Best Bakeries in Asheville
Asheville, North Carolina — updated August 22, 2026
Made-to-order yeast doughnuts on Haywood Road, a downtown patisserie running since 1994, and an East Asheville pastry counter that turns into an evening bar. Here is where Asheville's baking holds up, ranked by how settled the evidence is.
Listings verified
Asheville's bakeries keep short hours, and that is the single most useful thing to know before setting out: several of the best close by early afternoon, and two of them close a full day or two each week. The range runs from a West Asheville doughnut counter that fries every order to a downtown European patisserie that has been on Broadway since 1994. Ranked below by rating and by how many reviews stand behind it.
1. Hole Doughnuts
The highest-rated bakery on this list and the one with the deepest evidence behind it: 4.9 from more than 2,400 reviews, which is about as settled as a rating gets in this city. The Haywood Road shop makes hot yeast-raised doughnuts to order and serves them alongside fresh coffee, plus farm-to-home milk and chocolate milk. Varieties, seating and parking are all limited, so this is not a browse-the-case operation. Its own listing gives hours of 8 am to 1 pm with closures on Monday and Tuesday. Pickup orders can be phoned in during business hours; four dozen or more needs an email at least two days ahead.
2. Old Europe Pastries
A European patisserie and coffee shop that has held a Broadway Street address in downtown Asheville since 1994, with 4.7 from more than 2,400 reviews, a near-identical sample size to Hole and the same weight of proof. The menu splits between breakfast pastries, including quiche and blueberry muffins, and the cake and torte case that most people come for. The kitchen also brings back seasonal items, the Lemon Bavarian among them. Hours and the daily menu are posted on the website; the shop takes phone orders for pickup and delivery.
3. Flour
A 4.9 rating from more than 570 reviews, the same score as Hole Doughnuts on roughly a quarter of the sample. That is strong but less proven, and worth saying plainly. Flour sits on Wall Street downtown, the short curved lane below Haywood, which makes it an easy stop if you are already walking that block. There is little published detail beyond the address and the reviews, so treat the hours as something to confirm before you go rather than something to plan a morning around.
4. Sunshine Sammies
Rated 4.7 across more than 1,000 reviews, which puts it in the proven tier rather than the promising one. The shop is on South Lexington Avenue downtown, a block that fills up on weekend afternoons. Published detail on the menu is thin, so the honest recommendation is the rating itself: a four-figure review count holding at 4.7 in a downtown tourist corridor is harder to sustain than the same score in a quiet neighborhood.
5. Filo Pastries & Post 70 Indulgence Bar
The one on this list that stays open past the afternoon. Filo runs as a pastry, coffee and tea counter with breakfast and lunch on Tunnel Road in East Asheville, then Post 70 takes over Wednesday through Saturday from 5 to 9 pm with savory small plates, flatbreads, craft cocktails and desserts. Sourdough is baked Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday. Hours are 7 am to 4 pm Monday and Tuesday, 7 am to 9 pm Wednesday through Friday, 8 am to 9 pm Saturday and 9 am to 3 pm Sunday. Locally owned, 4.7 from more than 880 reviews.
6. City Bakery
The best option if you want a sit-down breakfast rather than a bag to carry off. The Charlotte Street cafe runs Monday through Saturday, 7:30 to 2:30, closed Sunday, with breakfast served until 11 on weekdays and until noon on Saturday. The pastry case covers scones, croissants, cinnamon rolls, sticky buns, muffins and danishes, and bagels and toast are available all day. There are sandwiches at lunch, including a Farmhouse. A 4.7 across more than 600 reviews.
7. Underground Cafe presents Stay Glazed Donuts
A doughnut counter at 22 South Pack Square, right on the downtown square, rated 4.7 from 354 reviews. That is the thinnest evidence on this list by some distance, and the rating could still move. Included because a 4.7 holding across several hundred reviews in the busiest pedestrian block in Asheville is a reasonable signal. Check hours before making the trip; little else is published about the operation.
What we left off
Duck Donuts on Merrimon Avenue rates 4.7 across more than 990 reviews, but it is a national franchise chain rather than an independent Asheville bakery, so it does not qualify for this list.