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Cream horns in the counter at Chin Mee Chin Confectionery
Restaurants

Singapore's best bakeries

Edited by Jamie   15 October 2026

Singapore's bakeries now laminate dough the way its hawkers fry kway teow: obsessively.

If your idea of a good Saturday starts with lamination, this is the list, and one rule covers all seven: go early. The best bakes in Singapore do not wait for a late brunch, and none of these is worth crossing the island for once the morning has gone. Pick by neighbourhood – there are two in Tiong Bahru and two in the east – and make a morning of it.

Ten years ago, a good croissant here was news. Now the city's bakers argue about butter and flour with the intensity of a laksa debate, and many of them trained abroad, in New York, Seoul and France, and came home with their own ideas about what a morning should taste like.

The range runs from the French-leaning bakery that started it, through small-batch specialists and a sourdough doughnut shop on Amoy Street, to a Muslim-owned bakery in Kampong Glam and an old-school Katong coffeeshop where the bakes have barely changed since your grandparents' day, which is exactly why you go.

Evergreen

The collection

  1. Shophouses in Joo Chiat

    Petit Pain

    Joo Chiat

    The croissant to plan an east-side morning around. Petit Pain has moved round the corner to Joo Chiat Place, and its owner learned lamination at Artisan Boulangerie Co., so this is a bakery run by someone who cares about the layers. It is a small operation, which makes it a morning stop rather than an afternoon one; go early and expect a thinner choice if you don't. Take a honey brioche home as well, because tomorrow's breakfast is part of the trip.

  2. 'Croissant in hand' brand imagery and the original Eng Hoon Street store

    Tiong Bahru Bakery

    Tiong Bahru

    The bakery that helped turn Tiong Bahru into a café neighbourhood in 2012, and the reason to go to the Eng Hoon Street original rather than any of the outlets now spread across the island. Plan a morning around it and order the kouign-amann, which is the thing it does that the rest of the list doesn't. Plain Vanilla's flagship on Yong Siak Street is a short walk away, so you can do both in one sitting if you pace yourself. The mall branches are for emergencies.

  3. Mother Dough's lime-green bakery shopfront on Jalan Kledek in Kampong Glam

    Mother Dough Bakery

    Kampong Glam

    Worth the trip to Kampong Glam for the almond croissant alone. It is a Muslim-owned bakery in a lime-green shophouse, run by a baker who trained in New York and brought a starter back from there too. Everything is made from scratch each morning, and that is also the practical note: what's in the case is what there is, so come in the morning rather than after lunch. The lime-green front is easy to find once you're on the right street.

  1. Sourdough bombolini, one cut open, at The Fat Kid Bakery on Amoy Street

    The Fat Kid Bakery

    Chinatown

    The CBD's best case for a doughnut at your desk. Self-taught baker Ariel Tang's Amoy Street shop specialises in sourdough bombolini, stuffed sweet or savoury, which means the choice is the hard part. Pick one hazelnut and one torched mentaiko and call it a balanced diet. Amoy Street is office territory, so a weekday break is the obvious time to go; on a weekend it works as a stop on a Chinatown wander rather than a destination in itself.

  2. Sourdough and a croissant side by side at Lean & Rich Bakery, UE SquareIllustration

    Lean & Rich Bakery

    River Valley

    The most interesting idea on the list: a former Tartine Seoul head baker who splits the menu into lean doughs and rich ones, so you choose by mood rather than by item. Start with the plain croissant, which is the fairest test of any bakery, and if you're staying, the morning platter is the order. UE Square suits a sit-down breakfast more than a grab-and-go, so give it time rather than squeezing it between errands.

  3. Plain Vanilla Tiong Bahru

    Plain Vanilla Tiong Bahru

    Tiong Bahru

    The Tiong Bahru stop for a group that can't agree. The Yong Siak Street flagship has the brand's widest range of bakes under a skylight in a shophouse, plus brunch and a shelf of groceries. Come early: the kitchen stops long before the shop closes and there are no reservations, so a late brunch plan can end in pastries only (which is not the worst outcome). Tiong Bahru Bakery's original on Eng Hoon Street is nearby if you want a second opinion.

  4. Chin Mee Chin Confectionery's cyan corner shophouse on East Coast Road, Katong, in morning light

    Chin Mee Chin Confectionery

    Katong

    The one for anyone who thinks the croissant boom has gone far enough. On East Coast Road since 1925, it closed in 2018 and was revived with its marble tables intact. Order charcoal-toasted kaya buns and a kopi at the table, then raid the glass counter for cream horns and old-school cupcakes. The counter is the part that runs out, so do it before the second kopi, not after. Petit Pain is in Joo Chiat, close enough to make it an east-side bakery morning.

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