Guide
Pizza Dough Hydration: 60% vs 70% vs 80% for Home Ovens and Steels
Hydration is not a score to post. It is the load on the gluten — and it has to match the hottest surface you actually own. Pick the water for your oven, not for a video.
Hydration is water as a percentage of flour weight. A dough with 1,000 g flour and 700 g water is 70% hydration. That one number changes how the dough mixes, how it stretches, how it browns, and whether it survives a 550°F home oven or only a 900°F deck.
One convention, kept straight: the percentages here count all water against all flour, including the flour and water inside a preferment. If your tool isolates the starter, its printed number will read a few points lower. Use one method and stay with it.
What the percentage is doing
Water does three jobs. It hydrates starch so the crumb sets. It lets gluten form and then slide. It turns to steam in the first minute of the bake and inflates the rim. Below about 58%, pizza dough is breadstick dough: tight, easy to roll, pale and dense in a home oven. Above about 82%, it is soup unless the flour is strong and the baker is fast. The useful home range is 60–78%.
| Hydration | Feel on the bench | Stretch | Best heat |
|---|---|---|---|
| 58–62% | Firm, barely tacky | Rolls or presses; tears if forced thin | 450–500°F sheet pan or stone |
| 65–72% | Soft, slightly sticky | Hand-stretch to 12 in without ripping | 500–550°F stone or steel |
| 75–80% | Slack, wet, needs oil on hands | Windowpane stretch; high rim if fermented cold | 550°F+ steel, or outdoor oven |
60%: the sheet-pan and weeknight dough
At 60% the dough mixes in 6–8 minutes in a stand mixer on speed 2, or 8–10 minutes by hand. It balls up cleanly. You can portion 250 g balls, bag them, and refrigerate 24–72 hours.
This is the dough for a 12-inch pie on a dark sheet pan at 475°F for 10–12 minutes, or on a preheated stone at 500°F for 7–9 minutes. The crust is thin and crisp, closer to a bar pie than a Neapolitan. It will not give you a leopard-spotted cornicione. It also will not glue itself to the peel.
Salt at 2.5–3% of flour weight. Oil at 2–3% is optional and makes the crumb a little tighter, which is useful at this hydration.
70%: the home-steel default
Seventy percent is the number most home bakers should start with if they own a 3/8-inch steel. Mix 8–12 minutes until the dough pulls from the bowl but still slumps. Bulk 4–6 hours at 74–76°F, or 2 hours at room temp then 24–48 hours in the fridge.
A 260–280 g ball stretches to 12 inches with a 3/4-inch rim. Launch onto a steel that has sat on the top rack at 550°F for 45–60 minutes. Bake 5–7 minutes. If the bottom burns before the top sets, drop the steel one rack and finish 60–90 seconds under the broiler.
At 70% you can use bread flour or a 50/50 mix of bread and 00. All-purpose works if you add 2–3 extra minutes of mix and accept a slightly smaller rise.
80%: only if the heat and the flour agree
Eighty percent dough is sticky on purpose. Mix until it is smooth, not until it clears the bowl — it will not. Use wet hands or a slap-and-fold every 20 minutes for the first hour, then cold ferment 24–72 hours.
This dough wants 550°F on a steel at minimum, and it is happier at 700–900°F in a dedicated oven. In a 500°F home oven it spreads, weeps, and gives you a cracker with a gummy center.
Flour protein needs to be 12.5% or higher: Caputo 00 Pizzeria or a strong bread flour. If the dough tears when you stretch it after a cold ferment, it was under-mixed or the gluten never developed in the folds. Do not chase 80% because a video did. Match hydration to the hottest surface you actually own.
A working formula at 70%
For two 12-inch pies:
A quick example
- Bread flour: 400 g
- Water: 280 g (70%)
- Fine salt: 10 g (2.5%)
- Instant yeast: 1.2 g for a same-day dough, or 0.4 g for a 24–48 hour cold ferment
- Extra-virgin olive oil: 8 g (2%), optional
If you use a ripe sourdough starter at 100% hydration, a common inoculation is 20% of flour weight (80 g starter on 400 g flour). Subtract the starter’s 40 g water and 40 g flour from the formula if you want total hydration to stay at 70%. Some tools leave starter water outside the headline number — check which one you are looking at.
Choosing in one sentence
Sheet pan or 475°F oven: 60–65%. Steel or stone at 525–550°F: 68–72%. Outdoor oven above 700°F: 70–78%, and only then if the flour can hold it.
Key numbers
- Hydration = water ÷ flour × 100, counting preferment water and flour unless your tool says otherwise.
- Home-steel sweet spot: 68–72%, 550°F steel, 45–60 min preheat, 5–7 min bake.
- 60% dough: mix 6–8 min, bake 7–12 min depending on pan.
- 80% dough: needs 12.5%+ protein flour and 550°F+; skip it in a 500°F oven.
- Salt 2.5–3%; ball weight 250–280 g for a 12-inch pie.