Baker's Percentage Calculator - Scale Any Bread Recipe

What is baker's percentage?

Baker's percentage (baker's math) expresses every ingredient as a percentage of the total flour weight. Flour is always 100%; other ingredients are proportional to it. This makes it easy to scale recipes up or down: just change the flour quantity and every other ingredient scales automatically.

Ingredient % = (Ingredient weight ÷ Flour weight) × 100

Reference percentages

Scaling example

Here is a standard country bread formula using baker's percentages, then scaled from 500 g flour up to 2,000 g flour:

To scale: multiply each ingredient's baker's % by the new flour weight and divide by 100. The ratio always stays consistent regardless of batch size.

Hydration effects on the final loaf

• 60–65% hydration (stiff): Easy to handle; produces a denser crumb with a tight structure. Good for bagels, sandwich loaves, and pasta dough.
• 68–75% hydration (medium): Balanced handling and open crumb. The most common range for everyday bread and sourdough.
• 78–85% hydration (slack/wet): Produces a highly open, irregular crumb with large holes (ciabatta, high-hydration sourdough). Requires stretch-and-fold technique and bench scrapers; sticky to handle by hand.

Pre-ferment percentages

Many advanced bread recipes include a portion of pre-fermented dough to develop flavor:

• Poolish: A wet pre-ferment (100% hydration). Typically 20–40% of total flour is prefermented. Produces complex flavor with thin, crispy crust.
• Biga: A stiff Italian pre-ferment (50–60% hydration). Develops slowly at cool temperatures; produces chewier texture.
• Levain (sourdough starter): Typically 10–20% of total flour weight. Build time and hydration of the levain significantly affect timing and flavor.