New York City / Pizza
Best Pizza in NYC: 24 Spots, Starting With the Top 5
The top five first, then everything else: the slice you eat standing up, the pie you plan a night around, and the counter still lit at 5am – 24 pizzerias across all five boroughs, every price and closing time checked against the shop’s own menu, all of them mapped.
Open-now status loads live – most of these counters open around noon
- 24 verified spots
- slices from $4
- whole pies from $15
- open till 5am
The best pizza in NYC right now is Una Pizza Napoletana on Orchard Street, named the No.1 pizzeria in the United States by 50 Top Pizza for the fifth year running, where pies run $36 to $44 and the doors open at 5pm three nights a week. For a slice it is L’Industrie in Williamsburg, which took the same list’s best-slice-in-America title in May and Pizza Today’s Pizzeria of the Year in August. Then Mama’s Too on the Upper West Side, whose cacio e pepe square Time Out called the best pizza in the world in February.
Underneath the trophies, the everyday answers: Joe’s on Carmine Street for the plain fold and a $28 whole pie, Lucali in Carroll Gardens for one $32 pie, cash and your own bottle, and Lamonte Pizza, brand new on Driggs Avenue, for a $4 cheese slice a block off the Bedford L. We checked all 24 against their own menus and ordering pages this week and cut every price and closing time we could not stand behind. Most cluster downtown and along the Williamsburg and Lower East Side corridors. More citywide picks in our NYC deals guide.
The top 5 pizzerias in NYC
- 1. Best sliceL’Industrie – 50 Top Pizza’s best slice in America for the third edition running, and Pizza Today’s Pizzeria of the Year in August 2026. Order the burrata slice. Three shops now, all with lines.
- 2. Best whole pieUna Pizza Napoletana – No.1 pizzeria in the United States every year since 2022, joint No.1 in the world in 2025. Thursday to Saturday only, $36–$44, book two weeks out.
- 3. Best night outLucali – the Carroll Gardens room half the city still argues is the real No.1. One $32 pie, cash only, bring your own bottle, names taken from 4pm.
- 4. Best squareMama’s Too – Time Out called the $7.75 cacio e pepe square the best pizza in the world in February 2026.
- 5. Best old guardDi Fara – Midwood, since 1965, $6 a slice, and the highest score Dave Portnoy has ever given a New York pizzeria at 9.4.
- Featured partnerLamonte Pizza – deliberately not in the ranking, because it is a paid placement and it opened this summer. The $4 cheese slice is still a real $4.
New opening / the Williamsburg sliceFeatured partner
Lamonte Pizza
558 Driggs Ave, Williamsburg · NY rounds and grandma squares · one block off the Bedford Av L
Here is the honest frame, because this is a paid placement and you should be able to weigh it: Lamonte Pizza is six weeks old, so it is not going to out-rank a shop with a national title on it. What it is, is the newest genuinely good reason to eat a slice on Driggs Avenue – and at $4 for cheese and $5 for everything else, the cheapest counter on this entire list.
It comes from the team behind Lamonte, the bistro that has been running across the street at 557 Driggs for five years, and the pizza window opened directly opposite it. Two things make it worth crossing Bedford Avenue for. The grandma squares – Classic and Calabrian, thick, crisp-edged, cut in the tray – are better than the round slices, which are perfectly good but not the reason to come. And the Argentinian empanadas at $6, beef or ham and cheese or corn, are not on any other pizza counter in the neighborhood.
The Local Move: a Calabrian grandma square with a dollar of hot honey on it plus a beef empanada runs $12 and eats like a full lunch. The Honest Caveat: they are closed Tuesdays, the room is a counter rather than a place to sit, and their posted hours say noon Monday and Wednesday while the online-ordering window does not open until 4pm those days – so call before you make a midday trip early in the week.
Full profile · Williamsburg happy hour · See it in the full list
At a glance
All 24 spots across five boroughs, slice counters first, then the whole-pie destinations you build an evening around. Row numbers match the map pins below. Every price here appears on the shop’s own menu or its own ordering platform – where a place publishes nothing, we say so rather than inventing a number.
| Spot | The order / what it costs | Where | Hours | $ |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lamonte Pizza Featured | Grandma square $5, cheese slice $4, hot honey $1, empanadas $6, pies $30–$34 | Williamsburg | Till 1am Fri–Sat | $$$ |
| L’Industrie Pizzeria | The burrata slice. No.1 slice in the USA, 50 Top Pizza 2026. No prices published | Williamsburg +2 | Not published | $$$ |
| Joe’s Pizza | The plain fold. Whole cheese pie $28 | Greenwich Village | To 3am, 4am Fri–Sat | $$$ |
| Mama’s Too | Cacio e pepe square, about $7.75. Named the world’s best pizza, Feb 2026 | Upper West Side +1 | Noon–11pm | $$$ |
| Prince Street Pizza | Spicy Spring square tray $47.84; The Original Prince round $26.84 | Nolita +1 | No hours published | $$$ |
| Scarr’s Pizza | House-milled flour. Slices $4.50–$7.50, 20in Original $33, Hotboi $45, Sicilian tray $37–$45 | Lower East Side | To 12.30am Thu–Sat | $$$ |
| Artichoke Basille’s | The artichoke slice. Counter prices not published | East Village +6 | Daily 11am–5am | $$$ |
| Una Pizza Napoletana | Margherita $40, marinara $36, bianca $42. Reservation only, party of 4 max | Lower East Side | Thu–Sat from 5pm | $$$ |
| Lucali | One pie, $32. Calzone $29. Cash only, BYOB, names taken from 4pm | Carroll Gardens | 5–11pm, closed Tue | $$$ |
| Di Fara | Regular slice $6, square $8, regular pie $32, square pie $36 | Midwood | Call ahead | $$$ |
| Rubirosa | Tie Dye 14in $33, vodka $31, classic $29 (online-ordering prices) | Nolita | Daily 11am–11pm | $$$ |
| Roberta’s | Wood-fired pies. No prices published on their own site | Bushwick | To 10pm, 11pm Sat | $$$ |
| Emily | The Emmy Burger $31; pies $20–$28 | Clinton Hill +1 | Dinner from 5pm | $$$ |
| Lombardi’s | The clam pie, coal oven, since 1905. No prices published | Nolita | To 10pm, midnight Fri–Sat | $$$ |
| John’s of Bleecker Street | Coal-oven pies $22 (14 in.) / $25 (16 in.), margherita $25/$28, calzone $17. No slices, ever | Greenwich Village | To 11pm Fri–Sat | $$ |
| Joe and Pat’s | 14 in. cheese $15, 16 in. $18, grandma $25, Sicilian $19–$23 – the cheapest whole pie here | Castleton Corners, SI | To 11pm Fri–Sat | $$ |
| Denino’s | 1951 Original 16 in. $26, vodka $31, clam $33 – Staten Island bar pie, now with a Village room | Greenwich Village + SI | Closed Mondays | $$ |
| Louie and Ernie’s | Slice $4.25, white or margherita slice $6.25, cheese pie $20 small / $22 large, Sicilian $34 | Pelham Bay, Bronx | Patio daily to 8.30pm | $$ |
| Mano’s Pizzeria | 50 Top Pizza’s No.11 slice in America, 2026. Five-day dough. No prices published first-hand | Ridgewood, Queens | Closed Mondays | $$ |
| L and B Spumoni Gardens | Sicilian square $4.50, round slice $4.50, whole Sicilian $35, vodka Sicilian $37 | Gravesend, Brooklyn | Daily to 11.30pm | $$ |
| Nuovo York Pizza | Cheese slice $4, Sicilian squares $4.50–$6.50, 18 in. pies $27–$35 – open to 4.30am Fri–Sat | East Village | To 4.30am Fri–Sat | $$ |
| Paulie Gee’s Slice Shop | Cheese pie $28, Hellboy $37, the deepest vegan pizza list in the city at $38–$42 | Greenpoint | To 1am Fri–Sat | $$ |
| Ops | No.17 on 50 Top Pizza USA 2026. Sourdough, wood-fired, and a James Beard-shortlisted wine list | Bushwick + East Village | Dinner only, from 5pm | $$ |
| Totonno’s | Coal oven since 1924. Whole pies only, no prices published, and the family is looking for a buyer | Coney Island | Sat–Sun noon–5.30pm | $$ |
Who actually won what: NYC pizza awards in 2026
Six different bodies handed out a “best pizza” title this year and they did not agree with each other, which is why nobody online can give you a straight answer. Here is the whole scoreboard in one place, with the month each was announced.
| The award | The New York winner | Announced |
|---|---|---|
| 50 Top Pizza USA – No.1 pizzeria | Una Pizza Napoletana, Lower East Side. Fifth year in a row, first in 2022 | May 2026 |
| 50 Top Pizza – best slice in the USA | L’Industrie, Williamsburg. Third edition running. Mama’s Too No.4, Mano’s in Ridgewood No.11 | May 2026 |
| Pizza Today – Pizzeria of the Year | L’Industrie, cited for scaling to three shops without dropping the slice | Aug 2026 |
| The Best Pizza Awards, Milan | Anthony Mangieri of Una Pizza Napoletana, No.7 in the world plus the Pizza Icon Award. Lucali 22, Stretch Pizza 28, Don Antonio 34, L’Industrie 52, Ceres 57 | June 2026 |
| Time Out – best pizza in the world | The $7.75 cacio e pepe square at Mama’s Too, Upper West Side. Only one other American entry made the list | Feb 2026 |
| 50 Top Pizza World – No.1 pizzeria | Una Pizza Napoletana, joint first with I Masanielli in Caserta. The 2026 world list is announced in Naples in September | Sept 2025 |
| One Bite – Dave Portnoy’s score | Di Fara 9.4, his highest ever in New York. John’s of Bleecker, Lucali, Luigi’s and Angelo’s all sit at 9.3 | Standing |
The Verdict: if you want one answer rather than seven, it is Una Pizza Napoletana for a whole pie and L’Industrie for a slice. Those two have won more, more recently, from more independent panels than anyone else in the city, and both are on this page with current prices. Everything below that line is preference, and we will tell you ours as we go.
The Honest Caveat: none of these panels eat everywhere. The Infatuation’s current No.1 is Chrissy’s Pizza in Greenpoint at 9.2 – a whole-pie-only counter on Nassau Avenue with nowhere to sit, which no awards body has touched. Beli’s users put Lucali first. F and F Pizzeria on Court Street shows up on three separate critics’ lists and zero award lists. A ranking tells you who showed up, not what is true.
Map: where the best pizza in NYC actually is
Four clusters do most of the work. Nolita holds Prince Street, Rubirosa and Lombardi’s inside three blocks. The Lower East Side has Una Pizza and Scarr’s five minutes apart on Orchard. North Brooklyn runs Lamonte Pizza and L’Industrie either side of Bedford Avenue. Everything else – Lucali, Di Fara, Emily, Roberta’s, Mama’s Too – is a deliberate trip.
Pins are numbered to match the table above – tap any pin for the order and directions.
Best pizza by the slice in NYC
A slice is the New York default: folded, eaten walking, gone in four bites. These seven counters are worth the detour, and the live pills show which are open as you read. Late-night stragglers cluster around the East Village and Nolita.
Lamonte Pizza Open now
The Verdict: the cheapest counter on this list and the newest, opened this summer by the people who have run the Lamonte bistro across the street since 2021. It is a Featured partner of ours, so weigh the recommendation accordingly – but the $4 cheese slice is a real $4, and the grandma squares are the reason to come rather than the round.
Order the Calabrian square. Thick, crisp at the edge where it meets the tray, spicy enough to want a drink after. Add the dollar of hot honey. The empanadas are the genuine outlier: no other slice counter in Williamsburg is making Argentinian beef and corn empanadas at $6, and they travel better than a slice if you are walking somewhere.
The Honest Caveat: closed Tuesdays, and their site posts a noon opening on Monday and Wednesday while the online-ordering window says 4pm those days. Call before a midday trip early in the week. It is a counter, not a room – for a table and a drink, the bistro is directly opposite.
Order online →
lamontepizza.com · Full profile on Happy Hour NYC · Drinks after, at Lamonte across the street
L’Industrie Pizzeria
The Verdict: the best slice in New York, and now the best slice in the country on paper too. Massimo Laveglia and Nick Baglivo took 50 Top Pizza’s USA slice title in May and Pizza Today’s Pizzeria of the Year six days ago. The burrata slice is the one everyone photographs – a thin, blistered, Neapolitan-leaning base that somehow holds a scoop of burrata and a drape of prosciutto without going to mush.
There are three shops now, not two: Williamsburg is the original, 104 Christopher Street covers the West Village, and 197 Grand Street in Little Italy opened in March 2026. Expect a line at all of them.
The Honest Caveat: L’Industrie publishes no hours and no prices anywhere on its own site, and the best third-party figures are two years old – so we are not printing either. Turn up hungry and flexible, or call the shop.
lindustriebk.com · Full profile on Happy Hour NYC · Williamsburg happy hour
Joe’s Pizza Open now
The Verdict: if you eat one slice in this city, eat it here. Joe Pozzuoli opened on Carmine Street in 1975 and the plain cheese is still the slice every other slice gets measured against. Nothing clever, no hot honey, no burrata – just the thing done right for fifty years by the same family.
The Local Move: order the whole pie. At $28 for eight slices it is the cheapest full pie on this page, and it comes out of the oven rather than off the warming shelf. Two minutes from here you are in the West Village happy hour run.
The Honest Caveat: Joe’s posts no hours on its own site, so the 3am and 4am windows are corroborated from listings rather than first-party – reliable, but not their word. Ignore any slice price you see online, including the $2.75 still floating around on review sites; check the board.
joespizzanyc.com · Full profile on Happy Hour NYC · Best bars in NYC
Mama’s Too Open now
The Verdict: proof you do not have to go downtown, and the strongest single slice on this list. In February, Time Out put Frank Tuttolomondo’s cacio e pepe square at No.1 in its ranking of the best pizzas in the world – not the city, the world. It deserves the attention: whipped mascarpone under aged mozzarella, pecorino and parmigiano over the top, cracked pepper, crisp base.
There are two shops now – the original at 106th and Broadway, which expanded into the storefront next door in 2025, and a second at 325 Bleecker Street in the West Village. The pepperoni square and the Angry Nonna are the two to order after the cacio e pepe.
The Honest Caveat: Mama’s Too publishes neither hours nor prices on its own site. The $7.75 and the noon-to-11pm come from West Side Rag and listings data, not the shop, and the two locations close an hour apart. Treat both as a guide.
mamastoo.com · Full profile on Happy Hour NYC · Upper West Side happy hour
Prince Street Pizza Open now
The Verdict: one order matters here and everybody knows it. The Spicy Spring is a Sicilian square under Fra Diavolo sauce, fresh mozzarella, pecorino and enough cup-and-char pepperoni to leave little pools of chilli oil across the whole slice. Crisp underneath, pillowy inside. It has been copied everywhere and beaten nowhere.
They opened a Brooklyn shop at 271 Smith Street in Carroll Gardens in April 2026, which is the first real relief the Nolita queue has had in a decade. In March the brand signed an expansion partnership aimed at national franchising – worth knowing, though the Prince Street shop is unchanged.
The Honest Caveat, and it is a correction to what this page said until today: Prince Street publishes no closing time anywhere first-hand. Not on its own site, not on its locations page – which has an “Our Hours” heading with nothing underneath it – and not on its ordering platforms, which show only an opening time. The 5am that follows this shop around the internet, including on this page, is not verifiable, and the Brooklyn opening-day coverage had that store running noon to midnight. Treat it as a normal-hours slice shop until someone posts otherwise. They publish no per-slice price either; the figures above are whole trays and rounds.
princestreetpizza.com · Full profile on Happy Hour NYC · Nolita happy hour
Scarr’s Pizza Open now
The Verdict: the most quietly serious slice downtown. Scarr Pimentel learned the trade at Lombardi’s, then did the thing almost no slice shop bothers with and started milling some of his own flour in the basement. You can taste it – the crust has actual depth rather than just structure.
The room is the other half of it: wood panelling, red booths, a deliberate 1980s pizzeria that manages not to feel like a set. Get the Original or the Hotboi, order a natural wine, stay longer than you meant to. Two minutes from the Lower East Side happy hour circuit.
The Honest Caveat: Scarr’s moved across the street to 35 Orchard in 2023 – if you have 22 Orchard saved anywhere, delete it. And while they sell by the slice in the shop, no slice price is published, so we are not printing one.
scarrspizza.com · Full profile on Happy Hour NYC · Best cocktail bars in NYC
Artichoke Basille’s Open now
The Verdict: not the best pizza in NYC and not trying to be. It is the best 2am decision in NYC, which is a different competition and one it wins outright. Francis Garcia and Sal Basille opened on East 14th in 2008 and the signature slice – thick, heavy, blanketed in a creamy artichoke and spinach dip – has been soaking up nights out ever since. Do not try to fold it.
The Local Move: the 5am close is only the East 14th original. Times Square and Bushwick run to 4am daily; MacDougal Street and Park Slope only reach 4am Thursday to Saturday and shut at midnight or 2am the rest of the week. Check which one you are walking to before you walk.
The Honest Caveat: no counter prices are published anywhere first-party, and the delivery-app numbers run high. The Chelsea, Financial District and Astoria shops are all permanently closed – ignore the stale listings still showing them. Handy after a night in the East Village.
artichokepizza.com · Full profile on Happy Hour NYC · Park Slope happy hour
Nuovo York Pizza Open now
The Verdict: not the best slice in New York, and it does not need to be. It is a clean $4 cheese slice on 9th Street that is still serving at half four in the morning, which is a genuinely useful thing to know and something no award list will ever tell you. Opened January 2024 in a shopfront that had sat empty since the end of 2022.
The owner, Atalay Mali, is a chemical engineer who runs pH tests on his dough and blends his own flour, and there is a whole page on his website about it. Whether any of that reaches the slice is a matter for you. What is not in doubt is the Sicilian: the squares are the better order here, and the $4.50 Herald Square cheese is the value pick on the board.
The Honest Caveat: their homepage advertises write-ups in Time Out and USA Today. Both are paid placements – the Time Out page is bylined “in partnership with Nuovo York Pizza” and the USA Today link sits under contributor content. It does not make the pizza worse. It does mean you should not read those as reviews, and we are not counting them as ones.
nuovoyorkpizza.com · East Village restaurants · East Village happy hour
Louie and Ernie’s
The Verdict: the best pizza in the Bronx and the only reason most Manhattanites will ever get off at Buhre Avenue. Thin, blistered, and carrying more fresh garlic than is strictly reasonable – ask for extra and they will not blink. At $4.25 it is also the cheapest slice on this page after Lamonte’s and Nuovo York’s.
The Local Move: get the white slice. The plain is the everyday order and it is very good, but the ricotta and garlic white at $6.25 is the one people take the trip for. They also run a real outdoor patio, open daily from 11am to 8.30pm weather permitting, which is more than most slice counters in this city can say.
The Honest Caveat: they publish a rolling “open today” line rather than a weekly schedule, so we are printing the patio hours they do publish and nothing more. Call before a late trip – the kitchen goes down well before dinner service ends elsewhere in the city.
louieanderniespizza.com · More in the Bronx · Woodlawn happy hour
Mano’s Pizzeria Open now
The Verdict: the only Queens shop that keeps landing on the national slice list, three editions in a row, and the only one on this page. A five-day fermented dough, thin and properly crackly, which is a slightly fancier version of the classic New York slice rather than a departure from it.
They are honest about the trajectory, too: they publish their own ranking history on their site, including the fact that they have slipped from No.4 to No.8 to No.11 as more shops got entered. That is a more useful signal than most award badges, because it tells you the list got bigger, not that the pizza got worse.
The Honest Caveat: Mano’s publishes no prices on its own site, and the figures on its Toast page are pre-tax – every one of them is a round menu price divided by 8.875 per cent. So we are printing no numbers here rather than a set that will be wrong at the register. Expect a normal Queens slice price.
L and B Spumoni Gardens Open now
The Verdict: the reference square. Thick, focaccia-ish underneath, sauce laid over the cheese rather than under it, and $4.50 a slice at a counter the Barbati family have run for four generations. If you only eat one Sicilian square in New York, the argument is between this and Mama’s Too, and they are not really the same food.
The Local Move: eat it outside at the tables, get the spumoni afterwards – the name is not decoration, they have been making it since 1939 – and do not order a round pie unless someone at the table insists. The round is fine. Nobody takes the D train to Gravesend for the round.
The Honest Caveat: after more than eighty years as a one-address institution they opened a second shop in 2025, at 46 Old Fulton Street in DUMBO. It is much easier to reach and it is not the same room. Their own site files the original under Bensonhurst; everyone else calls it Gravesend. It is on the border and both are defensible.
spumonigardens.com · More in Brooklyn · Coney Island food guide
Paulie Gee’s Slice Shop Open now
The Verdict: the rare New York slice counter you can actually sit down in. There is a back room, there is beer and wine, there is a television, and it runs to 1am on Friday and Saturday, which most of Greenpoint does not. The vegan lineup is the deepest of any pizzeria in this guide and it is not an afterthought.
The Honest Caveat, and it is a big one: the original Paulie Gee’s is gone. The wood-fired flagship at 60 Greenpoint Avenue reopened on 30 April 2026 as Me and Paul’s, a dive bar that still serves the Neapolitan-style pies until 2am seven nights a week. Same pizza, different room, different name. If you have an old bookmark for Paulie Gee’s Greenpoint, that is why it looks wrong. The Slice Shop at 110 Franklin is untouched.
They publish whole-pie prices and no slice prices, so the slice figures floating around on review sites are years old and we are not repeating them. A cheese slice here is not going to surprise you.
pauliegee.com · Greenpoint restaurants · Greenpoint happy hour
Best whole-pie pizza in NYC
The other kind of pizza night: a table, a reservation or a wait, and a pie you ordered on purpose. These seven are worth the planning. Three of them are in Brooklyn, and two of those are a genuine trip – see the wider Brooklyn guide if you are making a night of it.
Una Pizza Napoletana Open now
The Verdict: the best pizza in NYC if you are ordering a whole pie, and 50 Top Pizza has said so five years running – the 2026 USA list, published in May, put Anthony Mangieri at No.1 again. The menu is almost nothing: a handful of naturally leavened, wood-fired pies, made a few at a time, one per person, no sharing.
Get the margherita, or get the bianca and dip the crust in the pool of olive oil that gathers in the middle. Reservations open two weeks ahead at 9am on OpenTable and go fast; the maximum party is four. Walk-ins are drinks and snacks only.
The Honest Caveat: this is a $40-a-pie pilgrimage three nights a week with a hard 9:45pm last seating, and Una Pizza publishes an opening time but never a closing one. It is not a casual Tuesday. Plan it or skip it.
unapizza.com · Full profile on Happy Hour NYC · Best date-night restaurants
Lucali Open now
The Verdict: the most single-minded room in New York pizza. Mark Iacono’s menu is two things, pizza and calzones, and the pie is rolled paper-thin, baked in a wood oven and finished with basil torn over the top as it comes out. Cash only, BYOB, no reservations, candlelight.
The Local Move: the waitlist opens at 4pm, an hour before the doors. Send one person to put a name down at 4 while everyone else goes to buy wine – that hour is the whole game. Plenty of places online still say 5pm; the shop’s own site says 4pm twice.
The Honest Caveat: it is cash, it is a wait, and there is no version of Lucali that works as a spontaneous decision. If you want the same idea without the queue, it is also one of the better BYOB restaurants in NYC.
lucali.com · Full profile on Happy Hour NYC · Carroll Gardens happy hour
Di Fara
The Verdict: still worth the ride out to Avenue J. For decades Dom DeMarco made every pie in this corner shop himself and finished each one with basil cut from his own plants with scissors. He died in 2022; his family kept the room, the double-zero flour, the buffalo mozzarella and the hand-cut pepperoni. The square is the cult order.
The lines are shorter than they were in the pilgrimage years, which makes the trip easier to justify than it used to be. Take the Q to Avenue J and you are outside the door.
The Honest Caveat: three sources give three different sets of hours and Di Fara publishes none, so we are not printing any – call before you travel, and know the shop has a long history of unannounced closing days. The South Street Seaport outpost is permanently closed, and the frozen supermarket line and the Wonder delivery menu are licensing, not this room.
difarapizzany.com · Full profile on Happy Hour NYC · More in Brooklyn
Rubirosa Open now
The Verdict: a full Italian restaurant where the pizza is why people wait an hour. The crust is crackery and tissue-thin, the Staten Island style the Pappalardo family brought over, and the two to order are the vodka and the Tie Dye, which layers vodka sauce and pesto across the same pie. The gluten-free version is unusually good.
Put your name in and go have a drink nearby – you are three minutes from most of Nolita and five from SoHo.
The Honest Caveat: the prices above are from their own online-ordering menu, because the printed menu on their site carries none – the dine-in number may differ. The Hamptons spin-off became permanent this May, which has done nothing to shorten the Mulberry Street wait.
rubirosanyc.com · Full profile on Happy Hour NYC · Best restaurants in NYC
Roberta’s Open now
The Verdict: the pizza that put Bushwick on the map, and still the best blistered, charred, wood-fired pie in north Brooklyn. The Bee Sting – soppressata, chilli and a drizzle of honey – is the order to beat. Weekends are loud and the wait runs long; a weekday lunch gets you the room almost to yourself.
It slots neatly into an evening out here. The Bushwick happy hour spots are a few blocks over in every direction.
The Honest Caveat: correct a myth we have seen everywhere, including on this page previously – Roberta’s is not a late-night option. Their own site says 10pm six nights a week, 11pm on Saturday. They also publish no prices at all, so the Bee Sting figure you see quoted elsewhere is not from them. The Park Avenue outpost is permanently closed.
robertaspizza.com · Full profile on Happy Hour NYC · Bushwick happy hour
Emily Open now
The Verdict: Matt and Emily Hyland’s Clinton Hill original does a crisp, rich pie somewhere between New York and Detroit, and then hands you one of the best burgers in the city on a pretzel bun. Get a pizza and split the Emmy Burger – that is the whole point of coming here rather than to a straight pizzeria.
There is a West Village outpost at 35 Downing Street with a different, slightly cheaper menu and much longer hours, and the sibling Emmy Squared runs five NYC locations if you want the Detroit square without the trip.
The Honest Caveat: no weekday lunch in Clinton Hill – dinner starts at 5pm Monday to Friday. And the Colony pizza that shows up in a lot of Emily write-ups, this one included until today, is not on either menu. We cut it rather than keep repeating it.
pizzalovesemily.com · Full profile on Happy Hour NYC · West Village happy hour
Lombardi’s Open now
The Verdict: America’s first licensed pizzeria, and the coal oven is not a gimmick – it gives the crust a char and a smokiness a gas deck cannot fake. Order the clam pie if you want to order like someone who has been before; the margherita if you want the thing the place is famous for.
It is a sit-down room in the middle of Nolita, which makes it the easiest of the historic spots to actually build a downtown afternoon around.
The Honest Caveat: Lombardi’s publishes a full menu with no prices on it anywhere, so we are not quoting any. On payment, assume cash. Lombardi’s publishes no policy of its own, but every listing that states one – its OpenTable page, its own third-party menu host, Time Out – says cash only, and the card payments we found all run through delivery apps rather than the register. We had that the other way round here until today. Bring cash. The original 30 Spring Street room, whose coal oven was destroyed in 2022, is gone; 32 Spring is the one.
firstpizza.com · Full profile on Happy Hour NYC · More in Manhattan
John’s of Bleecker Street Open now
The Verdict: worth it, and the best-value whole pie in Manhattan at $22. An 850-degree coal oven that has been running on this block since the early 1930s, wooden booths carved up by eighty years of customers, tin ceilings, and a thin, charred, tomato-forward pie that has aged better than almost anything else from that era. Dave Portnoy has it at 9.3.
The Honest Caveat: no slices. Ever. Their menu has never listed one and it is not going to start. A 14-inch is billed on their own menu as serving one to two people, so order accordingly – a lot of first-timers turn up expecting a counter and leave confused. Walk-ins only, no reservations, and there is a line at peak.
One real oddity: four of their specialty pies are currently priced higher at 14 inches than at 16 on their own printed menu – the Veggie Special, Jimmy Gambino, Meat-Lovers and the “Fifty”. That is a mistake nobody has caught, so ask at the counter before you order one of those four. The Original and the Margherita, the two you actually want, are priced the right way round.
johnsofbleecker.com · Greenwich Village restaurants · Greenwich Village happy hour
Joe and Pat’s Open now
The Verdict: $15 for a 14-inch cheese pie is not a typo, and this is not a cheap-because-it-is-bad pizza. The crust is cracker-thin, the cheese and sauce run almost to the edge, and the vodka pie is the order people take the ferry for. Cheapest whole pie on this entire page by nine dollars.
The Local Move: it is a proper sit-down red-sauce restaurant, not a counter – but there is a slice window at the entrance if all you want is one and out. Order the vodka. If you are two people and cannot decide, get the 16-inch half-and-half for $18 and stop overthinking it.
The Honest Caveat: there is a second Joe and Pat’s at 168 First Avenue in the East Village, and it takes reservations on OpenTable, which the original does not. It posts its menu as photographs rather than text, so we cannot confirm the Manhattan prices match Victory Boulevard – assume they do not.
joeandpatsny.com · Staten Island happy hour · More on Staten Island
Denino’s Open now
The Verdict: the Staten Island bar pie is a real style – thin, crisp all the way through, well-done by default, almost no rim – and Denino’s has been making it in Port Richmond since 1937. The MacDougal Street room is the only place in Manhattan you can eat the actual recipe without a boat and a bus.
The Local Move: order it well done even though it already is, and get the clam. It is $33 and it is the pie the family put “voted No.1 in NYC” next to on their own menu, which is either confidence or cheek and works out fine either way.
The Honest Caveat: closed Mondays in the Village, and the Port Richmond original publishes no weekly hours at all – its own ordering page shows 11am to 10.30pm and nothing more official exists. Call before crossing.
deninosgreenwichvillage.com · Greenwich Village restaurants · More on Staten Island
Ops Open now
The Verdict: the highest-ranked New York pizzeria on this page after Una Pizza Napoletana, and the only one where the wine is the reason to go. Naturally leavened sourdough, wood-fired, square-cut tavern specials alongside the rounds, and a natural-wine list that made Ops a James Beard semifinalist for Outstanding Wine Program.
There are two now. The Bushwick original on Himrod Street is the one people mean; the East Village room at 176 Second Avenue opened in June 2025 in the old Numero 28 space, kept the wood oven, and is the easier reservation. Both are on Resy and both are dinner-first – nothing before 5pm on a weekday.
The Honest Caveat: no slices, and Ops publishes no prices in any form we can read, so we are printing none. Budget like a sit-down restaurant rather than a pizzeria, because that is what it is.
Totonno’s Open now
The Verdict: go now, honestly. Totonno’s has been firing the same coal oven since 1924 and it is the oldest continuously family-run pizzeria in the country, but it is currently open about eleven hours a week, takeout only, with the chairs stacked on the tables. The third generation has been publicly looking for a buyer since December 2025 – their second attempt, after a 2024 sale fell through – on condition that whoever takes it keeps the method and the menu.
The disaster ledger is on their own website: a fire in 1997 that closed them for three months, a worse one in 2009 that closed them for eleven, and Sandy in 2012 for another five. It has reopened every single time. That is the whole reason people still drive to Neptune Avenue on a Saturday.
The Honest Caveat: they publish no prices and no payment policy, and the cash-only reputation this place carries is not something we could confirm first-hand either way. Bring cash, turn up before five, and do not plan a sit-down dinner around it.
totonnosconeyisland.com · Coney Island food guide · Coney Island happy hour
The famous ones, and what you are actually getting
Four names turn up in every tourist guide to New York pizza. Two are worth the trip. Two are worth understanding before you join the line. Tourist math is not local math, so here is the honest read on each.
John’s of Bleecker Street – worth it. A coal oven that has been on the same Village block since the early 1930s and a $22 pie, which is the best value of any sit-down pizzeria in Manhattan. The rule that catches people: no slices, ever. A 14-inch is billed for one to two people. Full write-up above.
Lombardi’s – worth it, with a warning. America’s first licensed pizzeria, 1905, coal-fired, and the original margherita is fairly priced for Spring Street. But Lombardi’s does not take cards at the table. Their reservation listings and their own third-party menus all say cash only, and plastic works only through delivery apps. Bring cash or you will be walking to an ATM on Mott Street mid-meal.
Prince Street Pizza – get the square, skip the queue. The Spicy Spring is a genuinely excellent pepperoni square. It is also $47.84 for a whole one, and the line on Prince Street is regularly longer than the pizza is good. The move is the Carroll Gardens shop at 271 Smith Street, open since April 2026, selling the same square with a fraction of the wait. One correction while we are here: Prince Street publishes no closing time anywhere first-hand, so the 5am you have read attached to it – including on this page until today – is not something anybody can actually verify. The 5am on this page now belongs to Artichoke, which does publish it.
Artichoke Basille’s – a 4am food, not a dinner. The spinach and artichoke slice is heavy, molten, and exactly right at the end of a night out. It is not what you eat at 7pm on a Tuesday, and pretending otherwise is how it got its reputation. Worth knowing before you walk: three of their New York storefronts have closed – Chelsea, the Financial District, and now Astoria. The East Village original at 321 East 14th Street runs to 5am daily, which is the latest published closing time on this page.
The Local Move: none of the four is where a New Yorker goes on an ordinary Tuesday. That is L’Industrie, Mama’s Too, Joe’s, Louie and Ernie’s if you are in the Bronx, or whichever counter is nearest the apartment. The famous four are for when you have a visitor and a reason – and two of them are, genuinely, very good.
Best pizza in NYC: FAQ
What is the best pizza in NYC right now?
For a whole pie, Una Pizza Napoletana on Orchard Street. 50 Top Pizza named it the No.1 pizzeria in the United States in May 2026, the fifth year running, and pies run $36 to $44. For a slice, L’Industrie in Williamsburg took the same list’s best-slice-in-America title and was named Pizza Today’s Pizzeria of the Year in August 2026. Mama’s Too on the Upper West Side has the single most decorated slice in the city: Time Out ranked its cacio e pepe square the best pizza in the world in February 2026.
Where is the best pizza by the slice in NYC?
L’Industrie in Williamsburg for the burrata slice, Joe’s on Carmine Street for the plain New York fold, and Mama’s Too on the Upper West Side for the cacio e pepe square. For a pepperoni square it is Prince Street Pizza in Nolita, and for the cheapest good slice on this list it is Lamonte Pizza on Driggs Avenue in Williamsburg, at $4 for cheese and $5 for everything else.
What is the best late-night pizza in NYC?
Artichoke Basille’s on East 14th Street publishes a 5am close seven nights a week, which makes it the latest counter here. Nuovo York Pizza on East 9th Street is next, at 3am Sunday to Thursday and 4.30am on Friday and Saturday, and its cheese slice is $4. Joe’s on Carmine Street is the most reliable late slice downtown, posted at 3am most nights and 4am at weekends, though Joe’s publishes no hours of its own. Paulie Gee’s Slice Shop in Greenpoint runs to 1am Friday and Saturday, and Scarr’s to 12.30am Thursday to Saturday. Prince Street Pizza is often listed at 5am – it publishes no closing time at all, so we no longer repeat that.
What is the best pizza in Williamsburg?
L’Industrie on South 2nd Street, which holds two national titles in 2026 and is the best slice in the city, never mind the neighborhood. The newer option is Lamonte Pizza at 558 Driggs Avenue, a Featured partner of Happy Hour NYC, which opened this summer across the street from the Lamonte bistro and sells NY rounds at $4 to $5, Classic and Calabrian grandma squares, and Argentinian empanadas at $6. Both are within a few minutes of the Bedford Avenue L.
What pizza is New York City famous for?
The thin, foldable slice – large, pliable, eaten walking – is the city’s signature, and Joe’s on Carmine Street is where it is done most plainly and best. New York also lays claim to the coal-oven pie, which Lombardi’s has been baking since 1905, to wood-fired Neapolitan at the standard Una Pizza Napoletana sets, and to the Sicilian square, which Prince Street Pizza and Mama’s Too have pushed furthest.
Do you need a reservation for the best pizza in NYC?
Mostly no. Joe’s, L’Industrie, Scarr’s, Prince Street, Artichoke, Mama’s Too and Lamonte Pizza are all walk-up counters. Lucali and Rubirosa run same-day waitlists, and at Lucali the list opens at 4pm, an hour before the doors, so send someone early. Una Pizza Napoletana is the real exception: it is reservation-only, bookings open two weeks ahead at 9am on OpenTable, and the maximum party size is four.
What are the top 5 pizzerias in NYC?
Ours, ranked on what they have actually won and what they actually cost: L’Industrie in Williamsburg for the slice, Una Pizza Napoletana on the Lower East Side for the whole pie, Lucali in Carroll Gardens for the night out, Mama’s Too on the Upper West Side for the square, and Di Fara in Midwood for the old guard. Between those five they hold the No.1 pizzeria in America, the No.1 slice in America, the best pizza in the world by Time Out’s count, and the highest One Bite score ever given in New York.
What is considered the best pizza in New York?
By the count of awards, Una Pizza Napoletana on Orchard Street. 50 Top Pizza has named it the No.1 pizzeria in the United States every year since 2022, and it was joint No.1 in the world in 2025. For a slice rather than a whole pie it is L’Industrie in Williamsburg, which took the same list’s best-slice-in-America title in May 2026 and Pizza Today’s Pizzeria of the Year in August 2026. Ask a New Yorker instead of a panel and you will usually get Lucali, Di Fara, or whichever counter is closest to their apartment.
What is the famous pizza place in New York City?
Lombardi’s on Spring Street, opened in 1905 and generally credited as the first licensed pizzeria in America – bring cash, they do not take cards at the table. John’s of Bleecker Street has run its coal oven on the same Greenwich Village block since the early 1930s and sells whole pies only, never slices. Joe’s on Carmine Street is the famous slice. Totonno’s in Coney Island has been at it since 1924, though it is now open weekends only, noon to 5.30pm, takeout only.
Which NYC pizza won best in the world?
There are two current answers and they are both defensible. Una Pizza Napoletana was joint No.1 pizzeria in the world on 50 Top Pizza’s 2025 global list, tied with I Masanielli in Caserta; the 2026 world list is announced in Naples in September. And in February 2026 Time Out named a single slice the best pizza on the planet – the $7.75 cacio e pepe square at Mama’s Too on the Upper West Side. One is a restaurant award and the other is a dish award, which is why you see both quoted as “best in the world”.
What is Dave Portnoy’s highest rated pizza in NYC?
Di Fara in Midwood, Brooklyn, at 9.4 – the highest score he has given any New York pizzeria. John’s of Bleecker Street, Lucali, Luigi’s in Sunset Park and Angelo’s Coal Oven all sit at 9.3. Worth knowing: the One Bite app carries two numbers, and by the community score rather than Portnoy’s own, Lucali leads New York. No pizzeria in the city has ever taken a 10 from him.
Where is the best pizza in the Bronx, Queens and Staten Island?
Louie and Ernie’s on Crosby Avenue in Pelham Bay for the Bronx – a $4.25 slice with more fresh garlic than is strictly reasonable. Mano’s in Ridgewood for Queens, which 50 Top Pizza ranked the No.11 slice in the country in 2026. Joe and Pat’s on Victory Boulevard for Staten Island, where a 14-inch cheese pie is $15, the cheapest whole pie on this page. Denino’s in Port Richmond is the other Staten Island answer, and it has a Greenwich Village outpost if you would rather skip the ferry.
Last updated: August 2026. All 14 of these were re-checked against their own websites and ordering platforms on 9 August 2026, and anything we could not verify first-hand was cut rather than guessed – which is why several entries here carry no price. Menus and hours still change; confirm with the shop before you go. Spot something out of date? Let us know.
