The Best Gluten Free Bagels (Yes, They Exist)

Apart from the proliferation of indoor plumbing and disposable toilet paper (people used to poop in holes and wipe with rags on sticks!), it’s a bad time to be alive. That said, it’s a positively awesome time to be gluten free. The celiac-friendly offerings at the grocery store keep getting better—and our hunt for the best gluten free bagels is proof. 

Even in the past few years, since Sporked started taste testing gluten free groceries, the GF landscape has greatly improved. To be perfectly honest, I didn’t have high hopes that GF bagels could remotely resemble regular bagels. We’ve tried a lot of crummy gluten free bread, and bagels are, like, BIG BREAD. Bread squared or even cubed. Something like that. 

Anyway, I shopped for all the gluten free bagel brands I could find at grocery stores near us in a variety of styles and flavors, toasted them in our countertop oven, and tasted them dry to take flavor and texture into account without butter or cream cheese doing them any favors. I was pleasantly surprised.

Here are the best gluten free bagels (gluten free everything bagels, too).  

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Best Sweet GF Bagel

The Grain Escape Cinnamon Raisin

Sprouts

These gluten free bagels have such an excellent, glutenous chew. They contain plenty of raisins and that’s great because the raisins contribute a little bit of moisture (although the brand’s plain bagels are pretty moist, too, as you’ll see if you read on). The flavor is very mildly sweet and a little tart, with just enough warm cinnamon flavor to cover up any off-putting flavor from the alternative flours (these are made with a blend of modified tapioca starch, potato starch, and cassava flour, in case you were wondering). These are the best gluten free bagels if you like ‘em sweet.

Credit: Merc / Sprouts

Rating:

7.5/10

Sporks

Best Gluten Free Everything Bagels

Trader Joe’s Everything Gluten Free Bagels

Affiliate

I have spoken to GF people who don’t much care for Trader Joe’s gluten free bagels, but hear me out: Their gluten free everything bagels have GARLIC BITS IN THE MEAT OF THE BAGEL. The plain Trader Joe’s GF bagels are dry and crumbly, but the minced garlic in these keeps them moist, flavorful, and pleasantly chewy. Even if you’re not a fan of other Trader Joe’s GF bagels, you should give these a shot. 

Credit: Merc / Trader Joe’s

Rating:

7.5/10

Sporks

Best Plain Gluten Free Bagel

Grain Escape Plain Bagels

Instacart

These have a little bit of the weird GF flavor. It’s something I can’t quite put a finger on, but it makes them taste a little sweeter than bagels made with gluten. BUT the texture of Grain Escape’s plain GF bagels is really nice—chewy and glutinous. These are the best gluten free bagels to load up with a lot of toppings. With cream cheese and smoked salmon and capers and other savory stuff, you won’t notice the aftertaste, you’ll just enjoy the authentic bagel chew. 

Credit: Merc / Instacart

Rating:

8.5/10

Sporks

Best of the Best

O’Doughs Everything and Original Bagel Thins

Instacart

I buy bagel thins sometimes because I like the idea of consuming less bread and more cream cheese, and I truly would not be able to tell these apart from bagel thins made with wheat flour. The plain has a really nice toasty flavor with just a touch of that odd sweetness (O’Doughs uses a blend of potato starch, soya flour, tapioca starch, brown rice flour, and chickpea flour), but the everything has so much nice sesame and garlic flavor that you really don’t think about the flavor of the bagel itself. They’re chewy and toast nicely; I ate a few of these slathered with salted butter. I swear, all GF bread and bagels used to be so dry and crumbly, but they’ve really improved and figured out how to get that good glutinous chew without gluten. It’s impressive. I mean it when I say I would eat these GF bagels all the time. (Oh, and they’re vegan, too!)

Credit: Merc / Instacart

Rating:

10/10

Sporks

Other products we tried: Schar Gluten Free Plain Bagels, Schar Gluten Free Everything Bagels, Trader Joe’s Gluten Free Plain Bagels