6 Last-Minute Easy Halloween Cupcakes

6 Easy Halloween Cupcake Decorating Ideas

How to Decorate Cute Halloween Themed Cupcakes & Pull Apart Cupcakes

These easy Halloween cupcakes are perfect for a last-minute spooky, sweet treat! Made with your choice of boxed cake mix or your favorite homemade cupcake recipe, you can customize the flavors however you like. I used boxed cake mix to keep things simple—then made them fun and festive with 6 crave-ably cute Halloween cupcake decorating ideas!

If you’re throwing a party or enjoying a spooky evening with family, these simple Halloween cupcakes are an impressive yet easy Halloween treat to throw together. And, it’s a great activity to do together with friends or family! Simply bake the cupcakes of your choice, allow them to cool, and you can decorate a batch of creative Halloween cupcakes in a jiffy.

For a large gathering, boxed cake mix is the simplest option, but feel free to use any homemade cupcake recipe that you enjoy. Some designs are more complicated than others, but they’re all doable for beginners. Whether you’re looking for Halloween pull apart cupcakes or individual Halloween cupcake ideas, I’ve got 6 easy decoration options that you can explore!

To learn how to decorate these spooky cupcakes, watch my Last-Minute Halloween Cupcakes video!

Tips for Easy Halloween Cupcakes

• Whether you use boxed cake mix or a homemade cupcake recipe, allow cupcakes to cool completelybefore decorating them. They will need at least a few hours to cool.
• Read through the cupcake decorating instructions to see whether a recipe feels doable to you, and whether you have the equipment needed to execute the design.
• Some designs require a metal piping tip for best results, so pay attention to that if you don’t have any at home. If you don’t have the exact same metal piping tip as listed in the recipe, that’s okay! See if you have a similar shape and size that could be used to create the same effect.
• When using a decorating bag to pipe frosting onto your Halloween cupcakes, I recommend testing it first on a plate or paper towel. In my experience, it can take a few squeezes to get a feel for how much pressure you need.
• In many cases, the decorating bags aren’t necessary, they’re just helpful. For many of these easy Halloween cupcake ideas, you can just use an offset spatula or spreader to spread on the frosting.

Halloween Cupcakes Ingredients

• Frosting: Use premade frosting in your desired color for the most convenient option, or create your colors with white frosting + food coloring.
• Decorating Gel: Brown or black decorating gel is an ideal tool for drawing fine lines and details, like a ghost’s face or spider legs. Also, this is a great option to use in lieu of a small round piping tip!
• Cookies & Candies: Some of these easy Halloween cupcake ideas involve Oreo cookies or candies like chocolate kisses, so just be mindful that you have whatever you need.
• Candy Eyes: A must-have for adorable spooky spiders and mummy cupcakes! Pay attention to the size of the candy eyes you purchase, and the size called for in the recipe—some are mini, some are regular/medium-sized, and some are large.
• Sprinkles: These are optional on all designs, but Halloween sprinkles can be a great way to add fun, festive flair!

Cupcake Decorating Equipment

• Offset Spatula: A regular or large offset spatula is helpful for spreading frosting evenly onto your cupcakes, especially for the pull apart Halloween cupcake cake designs.
• Decorating Bags: In some designs, decorating bags are necessary for the frosting. In others, the decorating bags are simply helpful. If you don’t have decorating bags, several of these designs can be made with just an offset spatula for spreading and decorating gel for details.
• Metal Piping Tips: Some of these easy Halloween cupcake ideas use metal piping tips to create fun, impressive effects with the frosting. If you don’t have the same exact tip that’s listed in the recipe, use a similar shaped piping tip as a substitute. (I.e., if you don’t have an “open star piping tip #199,” you can look at its photo online and see if you have a similar tip.)

6 Easy Halloween Cupcake Ideas

With these tips and tricks in mind, I hope you’ll enjoy the simple Halloween cupcake decorating ideas shared below! From Halloween pull apart cupcake cake ideas, to Halloween spider cupcakes, to adorable mini ghost cupcakes—there are 6 spooky designs here that are all great for beginners.

Halloween Pull Apart Cupcakes

If you’re hosting a party or gathering this year, serve up one of these Halloween pull apart cupcake platters! Rather than individual cupcakes, these designs take multiple cupcakes and frost them all together into one large, festive Halloween cake. Perfect for guests to grab, pull apart, and enjoy! These are some of the easiest designs that are ideal for beginners—no metal piping tips required.

Ghost Pull Apart Cupcake Cake

This easy ghost pull apart cupcake cake is the perfect sweet treat to serve at a Halloween party—for kids or adults! Simply bake 1 box of cake mix into 24 cupcakes, then arrange them into a cute ghost shape once they’re cooled. Spread on a generous helping of white frosting, draw on a spooky ghost face, and voila! An adorable Halloween cake that guests can pull apart and enjoy.

Pull Apart Spider Web Cupcakes

For an unbelievably simple Halloween cupcake idea, whip up this platter of pull apart spider web cupcakes! You can make this as small or as large as you’d like, depending on how many cupcakes you want to use. Just create a circle of cupcakes, cover in your choice of frosting, then use decorating gel and a skewer to create a spooky spider web. Of course, it’s best served with a plastic spider on top for the full effect!

4 Simple Halloween Cupcake Decorating Ideas

If you’re hungry for individual Halloween cupcake ideas that’ll impress party guests, check out the 4 easy designs below! Keep in mind, all these designs involve at least one metal piping tip to achieve the full effect. Remember, if you don’t have the exact same piping tip, substitute with a similar one. If you have no piping tips, try the spider cupcakes using a tube of black decorating gel for the legs!

Halloween Witch Hat Cupcakes

These adorable Halloween cupcakes are my favorite of them all—and they’re so easy to make! With the help of a basic metal piping tip, you can create cute witch hat cupcakes using any color frosting you like. These look ultra-impressive with their cute hat topper, made with a chocolate kiss, frosting, and an Oreo cookie. So fun to serve, and the most fun to eat!

Halloween Spider Cupcakes

Delight your guests with a spooky batch of Halloween spider cupcakes! No metal piping tip? No problem. This design can be made with just frosting, an offset spatula, and decorating gel if needed. An Oreo cookie with candy eyes serves as the adorable spider face, making these treats even sweeter to eat! Creepy, crawly, and crave-ably cute.

Easy Halloween Mummy Cupcakes

These wide-eyed mummy cupcakes look extra impressive, yet they couldn’t be simpler to make! Use icing to glue large candy eyes onto the cupcakes of your choice, then ‘wrap’ each cupcake in layers of white frosting using a petal piping tip. You can have these decorated in around 20 minutes or less, but your guests are sure to remember them!

Mini Halloween Ghost Cupcakes

Last but not least, these mini ghost cupcakes are oh-so-adorable, but they can be tricky to decorate! I used a tub of marshmallow frosting for flavor variety, and because it’s a bit thicker and more voluminous—which is necessary to create the poofy ghost shape. Simply squeeze a swirl of frosting onto each cupcake using a large round piping tip, then add mini chocolate chips as eyes.