Oat Flour vs Barley Flour: Full Details 

Using alternative flours like oat flour and barley flour instead of “regular” all-purpose wheat flour can introduce new flavors, textures, and nutritional benefits. Not only that, but these flours can be more suitable if you’re on a gluten-free diet or have other dietary restrictions.

Oat flour and barley flour are both non-wheat flours, but that’s about where the similarities stop. In this article, we’ll explain the differences between oat flour and barley flour, including:

• How they’re made
• Their gluten-free status
• Their best uses
• Nutritional differences

We’ll also answer some common questions about oat flour and barley flour at the end – let’s dig in!

How they’re made – oat flour vs. barley flour

Oat flour

The process of making oat flour is quite simple – you can easily do it at home with a blender or food processor!

Oat flour is made by grinding whole oats and sifting out the extra-fine material (the part that is like dust). 

Barley flour

There are actually two types of barley flour: coarse barley flour and fine barley flour. 

Coarse barley flour is made by grinding barley groats, which are hulled seeds of the barley plant. (Hulling removes the outer part called the husk, which is not digestible. All types of barley byproducts are made from hulled barley.) 

Hulled barley is the whole-grain version of barley because it contains the fiber-rich bran.

Pearl barley, on the other hand, is more processed and removes part or all of the bran layer of the barley grain. The outer layer is polished and can then be ground into flour, which makes for finer-textured flour.

The majority of packaged barley flour is made from whole barley groats, not pearled barley. (We couldn’t even find flour made from pearl barley for our nutrition comparison at the end of this article!)

Are oat flour and barley flour gluten-free?

Gluten is a protein found in wheat, rye, and barley, so barley flour is not gluten-free.

It gets a little trickier for oat flour. Oats are naturally gluten-free, but some brands that manufacture oats and oat flour also process gluten-containing products on the same equipment.

That’s why not all oats or oat flour are certified gluten-free – the potential cross-contamination with gluten-containing ingredients might exceed the Food and Drug Administration’s cutoff for the certified gluten-free status, which is less than 20 ppm (parts per million) of gluten.

If you want to use oat flour but are on a gluten-free diet, look for oat flour with a certified gluten-free label, such as from a reputable brand like Bob’s Red Mill. If you’re making your own oat flour from non-gluten-free-certified oats, or the package of oat flour doesn’t specify that it’s gluten-free, then you should err on the side of caution and assume it isn’t gluten-free.

Best uses for oat flour vs. barley flour

Oat flour

Compared to all-purpose flour, oat flour is a more nutritious flour to make things like pancakes, waffles, muffins, cookies, bars, and fruit-based desserts like fruit crisps. 

Because it’s considered whole-grain flour, oat flour is higher in fiber than all-purpose flour and has a pleasant nutty flavor.

Barley flour

Like oat flour, barley flour is a suitable alternative to all-purpose flour for things like muffins, pancakes, waffles, cookies, and quick bread. If you want to bake bread (not quick bread) with barley flour, you might need to include some wheat flour or other rising agents since barley flour is lower in gluten and doesn’t rise like bread made from wheat flour.

Nutritional differences between oat flour vs. barley flour

If you’re curious how oat flour and barley flour compare nutrition-wise, we’ve included a table summarizing their nutritional information below.

Whole grain barley flour is the only kind we could find nutrition information for (not fine barley flour from pearl barley). We also included all-purpose flour to use as a reference!

A note on the glycemic index: Glycemic index (GI) is a unit of measuring how much a single food affects your blood sugar levels compared to pure glucose (sugar), which has a GI of 100. 

*=can vary; check the label to ensure GF status; serving size is for ¼ cup

Flour	Calories	Carbs	Fiber	Sugar	Fat	Protein	GF	GI
All-purpose flour	120	24 g	1 g	0 g	0.5 g	4 g	No	85
Barley flour (whole grain)	110	24 g	3 g	0 g	0.5 g	3 g	No	30
Oat flour	120	22 g	3 g	0 g	2 g	4 g	Yes*	44

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