BACKGROUND: Betalains are presently gaining popularity as pigments for use as natural colorants and/or bioactive compounds in functional foods. Quinoa (Chenopodium quinoa Willd.) has been recognized as an extremely nutritious grain and has recently been found to be a novel and good betalain source. Microencapsulation has been studied as a protected-delivery procedure to stabilize betalains. There are no studies about microencapsulation of betacyanins extracted from quinoa using spray-drying technology. RESULTS: Optimal microencapsulation was obtained at a drying temperature of 165 °C, a rotameter air flow rate of 47 mm (940 L h−1) and 10% w/w maltodextrin, which produced good encapsulation yield (58.1%) and efficiency (100%). Optimized maltodextrin–betacyanin microcapsules (diameter 4.4 μm) have low moisture (1.64 ± 0.08%) and water activity (0.127 ± 0.006), a betacyanin content of 0.1995 ± 0.0017 g kg−1 and saponin content <0.080 mg kg−1. The oxygen consumption rate by betacyanin was −4.373 × 10−5 bar min−1 at 80 °C and −6.67 × 10−5 bar min−1 at 90 °C, which was accompanied by fading of the color. CONCLUSION: Microencapsulated betacyanin was optimized by response surface methodology, and its stability was measured under accelerated conditions by oxygen consumption. Microencapsulations contain betacyanin and low saponin concentration, which might confer unique health-promoting properties. © 2018 Society of Chemical Industry.