The Absolute Best Birthday Cake Ideas for Baby’s First Birthday

Your kid’s made it a whole year on planet Earth—so they’ve earned dessert for breakfast, no? Make their morning with a wholesome layer cake from Yummy Toddler Food; it’s stocked with b-fast staples like Greek yogurt, oats and berries. Quite possibly one of the most nutritious birthday cake ideas out there, it’s like a grab-and-go parfait with better self-esteem.

Looking for more healthified birthday cake ideas? Consider this carrot cake from The Vintage Mixer—its sugar content caps off at a respectable quarter-cup. The rest of its sweetness comes from applesauce, carrots and a nutty-delish cashew-cream frosting.

This eensy-weensy, gluten-free cake, also from The Vintage Mixer, is made with almond flour, coconut flour and lots of juicy cherries. Plus, you can whip it up in advance, pop it in the freezer and take it out day-of to add icing. (Frozen cakes are easier to frost, and this tiny little guy will thaw in no time.)

It’s a tricky thing, finding birthday cake ideas for a one-year old: You want it to be Instagrammably cute, but not so cute that it breaks your heart when said cake is ham-fistedly destroyed. This easy-peasy ombre design, from This Silly Girl’s Kitchen, is the happy medium: just mix up three shades of frosting, swipe ’em on and voila.

Your babe will go bananas for this easy little smash cake from Sugary & Buttery. Its cream cheese frosting comes together in a blink, and she’ll be tickled to help out by throwing the sprinkles on top.

This itty-bitty cake gets a big dose of tropical flavor from crushed pineapples. And it’s just the right amount of sweet—aka not so addictively sugary that your kid won’t eat vegetables for a month. Thank you, Audra from the The Baker Chick!

Good news, paleo parents! There are more paleo-diet-friendly kid birthday cakes out there than you might think, and this one from Grazed + Enthused happens to be super-easy and free of dairy, nuts, grains and sweeteners too. So what does have? A chocolate-y avocado-carob frosting that even sugar fiends can get behind.

You can feel good about feeding your kid this chocolate cake from Chocolate & Carrots: It’s made with black beans, which are blender-whirred into fudgy perfection. Just be sure to use no-salt-added beans—they carry the cocoa flavor better.

This kids birthday cake’s pretty in pink, thanks to pureed strawberries and roasted beets. For extra berry fun, Aimee at Simple Bites celebrated her daughter’s one-year-old bash with a side of fresh strawberries soaked in a mix of cane sugar and vanilla.

Because you can’t have enough healthy chocolatey options when it comes to kids’ birthday cakes, here’s another: In this un-beetable dark chocolate confection from The Smart Cookie, you won’t taste the root veggies at all, just sweetness from dates and applesauce and oodles of rich, chocolaty goodness. The gooey, ganache-like frosting gets its silky consistency from—would ya believe it?—tofu.

Too many kids grow up adverse to coconut, a so-called “acquired taste.” Nip that in the bud and introduce your little one to coconutty excellence stat, via this naturally sweet dessert from Mother.

This spectacular spotted number from The Bakermama is slathered in marshmallow creme frosting and decked out with jumbo sprinkles. And the banana cake base is perfectly baby-friendly.

Obviously, one can’t go wrong with a funfetti batter. But the real magic of this cake from Preppy Kitchen is its exterior: proof positive that not all cute birthday cakes are labor intensive, and that a few well-placed sprinkles go a long way. Just press them onto the bottom of the cake with your fingers and you’ve got festive fabulousness.

This one’s more of a melt cake than a smash cake. Raspberry sorbet filling sweetens up creamy, tangy layers of Greek yogurt in this refreshing cake from Barbara at Buona Pappa. We think it’s one of the best birthday cake ideas for summer babies.

Scale up with this epic iced banana-date spice situation from Snixy Kitchen. To make the pillowy pattern, blob four dots of frosting in a straight line up the side of the cake. Then, use a spatula to flatten half of the dot. Repeat until the cake is fully fierce. Yay for birthday cake decorating ideas that are way easier than they look!

It’s a lean, green birthday-celebrating machine! This pretty dessert from Weelicious gets its preppy hue from five cups of protein-rich spinach. Ergo, it’s basically salad.

Looking for easy birthday cake ideas? Consider the naked cake, which always looks super-cute with little decorating fuss. Kristine’s Kitchen used whipped cream as a smart fluffier alternative to frosting. This delicate little confection is covered in clouds of the sweet stuff. Blend it with blueberries to get that gorgeous lilac tint.

Behold, a little monster for your little monster! To make these shaggy cuties from Joyfully Home, pipe on frosting “fur” through a star tip and add on fondant features. It’s a little more work than some of the other cake decorating ideas on this list, but look at the endgame. Totally worth it.

There are a slew of stunning kids’ birthday cakes out there, but this one from Wilton is a real showstopper. The “candy shards” are tinted white candy melts and the base is the result of a spectacular jumble of different sprinkles.

Double the dessert, double the fun. This cookie-studded marvel from Confessions of a Cookbook Queen is kid heaven, plain and simple. The outside’s obviously tres cute, but the best part is the filling: dreamy whipped cream mixed with crushed cookies.

It’s a bear necessity—kids’ birthday cakes that resemble their teddy. And yes, your hand may cramp up a bit from squeezing out each squiggle of icing for this cutie from Liv for Cake, but just look at that adorable little snout!

We’re positively dotty for this rainbow-licious cake. You can organize the Froot Loops in rings, like Liv for Cake did, or use them to make a poppy pattern on the top. Loopy for loops? Plunk ‘em all over the cake at random. Ta-da: polka dots.

Baby’s probably not noshing on tacos just yet, but it wouldn’t hurt to get him accustomed to the notion. One of the silliest birthday cake ideas we’ve seen, this concoction from Studio DIY! uses any cake you like, cut in half and flipped to its side. It’s frosted with buttercream tinted in taco-appropriate colors. And the beef? Crushed chocolate cake or Oreos.

If you’re searching for princess birthday cake ideas that aren’t too princess-y, look no further. To make this darling dessert, use a spatula to slightly ombre-ify the sides of the cake, as 100 Layer Cake did, then stack macarons neatly atop. (You can use extra icing to hold them together.)

Kids love applesauce, period. This cake-ified rendition, created by The Live-In Kitchen, is no exception. To get it perfectly petite, pour the batter into (very clean!) tuna cans and bake.

It’s dessert and toys, all in one—and less work for you! Instead of slicing off the top of this cake before frosting, you just leave it “rugged,” so it looks mountainous, as Jes at Whisk + Wander ingeniously suggests. Plunk on a few figurines channeling Bambi and co., and it’s woodland wonderful.

An ice-cream sundae without ice cream? Blasphemy—unless, of course, you’re referring to this tricked-out birthday cake from Dedra at Queenslee Appetit. It earns its maraschino cherry with four kinds of buttercream (!) and a heavenly ganache. Side perk: Baby will look really, really cute with this smeared all over her face.

This simple white cake from Christine W Photography uses real vanilla bean and is good for the smashin’. Stick a real flower on top—or on the side—for a shamelessly easy, yet gorgeous, pop of color. Don’t forget to wrap the flower stem with plastic wrap to keep it food-safe.

These days, adults love unicorns as much as kids do—so this fondant-horned mythical creature cake is a guaranteed crowd-pleaser. You don’t have to stack six rainbow-bright cake layers inside, as Marvelous Mommy did, but it does add quite a bit of magic.

Baking not your thing? Consider birthday cake ideas that are actually cheesecakes. Lindsay of Life, Love and Sugar whipped up this celebratory cake on a whim—with a divine blend of cream cheese and funfetti cake mix scooped into a crushed-Golden-Oreo crust. Sweet!

This teeny-tiny layer cake is deliciously moist and satisfying—a la banana bread—and subtly sweet, thanks to maple syrup and fruit. But the real standout is the frosting, concocted by The Faux Martha: With just three ingredients—cream cheese, maple syrup and butter—it’s make-in-your-sleep easy.

Here’s a little somethin’-somethin’ dreamt up by the folks at Whipped Bakeshop in Philadelphia. Your little one (and grown-up guests!) will ooh and aah over the glimmery burst of “amethyst” in this gem found among a slew of cool birthday cake ideas. It’s perfect for February babies!

This sly confection from Wilton, which takes a few days to concoct just right, is, admittedly, not the fastest kids’ birthday cakes to whip up. But it’s not difficult either; thanks to the fondant cut-out patterns (sold on the site), you’ll be piecing this together with the confidence of a professional pastry chef.

Whether it’s because of their bright red color or snappy little arms, cartoon crabs come up a lot in the baby toy and book universe. So, chances are, your munchkin will see a crab cake as a familiar friend. This one—another from Wilton—also makes smart use of fondant and fondant patterns.

Who says birthday cupcake ideas need to be pint-sized? Wilton went big with theirs to wondrous effect. Give it a whirl with a decorating tip for rosettes and another for stars.

Updated November 2017