This American Chocolate Buttercream Frosting is silky, whipped, decadent, and chocolatey with just the right amount of sweetness. It has 6 simple ingredients and takes just 6 minutes to make.
This Chocolate Buttercream spreads and pipes beautifully over chocolate cakes and cupcakes so it’s perfect for all of your baking projects.
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We love homemade frosting recipes from Vanilla Buttercream to Cream Cheese Frosting and of course, this easy Chocolate Buttercream Frosting. In fact, we loved it so much that I even used it on my daughter’s Chocolate Birthday Cake in Natasha’s Kitchen Cookbook. Homemade frostings use higher-quality ingredients and taste way better than store-bought.
Chocolate Frosting Video Tutorial
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Chocolate Buttercream Recipe
This chocolate buttercream frosting is thick and fluffy. It holds its shape well, just like Swiss Meringue Buttercream so it’s great for decorating and piping. It also has a rich chocolate flavor.
How much frosting does this make?
Frosting Cupcakes? This recipe yields about 2 1/4 cups frosting and generously frosts 12 cupcakes or lightly frosts 24 cupcakes.
Frosting a Cakes? To frost a 9” 2-layer cake, increase the recipe by 50% (i.e. 1 1/2 cups butter, 4 1/2 cups sugar, etc).
The Key to Great Chocolate Buttercream
Soften Butter Correctly – For the best-textured buttercream, make sure the butter is at the correct temperature. Properly softened butter should be left at room temperature for about 1 1/2 hours, or watch our video on how to soften butter in 5 minutes.
Your butter should feel cool to the touch and you should be able to indent it with your fingertip. Never melt or over-soften butter for the frosting or it will become too thin and greasy.
Scrape down the bowl several times while mixing to ensure your chocolate and sugar are incorporated with the butter. If you don’t scrape down the bowl, your frosting will have streaks of cocoa and won’t be uniform in color. It will be especially obvious if you pipe the frosting.
Ingredients for Chocolate Buttercream Frosting
- Unsalted butter – should be softened at room temperature. Use unsalted so you can control the salt in the recipe.
- Confectioners sugar – also known as powdered sugar. This is measured before sifting (sifting is not necessary).
- Cocoa powder – natural unsweetened cocoa powder or Dutch process.
- Heavy whipping cream – lightens up and thins the frosting.
- Vanilla extract – we use real vanilla extract for the best flavor.
- Salt – balances the sweetness of the buttercream. It’s the secret ingredient in buttercream that makes it taste not too sweet. We use fine sea salt.
How to Make Chocolate Buttercream
The best Chocolate Buttercream is easier and takes less time than you think!
- Beat butter in a mixing bowl with the whisk attachment on high speed for 3 minutes until creamy and lightened in color.
- Add remaining ingredients – powdered sugar, cocoa powder, heavy cream, vanilla extract, and salt.
- Beat together on low speed until powdered sugar is incorporated then on medium/high speed for another 3 minutes, scraping down the bowl several times. Add more cream at the end if needed to thin the frosting.
Pro Tip:
Use a silicone spatula to scrape down the bowl several times while mixing to ensure the frosting is evenly blended and even in color and texture.
Frequently Asked Questions
You can use unsweetened natural cocoa powder such as Hershey’s brand, or use Dutch process cocoa powder to make chocolate buttercream.
You can thin the frosting with milk instead of heavy cream, but you may need slightly less. Add it until you reach your desired texture.
You can easily double the recipe, increasing your mixing times slightly.
Funny story, I spent years sifting the dry ingredients for this recipe until I decided to skip the step one day and found it did not make a difference. The ingredients will be incorporated easily without sifting.
How to Serve Chocolate Buttercream
This frosting is delicious over cakes, cupcakes, sweet bread, cookies you name it! Here are some of our favorite ways to use Chocolate Buttercream frosting:
- Chocolate Cupcakes
- Sugar Cookies
- Vanilla Cupcakes
- Honey Cupcakes
- Greek Yogurt Cupcakes
- Chocolate Cake or Vanilla Cake – scale it up by 50% for a 2-layer cake.
Enjoy this easy 6-minute Chocolate Buttercream Frosting. It’s one I’ve been making for years and I will never stop loving this recipe.
Make-Ahead
- To Refrigerate: Store in an airtight container or ziploc bag for up to a week (do not store near fish or meat as it may absorb those fridge odors). Bring to room temperature and re-whip to make the frosting fluffy.
- Freezing: Package the same way as for refrigerating, then freeze for up to 3 months. Thaw in the refrigerator overnight then bring to room temperature before re-whipping to a fluffy consistency.
More Homemade Frosting Recipes
If you love to bake, here are the frosting recipes that you should have in your recipe box. They are my go-to’s for cakes and cupcakes:
- Vanilla Cupcake Frosting
- Chocolate Cream Cheese Frosting
- Chocolate Ganache
- Cinnamon Roll Icing
- Blackberry Frosting
- White Chocolate Frosting
- Homemade Whipped Cream
Chocolate Buttercream Frosting (6-Minute Recipe)
Ingredients
- 1 cup unsalted butter, softened
- 3 cups confectioners sugar
- 1/2 cup unsweetened natural cocoa powder
- 3 to 4 Tbsp heavy whipping cream, plus more to thin the frosting
- 2 tsp pure vanilla extract
- 1/4 tsp salt
Instructions
- With a handheld mixer or stand mixer fitted with a whisk attachment, beat butter on high speed for about 3 minutes or until creamy and lightened in color, scraping down the bowl as needed.
- Add confectioners sugar, cocoa powder, 3 Tbsp heavy cream, 2 tsp vanilla extract, and 1/4 tsp salt.
- Beat on low speed until sugar is incorporated then increase to medium/high speed and beat for 3 minutes, scraping down the bowl several times to ensure everything is well blended. Add another Tablespoon of heavy cream if needed to thin the frosting.
Nutrition Per Serving
Filed Under
Wonderful recipe! It is now my go to chocolate buttercream! Thank you for sharing!
I’m happy to know that, Elle. Thank you for sharing!
I tried making the chocolate butter cream frosting. It didn’t look nice & rich dark brown frosting. It was light brown in color. Not very inviting. Taste was good but look was off.
Hi Michele, did you use a different kind of cocoa powder? That could make a difference if your color was different than what is shown in the photos.
I’ve been looking for a good chocolate frosting that isn’t super sweet: and this turned out wonderfully! I put them on vanilla cupcakes. Yum!
I’m glad you found and loved this recipe, Jana!
Made this for my granddaughters 1st birthday cake & she absolutely loved it!!! Great taste with great texture!!
Aww, that’s the best! Thank you so much for sharing that with me, Jessica!
I just make 3 batches of this Chocolate Buttercream for 42 jumbo chocolate cupcakes, the frosting was AWESOME! It tasted great and was so creamy so it covered them nicely! Thank you for sharing!
Thank you for the review, Dianna! Great to hear that you loved it!
Thank you Natasha for the recipe! Did this frosting for my son’s birthday and it was really tasty plus the cake looked gorgeous.
You’re welcome, Genevieve. Happy to hear that it was a success!
I made this for my homemade yellow cake, and it was delicious! This chocolate buttercream recipe is exactly what is stated; it only takes approximately 6 minutes, and very light without the heaviness (smile). Thank you for sharing such a delicious frosting, and I’ll be making this for now on. It’s a winner! (smile).
Fantastic feedback! Thank you for sharing your experience with this recipe, Keri. So glad you enjoyed it!
This looks like a great recipe. Can the heavy whipping cream be substituted for milk instead?
I haven’t tested that and I assume the whole milk would not be nearly as creamy causing the frosting not to set up correctly.
Hi Natasha! I’m making 6 inches chocolate cake. How much butter and confection sugar should I use? Thank you
Hi Abby, please see this section in the recipe: “How much frosting does this make?” I hope it’s helpful!
Just made a batch, thank you for making it extremely easy, I’ve never attempted it before because I didn’t think I’d get it right lol my piping skills need some work lmao but the frosting turned out awesome.
Hello Mark, nice work! Good to know that you enjoyed how it turned out.
Hi Natasha , Do you have a recipe for a creamy peanut butter frosting?
Hi Joe, I don’t have one currently but thank you for the great suggestion
I really love your video recipes and you talking us through it step by step, sorry I miss it and found it not as helpful to just have music, your voice makes it much more approachable to tackle and try new recipes (and I have done quite a few)
Hi Ann, we only have the short videos are the simple recipes that are about a minute long, but we do have the full video with voice on our Chocolate Cake video. I hope that helps and thanks for that feedback.
Thank you for this recipe. We are hosting good friends in our new home and this recipe to go with vanilla cupcakes. I did not have all ingredients for cupcakes so I used Betty Crocker boxed mix. But I wanted the cupcakes to be special so I made this frosting recipe and my guests really loved it and raved about the frosting. Thank you! l really appreciate your recipes.
You’re very welcome, Marianne! I’m happy to hear that it was a huge hit!
Would I need to increase the recipe for a 9″x13″ sheet cake, or would this be enough to cover the top of the cake?
Hi Jennifer, yes, you will need to increase the recipe for a 9×13. Please see the note in the recipe “How much frosting does this make?”
Do I need to sift the confectioners sugar?
Hi Susan, please see this note in the recipe: “Confectioners sugar – also known as powdered sugar. Measured before sifting (sifting is not necessary).”
With request from my niece asking for a yellow cake with chocolate frosting for her B-day. I don’t buy the store self frosting, way to much sugar for my tastebuds. So, I made this buttercream chocolate frosting. OMG…silky, creamy, buttery and absolutely DELICIOUS!!
Natasha thank you for another one of your awesome recipes!! Everyone enjoyed it so very much!! Definitely a keeper in my recipe book!! I will share with ALL my family & friends with delight!! 🙂
Aww, that’s the best! Happy birthday to your niece! I’m so glad you all enjoyed this frosting!
Hi Natasha,
I made your chocolate buttercream frosting yesterday and it was delicious, but it had a grainy texture even though I used powdered sugar. Can you please tell me what may have gone wrong? Maybe using icing sugar would have helped?
Also how do we prevent the frosting from melting? Any solutions for that?
It would be highly appreciated if you could clarify these for me. Thanks in advance! 🙂
Hi Jenna, this buttercream is pretty stable normally. It sounds like either the butter was oversoftenend or too cold – either of these two could be the culprit for a grainy frosting. A buttercream should not melt unless you put it in a very warm environment or out in the sun so I would avoid both, but this is normally stable for several hours at room temperature. I would refrigerate overnight.
How soft should the butter be ideally? Sorry for asking such a question, but I have no idea regarding all of this as I am a beginner in baking.
I haven’t tested that to advise on the outcome. If you experiment, let me know how you liked the recipe.
Jenna, set your butter on the counter to soften, not melted. If your room is too warm and the butter gets too soft, chill it back up a bit. You want to be able to spread it. It’s great you are new to baking, hope you enjoy it!!
We made this today……………AWESOME!!!
I’m so happy you enjoyed that. Thank you for sharing that with us!
Very rich;
very deliciou!
Thanks Natasha
I used you chocolate butter cream recipe and it was absolutely perfect in texture. Thank you for posting
You’re welcome, Delana! I’m so glad you enjoyed it!