Who isn’t a pizza lover? Who doesn’t like eating outside? It’s a challenge to find anyone who doesn’t love pizza and who’d rather be inside than outside on a warm summer evening or a fresh, bright autumn afternoon.

Outdoor pizza ovens tick both boxes – an alternative to the somewhat boring UK tradition of a BBQ, a pizza oven takes British al fresco dining to a whole new level. Instead of predictable BBQ food such as burgers, sausages and baked potatoes, shake things up Italian style with an outdoor pizza oven! It’s sure to meet the demands of any true pizza lover, serving up fresh, perfectly-cooked, homemade pizza tailored to your taste with your choice of base and toppings.

With the smells and tastes of Italy at your fingertips, your pizza oven will transform your garden or patio into an authentic Neapolitan pizzeria for the evening and you won’t even have to leave your home to be part of it!

Best Pick Outdoor Pizza Oven

No products found.

Only got 5 minutes

The best outdoor pizza ovens will have generously sized domes; the capability to reach temperatures of around 370ºC in a relatively short space of time; will distribute heat evenly to cook your pizza through without burning; and deliver a crunch to your pizza base that just wouldn’t be possible using a conventional oven.

The first choice you need to make when considering an outdoor pizza oven is the build material – authentic clay; modern stainless steel; and traditional brick are the most common unless you decide you’re up for a bit of DIY and fancy constructing your own outdoor pizza oven from scratch using a build-your-own kit! Whatever your design preference or style choice, there’s certainly enough variety out there for you to find a model that fits your brief.

As well as choosing the build material, you’ll need to decide which fuel type or fuel type combination you want to power your outdoor pizza oven.

Wood fired

It’s authentic and produces flavours that are sure to set your taste buds alive! It can take a while to heat up, and can be a bit messy to clean, but in terms of authenticity and taste, wood fired pizza ovens are hard to best.

Gas fired

Gas fired outdoor pizza ovens were introduced for those of us who like the easy option. The designs usually closely resemble the wood fired models, but in terms of maintenance it requires much less time and effort than a traditional wood burning pizza oven. 

Gas assist

A gas assist pizza oven uses wood as the primary fuel, and gas to stabilise the temperature. It’s the perfect compromise if you’re looking for the authenticity and flavours that come with a traditional wood fired pizza oven but without any hassle!

Cooking using an outdoor pizza oven

1. Rub a small amount of flour onto your wooden pizza paddle – you want the dough to slide off easily and this should stop the pizza base sticking.

2. Put the wooden paddle and pizza into the dome of the oven; slide the paddle from under the pizza.

3. Secure the oven door and allow your pizza to cook for the time outlined in the user manual. During this time, using the metal paddle and tongs, rotate the pizza so it cooks evenly.

4. Release the pizza oven door and slide the metal paddle under the pizza base.

5. If you suspect the pizza needs a little more cooking time, rotate on the paddle and put it back into the oven; take care not to overcook – if it’s just crisping and browning you’re after then the pizza may only need another 10-20 seconds.

6. Once you’re satisfied your pizza is cooked just the way you like it, remove it from the oven and tuck in! 

Best Budget Outdoor Pizza Oven

No products found.

Fuel – Gas or Wood?

If it’s traditional, rustic Italian flavours you’re after, it’s hard to see past an authentic wood fired clay pizza oven. There’s a reason some of the best pizzerias in the world choose to ignore the newcomers to the pizza oven market and stick with where it all began – if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it!

A gas fired pizza oven may be similar in appearance to the traditional wood-fired pizza ovens, but look closer and it’s actually very different – low maintenance and requiring significantly less heating-up time, it’s the oven of choice for those of us who struggle to find time for cooking and are looking for a quick and easy solution to cooking pizza al fresco.

Is an outdoor gas assisted pizza oven really the perfect compromise?

Gas assisted outdoor pizza ovens are perfect for outdoor-loving pizza fans who want to indulge without the hard work. The best outdoor gas assisted pizza ovens will still provide all the smells, sights and sounds of a traditional wood fired pizza oven, even though gas takes the lead as the main fuel source.

Having a gas assisted pizza oven is perfect when it comes to entertaining family and friends. Because it self-regulates and maintains a constant temperature in the dome, this leaves you free to play host. If it’s just family, you have the time to prepare the kids’ pizzas between cooking (you know they’re going to want more than one!) or, if the kids are happy making their own, you’re free to take that ten minutes and sit and relax. Close your eyes and, for a second, you may well believe you’re sat in a back-street Naples pizzeria with nothing but the smells and sounds of authentic Italian cooking to keep you company!

Pizzaiolo survival kit

Fancy yourself as a pizzaiolo? A good workman is nothing without his tools and the same goes for making pizza! When you’re shopping around for your pizza oven, look out for deals where extras and accessories are included in the price – it will save you a fortune if you can get at least some of the following thrown in when you first buy your outdoor pizza oven: 

• Metal pizza paddle
• Wooden pizza paddle
• Pizza oven stone
• Tongs
• Protective gloves
• Pizza oven brush
• Pizza oven ash rake
• Fire reviver poker
• Pizza cutter
• Pizza oven cover

Pizza Paddles

A pizza paddle or pizza peel is the most important piece of kit besides the oven itself. The best outdoor pizza ovens should come with these as ‘free’ extras but if not, you’ll need to pick a couple up before attempting to use your oven. A wooden pizza peel is needed for preparing the pizza and putting your pizza into the oven; raw dough is far less likely to stick to wood than it is to metal, although it’s worth sprinkling a bit of flour over the wood just to help it along when it comes to sliding off! The metal pizza peel, which is usually aluminium, is used for taking the pizza out of the oven and for rotating the pizza whilst its cooking. Having to only use the wooden paddle to feed the uncooked pizza into the oven is great as then it’s free to be used for the next pizza – you can have the next pizza prepped and ready for cooking as soon as the first one’s done! Just make sure that between pizzas the wooden pizza peel remains dry otherwise you’ll find the dough will start to stick.

Getting ready to use your outdoor pizza oven

Although the cooking of the pizza itself in an outdoor pizza oven is unbelievably quick, preheating your pizza oven, particularly if it’s wood fired, is likely to take considerably longer. You’ll need to consult the manufacturer’s guidelines to see roughly how long your oven is likely to take to reach the optimum pizza cooking temperature of approximately 400ºC – it’s usually around 20 minutes.

The pizza oven stone must be allowed to reach the desired temperature before you attempt to cook, otherwise you run the risk of ending up with a partially cooked pizza with an undercooked base and raw toppings. The best outdoor pizza ovens will have an integrated thermostat to allow you to see the exact temperature inside the dome of the pizza oven.

The pizza oven stone is the ‘heart’ of your outdoor pizza oven, yet it requires very little maintenance considering the role it plays in cooking your pizza. The only attention it needs is a light clean between uses. A gentle wipe with a damp cloth should be sufficient as you’re simply aiming to remove any remnants of your last pizza cooking session. If you over-clean the pizza stone, you run the risk of removing the oils and flavours, which it will have retained from previous uses – you want your pizza stone to be a seasoned pizza stone. What you don’t want is a pizza stone that’s been cleaned so thoroughly it’s been stripped of all the intense flavours and aromas, and left with a soapy residue, which is unlikely to taste great next time you cook a pizza on it!

When it comes to using your outdoor pizza oven, don’t worry about oiling or greasing the stone. Natural oils from the pizza will take care of that and you shouldn’t have any problems when it comes to lifting the cooker pizza off the stone. It’s also worth mentioning that a pizza stone which changes colour is completely normal! The oils mentioned previously are likely to cause the stone to appear darker but it’s nothing to worry about – if anything it’s the end goal as the darker the stone, the most tasty the pizza!

Mastering your pizzaiolo skills

The design of a pizza oven may be relatively simple but using one still requires patience and practice.  Although it may be tempting to just stick with cooking your pizzas using the oven in your kitchen, keep in mind that the pizzas you’ll get from your outdoor pizza oven will be in a different league in terms of taste and flavour.

When you first start practising, keep toppings to a minimum then, if it does go wrong, you’re not wasting cheese, meat and vegetables that can be saved for when you’ve got the hang of it. Practice makes perfect so don’t be afraid of experimenting a little – play around with timings, accessories and toppings until you feel confident. The last thing you want to do is invite friends and family round before you’re ready and find that you’re pizzaiolo skills aren’t quite up to scratch.

Handy hints:

• Keep rotating the pizza, a moving pizza is an evenly cooked pizza!

• If you see or smell the pizza base starting to burn, use the metal pizza paddle to lift the base off the pizza stone; this way the cheese and toppings will keep browning but the base is off the heat.

• Size isn’t everything! If you make your pizza to big, you risk the heat not being able to circulate around the oven as it should.

• Rolling the dough too thick may result in a soggy inside and burnt outside. You want the pizza base to be around 6mm thick

• Don’t over pile the toppings – you want them all to have the same heat exposure and to cook evenly.

Best of the Rest

No products found.

No products found.

No products found.

Frequently Asked Questions