Baker’s Percentage CalculatorBread Formula, True Hydration & Dough Scaling
Enter your ingredients in grams to get every baker’s percentage, the true hydration of a sourdough (with the starter’s flour and water split out), the salt percentage, and scaled weights for any batch size.
Built & tested by Manzoor Ahmad, Pharmacist & Calculator Developer · Updated
Uses the standard professional baker’s percentage convention (total flour = 100%), with sourdough starter split into its flour and water for true hydration.
How do you calculate baker’s percentage?
Baker’s % = ingredient weight ÷ total flour weight × 100, with flour always 100%. For 1,000 g flour, 700 g water and 20 g salt, the water is 70% and the salt 2%. For sourdough, split the starter into its flour and water to find true hydration: adding 200 g of a 100% starter gives 800 ÷ 1,100 = 72.7%.
Your formula
100% = equal weights of flour and water in your starter
Baker’s percentages
| Ingredient | Grams | Baker’s % | Scaled |
|---|
Typical baker’s percentages by bread type
| Bread | Hydration | Salt | Yeast / starter | Fat & sugar |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| French baguette | 65–75% | 1.8–2% | IDY 0.5–1% or poolish | — |
| Country sourdough | 72–80% | 2% | Levain 15–25% | — |
| Sandwich loaf | 60–65% | 1.8–2% | IDY 1–1.5% | Butter 5–8% · sugar 4–6% |
| Ciabatta | 75–85% | 2% | Biga 20–40% | Olive oil 0–3% |
| Bagels | 52–58% | 2% | IDY 0.5–1% | Malt 1–2% |
| Brioche | ≈ 55–65% (eggs + milk) | 2% | IDY 1–1.5% | Butter 40–60% · sugar 10–15% |
Baker’s percentage formulas
Country sourdough, 2 loaves
- Flour 1,000 g (900 bread + 100 whole wheat) = 100%
- Water 700 g = 70% · Starter 200 g = 20% · Salt 20 g = 2%
- The 100% hydration starter adds 100 g flour + 100 g water.
- True hydration = 800 ÷ 1,100 = 72.7%
- Salt as % of total flour = 20 ÷ 1,100 = 1.8%
Bread, coeliac disease and “sourdough is gluten-free” myths
Long sourdough fermentation reduces some FODMAPs, so many people with IBS tolerate it better. But it does not make wheat bread safe for people with coeliac disease. Gluten levels remain far above the 20 ppm gluten-free threshold. If you bake for someone with coeliac disease, use certified gluten-free flours and a separate, uncontaminated starter. Also worth knowing: some medicines use wheat starch as a filler. Most contain only trace gluten, but ask your pharmacist if you’re unsure.
Related calculators
Baker’s Percentage calculator FAQs
Baker’s percentage expresses each ingredient as a percentage of the total flour weight, which is always 100%. With 1,000 g of flour and 700 g of water, the water is 70%. It makes recipes easy to scale and compare.
Divide the total water weight by the total flour weight and multiply by 100. For sourdough, include the water and flour in your starter: a 100% hydration starter is half flour and half water.
Because flour is 100% and everything else is added on top. A simple dough of flour (100%), water (70%), salt (2%) and yeast (1%) totals 173%.
Most home bakers start at 70–75% true hydration with bread flour. Open-crumb country loaves often reach 78–85%, but they need more skill to shape. Whole-grain flours absorb more water, so they handle higher hydration.
Usually 1.8–2.2% of the flour weight. That’s 18–22 g per 1,000 g of flour. Below 1.5% bread tastes flat, and above 2.5% fermentation slows noticeably.
Decide on the total dough weight you want, divide it by the sum of all the percentages (as a decimal) to get the flour weight, then multiply the flour by each percentage. The scale box above does this for you.
Manzoor Ahmad
Pharmacist · Supplement & Nutrition Writer (9+ yrs) · Calculator Developer (13+ yrs)
I’m a pharmacist and DexoCalc’s developer. Baker’s maths is a lot like compounding in a pharmacy, because everything is a ratio. This calculator includes the step most tools skip: splitting the starter into its flour and water, so your hydration number actually matches how the dough feels.
References
- Cauvain SP. Technology of Breadmaking, 3rd ed. Springer; 2015.
- Laatikainen R, et al. Randomised clinical trial: low-FODMAP rye bread vs regular rye bread in IBS. Aliment Pharmacol Ther. 2016;44(5):460–470. PubMed
- FDA. Gluten-Free Labeling of Foods.
Note: Flour absorption varies by brand and protein content. Use hydration as a starting point and adjust by feel.