How Long to Brine a Turkey: Hours by Weight

Brining time by turkey weight

The wet column is 0.75 to 1 hour per pound at 5% salt, capped at 24 hours. The salt is for the water a brining bag needs to cover the bird: 1 gallon under 14 lb, 1.5 gallons from 14 to 20 lb, 2 gallons above. The dry column is 3 g of salt per pound rubbed on, and the time is the same for every size because the salt is scaled to the bird, not the clock.

Turkey	Wet brine	Salt at 5%, water	Dry brine	Salt rubbed on
8 lb	6 to 8 h	189 g, 1 1/2 cups DC, 1 gal	24 to 72 h	24 g, 3 tbsp DC
10 lb	8 to 10 h	189 g, 1 1/2 cups DC, 1 gal	24 to 72 h	30 g, 3 1/2 tbsp DC
12 lb	9 to 12 h	189 g, 1 1/2 cups DC, 1 gal	24 to 72 h	36 g, 4 1/2 tbsp DC
14 lb	11 to 14 h	284 g, 2 cups DC, 1.5 gal	24 to 72 h	42 g, 5 tbsp DC
15 lb	11 to 15 h	284 g, 2 cups DC, 1.5 gal	24 to 72 h	45 g, 5 1/2 tbsp DC
16 lb	12 to 16 h	284 g, 2 cups DC, 1.5 gal	24 to 72 h	48 g, 5 1/2 tbsp DC
18 lb	14 to 18 h	284 g, 2 cups DC, 1.5 gal	24 to 72 h	54 g, 6 1/2 tbsp DC
20 lb	15 to 20 h	284 g, 2 cups DC, 1.5 gal	24 to 72 h	60 g, 7 tbsp DC
22 lb	17 to 22 h	379 g, 2 3/4 cups DC, 2 gal	24 to 72 h	66 g, 8 tbsp DC
24 lb	18 to 24 h	379 g, 2 3/4 cups DC, 2 gal	24 to 72 h	72 g, 8 1/2 tbsp DC

Sources for the figures: the 1 hour per pound wet rule and the 24-hour ceiling follow Morton's brining guide (1 cup Morton kosher per gallon for 4 to 5 hours, 1/2 cup overnight or up to 14 hours) and Diamond Crystal's basic turkey brine (1 cup per gallon, overnight); 5% is the middle of those two ratios. The dry brine amount is America's Test Kitchen's salted turkey (5 tablespoons of Diamond Crystal for a 12 to 14 lb bird, refrigerated 24 to 48 hours). The 40°F refrigeration rule is USDA FSIS. DC is Diamond Crystal kosher, 134 g per cup and 8.4 g per tablespoon from its label; for Morton kosher use about 58% of the volume, for table salt about 47%. Cups are rounded to the nearest quarter, tablespoons to the nearest half; the grams are the figure to use.

Check your own bird

Enter the weight and get the hours and the salt for a wet or dry brine. It runs the same formula as the turkey brine calculator, which also sets the water, the brine strength, and a dinner-day timeline.

Your turkey

Turkey weight

Thawed, without giblets. 4 to 30 lb (1.8 to 13.6 kg).

Brine type

Salt you have

The grams stay the same whichever you pick; only the cups change.

14 lb turkey, 5% wet brine

11 to 14 hours

in the fridge, never more than 24

Salt: 284 g (about 2 cups Diamond Crystal)
Water: 1.5 gal (5.7 L)

Dissolve the salt, chill the brine to 40°F or below, then submerge the bird.

Open the full turkey brine calculator for the strength, sugar, and the dinner-day timeline.

Wet brine vs dry brine timing

A wet brine is fast because the meat sits in salt water and the salt moves in from every side at once. At 5% the timing rule is about 1 hour per pound, with 0.75 hour per pound as the low end for a lighter result. Morton's guide puts a 1 cup per gallon brine (6%) at 4 to 5 hours and a 1/2 cup per gallon brine (3%) overnight or up to 14 hours, which brackets the 5% row in the table above: stronger brines finish sooner. Diamond Crystal's 1 cup per gallon (3.5%) goes overnight.

A dry brine is slower because it has to make its own liquid. The salt on the skin pulls moisture out of the meat, dissolves in it, and that concentrated brine is drawn back in over the next day. America's Test Kitchen's salted turkey rests 24 to 48 hours; the range on this site runs to 72 hours because the last day dries the skin without adding salt. Under 24 hours the breast is not seasoned through.

Which to choose is a separate question, covered in wet brine vs dry brine. In short: wet for the moistest meat and the least planning, dry for crisper skin and no container.

Why 24 hours is the limit

A wet brine never reaches a stopping point on its own. A 5% brine is far saltier than the meat, so salt keeps moving in for as long as the bird sits there, and the proteins in the outer layer keep unwinding in the salt water. Up to about a day that reads as juicy and seasoned. Past a day the outer breast goes soft and spongy and the whole bird tastes salty rather than seasoned. None of the published guides goes past a day: Morton stops at 14 hours, America's Test Kitchen's brining chart at 12, and USDA FSIS says not to brine longer than two days. 24 hours is this site's ceiling, and it is the limit in the brining time calculator for any wet brine on this site.

The other half of the limit is temperature. USDA FSIS puts raw poultry at 40°F (4°C) or below at all times, so the brine has to be chilled before the bird goes in and the container has to sit in the fridge or in a cooler with ice around it, checked with a thermometer. A bird that spends its brining time above 40°F is a food-safety problem before it is a texture problem.

A dry brine is self-limiting. There are only 3 g of salt per pound on the bird, so once it has all moved in, nothing more can happen except drying. That is why the dry range can run three times longer than the wet one.

Timing around thawing

The brine clock starts when the turkey is fully thawed. Salt does not move into frozen meat, so a bird that goes into the brine still icy in the middle comes out seasoned on the outside and bland at the bone. Refrigerator thawing takes 24 hours for every 4 to 5 lb per foodsafety.gov: 1 to 3 days for 4 to 12 lb, 3 to 4 days for 12 to 16 lb, 4 to 5 days for 16 to 20 lb, and 5 to 6 days for 20 to 24 lb.

Add the two together and work back from dinner. A frozen 14 lb turkey for a Thursday 3 pm dinner: it roasts about 3 3/4 hours (USDA FSIS chart at 325°F) plus a 30-minute rest, so it goes in the oven around 10:45 am. A 14-hour wet brine starts Wednesday evening. Four days of thawing before that means the bird moves from the freezer to the fridge on Saturday. The turkey thawing time calculator does this arithmetic for any weight and dinner time, and the turkey brine calculator builds the whole timeline.

A thawed turkey keeps 1 to 2 days in the refrigerator (USDA FSIS), and the brine hours count against that window, so do not thaw early and then let the bird wait.

What if you run short of time

Half the hours: a wet brine at half the table time still seasons the outer inch of meat, which is where most of the flavor lands. It is worth doing. Do not raise the strength above 6% to compensate; a stronger brine seasons the outside faster and leaves the center the same.
Under 6 hours wet: switch to a dry brine on the breast only, or skip the brine and salt the bird well before roasting. Salting under the skin an hour ahead does more than a 2-hour dip.
Dry brine with only 12 hours: it will not season the breast through, but the skin will dry and crisp. Use it for the skin and pass a little extra salt at the table.
Frozen and short on days: thaw in cold water at 30 minutes per pound with the water changed every 30 minutes (foodsafety.gov), then cook right away. That method leaves no time to brine; season the bird as it goes in the oven instead. A turkey can also be roasted from frozen, unbrined, at about 50% longer than the chart time (USDA FSIS).

Enhanced and self-basting birds

Check the label before you plan any hours. A turkey marked enhanced, self-basting, basted, or containing up to X% of a solution has already been injected with salt water at the plant, and a kosher turkey has been salted as part of koshering. Morton's guide says outright not to brine meat that has been basted, enhanced, marinated, or classified as kosher, and America's Test Kitchen says the same for its salted turkey. Brining one of these for the full time gives you a salty bird. If you want the crisp skin a dry brine gives, leave an enhanced bird uncovered on a rack in the fridge for 24 hours with no salt; the drying does that part of the job.

Turkey breast and parts

The per-pound rule was built for a whole bird, where the brine has to reach the thigh through a thick layer. A turkey breast is thinner for its weight, so it brines faster: America's Test Kitchen's brining chart gives a turkey breast 3 to 6 hours wet, and its salting chart 6 to 24 hours dry. A 6 lb bone-in breast sits at the top of that wet range, 5 to 6 hours, which is what the turkey brine calculator returns for it; a boneless breast of the same weight is done at the low end because the salt reaches the middle from both sides. Stop early rather than late with parts; a breast that brines too long turns hammy.

Legs, thighs, and wings have no published turkey-specific row. The nearest figures are the chicken-pieces lines: 30 minutes to 1 hour wet on America's Test Kitchen's chart (Destination BBQ runs breasts to 2 hours) and 6 to 24 hours dry on the salting chart; turkey pieces are thicker, so use the top of those ranges. The brining time calculator holds every cut and sizes the hours by thickness rather than by weight.

Times for the common sizes

The rows people search for most, pulled from the table with the arithmetic shown. Wet figures are for a 5% brine in the default water; dry figures are 3 g of salt per pound.

How long to brine a 12 lb turkey

Wet: 9 to 12 hours, with 189 g of salt (about 1 1/2 cups Diamond Crystal) in 1 gallon of water. Dry: 24 to 72 hours with 36 g of salt (about 4 1/2 tablespoons Diamond Crystal). A 12 lb bird is the easy case: in the brine after dinner, out before lunch.

How long to brine a 14 lb turkey

Wet: 11 to 14 hours, with 284 g of salt (about 2 cups Diamond Crystal) in 1.5 gallons of water. Dry: 24 to 72 hours with 42 g of salt (about 5 tablespoons), which is the America's Test Kitchen amount for this size.

How long to brine a 15 lb turkey

Wet: 11 to 15 hours, with 284 g of salt in 1.5 gallons. Dry: 24 to 72 hours with 45 g of salt (about 5 1/2 tablespoons Diamond Crystal). Into the brine at 6 pm, out between 5 and 9 the next morning.

How long to brine a 16 lb turkey

Wet: 12 to 16 hours, with 284 g of salt in 1.5 gallons. Dry: 24 to 72 hours with 48 g of salt (about 5 1/2 tablespoons). An overnight wet brine of 12 hours is the low end here, not the middle.

How long to brine an 18 lb turkey

Wet: 14 to 18 hours, with 284 g of salt in 1.5 gallons. Dry: 24 to 72 hours with 54 g of salt (about 6 1/2 tablespoons). Wet-brining an 18 lb bird means starting in the afternoon the day before.

How long to brine a 20 lb turkey

Wet: 15 to 20 hours, with 284 g of salt in 1.5 gallons (raise the water to 2 gallons if the bag needs it, and the salt to 379 g with it). Dry: 24 to 72 hours with 60 g of salt (about 7 tablespoons Diamond Crystal). At this size a wet brine runs close to the 24-hour ceiling, and a dry brine is easier to fit in the fridge.

How long to brine a 22 to 24 lb turkey

Wet: 17 to 22 hours for 22 lb and 18 to 24 hours for 24 lb, with 379 g of salt (about 2 3/4 cups Diamond Crystal) in 2 gallons. Dry: 24 to 72 hours with 66 to 72 g of salt (8 to 8 1/2 tablespoons). Above 24 lb the wet time is capped at 24 hours whatever the weight, and above 30 lb two smaller birds brine, thaw, and roast more evenly than one.

What you'll need

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Kitchen scale in grams. The table is written in grams because a cup of Diamond Crystal, Morton, and table salt are three different amounts.
Brining bag, 2 gallon or larger, set inside a roasting pan. Least water, least fridge space.
Instant-read thermometer for 165°F in the breast and thigh, and for checking a cooler stays at 40°F if the bird brines outside the fridge.
Wire rack and sheet pan for a dry brine, so air reaches the whole skin.

Safety

40°F (4°C) or below the whole time, in the fridge or an iced cooler with a thermometer in it (USDA FSIS, Let's Talk Turkey). Never brine on the counter.
Never over 24 hours wet. Set an alarm for the long brines on the 18 to 24 lb rows.
Thaw before you brine, and count a thawed turkey's 1 to 2 days of fridge life against the brine hours (USDA FSIS).
Do not rinse the bird after brining; pat it dry (USDA FSIS advice on washing raw poultry).
Throw the brine away. It has held raw poultry. Wash and sanitize the container and the sink.
Cook to 165°F (74°C) in the thickest part of the breast and thigh, measured with a food thermometer (USDA FSIS).

How this page is checked

This guide was written by Cedrick Reese for BrineCalculators.com. Every hour and gram in the table is produced by the same formula that runs the turkey brine calculator, so the two pages cannot disagree; the formula's inputs are Morton's and Diamond Crystal's published brine ratios, America's Test Kitchen's salted turkey, and the Diamond Crystal label weight of 134 g per cup. The 40°F and 165°F limits, the thawing times, and the roasting times are read from the USDA FSIS and foodsafety.gov pages linked in the references; the 24-hour ceiling is this site's, inside the FSIS two-day brining limit.

When a source above changes, the constant behind it is changed once and this table is regenerated from it. If a figure here disagrees with the current text of one of those sources, the source wins; use the contact page to report it.

Frequently asked questions

How long can you brine a turkey?

Wet, up to 24 hours and no longer. Past that the salt keeps moving in, the outer meat turns soft and spongy, and the bird ends up salty. Dry, up to 72 hours; the salt is fixed at about 3 g per pound, so the bird cannot get saltier than that, and the extra time only dries the skin further. Both limits assume the turkey stays at 40°F (4°C) or below the whole time, which is the USDA FSIS refrigeration rule.

How long do you brine a 12 lb turkey?

9 to 12 hours in a 5% wet brine (189 g of salt in 1 gallon of water), or 24 to 72 hours with 36 g of salt rubbed on as a dry brine. Overnight in the fridge covers the wet brine.

How long do you brine a 15 lb turkey?

11 to 15 hours in a 5% wet brine (284 g of salt in 1.5 gallons of water), or 24 to 72 hours with 45 g of salt as a dry brine. Put a wet-brined 15 lb bird in around dinner time the day before and take it out mid-morning.

How long do you brine a 20 lb turkey?

15 to 20 hours in a 5% wet brine (284 g of salt in 1.5 gallons of water), or 24 to 72 hours with 60 g of salt as a dry brine. A 20 lb bird is the size where a wet brine runs close to the 24-hour limit, so set an alarm rather than leaving it for a full day.

How long do you dry brine a turkey?

24 to 72 hours, uncovered on a rack in the refrigerator. America's Test Kitchen's salted turkey uses 24 to 48 hours for a 12 to 14 lb bird with 5 tablespoons of Diamond Crystal kosher salt. The salt needs the first 24 hours to draw moisture out and carry it back in; the time after that mostly dries the skin. There is no benefit past 72 hours.

Can you brine a turkey for 48 hours?

Dry brine, yes; 48 hours is the middle of the range and a common choice. Wet brine, no. A wet brine is done at 1 hour per pound and never goes past 24 hours, so 48 hours in salt water makes the meat mushy and over-salted.

Is 12 hours long enough to brine a turkey?

For a wet brine, 12 hours fully brines a turkey up to about 14 lb and gets a 16 lb bird most of the way there. The salt only needs to season the meat, not saturate it, so a 20 lb bird at 12 hours is lightly brined rather than unbrined. For a dry brine, 12 hours seasons the surface and gives some skin drying but the salt will not have reached deep into the breast; 24 hours is the minimum that works.

Can you brine a frozen or partly frozen turkey?

No. Salt cannot move into frozen meat, so a wet brine on a partly thawed bird seasons the outside and leaves the center bland, and a dry brine on a frozen one does nothing until it thaws. Thaw fully first: 24 hours for every 4 to 5 lb in the refrigerator per foodsafety.gov, so a 14 lb turkey needs 3 to 4 days. Add the brine time to that when you plan.

Should a turkey be brined before smoking?

The same times apply. A brine helps a smoked turkey most because smoking runs long and low, which dries the breast; a 5% wet brine at 1 hour per pound, or a dry brine for 24 to 48 hours, both work. Pat the bird dry and let the skin air-dry uncovered in the fridge for 12 hours before it goes on the smoker, or the skin will come out rubbery.

Do you rinse a turkey after brining?

No. USDA FSIS advises against rinsing raw poultry because it spreads bacteria around the sink. After a wet brine, drain the bird and pat it dry; after a dry brine, just pat it dry. The strength and time of the brine set the saltiness, not a rinse.

References

Disclaimer

The information on this page is for general informational and educational purposes only. Results vary with the bird, the salt, and the refrigerator. Always follow USDA guidelines for safe food handling: keep raw turkey at 40°F (4°C) or below and cook it to 165°F (74°C) measured with a food thermometer. BrineCalculators.com makes no warranties regarding the accuracy or suitability of this information and is not responsible for outcomes from its use. See the full disclaimer.

How Long to Brine a Turkey