If you’re like me, you might have a variety of recipes you use fairly often that you have mostly memorized. We have a few favorite recipes for rolls, sweetbreads, sandwich loaves, and sourdough, that we’ve made enough to whip the ingredients together without looking at a recipe.
But the problem is, I often forget what temperature we bake certain bread types at. I don’t know how many times I’ve gone to preheat the oven only to call out into the other room, “Carrie, what temp do we bake this at again?”
Maybe that’s you too. Or maybe you just want to experiment with your own recipes and are looking for a good estimate for times and temperatures to bake your type of loaf.
Then again, maybe you’re just curious, that’s okay too. Either way, we decided to pour over a plethora of bread recipes and put together a list of the most commonly used temperatures and times for a variety of the most common bread types.
There is a wide range of temperatures that bread is typically baked at, but most types of bread fall between 325-500° F (162-260° C). However, baking temperatures are not interchangeable across different bread types. The type of bread greatly determines the temperature used. Additionally, baking temperatures depend on the type of ingredients used as well as the weight of the total ingredients used.
We spent an entire day pulling together every recipe we could get our hands-on, looking for the most commonly used temperature and times. In other words, the time and temp we saw most often for each bread type with a similar weight of ingredients made it on our list. In short, the mathematical mode. When there wasn’t a clear mode (temp that occurred the most) we split the difference between the most common temperatures and times. We also included the highest and lowest temperatures we saw for reference.
Common Bread Baking Times and Temperatures
| Lowest Temp | Highest Temp | Most Common Temp | Time | |
| Sandwich Loaf | 350° F / 175° C | 375° F / 190° C | 350° F / 175° C | 30-35 min |
| Whole Grain Loaf | 350° F / 175° C | 425° F / 218° C | 375° F / 190° C | 30-40 min |
| Dinner Rolls | 350° F / 175° C | 375° F / 190° C | 350° F / 175° C | 20-25 min |
| Hamburger Buns | 350° F / 175° C | 400° F / 205° C | 400° F / 205° C | 15-25 min |
| Hot dog Buns | 350° F / 175° C | 400° F / 205° C | 400° F / 205° C | 20 min |
| Rustic No-Knead Round | 425° F / 218° C | 475° F / 245° C | *450° F / 230° C | 35-45 min |
| Sourdough Round | 400° F / 205° C | 500° F / 260° C | **450° F / 230° C | 35-45 min |
| Banana Bread | 325° F / 162° C | 350° F / 175° C | 350° F / 175° C | 60-65 min |
| Zucchini Bread | 325° F / 162° C | 350° F / 175° C | 350° F / 175° C | 50-60 min |
| Bagels | 400° F / 205° C | 475° F / 245° C | ***425° F / 218° C | 25 min |
| French Loaf | 350° F / 175° C | 400° F / 205° C | 375° F / 190° C | 30-40 min |
| Baguette | 375° F / 190° C | 500° F / 260° C | 450° F / 230° C | 30-35 min |
| Pizza | 450° F / 230° C | 550° F / 288° C | 500° F / 260° C | 8-15 min |
| Babka | 350° F / 175° C | 375° F / 190° C | 350° F / 175° C | 40-50 min |
| Potato Bread Loaf | 350° F / 175° C | 375° F / 190° C | 350° F / 175° C | 35 min |
| Milk Bread Loaf | 350° F / 175° C | 350° F / 175° C | 350° F / 175° C | 30-35 min |
| Sweet Rolls | 350° F / 175° C | 375° F / 190° C | 350° F / 175° C | 20-25 min |
* For the rustic no-knead, the most common method we found was in a Dutch oven and involved preheating your dutch oven before baking. It involved baking with the lid on for 20-30 minutes and then removing the lid for the remainder of the bake.
** For the sourdough times and temps, the most common recipes used Dutch ovens. They also call for preheating the dutch oven. And again, also call for baking with the lid on for 20-30 minutes then removing the lid for the remainder of the bake. Most recipes suggest preheating your dutch oven at 500°F (260°C) and then reducing heat to 450°F (230°C) degrees for the bake. Some even call for starting the bake at 500°F (260°C), then reducing to 450°F (230°C) after removing the lid.
*** Bagels are boiled before baking, we did not include those times and temps on the list. We saw in most recipes, that bagels were placed in water that had been reduced from a boil to medium/high heat and boiled for 30 seconds to 1 minute on each side.