Types of Donuts by Name: A Complete Guide to Every Variety

Walk into a well-stocked donut shop and you’re confronted by a case of choices that, if you didn’t grow up with the vocabulary, can be quietly bewildering.

What separates an old-fashioned from a cake donut? Is a cruller the same as a French cruller? What exactly is a bismark, and is it the same as a bismarck? And why does the donut case in Honolulu look so different from the one in Milwaukee?

This guide names and explains every major donut type — American classics, regional specialities, and international varieties — organised so you can navigate any bakery counter in the world with confidence.

Visit our full crossword donut article.

The Two Foundations: Yeast vs. Cake

Every donut in existence — from the simplest glazed ring to the most elaborate filled brioche — descends from one of two fundamental categories. Understanding the distinction between them is the single most useful piece of donut knowledge you can carry.

Yeast Donuts (Raised Donuts)

Yeast donuts are made from a leavened dough in which active yeast ferments, producing carbon dioxide that causes the dough to rise before frying. The fermentation process — typically three or more hours from mixing to frying — develops flavour as well as structure, giving yeast donuts their signature mild tang, light crumb, and soft, slightly chewy interior.

After frying, yeast donuts have a thin, delicate crust that gives way immediately to a pillowy interior. They are best consumed warm and fresh — ideally within hours of frying — because their high moisture content means they stale quickly. Glazes and thin icings suit them best; their delicate structure is also what makes them ideal for filling with cream, custard, or jelly.

Yeast donuts account for the majority of donuts sold in American shops. Dunkin’s internal figures classify yeast donuts — their glazed rings, iced rings, filled shells, and “fancies” (coffee rolls, bismarks, bow ties) — as roughly 65 per cent of their total donut mix.

Cake Donuts

Cake donuts use chemical leavening — baking powder or baking soda — instead of yeast. Because there is no fermentation, they require no rise time, moving from mixing to frying in minutes. The resulting texture is denser, with a tighter crumb and a more substantial bite. Where a yeast donut gives, a cake donut resists slightly before yielding.

Cake donuts have a crisper exterior than yeast donuts, hold their structure better, and stale more slowly. Their sturdier body makes them well-suited to thick glazes, heavy frosting, and topping combinations (sprinkles, nuts, bacon) that would overwhelm a lighter yeast donut.

Flavouring cake donuts is also easier: vanilla, chocolate, blueberry, sour cream, cider, and spice variations all work cleanly in the batter.

The old-fashioned donut is the definitive cake donut. Everything else in the cake category elaborates on that foundation.

American Classic Donuts

Glazed Donut

The most popular donut in America, the glazed donut is a yeast-raised ring coated in a thin, semi-transparent sugar glaze that sets into a slightly crackly shell when cool but dissolves instantly on the tongue.

Krispy Kreme built a global business on this single variety — their “Hot Now” sign signals that fresh glazed donuts are coming off the line, warm enough that the glaze is still translucent and yielding.

The glaze is typically made from powdered sugar, water or milk, and a touch of vanilla. At its best, the balance between the slightly fermented dough and the clean sweetness of the glaze is one of the great simple pleasures in baking.

Old-Fashioned Donut

The old-fashioned is a cake donut distinguished by its irregular, craggy surface and pronounced ridged edge. It is made from a stiff batter that, when fried, cracks and splits at the edges — creating extra-crispy surfaces that absorb glaze unevenly, resulting in sweet-caramelised ridges alongside softer interior pockets.

The classic flavor profile of an old-fashioned is mild vanilla with a subtle nutmeg finish. A sour cream old-fashioned adds tanginess and moisture, producing a particularly tender crumb beneath the crisp exterior. Old-fashioned donuts are typically finished with a simple glaze rather than frosting or filling.

Cake Donut (Plain)

The plain cake donut is the baseline of the cake family: symmetrical, round (or ring-shaped), golden brown, and leavened with baking powder. It has a crisp outer edge, a tender interior, and takes well to a dusting of powdered sugar, a roll in cinnamon sugar, or a simple glaze. Unlike the old-fashioned, the plain cake donut has a smooth, even surface with no cracking.

Boston Cream Donut

The Boston cream donut is one of the most loved filled varieties in American baking. It is a yeast-raised shell — typically oval or round — filled with vanilla pastry cream (a thick, eggy custard) and finished with a dark chocolate glaze or ganache on top. It is inspired directly by Boston cream pie, the official state dessert of Massachusetts, and shares its flavour logic: vanilla custard meeting chocolate, with soft dough as the vehicle.

The pastry cream filling distinguishes a Boston cream from a standard jelly donut: where jelly donuts use fruit preserves, Boston creams use a cooked, milk-and-egg-based cream.

Jelly Donut (Jelly-Filled)

A round, yeast-raised shell injected post-frying with fruit preserves — typically strawberry, raspberry, or grape jelly — and dusted with powdered sugar. The injection method (using a baker’s syringe or pastry bag) allows the filling to occupy a cavity in the centre of the donut without exposing it to the frying oil.

Jelly donuts go by many names depending on geography: in parts of the American Upper Midwest, Alberta, and Saskatchewan (Canada), they are called “bismarcks” or “bismarks”. In Manitoba, they are “jam busters”. In Britain, they are simply “jam doughnuts”.

Long John (Bar Donut)

A long john is a rectangular or bar-shaped donut — the elongated counterpart to the round ring. It can be made from yeast or cake dough, though yeast versions are more common. The extended surface area means more room for topping: a chocolate-frosted long john filled with Bavarian cream is one of the most indulgent items in the donut case.

Long johns filled with custard and topped with maple glaze are a particular favourite in the upper Midwest and Canada.

Cruller

The cruller is one of the donut world’s most specific and contested varieties. In its traditional American form, a cruller is a twisted, ridged ring made from an egg-enriched dough — richer and chewier than a plain yeast ring, with a distinctive spiral shape. In the Dutch tradition from which the name derives (*krulle* = “curled”), crullers were twisted lengths of fried dough.

French cruller is a distinct sub-variety made from choux pastry dough — the same egg-and-butter dough used for profiteroles and éclairs. Piped into rings and fried, a French cruller is dramatically lighter and airier than a standard cruller, with a wet interior and a crunchy exterior. It is customarily glazed. A proper French cruller should resemble a golden-brown pinwheel.

The two should not be confused: an American cruller uses a standard enriched dough; a French cruller uses choux. The French cruller is more delicate and technically demanding.

Apple Fritter

An apple fritter is a drop-style donut made from a batter — usually cake-style — in which pieces of apple are mixed directly into the dough before frying. The result is irregular in shape, with apple pieces visible throughout and a craggy, caramelised surface. Most apple fritters are finished with a glaze or a dusting of powdered sugar.

Good apple fritters have textural contrast: soft, apple-studded interior against a crisp, sweet exterior. Cinnamon is almost always present in the batter. Fritters are typically larger than ring donuts and denser than filled varieties.

Bear Claw

The bear claw is a pastry that straddles the line between donut and Danish.

It is made from a sweet, enriched dough (sometimes laminated, like a croissant; sometimes a plain yeast dough) filled with almond paste, then shaped and scored along one edge to create the “toes” of the bear’s paw. The filling gives the interior a marzipan-like sweetness; the scored top creates a fanned presentation.

Bear claws are found in donut shops alongside the ring and filled varieties but occupy their own category: they are more substantial, more pastry-like, and more complex in flavour than a typical glazed donut.

Bismark / Bismarck

The bismark is a filled, round yeast donut — essentially a jelly donut — named after the 19th-century German chancellor Otto von Bismarck, through the regional “Berliner” tradition.

In the American Midwest, bismark and jelly donut are used interchangeably. Some bismarks are filled with custard rather than jelly; others carry a chocolate or maple glaze on top alongside their powdered sugar coating.

Honey Bun

A honey bun is made from a honey-and-cinnamon yeast dough that is rolled, formed into a swirled shape (similar to a cinnamon roll), and then fried rather than baked.

After frying, honey buns are finished with a sweet glaze or icing. The result is somewhere between a donut and a sweet roll: structured, layered, and significantly more substantial than a ring donut.

Honey buns became particularly associated with American convenience store and vending machine culture in the latter half of the 20th century.

Tiger Tail

A tiger tail is made from two strips of dough — one chocolate, one plain (vanilla) — twisted together before frying, then glazed with honey. The twisting creates a visual striped effect (hence the name) and a dual-flavour eating experience. Tiger tails are a specialty of certain American and Canadian donut shops and are less commonly found in large chains.

Donut Holes (Munchkins / Timbits)

Donut holes are bite-sized, roughly spherical fried pieces of dough — traditionally (and mythologically) made from the dough punched out of the centre of a ring donut. In practice, most donut holes today are made from their own dedicated batch of dough, but the origin story persists and gives them their name.

Dunkin’ Donuts calls their donut holes “Munchkins”; Tim Hortons calls theirs “Timbits”. Both are proprietary brand names for the same concept. Most donut holes are cake-style, coated in cinnamon sugar, powdered sugar, or glaze.

Cruller Hole / Drop Donut

Where donut holes are made from punched-out ring dough, drop donuts are made by dropping a spoonful of loose batter directly into hot oil.

The result is an irregular, roughly spherical fried dough with a crunchy exterior and a dense, doughy interior. Drop donuts can be made from either yeast or cake batter, and are the basis for many international varieties (oliebollen, African donuts, beignets).

American Regional Specialities

Apple Cider Donut

A New England and Mid-Atlantic specialty — particularly associated with autumn apple orchards — the apple cider donut is a cake donut in which a portion of the liquid is replaced with reduced apple cider.

The reduction concentrates the apple flavour without adding significant moisture. Cider donuts are typically rolled in cinnamon sugar immediately after frying and are eaten warm.

They are sold at farm stands, cider mills, and seasonal markets throughout the Northeast from September through November.

Sour Cream Donut

A cake donut in which sour cream replaces some or all of the milk in the batter. The acidity of the sour cream reacts with the chemical leavening to create a particularly tender crumb, while adding a faint tang that prevents the donut from being cloyingly sweet.

Sour cream donuts are typically old-fashioned in shape — craggy and ridged — and glazed simply.

Fastnacht (Fasnacht)

A fastnacht is a heavy, yeast-raised potato doughnut traditional to Pennsylvania Dutch (Pennsylvania German) communities. The name comes from the German *Fastnacht*, meaning “the night before the fast” — referring to Shrove Tuesday (Fat Tuesday), the day before Lent begins.

Fastnachts are typically square or triangular in shape and are served dusted with powdered sugar or dipped in molasses. In Pennsylvania Dutch country, Fat Tuesday is so associated with fastnachts that it is informally called Fastnacht Day.

Malasada (Hawaii)

Malasadas are Portuguese yeast donuts that were brought to Hawaii by early immigrant workers from Madeira and the Azores in the 19th century.

They are round, hole-less, made from a particularly eggy and rich dough, and fried until deeply golden.

In Portugal, malasadas are traditionally eaten on Fat Tuesday; in Hawaii, they are a year-round institution. Leonard’s Bakery in Honolulu, opened in 1952, is credited with popularising malasadas among non-Portuguese Hawaiians, and the shop remains a landmark. Hawaiian malasadas are often filled with haupia (coconut pudding), guava, or lilikoi (passion fruit).

Paczki (Polish-American)

Pączki (pronounced PONCH-kee; singular *pączek*) are Polish jelly donuts of extraordinary richness — made with a dough that includes grain alcohol (to prevent oil absorption during frying), extra egg yolks, and often a touch of rum or rose water.

The result is a light, spongy interior surrounded by a thin crust, filled generously with prune, rose, or fruit preserve, and topped with candied orange peel and powdered sugar.

Pączki are eaten on Fat Thursday (Tłusty Czwartek), the Thursday before Ash Wednesday in the Polish Catholic tradition.

In American cities with large Polish communities — Chicago, Milwaukee, Detroit — Fat Thursday is observed with great enthusiasm, with bakeries selling thousands of pączki in a single day.

Buttermilk Drop Donut (New Orleans)

A New Orleans specialty and culinary relative of the African donut, the buttermilk drop donut is a drop-style cake donut made with buttermilk batter.

It is less well-known than the beignet but locally beloved, with a crisp exterior and a dense, tangy interior. They are often served dusted with powdered sugar.

Modern and Specialty American Donuts

Cronut

The cronut — a portmanteau of *croissant* and *donut* — was invented by French-American pastry chef Dominique Ansel at his New York City bakery in May 2013.

It is made from laminated dough (layered with butter in the manner of croissant pastry), fried rather than baked, filled with cream, and finished with glaze and sugar. The result has flaky, laminated layers combined with the exterior characteristics of a fried pastry.

The cronut became a cultural phenomenon almost immediately after its debut, with queues forming outside Ansel’s bakery before dawn and a black market of resellers emerging within weeks.

Dominique Ansel trademarked the name “Cronut”; other bakeries produce similar items under different names (dossants, crognuts, and so on).

Mochi Donut (Pon de Ring)

Mochi donuts are made using glutinous rice flour (*mochiko*) rather than wheat flour, giving them a distinctive springy, chewy texture quite unlike any traditional donut.

They typically contain roughly half the calories of a standard cake or yeast donut. The Pon de Ring, developed by the Japanese donut chain Mister Donut, is the most iconic mochi donut format: instead of a solid ring, it is composed of eight small balls of dough connected in a ring, creating a pop-it-toy appearance.

Mochi donuts have become a significant trend in American artisan donut shops, valued for their unique texture and their compatibility with bold flavoured glazes (ube, matcha, black sesame).

Brioche Donut

A brioche donut is made from French brioche dough — enriched with a substantial quantity of butter and eggs — which produces a donut that is extremely tender, pillowy, and rich. Brioche donuts have a melt-in-the-mouth quality that regular yeast donuts do not, and they are particularly well-suited to generous cream fillings. They are the standard format of many high-end and artisan donut shops that have emerged since the 2010s.

Sourdough Donut

Leavened with a fermented sourdough starter rather than commercial yeast, sourdough donuts have a more complex, tangy flavour profile than standard yeast donuts.

The long fermentation required for sourdough develops organic acids that give the dough its characteristic tang and create a fine, delicate crumb. They are typically finished simply — with cinnamon sugar or a light glaze — to let the dough’s flavour speak clearly.

Maple Bacon Donut

A contemporary American specialty that balances sweet and savoury: a yeast or cake donut finished with maple-flavoured glaze and topped with crispy bacon pieces.

The combination of cured pork fat, sweet maple, and fried dough became a signature of artisan donut culture in the late 2000s and 2010s, popularised by shops like Voodoo Doughnut in Portland, Oregon.

International Donut Varieties

Beignet (France / Louisiana)

Beignets are square pillows of fried yeast dough, dusted thickly with powdered sugar. The word comes from the French for “fritter.”

While beignets exist throughout French culinary tradition, in America they are inseparably associated with New Orleans, where they have been a Creole institution since the city’s French colonial period.

Café Du Monde, opened in 1862, has been serving beignets continuously (with wartime interruptions) and remains the city’s most famous beignet address.

Berliner (Germany)

The Berliner — or Berliner Pfannkuchen, meaning “Berlin frying pan” — is Germany’s primary fried pastry: a round, filled yeast donut dusted with powdered sugar or coated in icing. It is filled with jam, custard, or advocaat (egg liqueur).

Berliners are eaten throughout Germany and across Central Europe; in Austria they are called *Krapfen*; in France, *boule de Berlin*; in Portugal, *bola de Berlim*. Confusingly, in Berlin itself, residents call them *Pfannkuchen* (pancakes), reserving “Berliner” for the rest of Germany.

The first documented recipe for a filled fried dough pastry in this tradition appeared in the 1485 German cookbook Kuchenmeisterei — one of the earliest printed cookbooks — under the name Gefüllte Krapfen (“filled pastries”).

Pączki (Poland)

See above under American regional specialities. In Poland, pączki are a national institution: on Fat Thursday, Poles are estimated to consume approximately 100 million pączki in a single day. The record for the largest pączki is regularly contested by Polish bakeries.

Sufganiyah (Israel)

Sufganiyot (singular: sufganiyah) are Israel’s Hanukkah donut — a round, jelly-filled yeast donut topped with powdered sugar, eaten during the eight-day festival to commemorate the miracle of the Temple oil.

The name derives from the Talmudic words *sofgan* and *sfogga*, referring to a “spongy dough.” The tradition was brought to Israel by Polish Jewish immigrants who called the pastry *ponchik* (derived from the Polish *pączek*), and the Histadrut (Israel’s labour federation) actively promoted sufganiyot over homemade latkes in the 1920s as a way of creating bakery employment.

Modern sufganiyot in Israel extend well beyond the traditional red jelly filling, with gourmet varieties filled with dulce de leche, chocolate cream, cappuccino cream, halva, and crème brûlée.

Zeppole (Italy)

Italian zeppole (singular: zeppola) are fried dough balls from the southern Italian tradition — particularly Calabria and Campania. They are made from a soft yeast dough, fried until golden, and typically filled or topped with pastry cream, ricotta, jam, or custard, then dusted with powdered sugar.

They are especially associated with the Feast of Saint Joseph (19 March), where they are known as *zeppole di San Giuseppe*.

Italian donut vocabulary is remarkably regional: the same concept might be called bomboloni in Tuscany, ciambelle (ring donuts) across the country, krapfen in the Alpine north, fritelle in Veneto, or maritozzi in Rome.

Bomboloni (Italy / Tuscany)

Bomboloni (singular: bombolone) are Tuscan filled donuts — round, yeast-raised balls fried and filled with pastry cream, chocolate, or fruit preserves. They are typically eaten warm, dusted with granulated sugar rather than powdered sugar.

Bomboloni have become popular well beyond Tuscany and appear in Italian bakeries globally.

Oliebollen (Netherlands)

Oliebollen — literally “oil balls” — are Dutch drop donuts eaten primarily during New Year’s Eve celebrations.

A loose batter is loaded with currants, raisins, and apple pieces, then dropped by the spoonful into hot oil and fried to a deep golden brown. They are served immediately, dusted with powdered sugar.

Oliebollen are the direct culinary ancestor of American donuts, via the Dutch settlers who brought oliekoek recipes to New Amsterdam.

Churro (Spain / Latin America)

The churro is a fried choux pastry dough piped through a star-shaped nozzle to create a ridged cylinder, then fried and rolled in cinnamon sugar. Churros are often served alongside thick drinking chocolate for dipping. While not technically a donut in the ring or ball sense, churros are universally listed alongside donuts as fried sweet doughs and share their basic logic of fried dough and sugar.

In Latin America, churros are frequently filled — with dulce de leche, chocolate, or cajeta — giving them a closer kinship to filled donuts.

Malasada (Portugal)

Portugal’s malasada (or malassada* is the source of the Hawaiian version: a round, hole-less yeast donut made from an egg-enriched dough, fried and coated in sugar. They are traditionally eaten on Shrove Tuesday in Madeira and the Azores. The name is thought to derive from the Portuguese mal assada — “badly cooked” or “undercooked” — a self-deprecating reference to the soft, eggy interior.

Sfenj (Morocco / Maghreb)

Sfenj is a North African donut — an irregular, ring-shaped fried dough with no filling, eaten sprinkled with sugar or dipped in honey.

It is a Maghrebi staple, sold by street vendors in Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia. The word shares a root with the Hebrew sufganiyah and the Arabic sfanj, all tracing back to a term for spongy dough. Sfenj is typically made without eggs or dairy, making it leaner and chewier than European filled donuts.

Pampushky (Ukraine)

Pampushky are Ukrainian round buns made from wheat (or sometimes rye or buckwheat) yeast dough, traditionally baked but sometimes fried. The sweet version is filled with jam or rose petal preserve; the savoury version — often served alongside Ukrainian borscht — is brushed with garlic oil. The frying of sweet pampushky places them firmly in donut territory.

Ponchiki / Pyshki (Russia)

Russian ponchiki (пончики) are round, fried yeast donuts — similar to the Polish pączki in form but typically less rich. They are a common breakfast pastry across Russia and the former Soviet states.

In St. Petersburg specifically, the same pastry is called pyshki (пышки), and the city’s Pyshechnaya bakery, which has been operating in the same location since 1958, is considered an institution.

Smultring (Norway)

Smultring — from the Norwegian for “lard ring” — is a ring donut traditional in Norway, made from a dough enriched with sour cream or buttermilk and fried in fat.

Smultringer have a distinctive ridged surface (from a special cutter) and a slightly dense, cake-like texture.

Pon de Ring (Japan)

Japan’s most iconic donut format, the Pon de Ring was developed by Mister Donut and first introduced in 2003.

Made from mochi dough (glutinous rice flour) shaped into eight balls connected in a ring, it has a unique Q-texture — the Japanese term for a pleasantly springy, chewy bite. The Pon de Ring comes in numerous seasonal and limited-edition flavours.

Youtiao (China)

Youtiao (油條; literally “oil strips”) are Chinese fried dough sticks — long, paired, savoury twists of unleavened dough, deep-fried until golden and eaten for breakfast alongside soy milk, rice porridge, or congee. While savoury rather than sweet, youtiao are fundamentally fried dough and appear in the donut family as the Chinese contribution.

They have spread through Southeast Asian cuisines: pa thong ko in Thailand, cakwe in Indonesia, e kya kway in Myanmar.

Koeksister (South Africa)

A koeksister is a South African fried dough pastry — braided or twisted and then soaked in cold sugar syrup after frying, creating an intensely sweet, sticky, syrup-saturated exterior with a soft interior.

The Cape Malay version (*koesister*) is a different item: a spiced, coconut-coated dough ball. The Afrikaans koeksister gets its distinctive syrup coating by submerging the hot pastry in ice-cold syrup immediately after frying, causing the syrup to be drawn in as the steam condenses.

Item	Description	Key Difference
Afrikaans koeksister	A plaited fried pastry soaked in cold sugar syrup immediately after frying.	Very sweet, sticky, syrup-saturated outside with a soft interior.
Cape Malay koesister	A spiced dough ball that is usually coated with coconut.	Not plaited and not syrup-soaked in the same way as the Afrikaans koeksister.
Syrup method	The hot Afrikaans koeksister is submerged in ice-cold syrup straight after frying.	The temperature difference helps draw syrup into the pastry as steam condenses.

How to Read a Donut Case

Armed with this guide, approaching any donut case becomes a more confident experience.

The key questions to ask yourself:

• Is it a ring or filled? Rings are the foundation; filled varieties are built on top of that.
• Yeast or cake? Yeast donuts are lighter, softer, and best eaten fresh. Cake donuts are denser, sturdier, and last longer.
• What’s the finishing? Glaze, icing, powdered sugar, cinnamon sugar, or no coating — each changes the experience significantly.
• Is there a regional story? Many of the best donuts in America are regional specialties — the pączki in Chicago, the malasada in Honolulu, the fastnacht in Lancaster County — and understanding their background deepens the pleasure of eating them.