Homemade Buffalo Wings have a secret ingredient that makes them super crisp and irresistible. The easy buffalo sauce is just 3 ingredients and makes these taste like a restaurant-quality appetizer.
If you loved our Air Fryer Chicken Wings, you’ll love these Oven-Baked Buffalo Chicken Wings. You can bake a bigger batch all at once which is great for feeding a crowd. Think Super Bowl appetizer.
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Baked Buffalo Chicken Wings
The beauty of baked buffalo chicken wings is that you can get the same, crispy texture without the need for splattering hot fryer oil. Using our handy baking powder trick and a wire rack, they get a wonderful crust with a fraction of the fat of deep-fried versions. Tossing the crispy wings together with a buttery, tangy buffalo sauce is irresistibly good.
Ingredients for the Crispiest Buffalo Chicken Wings
- Chicken wings – Use fresh or thawed frozen wings that are broken down into drumettes and wingettes
- Baking powder – The secret ingredient for getting your chicken wings ultra-crispy without the need for deep frying
- Salt – we use fine sea salt in nearly all of our cooking
- Garlic powder – adds a bit of zest to your wings before tossing them in the buffalo sauce
- Unsalted butter – adds a nice creaminess to the buffalo sauce
- Frank’s Original Red Hot Sauce – This is the perfect base for your wing sauce. It’s tangy, a little sweet, and has just the right amount of spiciness.
- Sugar – helps the sauce caramelize and thicken on your piping hot wings.
How to Make Crispy Buffalo Wings
- Prep Chicken Wings – cut wings in half to separate the drums from the wingettes. Pat the wings dry with a paper towel. Preheat the oven and line a rimmed baking sheet with foil and place a wire rack over the pan.
- Make dry seasoning – Combine baking powder, salt, and garlic powder.
- Season the wings – Place the chicken wings in a large mixing bowl and toss them in the dry seasoning until well-coated. Assemble the wings in a single layer over the rack.
- Bake in the center of the oven for 50 minutes, flipping halfway.
- Make the Buffalo Sauce – In a medium bowl, stir together melted butter, sugar, and hot sauce.
- Toss Wings in Sauce – Transfer chicken wings to a bowl, and toss, drizzle with sauce and toss to coat. Serve with your favorite sauce.
Tips for the Best Buffalo Wings
- Remove moisture – pat dry with paper towels to remove as much moisture as you can to ensure they turn out crispy.
- Use baking powder – The baking powder creates such an incredible crust on the wings. It’s a must!
- Bake on a rack – A wire rack allows the wings to circulate and makes them crispy all around.
How to Serve
- Restaurant Style – We love to serve buffalo wings as they do at Chilis restaurant alongside some chunky blue cheese dip and celery sticks.
- Avocado Ranch – this dressing is also an amazing dip for buffalo chicken.
- Jalapeno Ranch – if you want a spicy kick to your sauce as well, adding jalapeno adds just the right amount of heat.
- Add fries – you can turn this into lunch by serving with crispy Air Fryer French Fries.
Common Questions
The temperature and timing should be adequate, but you can always use a thermometer to check the internal temperature of the chicken (at least 165˚F and tastier if 175˚F).
You can, but be sure to thaw completely before baking, or they won’t crisp up properly.
Add in a teaspoon of cayenne pepper or black pepper to the dry seasoning for a spicier wing.
You can cook the wings following the time and temperature for our Air Fryer Chicken Wings then toss with buffalo sauce to finish. You will need to cook in 3 batches or cut the recipe down to 1 lb of chicken wings.
More Easy Chicken Recipes
Chicken is so versatile, from chicken wings to drumsticks, thighs, and chicken breast. My favorite thing to do is Cut a Whole Chicken, freeze the various cuts and then use the bones for the Best Chicken Stock.
If you love chicken as much as we do, you’re sure to find some new favorites in this list of our favorite chicken recipes:
- Baked Chicken Legs
- Chicken Tortilla Soup
- Stuffed Chicken Breast
- Air Fryer Buffalo Wings
- Popeyes Chicken Sandwich
Crispy Buffalo Wings Recipe
Ingredients
- 3 lb chicken wings, wings and drummettes split, wingtips removed
- 1 Tbsp baking powder, (use aluminum free)
- 1 tsp fine sea salt
- 2 tsp garlic powder
Buffalo Sauce
- 1/4 cup unsalted butter, melted
- 1/4 cup Franks Original Red Hot Sauce
- 1 tbsp granulated sugar, or brown sugar
Instructions
- Thoroughly pat dry the chicken with a paper towel. Preheat the oven to 450˚F. Line a rimmed baking sheet with foil and place a wire rack over the pan.
- Combine the baking powder, salt and garlic powder in a bowl, sprinkle over the chicken and toss to combine. Arrange chicken on the prepared wire rack.
- Bake the chicken for 25 minutes, flip it over and bake for another 25 minutes or until crisp and cooked through.
- In a medium-size bowl combine sauce ingredients. Remove chicken from the baking sheet to a bowl. Drizzle the sauce over the chicken. Toss to coat the chicken in the sauce. Serve with your favorite dipping sauce.
Nutrition Per Serving
Filed Under
Hi! I’m Natasha Kravchuk, a New York Times bestselling cookbook author, recipe developer, food photographer, and writer. Here you’ll find delicious, reliable recipes made with simple ingredients, plus easy step-by-step photos and videos to help you cook confidently at home. 
Would it be okay to leave the sugar out from the sauce. Seems the sugar would take away the hotness.
Hi Janet! You can try it but the sugar helps the sauce caramelize and thicken.
Made these tonight and a HIT! Will do again. Easy peasy recipe and tasty. Thank you Natasha.
Yay, that’s awesome feedback! Thanks a lot for sharing.
Amazing Buffalo Wings! FIVE STAR all the way……. Change nothing and enjoy!
I’m so glad you loved the recipe. Thank you for the review!
These are the very best wings I’ve ever eaten and I’ve eaten my share of wings. Thank you, Natasha, for sharing this excellent recipe. I know wings aren’t the healthiest food but your recipe has made these a family favorite.
You’re very welcome! So glad they were a hit!
Natasha, your recipes are always a winner! This one is no exception! I followed the recipe exactly as written and these were the best wings I’ve had in my adult life! I grew up in Buffalo, so this is a huge compliment. I used very spicy hot sauce, so I toned it down a bit with more butter ans brown sugar. The wings were so crispy and delicious! It was a huge hit with the family! I can’t wait to make these again!
I’m so glad it was a hit, Janelle! Thank you for the feedback!
I’m not sure if I did anything wrong. I followed the recipe exactly. But it took much longer to get the skin crispy. And also the sauce was somewhat thinner and runnier than what I was expecting it was hard to get a good coating. Any suggestions?
Hi Robert. Be sure to pat the wings dry with a paper towel to remove any extra moisture prior to tossing them through the baking powder and seasoning. Every oven bakes differently, so you may need to add or subtract based on that. I highly recommend using an internal oven thermometer. Let you oven fully preheat before baking and don’t overcrowd the pan, allow enough room for air to circulate between the wings. I hope that helps.
OK I will try that thank you very much! I have already experimented with letting them cook longer etc. and by the third time I wasn’t really measuring just mixing the ingredients by eye!
These are the best! My son is a chicken wing connoisseur and loves these! We love doing pizzas at home in the Ooni and these wings are a perfect addition to at home pizza night. Incredibly easy too. Love all of your recipes!
That’s so great! It sounds like you have a new family favorite, Jill! Thank you for your wonderful review!
The wings were delicious! I never made wings before as I never wanted to deep fry anything. The baking method and sauce is a keeper. Love trying new recipes even for a 70 year old like me. Your web site never fails me. Thanks.
I’m so glad you enjoyed these wings, Lynn! Thank you for your wonderful review!
BEST. WINGS. EVER. I’d always heard about the Baking powder idea, but never tried it, and loved baking, not frying. Used extra garlic because we love it, and 1/4c Frank’s and 1/4c Cholula (that’s all I had) and threw some Newman’s Own Italian in. Not necessary, so I won’t next time. Thank you, Natalya!
That’s so great! It sounds like you have a new favorite, Lea!
This was amazing. Thank you so much. Am an old time cook and learning new things like chicken wings.
Will keep this—just as it is.
That’s wonderful, Bernadine! You’re welcome. Thank you for trying my recipe.
I always have issues eating buffalo wings because they’re SO spicy. I made this recipe and added a little extra honey to the sauce and……OMG! They were the best buffalo wings I’ve ever tasted! Thank you so much for this one
That’s wonderful, Andrea. Thank you for sharing.
First time making wings and these got an A+ from my family. So good. Thank you again Natasha for a really good recipe that is added to our rotation!
So glad to hear that, Chrissy! You’re very welcome. 🙂
My first time making these and my family gave them an A+. So good!! They had just the right crisp and the sauce was delicious. Another great recipe Natasha; thank you. These will be on our rotation now.
Love it! Thanks so much for the awesome review and feedback.
I was really excited to make this but it came out nearly inedible. I’m sure it was my inexperience but my hubby asked me to never make again. We both agreed that we get the baking powder idea but it left a bad taste like uncooked flour in gravy. I try to find positives but the best my hubby could say was that I served celery sticks. I must have done it wrong.
Hi Heather! I’m really sorry to hear that. I am not sure what happened. I have never had that experience. I only used 1 tbsp of baking powder (aluminum free to avoid an unpleasant taste) for 3lbs of chicken so it really doesn’t impact the flavor that much. I like to pat my chicken dry though, the extra moisture could make it “cake” on thicker in certain spots. You could also try replacing the baking powder with corn starch, many of my readers have done this. If you try this recipe again, I hope you have better results.
Had the same experience.. My husband hated it. Disappointing since I made them for our Football Game. The recipe called for 2 Tablespoon of Baking Power.. maybe that was the issue, but it really needed more spices and I had to cook longer to brown. Would not use this recipe again.
Best wings I ever made…I did use Franks Hot Sauce…I believe it was made for buffolo wings and it’s the best!
That’s great, Bob! So glad you enjoyed this recipe.
Thank you so much for a fantastic recipe. I’m horrible at fried chicken, but his oven fried chicken is awesome. I will not use oil fried chicken ever again. The buffalo wings were restaurant quality. The only change I made is in my seasoning. I love well seasoned marinated chicken. So I did that.
That’s okay and good to know that the result was great!
I did not like the baking powder on the chicken (left a weird feeling on my teeth). I found just baste in butter while cooking and that makes them really crunchy.
Can’t wait to try! Have you tried Frank’s Buffalo Wing Sauce with this recipe?
I have not, just their Original Hot Sauce. If you test it out, let us know how you like it! 🙂
Hi Natasha,
I made these last night and they were the best oven baked wings I have ever made. Baking powder and a rack – awesome.
So glad you enjoyed them, Chris. Thank you for the review.
Instead of chicken wings , thought I would try chicken tenders. What temperature and how long do you think it would take to cook
Thank you
I have not made this with chicken tenders to advise.