. Wound up making two kinds of cookies and they were a hit – at home and at the event. Made 36 for each batch. Thank you!