Those who want to use charcoal should go for a wood-fired oven and introduce a few briquettes to a mostly wood-based fire. BBQ pizza ovens Honestly, get an Ooni for yourself, and your life will absolutely improve (since the pizza will be flowing year-round), but give an Ooni as a gift, and you’re the GOAT. First, you should compare the dimensions of the oven you're interested in with the size of your barbecue – you won't get far if your grill isn't big enough for the oven to sit snugly. A blend of wood fired logs or pellets along with a few briquettes is the only workable way to introduce charcoal to cooking with pizza. As such, you won't find any 'charcoal-only' ovens for sale.

Propane burns hotter than butane and is therefore the preferred gas for use with pizza ovens. The majority are propane-only, but some work with butane too. Wood-fired pizza ovens We use the same methods, dough, sauce and toppings to prepare and cook each pizza to keep our tests as fair as possible. Pizza cutter A good pizza cutter is key for slicing up and serving your pizza. The larger the circular blade, the better. This prevents the pizza cutter from moving your toppings around and makes it easier to cut through extra-puffy pizza crusts. In each pizza oven, we cook three of the most popular types of pizza – margherita, pepperoni and veggie – to see what results we get when cooking with a variety of textures and flavours. We select the UK's bestselling pizza ovens and have cooked more than 80 pizzas to find out which are the easiest to use and which cook the best food.

They do, however, usually produce the tastiest pizza, as the wood smoke infuses additional flavours into the crust and base. Rotate it regularly The strongest heat usually comes from one direction, especially in gas and wood-fired ovens. You'll want to rotate the pizza a few times during cooking to make sure it cooks evenly. Once every 30 seconds is a good rule of thumb, but keep an eye on it while it cooks. Sustainably sourced wood logs are available. Where possible, we'd suggest buying these for a reduced environmental impact. Charcoal pizza ovens This can result in pizzas with very crispy bases and underdone tops. You might need to use a pizza peel to hold your pizza aloft in the oven for a while to help the top catch up with how well done the base is. Electric pizza ovens

When getting the flames going, heating the oven to temperature and cooking pizzas, we note any design elements or features that impact our cooking experience. Time to reach cooking temperature

Pizza stone These are the cooking surface and are usually made from moisture-absorbent cordierite. They're fantastic for retaining heat and are key for crisping up the base of your pizza. Most ovens come with a pizza stone included. Pizza ovens are often billed as portable, so we weigh them and carry them a short distance, taking bulkiness and comfort into account. Try other dishes too Pizza isn't the only thing these ovens are good for. If you have cookware that can handle the heat, there are endless possibilities – try roasting a joints of meat, steaming a pot of mussels or even baking bread.