Baker's Percentage Calculator,
the professional formula.

Field guide

What are baker's percentages and why do professional bakers use them?

Baker's percentages are a system for expressing ingredient quantities relative to the total flour weight. The flour is always assigned 100%, and every other ingredient is a percentage of that flour weight. A recipe that calls for 500 g of flour and 350 g of water has a hydration of 70%. This is true whether you scale the recipe up to 5 kg of flour or down to 100 g — the percentages stay constant, only the gram weights change.

The system was developed by professional bakers who need to scale recipes across wildly different batch sizes without recalculating every ingredient individually. Once you know a recipe in baker's percentages, you can bake any quantity by multiplying the flour weight you want by each percentage.

Why flour is always 100%

In baker's math, the flour is the base unit, not the total dough weight. This is why the total baker's percentage always exceeds 100%: flour contributes its own 100% to the sum, and every other ingredient adds on top. A simple lean bread formula (flour + water + salt + yeast) will have a total baker's percentage around 172%, not 100%.

This is counterintuitive coming from most percentage systems, where everything must add to 100. But in bread-making, the flour-centric system is far more practical: adding a new ingredient (say, whole wheat flour, butter, or eggs) does not force you to recalculate every other percentage. The flour stays 100, and you just add the new item at whatever percentage you want.

How to read a baking formula

Here is a classic white sandwich bread in baker's percentages:

• Flour: 100%
• Water: 65% (standard, slightly soft dough)
• Salt: 1.8%
• Instant yeast: 0.5%
• Butter: 5%

To bake a 700 g loaf, work backwards: if flour is 100% and the total dough is 172.3%, you need approximately 406 g of flour (700 ÷ 1.723). Then multiply each percentage by 406 to get exact gram weights.

Alternatively, start with a flour weight you know (say, 500 g), multiply by each percentage, and find the total dough weight from the sum.

Hydration: the most important percentage

The water percentage — called hydration — is the single most important variable in bread baking. It controls dough texture, crumb structure, crust character, and fermentation speed. Here is how the hydration ranges behave in practice:

• Below 58% (very stiff): Tight, dense crumb. Dough is firm and easy to shape without sticking, but requires more kneading energy to develop gluten. Used for bagels, soft pretzels, and many pasta doughs.
• 58–65% (low hydration): Traditional Neapolitan pizza, many crackers and flatbreads. Manageable dough with good crust snap.
• 65–75% (standard): The everyday home baker's range. Sandwich loaves, dinner rolls, and most commercial bread fall here. Dough is soft but workable by hand.
• 75–85% (high hydration): Requires either very strong flour, the stretch-and-fold technique, or both. Produces open, airy crumb with large irregular holes. Classic for ciabatta and baguette.
• Above 85% (very wet): Requires a banneton (proofing basket) and a Dutch oven or steam injection to maintain shape. Produces the ultra-open crumb found in bakery sourdoughs and pan de cristal. Handling skill matters as much as the formula.

Salt percentage: why 1.8–2.2%

Salt does far more than flavour. It strengthens gluten by tightening the protein network, slows fermentation by partially inhibiting yeast (giving more fermentation control), and extends shelf life by retaining moisture.

Most bread formulas land between 1.8% and 2.2%. Below 1.5%, bread tastes flat and stales faster. Above 2.5%, fermentation slows noticeably and the bread tastes salty. The precise amount within the standard range is a matter of personal taste and flour quality.

One important note: never add salt directly onto dry yeast.Salt at high concentrations kills yeast cells. Mix salt into the flour first, or add it after initial mixing when the ingredients are more diluted.

Yeast percentages

Yeast percentage varies significantly depending on yeast type and fermentation time. Longer, slower fermentation requires less yeast because the yeast has more time to work. Using more yeast speeds fermentation but reduces flavour complexity.

• Instant (dry) yeast, same-day bread: 0.5–1.5%. Higher amounts if the dough is enriched (contains sugar, fat, or eggs) because these ingredients slow yeast activity.
• Instant yeast, overnight cold retard: 0.2–0.5%. The dough spends 8–16 hours in the refrigerator, developing flavor slowly with minimal yeast.
• Fresh (cake) yeast: Use approximately 3× the weight of instant yeast. Fresh yeast is more active but has a short shelf life.
• Active dry yeast: Use approximately 1.25× the weight of instant yeast. Active dry needs to be dissolved in warm water before use.

Scaling from percentages to a target dough weight

If you want a specific total dough weight (say, 900 g for two small loaves), you need to work backwards from the total baker's percentage:

For a formula totalling 172.4% and a target dough weight of 900 g: flour = 900 ÷ 1.724 = 522 g. Then multiply each percentage by 522 to get the remaining ingredient weights.

Enriched doughs and additional ingredients

Baker's percentages work equally well for enriched doughs that contain butter, eggs, milk, sugar, or oil. Each ingredient is still expressed as a percentage of the flour:

• Brioche-style: Butter 40–60%, eggs 40%, milk 20–30%, sugar 10–15%
• Focaccia: Olive oil 5–10%, often 75–85% hydration
• Croissant: Butter (fold-in) 45–55%, eggs 15%, milk 50%
• Milk bread (shokupan): Milk 60–70%, butter 8–10%, sugar 8–10%, egg 10%

Enrichments slow fermentation and tighten gluten (fat coats proteins). Very enriched doughs often require more yeast, longer fermentation, or both.

Disclaimer

Baker's percentages are a precision tool, not a guarantee of outcome. Flour protein content, ambient temperature, humidity, fermentation time, shaping technique, and oven performance all affect the final bake. Use this calculator to formulate and scale reliably — then rely on your senses and experience to interpret the results.