The New York Pizza Ranking

We’re all agreed, I hope, that pizza is awesome. Some pizzas are more awesome than others, though, and while there’s certainly disagreement over which pizzas are better (which I think is imperative for a thriving pizza scene), we do seem to have some traction on what makes a pizza particularly good. I think exposure to different individuals’ opinions helps us develop this traction, and it is to this end that I hope this (openly) subjective and regularly updated ranking will provide some guidance.

Each row evaluates the Margherita slice (or its closest available relative) at a particular pizza joint. I rank the crust, sauce, and cheese of that slice out of ten, and then award any bonus points that I think are merited (for cohesiveness of ingredients, vibe of the restaurant, variety and/or novelty of flavours, etc.). A score of ‘6’ should be interpreted as being on par with the average New York Margherita slice (that’s in the $4–$7 price range), ‘7’ as Good, ‘8’ as Very Good, ‘9’ as Excellent, and ’10’ as Perfect; on the flip side, ‘5’ should be interpreted as Subpar, and ‘4’ as Disappointing. (There’s admittedly some asymmetry in the way I allocate scores for good and bad slices, but I think that’s faithful to the asymmetry in how we interpret scores – we typically don’t take a score of 5/10 to be average, for example.)