Bread & Sourdough Hydration Calculator

Most beginner-friendly sourdough recipes sit around 65–70% hydration — wet enough for a good open crumb, but manageable to shape without a lot of experience handling sticky dough.

Yes. A typical starter maintained at 100% hydration is half flour and half water by weight, so both halves should be added into your total flour and total water before calculating the overall percentage.

Flour protein content, how long the dough has been mixed, and ambient humidity all affect how wet a dough feels at a given hydration — whole wheat and rye flours in particular absorb water differently than white bread flour.