The 5 best pizza ovens of 2024
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Making good pizza at home can be challenging. Most residential ovens top out at between 500 and 550 degrees, making it difficult to achieve pizzeria-quality pies. Fortunately, there are both indoor and outdoor home ovens for the aspiring at-home pizzaiolo to choose from. "There are so many different styles of pizza," says Tim Haigh, owner of Bambolina in Salem, Massachusetts. "It's finding the oven that cooks the style that you like."
Outdoor ovens can reach temperatures upwards of 900 degrees F using wood and/or gas as a fuel source, allowing you to make true, Neapolitan pizza. Our favorite is the Gozney Roccbox Pizza Oven because it doesn't take up too much space and quickly reaches above 900 degrees. Indoor options consist of tabletop electronic appliances that utilize heated coils to bake pizzas from both above and below. In that category, the Breville Smart Oven Pizzaiolo is a pricey, but effective option that nearly replicates outdoor oven results.
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Our top picks for the best pizza ovens:
Best overall: Roccbox Pizza Oven — See at Amazon
Best wood-fired: Ooni Frya Pizza Oven — See at Crate and Barrel
Best indoor: Breville Smart Oven Pizzaiolo — See at Amazon
Best budget: Presto Pizzazz Plus Rotating Oven — See at Amazon
Best for grilling: KettlePizza Oven Kit — See at Amazon
The Roccbox Pizza Oven uses gas or wood to reach temperatures up to 930 degrees Fahrenheit in 30 minutes or less so you can cook pizzas faster.
- Heats up to 932 degrees F in about 30 minutes
- Self-cleaning
- Easy to assemble with a sleek design
- 12-inch maximum pizza size
- Heavy
The Roccbox Pizza Oven is a powerful oven with a small footprint. It has a max temperature of 932 degrees F and, with the legs folded up, is only under two feet long. The oven weighs almost 45 pounds, but is small enough for you to pack and bring with you to parties or camping. Due to the high temps, the oven incinerates debris so there's virtually no clean-up.
The oven comes with attachments for wood-burning and gas heating, an extensive user manual with recipes, a high-quality metal pizza peel, and a one-year warranty. The body of the oven is durable stainless steel covered with a safe-touch silicone jacket. A thermometer is built into the oven so you can easily track the temperature.
We've used the Roccbox to make dozens of pizzas and were impressed by the speed — we made 12 pizzas in under an hour using this oven. Since the flames come from the back, you need to rotate the pizza halfway through, but the metal peel made that task easy. The oven is well-designed, the right size, durable, easy to use, and easy to clean. In addition to making pizza, the Roccbox easily handles steak, salmon, pork chops, and roasted vegetables.
Ken Forkish, author of The Elements of Pizza and owner of Ken's Artisan Pizza also recommends the Roccbox for non-pizza cookery. "The height of the dome in these small portable outdoor ovens is very much relevant. It [the Roccbox] has a higher dome and I did pretty good steaks in it, but I can't do them in my Ooni. If you want to do general cookery outside of pizza, I've found the Roccbox to be more flexible." Just be mindful that you're cooking with extremely high heat, so you'll need to closely watch whatever you're cooking.
Featuring a wood-pellet heat source, portable design, and efficient heating and cooking, the Ooni Fyra 12 Pizza Oven is ideal for wood-fired pizza lovers.
- Heats quickly to 900 degrees F
- Portable
- Mild wood-smoked flavor
- Learning curve for those unfamiliar with pellet grilling
The Ooni Fyra Pizza oven (formerly the Ooni 3) is made of powder-coated carbon steel for long-term durability and reaches temperatures up to 950 degrees. The oven has a striking appearance with a large chimney for optimal airflow. It fits pizzas up to 12 inches in diameter.
The body features ceramic insulation to maintain heat efficiency. While the previous model offered the option to use gas via an optional burner accessory, the current Fyra is a dedicated wood pellet oven. (If you want to learn more about cooking with wood pellets, check out our guide to the best pellet smokers.)
The oven gets up to temperature in as little as 15 minutes and a 20-pound bag of wood pellets was enough to make about 50 pizzas. You have to keep an eye on the pellets to make sure the airflow is just right and that they don't jam up in the metal tube.
The flames are directed to the roof of the oven rather than directly onto the pizza, so you get excellent radiant heat. For best results, you should rotate the pizza every 20 to 30 seconds and keep a close eye on the pellets to ensure they are burning properly. We've also tested the Ooni Koda 16 and loved the performance.
The Breville Smart Oven Pizzaiolo brings the high-heat performance of a pizza oven into a compact kitchen appliance — and it makes awesome pizza.
- Emulates a wood-fired oven in a countertop size
- Fast preheating
- Easy for beginners to use
- Bulky
- Small cooking opening
How do you bring the fiery furnace of a pizza oven indoors? One way is to get the Breville Smart Oven Pizzaiolo for your kitchen. This countertop appliance can reach temperatures of up to 750 degrees F, and is designed to emulate a brick oven; it's sealed to protect against heat loss, including the double-pane window.
Using Breville's Element IQ technology, the Pizzaiolo cooks pizza evenly, whether it's frozen or fresh. It also has settings for pizza styles, like thin-and-crispy, New York, or wood-fired.
In our review, we found the oven only required a few minutes to preheat, which makes getting a pizza from dough to mouth even faster. Despite the small opening, the Pizzaiolo can cook other foods too, thanks to the auto-eject door that facilitates easy removal of food from the oven. In our tests, pizzas baked evenly with just one spin (although this isn't really necessary).
However, it's an expensive appliance that's really for a single purpose. If you love Neapolitan-style pizza, there's no other compact appliance that can achieve what the Pizzaiolo can. But, if you don't care about this particular style of pizza, you may be better served by Breville's Crispy Crust Pizza Maker, which can be had for around $150 and does a good enough job.
The Presto Pizzazz Plus Rotating Oven is a great, affordable indoor pizza-maker for those days when the weather is less than ideal.
- Portable and usable indoors
- Custom heat settings
- Built-in timer
- Single-use appliance that takes up a lot of space
Though not shaped like a classic oven, the Pizzazz features a 12-inch nonstick baking pan that rotates between two heating elements: one on top and one on the bottom. As it rotates, the pizza — or other foodstuffs — cook evenly. We called it the best novelty pizza maker in our guide to the best pizza-making tools.
The Pizzazz has served as an integral part of several dinner parties thanks to its ability to bake delicious homemade pizzas with minimal effort. Because your pizzas cook out in the open, it's a pretty hypnotizing way to watch your crust puff and your cheese bubble.
Cooking pizza often requires screaming hot ovens, but with the Pizzazz, you'll get a well-cooked pizza without heating up the whole house. It's also a great way to crisp up the frozen ones — though of course, homemade dough will always yield a better result.
Turn your Weber Kettle charcoal grill into an instant pizza oven with the KettlePizza Oven Kit.
- Adds more functionality to your grill
- Easy to create a high-heat oven
- Doesn't take up too much extra space
- Compatible only with select Weber Kettle grills
- Temperature can be hard to regulate
When it comes to outdoor cooking, there's just nothing like the taste that comes from the best charcoal grills. Making pizzas on a charcoal grill isn't new, but the KettlePizza turns a Weber Kettle Grill into a pizza oven that reaches temperatures of up to 750 degrees F. That's plenty hot enough to create the crust and mouth-feel you'd get from a good pizzeria.
The basic kit comes with an expandable insert that fits on the base of a Kettle grill, which you cover with the lid; an aluminum pan is included. The Deluxe USA kit includes a metal peel and pizza stone. If you already have a Weber Kettle, this is by far the best value you'll get when buying a pizza oven.
For non-Weber owners, KettlePizza also offers pizza oven kits for gas grills that sit directly on the grill grates. The stainless steel insert reflects heat down to the surface of the pizza and can reach temperatures between 600 and 700 degrees F.
Propane and natural gas: While some prefer the flavor of wood-fired pizzas, gas-powered ovens are capable of producing top notch pies and can be easier to manage than other fuel sources. "Gas is really a lot more easy to control and because of the size of these ovens," says Forkish. Gas ovens also heat up and cool down faster than their wood or charcoal-fueled counterparts, which is an asset if you plan to store your oven, rather than keeping it set up permanently.
Wood and charcoal: There's a distinct flavor and smokiness you can only get from cooking over a fire, but wood-fire ovens require more maintenance. "If you're not used to working with wood-fired ovens, there's a way bigger learning curve with wood." says Andrew Janjigian, author of Wordloaf. Cooking pizzas over a wood or charcoal fire means actively tending to that fire to maintain an even temperature.
Hybrid: Hybrid ovens offer the option to use wood (or wood pellets), charcoal, or gas as a fuel source. Some, like the Roccbox, ship with a hose to connect the oven to a propane tank and offer an optional attachment for wood-burning. Others, like some Ooni pizza ovens, have the option to purchase an accessory to attach the oven to a fixed natural gas line.
Electric: Indoor ovens are designed to sit on a countertop and plug into a standard 120 V outlet. They're great if you don't have the space for an outdoor oven or want to make pizza in any weather. The electric options we recommend have lower temperature ranges than outdoor ovens, topping out around 750° F. However, with heat sources both above and below the cook surface and a variety of available settings, you can still make fantastic pizza.
Grill insert: Cooking pizza over charcoal on a grill offers a similar smoky flavor to wood, but can require tending to maintain consistent temperatures when cooking more than one pie. It can be difficult to achieve the high temperatures necessary to cook Neapolitan-style pizza quickly with charcoal alone. KettleGrill recommends adding hardwood chunks on top of charcoal briquettes when cooking pizza if you want to achieve a temperature above 600 degrees.
What else can you cook in a pizza oven?
Pizza ovens can cook plenty of other foods, but it requires some strategy. Because pizza ovens operate at extremely high temperatures, you should check your cookware for the manufacturer's recommendations for maximum temperature thresholds. The best cast iron is a good bet.
Ken Forkish encourages home cooks to consider the dimensions of their oven before embarking on non-pizza cookery. "I found the height of the dome in these small portable outdoor ovens is very much relevant," he says. With a lower dome, any splatters from your food will hit the ceiling and then come down as soot. Forkish recommends the Gozney Roccbox Pizza Oven for cooking things other than pizza.
Andrew Janjigian uses his Ooni oven to pre-cook pizza toppings and sauces while the oven is heating up as well as baking bread: "I did a pita recipe and a lahmajun recipe, and many other flatbreads I do all the time."
How do you clean a pizza oven?
Pizza ovens are meant to run at very high temperatures, which functionally is like running your residential oven on self-clean mode. Temperatures ranging from 700 to 900 degrees F and above get rid of most debris and grime. That said, you should occasionally surface clean the inside of your oven and the surface of your stone. Be sure the oven is completely cool before cleaning.
Ovens with chimneys may periodically need extra soot cleaned out to maintain optimal airflow. Avoid abrasive materials and harsh chemicals when cleaning your oven, opting instead for mild soap and water, and be sure to dry all surfaces thoroughly.
How do you clean a pizza stone?
The most important part of cleaning a pizza stone is not using soap. Most stones are porous and can absorb the soapy smell and taste. Ooni, the manufacturer of our best wood fire pizza oven, recommends removing the baking stone from their oven, flipping it over, and placing it back in the oven so that the bottom of the stone essentially cleans itself in the high heat.
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