We Found the Best Chocolate Cake to Buy at the Grocery Store

Think all grocery store chocolate cake is the same? You couldn’t be more wrong. My esteemed taste testing colleagues and I sat down to a feast of cocoa confections in search of the best chocolate cake from the grocery store, and we were treated to a wide array of cakes of all types (and qualities).

How we tasted the chocolate cakes

We didn’t just dive in, fork first. We cut slices out of the cakes in order to observe the cross-sections and taste every layer. 

What we looked for in the best chocolate cake

We wanted moist cake (yep, get ready to see that word a lot). And we wanted frosting that tasted like chocolate. It could be fudgey, it could be more of a classic buttercream, but it needed to taste like cocoa was involved. There are lots of styles of chocolate cake—chocolate mousse cake, German chocolate cake, chocolate sheet cake, etc.—and you’ll see them all represented in this list. We tried not to compare apples to oranges (or, I guess, German chocolate cakes to chocolate mousse cakes) and assess the cakes on their own merits. But they all needed to taste like chocolate. No flavorless cakes here. 

Grab the candles and a big ‘ol tub of vanilla ice cream. Here’s our ranking of the best chocolate cake to buy from the grocery store. (And if you want to make your own, here’s our ranking of the best boxed chocolate cake mix you can buy.)

Best grocery store chocolate cake, ranked

Best Cheap Sheet Cake

Trader Joe’s Dark Chocolate Ganache Mini Sheet Cake

Trader Joe’s

It’s not the best store bought chocolate cake, but Trader Joe’s mini chocolate sheet cake is there for you in a pinch (as long as you live near a Trader Joe’s). It’s cheap and ready to grab from the bakery section. It’s the best chocolate cake to snag when you need to celebrate a last minute office birthday or when you just want some chocolate cake for the heck of it. The cake itself is a bit like a cakey brownie—it’s not the moistest. However, that’s remedied by the thick topping of sweet, sweet chocolate frosting. If you only eat cake because you don’t feel like you can or should eat frosting straight from the can, snag a Trader Joe’s chocolate cake. It’s a great, socially acceptable way to eat a lot of frosting.

Credit: Merc / Trader Joe’s

Rating:

7/10

Sporks

Best Costco Dupe

Private Selection Four Layer Chocolate Cake

Instacart

This chocolate cake from Kroger might not be our number one best chocolate cake from a grocery store—but it’s a solid dupe for our number one, making it the best grocery store chocolate cake to snag if you don’t have a Costco membership but you want a cake like the one they sell. It’s totally huge, it’s perfectly moist, it’s super chocolaty, and it’s coated with a wonderfully fudgey frosting. Plus, this Kroger chocolate cake has something that the Costco cake doesn’t have: chocolate ribbons! Pretty!

Credit: Merc / Instacart

Rating:

7.5/10

Sporks

Best German Chocolate Cake

Private Selection German Chocolate

Kroger

Another Kroger pick, this is the best German chocolate cake to buy from a grocery store if that’s your style. Be warned, though, this cake is very, very sweet. The coconutty custard filling and topping dominate the flavor profile. But that’s what German chocolate cake is all about. This store bought cake is not for the faint of heart. It’s tall. It’s gooey. And, again, it’s sweet.

Credit: Merc / Kroger

Rating:

8/10

Sporks

Best Bundt Cake

Marketside Chocolate Fudge Cake

Walmart

Looking for a bundt cake but don’t want to visit Nothing Bundt Cakes because you’re morally against somewhat confusing food puns? Head to Walmart. The Marketside chocolate fudge cake is essentially a chocolate bundt cake drizzled with chocolate. My colleague Gwynedd Stuart said it tasted like an Entenmann’s doughnut in the best way and she is not wrong. This isn’t a birthday cake—not in the traditional sense, at least. It’s closer to a tea cake. It’s not heavily iced and the actual cake isn’t too sweet—it has a nice zip of salt that helps bring out the cocoa flavor. It’s the best supermarket chocolate cake to eat on a weekday. Or for breakfast.

Credit: Merc / Walmart

Rating:

8.5/10

Sporks

Best Chocolate Mousse Cake

Whole Foods Belgian Chocolate Mousse Cake

Whole Foods

If you ask me, this Whole Foods chocolate mousse cake is the best chocolate cake to buy at a grocery store. But Sporked is a democracy, and not everyone thought this would satisfy a true cake craving. So, it’ll have to be happy in the number two slot. I get it—it’s chocolate mousse cake, not classic cakey chocolate cake. But it’s so good. It’s a tall, creamy cylinder of deep, dark chocolate mousse with a nutty pie crust. It’s definitely the best store bought chocolate mousse cake—and you can get a mini version, too, if you’re just looking to treat yourself.

Credit: Merc / Whole Foods

Rating:

9.5/10

Sporks

Best of the Best

Kirkland Chocolate Cake Filled with Chocolate Mousse

Costco

My colleague Jordan Myrick has been outspoken about their love of this Costco chocolate cake for years. (They wrote a whole article about it.) And, having now tried it, I can see why. This is the platonic ideal of a grocery store chocolate cake. The cake is moist. The frosting is fudgey. The mousse layer is light and has some crystals of cocoa. It’s almost like a cupcake but big. And it’s cheap. According to Jordan, this cake alone is worth the cost of a Costco membership. If you’re looking for the best grocery store chocolate cake, look no further.

Credit: Merc / Costco

Rating:

10/10

Sporks

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