Here, you’ll find 25 stunning Halloween cake ideas to celebrate a Halloween party or a Halloween birthday. If you’re looking for inspiration to place an order with your local baker, or you want to recreate one of these cakes yourself thanks to the guidance I provide, you’re in the perfect place.
How to find a Halloween cake idea suited to your cake-decorating level?
I’ve come up with a system. The cake ideas are presented to you according to their level of difficulty. There are three categories :
What Are Beginner Cake Ideas?
These are easy cake ideas. If you’ve never decorated a cake before (or only did it once or twice), these are the cakes that you should pay attention to.
- What you’ll find: Beautiful cake ideas that only require basic cake decorating techniques. This is a great place to start your journey.
What Are Intermediate Cake Ideas?
Low Intermediate Baker: If you are confident that you’ve mastered the cake decorating basics, such as how to smooth a cake, but feel like you still have a lot of techniques to learn apart from this foundation, this category is perfect for you.
- What you’ll find: Cake ideas that require both basic decorating skills and one or two techniques that are a little bit more advanced. This is a great place to grow your cake-decorating skills.
High Intermediate Baker: If you’ve mastered both basic techniques and several more advanced cake decorating techniques, these cake ideas are made for you.
- What you’ll find: Stunning cake ideas that can be fairly challenging, but are a great place to get even better than you already are.
What Are Advanced Cake Ideas?
If you consider yourself an experienced cake decorator and have mastered most of the decorating techniques, including the use of fondant, then this is the perfect place for you.
- What you’ll find: Showstopping and challenging cake ideas, perfect to sharpen and maintain your skills.
The Grading System
Finally, I’ve also assigned a grade of difficulty to each cake inspiration: 1/5 being the easiest design and 5/5 being the hardest. The goal is to make the ranking the most accurate possible. You will find this to be particularly helpful if you happen to fall in the Beginner or the Intermediate Cake Ideas categories.
Growth Tip : This list is great a place to set goals about your cake decorating skills. Pin this post and come back later to tell us how far you’ve come in your cake decorating journey !
How to follow the instructions of the designs.
For the cake designs in the beginner category: I’ll provide written instructions on how to recreate the cake idea presented to you. Don’t hesitate to watch video tutorials about basic techniques such as how to smooth a cake.
For the designs in the intermediate category: I’ll provide some guidance on how to perform the more complicated techniques.
For the advanced category: you are an experienced baker, at this point, and you will find great opportunities to put this experience to use. To be completely honest, I cannot make myself several cake ideas from the advanced category, so trust your abilities and go for it.
Find the perfect Halloween cake idea for your baking skills.
Growth Tip : If you aim to get better at cake decorating, you should choose a cake idea that feels sligthly above your current cake decorating level. Get out of your comfort zone !
Halloween Cake Ideas For Beginner Bakers
Here, you’ll find 4 easy Halloween cake ideas perfect for beginner bakers.
Easy Halloween Cake
Difficulty Level: 1/5.
What you will need :
- Enough frosting to cover your cake.
- Store-bought Halloween cake toppers and decorations.
How to recreate this cake?
- First, you must crumb-coat the cake to avoid any crumbs in your final design. Apply a thin and even coat of frosting with your offset spatula all around your cake.
- Smooth it with your bench scraper, holding it at a 45-degree angle on the cake while spinning your turntable. Your bench scraper isn’t supposed to move, only turn the table.
- It doesn’t have to be perfect as it only is the first coat. Chill the cake 20 to 30 minutes in the fridge (until your frosting sets).
- Then, apply a thicker coat of frosting and repeat the smoothing operation. Fill in any gaps and smooth the cake again. Repeat this operation until the cake looks smooth enough for you. Here, you’ll find a video tutorial of the covering process, if needed.
- Next, chill your cake in the fridge for 30 minutes or until your buttercream cover sets.
- Use a knife warmed with water to cut sharp edges on your cake.
- Finally, add your cake toppers and cake decorations.
What you’ve learned :
As a cake decorator, the very first technique you have to master is how to frost a cake properly.
Glittery Halloween Cake
Difficulty Level: 1/5.
What you will need:
- Enough black frosting to cover your cake.
- Silver sprinkles and edible pearls.
How to recreate this cake?
- First, crumb coat, cover, chill, and cut the edges of your cake as explained in the previous cake design.
- Then, place your sprinkles in the shape of a spiderweb.
What you’ve learned :
Adding silver or golden accents to a cake design is an easy way to elevate its look.
Halloween Cake For Kids
Difficulty Level: 1,5/5.
What you will need:
- Enough frosting to cover your cake.
- Halloween cake toppers for kids.
How to recreate this cake?
- First, crumb coat, and cover your cake as explained in the previous cake design.
- Then, place your angled spatula at the center of the top of your cake and start spinning the turntable while slowly moving away from the center.
- Then, repeat the process on the cake’s sides, moving your spatula from the top to the bottom of the cake.
- Place your cake in the fridge until the frosting sets, then, cut the raw edges of buttercream with a knife warmed with water.
- Finally, place your cake toppers.
What you’ve learned :
Cake decorations are the beginner cake decorator’s best friend. This cake is a perfect example of how you can DIY them with a little bit of creativity.
Halloween Cake For Children
Difficulty Level: 1/5.
What you will need:
- Enough frosting to cover and decorate your cake.
- Small round piping tip (such as the #1 by Wilton).
- Halloween cake toppers.
- Star-shaped sprinkles.
How to recreate this cake?
- First, crumb coat, cover, chill, and cut the edges of your cake as explained in the previous cake design.
- Then, use your angled spatula to create the ghosts by spreading a little bit of buttercream as shown in this buttercream ghost tutorial.
- Next draw faces to the ghosts with your small round piping tip.
- Finally, place your sprinkles and your cake toppers.
What you’ve learned :
With very simple techniques such as the buttercream ghosts, you can create really cute Halloween cake designs.
Halloween Cake Ideas Perfect For Intermediate Bakers
Here, you’ll find 15 Halloween cake ideas perfect for intermediate bakers.
Layered Buttercream Fortnite Cake
Difficulty Level: 2,5/5 (Low-Intermediate)
A Halloween cake is the perfect opportunity to use treats as cake decorations.
A little guidance
To recreate these beautiful buttercream swirls, you can follow this beginner-friendly buttercream swirls tutorial.
Halloween Drip Cakes
Difficulty Level: 3/5 (Intermediate).
A drip cake is perfectly suited to the Halloween theme as it easily reminds of blood.
A little guidance
You can recreate this effect following this drip cake tutorial. For the cake decorations don’t hesitate to check out this chocolate ghosts tutorial and this marshmallow spiderweb tutorial.
Halloween Pumpkin Cake
Difficulty Level: 3/5 (Intermediate)
You can easily adapt this Halloween cake and this technique to the Halloween character of your choice.
A little guidance
For a perfect Halloween pumpkin face, you can cut the design out of parchment paper, use it as a stencil, and spread buttercream over the holes. You’ll get a beautiful result even if you’re not good with a piping bag.
Halloween Spiderweb Cake
Difficulty Level: 3/5 (Intermediate)
A little guidance
Use a toothpick to imprint where you’re going to draw your spiderweb and draw with your piping bag over it for a neat result.
Halloween Cake For Girls
Difficulty Level: 3/5 (Intermediate)
A little guidance
To recreate this gradient effect, apply a light buttercream on the top half of your cake and your darker shade on the bottom half. Then, use your spatula to blend the demarcation as much as you can. Finally, smooth your cake as usual. If you think the gradient isn’t as blended as you wished, keep blending and smoothing until satisfied.
Girly Halloween Birthday Cake
Difficulty Level: 3,5/5 (High-Intermediate)
A little guidance
Use a cake comb to create ridges as shown in this striped cake tutorial, and let it set in the fridge. Next, fill them with your second color of buttercream. Smooth your cake until neat buttercream stripes are revealed.
Halloween Unicorn Cake
Difficulty Level: 3,5/5 (High-Intermediate)
You can easily adapt this cake to any theme of your choice such as a Halloween mermaid or a Halloween princess, which will create a perfect Halloween cake for kids.
A little guidance
If you’d like to recreate this Halloween cake design, you can follow this unicorn cake tutorial and change the color palette to fit the theme.
Halloween Vintage Cakes
Difficulty Level: 3,5/5 (High-Intermediate)
You can adapt any cake trend to the Halloween theme with a little bit of creativity.
A little guidance
Check out this vintage cake piping tutorial to get a head start on your Halloween vintage cake. Also, you don’t a special can tin to create a heart-shaped cake you can easily DIY them from round cakes.
Fondant Halloween Cakes
Difficulty Level: 4/5 (High-Intermediate)
A little guidance
My three tips when covering a cake in fondant are the following:
- You should pay extra attention when preparing your cake. Make sure it’s leveled, and your buttercream (or ganache) should be very neat to get a cleaner finish.
- You should roll your fondant to a thickness between 1/8th inch and 1/4 inch.
- You should keep in mind that your first attempt probably isn’t going to be flawless, but it’s perfectly fine because practice will make your technique perfect.
Finally, here’s a detailed video tutorial, that’ll teach everything you need to know.
Ghosts Halloween Cake
Difficulty Level: 4,5/5 (High-Intermediate)
When hosting a lot of guests, tiered cakes are definitely the way to go. They also offer more room to express your creativity.
A little guidance
When making tiered cakes, you have to pay extra attention to the structure of the cake. Therefore, you should always use a sturdy cake board for each tier. You should also support the bottom tier with dowel rods or bubble tea straws cut to the height of the cake. Finally, you should ensure each tier is leveled before stacking them.
Fortnite Cake Ideas For Advanced Bakers
These 6 Halloween cake ideas will be perfectly suited to experienced cake decorators.
Halloween Monster Cakes
Difficulty level: 5/5
You can personalize these cake ideas using the monsters of your choice, a mummy, a Halloween unicorn, or a ghost for example.
Halloween Cakes For Adults
Difficulty Level: 5/5
You can also opt for more elegant versions of a Halloween cake, perfect for adults.
Halloween Witch Cakes
Difficulty Level: 5/5
Finally, if you want a cake that’ll amaze adults and children alike, honestly most of the cakes in this list will do.
If you’re looking for more cake ideas, check out my other cake ideas for boys or my cake ideas for adults.
Did you enjoy these Halloween cake inspirations? Sharing is caring! Pin this post to come back to it.
Please let me know in the comments if you’d like some specific cake ideas and/or tag me on Instagram @theperfectcakeidea. I’d also love to see your creations.
