The Best Temperature to Cook Pizza at Home

If you are cooking a pizza in your home oven then it is important to know the best temperature to cook pizza at home. Cooking pizza at the right temp can help you get a good crispy pizza crust.

I had struggled for a long time to make a pizza with my home oven. There were times when the pizza base was just not cooked properly, and sometimes I even ended up with a soggy base.

The soggy base situation was sorted later, but I just could not figure out what had to do so that the base came out crispy.

I was setting my oven at 450 degrees Fahrenheit and still did not get the pizza base cooked to my liking. If you are in a similar situation, you will love this post as we would share how to get the pizza cooked perfectly at home.

All about the Best Temperature to Cook Pizza at Home…

If you are thinking about the best temperature to cook pizza at home, then let me tell you, 475 degrees Fahrenheit, the temperature you see in every recipe is not a mandatory temperature at which you need to cook your pizza.

You need to crank up your oven to the highest possible temperature. So, if your oven can do 550 degrees Fahrenheit, then 550 degrees Fahrenheit it is!

You need to understand that the hotter your oven is, the better is your pizza base. So make sure that you preheat your oven and make it extremely hot to be ready for cooking pizzas.

Do not shove your pizza inside a cold oven as it is just not going to cook that well and if you are using a pizza stone, make sure that it is inserted inside the oven while preheating it.

So, the general rule of thumb is to go for the highest temperature as it is the best temperature to cook pizza at home.

How long you should cook your pizza in an oven?

Now, once you are good with the temperature, you need to set your timer accordingly.

Make sure that you keep checking your pizza and make sure that it is not overcooked or burned.

Honestly, you need to make sure that the crust cooks to perfection, and for that, it does take some trials and errors. I usually cook my pizza for not more than 10 minutes but at 475 degrees Fahrenheit.

If you are cooking at higher temperatures, it will take you very little time in comparison.

You can cook your pizza in 6-7 minutes if you preheat your oven to increase the temperature.

The pizza comes out crispy, and the toppings are cooked to perfection.

The cheese on the top of the pizza melts well, so you get the soft and gooey cheese on top with well-cooked toppings and a crispy base.

How hot is way too hot??

Honestly, there is no such thing as way too hot for a pizza oven.

The hotter the pizza oven, the better is your pizza. In the case of a wood-fired pizza oven, the temperature is up to 700-800 degrees Fahrenheit and the pizza that comes out cooked perfectly well.

So your home oven is not going to reach those temperatures, and your pizza will not get burnt.

Just make sure that when your pizza, you have preheated the oven and watch the pizza.

You can stop cooking when the pizza looks ready(basically when the toppings charred a bit and the base turned golden brown).

So, do not worry, nothing is way too hot for cooking a pizza, if your oven is way hot, then make sure that you set the timer accordingly.

If you watch the pizza, it just gets easier to make sure that you are not burning it(which is rare in a home oven) so yes, try this trick and hope your pizza turns out the way you want it to.

What Determines The Baking Temperature?

The baking temperature is determined by the radiant heat that comes from the burners.

It gets a little more complicated than just the radiant heat you use when it comes to pizza.

See, cooking pizza involves the radiant heat coming from the burners and the surface temperature of the pizza stone or the cooking surface you are using.

The cooking surface should also reach the set temperature to know if the oven is ready for baking the pizza.

That usually means that it needs to get up to 500-600 degrees Fahrenheit.

This cooking surface should also help in making evenly distributed heat throughout the oven.

At 500 degrees Fahrenheit, the pizza will need to cook longer to get a crispy crust.

The baking temperature combines the surface temperature of the cooking floor and the radiant heat caused by the oven spring so that the dough cooks quickly and perfectly.

Thickness of the Pizza Crust

An important factor in determining the baking temperature is the thickness of the pizza crust.

If the pizza crust is thick then you might want to cook the pizza longer and go for a higher pizza temperature.

Since, the highest pizza temperature on your home oven is the best temperature to cook the pizza at, it might take a little longer to cook maybe a pan pizza in comparison to a nice crispy thin crust Margherita pizza.

How Does Temperature Affect Pizza Baking?

You might have noticed that baking pizza is unlike other baking processes.

The process needs an oven that can reach high temperatures to cook the pizza within minutes or seconds.

The temperature of your oven greatly affects the cooking process of pizza as it determines the crispiness and even finishes of your pizza. You cannot achieve both at a low temperature.

The hotter the temperature of the oven, the quicker the process will be.

That is why it is best to cook pizzas in a wood-fired brick oven as it gets to the highest temperature that can cook pizza.

If you go with lower temperatures, the pizza will cook slower and while you wait for the crust to become crispy, the pizza’s interior will become denser, making it soggy.

The Best Temperature To Cook Homemade Pizza

We have to consider that not all of our readers have a wood-fired brick oven. But if you have a wood-fired pizza oven then we would discuss the best temperature to cook homemade pizza in a wood-fired oven soon.

But if you are using an oven then you do not have to worry as you can still cook great pizzas with your home oven.

Homemade pizza can, of course, be defined by many things as long as you make the pizza at home. You could be making the entire pizza including pizza dough from scratch.

Or you could just be using a store-bought pizza dough/ store-bought gluten-free pizza dough and adding some toppings and cheese on top.

Another possibility is cooking frozen pizza. The best temperature to cook frozen pizza in a convection oven is usually given at the back to the pack so there is no guesswork involved there.

But if you are using conventional ovens to cook a pizza be it including a homemade dough or premade dough, the rules are slightly different.

Most home ovens can reach 500 degrees Fahrenheit.

That means that it can still cook pizzas, but you risk giving the crust a denser texture, making it soggy. I have ended up with pizzas that have a bread-like crust.

To fix this, you need to set the temperature of your home oven to the highest and then cook the pizza longer. TO get the base crispy you MUST use pizza steel or any other pizza stone alternatives easily available at home.

Never remove the pizza until you see a golden brown color on the crust.

This takes around 5 to 10 minutes at 500 degrees Fahrenheit. Most home ovens can reach that temperature but if you have an oven that can go higher, then, by all means, use it.

The Best Temperature To Cook Neapolitan Pizza

There are many different ways to cook pizzas nowadays, but if you want the authentic way to make one, you should get this – Neapolitan pizza needs a lot of heat.

There is no other way to cook Neapolitan pizza other than cooking it at high temperatures.

The best temperature to cook Neapolitan pizza is 800 degrees Fahrenheit but since that is not achievable with a home oven, we need to adjust a few things to get there.

Neapolitan pizza cooks in 60 seconds or 90 seconds maximum to create a crispy crust at home when you are using a pizza oven like Ooni.

If you are using a home oven then make sure you use pizza steel or pizza stone. Preheat the pizza stone to 550 degrees Fahrenheit and then cook the pizza very close to the top of the oven where there is the heating coil.

This is known as the broiler method and I have cooked pretty good pizzas using this exact same method.

Make sure that you preheat your pizza steel and check the temperature then insert the pizza inside the oven. The best temperature to then cook the pizza would be on the highest temperature setting that you have on your oven in the broiler or grill mode.

Depending on the pizza oven you are using the pizza oven temperature and time may vary slightly but you can definitely get some really good results.

The temperature to cook a flatbread pizza will be the same but the cooking time will vary and the same thing goes with the temperature to cook a thin crust pizza.

The temperature remains the same but depending on your crust the cooking time is different.

The only pizza where the temperature is slightly different is the Chicago deep-dish and you do not use the broiler method to cook it.

This is the real pizza, and you cannot hold back with the heat you are using.

To cook the pizza in just 1 minute, you will need an oven to get up to at least 900 degrees Fahrenheit.

That will cook the pizza in just 90 seconds and you can even get the temperature up to 1000 degrees Fahrenheit.

This temperature is usually achieved only by wood-fired brick ovens.

The Best Temperature To Cook New York-Style Pizza

New York-style pizza is slightly different from Neapolitan pizza as you do not necessarily need the crust to be cracker-like in texture. This is a tradition for many years in New York.

Since people are always on the move, they need to eat while walking or going to work.

That is why the crust of a New York-style pizza is usually crispy but is also dense enough.

The density and chewiness of the interior of the pizza are what make the pizza easy to fold.

Therefore, you can eat it while you are on the move without spilling the toppings all over.

Cooking New York-style pizza needs a little bit more heat than what home ovens can.

The best temperature to cook New York-style pizza is around 700 degrees Fahrenheit and cook the pizza for 3 to 5 minutes.

This is not achievable with a normal home oven but you can always use a pizza stone and the broiler method to achieve similar results.

Make sure that you preheat the pizza steel till it reaches about 550 degrees Fahrenheit and then place the pizza on top of it and close to the broiler or the coil present at the top of the oven and cook it for about 7-10 minutes.

This is the best temp to cook New York-style pizza in a home oven and if you will be shocked with the results.

This will give the pizza a nice crispy crust while also allowing the dough to get a little denser inside so you can fold the slices. The slices are also made large for this same reason.

The Best Temperature To Cook Chicago Deep-dish Pizza

The best temperature to cook a Chicago deep-dish pizza is a little different than the rest since Chicago deep-dish pizza needs more time to cook.

Due to the slightly thicker crust and stacked toppings, you need to make sure the pizza cooks.

This means that you need the oven to be hot enough to cook the crust into a crispy finish while also being cold enough not to burn the outer parts of the pizza as you cook the toppings inside.

It is searching for a balance between cooking the crust with a crispy finish and allowing the heat to seep to the middle of the pizza to cook the toppings perfectly.

With these conditions, the perfect temperature to bake deep-dish pizza in the pan is 425 degrees Fahrenheit.

The best pizza temperature and time for Chicago deep-dish pizza are 425 degrees Fahrenheit and depending on the thickness of the pizza, I usually cook for about 20-30 minutes in my home oven.

To make the crust crispy, you need to put olive oil on the cake pan that you use.

This will slightly fry the dough to make it crispy and the insides melt and cook really well giving the deep dish pizza a nice balance of texture and flavor.

The relatively low temperature will slowly seep into the dough and on the toppings to cook even the thickest of toppings.

The Best Temperature To Cook Frozen Pizza

While some would suggest that the best temperature to cook a frozen pizza is over the high heat of up to 550 degrees Fahrenheit, I say that there is a safer way to do this to prevent burning the crust.

See, to cook a frozen pizza, you need the process to be slow enough to distribute the heat into the middle of the pizza while also being hot enough to create a crispy finish on the crust.

I usually go with 400 to 425 degrees when cooking frozen pizza in my oven.

Make sure to set the oven to bake to create radiant heat and cook the cold interior of the pizza.

You can also see the instructions on the package of the frozen pizza but I usually go with 400-425 and I’m good with these temperatures.

To cook the crust with a crispy finish, you will need to create a hot cooking surface.

That means that you will need to preheat the oven along with a pizza stone.

Once the pizza stone is hot enough, place the frozen pizza inside.

The hot stone will help cook a crispy crust while also collecting the heat to create even heat in the oven.

Why Is Pizza Cooked At Such A High Temperature?

A pizza oven needs to be so hot to cook pizza because you need a crisp crust.

No one likes a soggy crust with slightly raw toppings on it.

The high temperature inside an oven makes sure that the moisture from the crust- which is the main reason it becomes soggy– is evaporated quickly to empty the dough of water.

That means that the air pockets inside the dough fill with hot air, which creates a crispy finish while preventing the crust from burning, so you still get a chewy interior.

The hot cooking temperature for pizzas also involves radiant heat.

The heat inside the oven is also crucial in making the cheese melt over the toppings so they also do not burn.

Do I Need To Preheat My Oven Before Cooking Pizza?

Yes, absolutely. You need the oven to get up to the highest temperature it can get to create the perfect environment for cooking your pizza and making it crispy on the outside.

The reason behind preheating the oven is that you need to create an oven spring.

Oven spring is the final stage of rising the dough wherein you get to use high temperature to buff up the dough.

What I mean by that is you need the dough to spring off from the inside.

That creates bubbles and air pockets that will also cause the dough to become crispy when done.

Preheating the oven along with your pizza stone is important because it will cook your pizza faster.

Since you also need the air inside the oven to be heated, preheating your oven is necessary.

Do I Need To Cook My Pizza On A Pizza Stone?

You do need to cook your pizza on a pizza stone to create a crispy crust. If you do not have a pizza stone then you can check out these pizza stone alternatives like mentioned above.

Pizza stone helps create a hot cooking surface so that the moisture on the crust will evaporate quickly.

Aside from the heat that it absorbs, there is also the heat that it releases.

Pizza stones can distribute the heat they collected into the oven to increase the air temperature.

That cooks the toppings of the pizza evenly.

There are also substitutes to pizza stones so you do not have to use a pizza stone per se, but you need to have a hot cooking surface.

Can I Use A Baking Tray Instead Of A Pizza Stone?

While I do not recommend it, you can still use a baking tray to cook pizza.

It will not be as effective as a pizza stone, but as long as it can hold the pizza together, then it will be fine.

A baking tray will only hold the pizza as the thin structure will not absorb heat and redistribute it.

That means that you risk getting your pizza crust soggy or uncooked.

Other alternatives are better than a baking tray, such as a cast-iron pan, pizza steel, fire bricks, and more.

So a baking tray for pizza should be your last resort.

What Is A Pizza Peel And Do I Need One?

A pizza peel is a straightforward tool. It looks like a large spatula that allows you to pick up the pizza and transfer it from the work surface to the oven and vice versa.

It is a convenient tool that lets you manage the pizza while it is in the hot oven. You can turn the pizza around using the pizza peel so you can prevent the pizza from burning.

If you have a hot oven or a wood-fired brick oven, I suggest getting one as it is necessary. You need a pizza peel to safely transfer the pizza and prevent burning yourself.

How Long Should I Cook My Homemade Pizza For?

If you are using home ovens that can only reach a maximum of 500 degrees Fahrenheit or less, you will need to cook your pizza longer to get the finish you want.

At 475 degrees Fahrenheit, which should be a safe temperature as an average for most home ovens, you need to cook the pizza for 10 to 15 minutes to make the crust crispy.

At a higher temperature such as 550 degrees Fahrenheit (the usual highest temperature on home ovens), the cooking should be around 7 to 10 minutes for the pizza to be crispy.  

How Do I Know When My Homemade Pizza Is Cooked?

There is not much when it comes to the signs that indicate your pizza cooked perfectly.

You can see it right away as the curst of your pizza will start to become brown or at least golden brown.

The crust should also be firm and crispy.

You can test this by using the pizza turner to pat the pizza’s crust; it should sound solid and hollow when you tap it to see if it is crispy.

A pizza crust that is too crispy will not be a problem as it will become softer once you bring it out of the oven.

This will help the pizza become a little chewier to blend the flavors.

The cheese on the pizza should have melted over the toppings, and if you can still see the toppings, they should have turned into a slightly different color, indicating that you can eat it now.

The best way to determine whether the pizza is cooked or not is to cook more.

You will easily determine when your pizza is ready after cooking frequently so do not be afraid of messed-up pizzas!

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