Meat Per Person Calculator
Calculate how much raw meat to buy for any number of guests.
Results
Planning meat for a gathering means accounting for cooking shrinkage. Most people plan 170-225g (6-8 oz) of cooked meat per person for a main course, but you need to buy more raw weight to account for the 20-45% loss during cooking. This calculator does the math for any meat type and guest count.
Explore all our meat yield calculator tools, or browse the full cooking hub.
Frequently asked questions
For 20 people at 200g cooked each, you need about 5.33 kg (11.7 lb) of raw chicken breast. Chicken breast has a 75% yield.
A whole turkey yields about 55% cooked meat. For 12 guests at 200g each, you need about 4.36 kg (9.6 lb) raw, so a 10-12 pound turkey is ideal.
Pork roast yields about 60% cooked weight. For 30 people at 200g each, you need 10 kg (22 lb) of raw pork shoulder.
Plan for 225-340g (8-12 oz) of raw steak per person. After cooking, a 340g steak yields about 238g (8.4 oz) of cooked meat.
Fish fillets retain about 85% of their raw weight. Plan for 170-200g (6-7 oz) raw per person for a generous cooked portion.