RFK Cuisine · Pizza · Boston
Best Pizza Restaurants in Boston 2026
Pizza · Boston · 6 pizzerias ranked · Updated June 2026
Compiled by the Restaurants for Kings editorial team · Published June 20, 2026 · Updated June 20, 2026
Regina has burned wood in the same brick oven on Thacher Street since 1926, and a century later that oven still settles most Boston pizza arguments before they start. The city's pie is the thin, blistered bar style baked hot and fast, a cousin to New Haven and a world away from a thick Sicilian slab, though Boston does that too. What it never built was a glamorous pizza scene; the best rooms here are old Italian institutions with lines out the door and a newer wave of wood-fired Neapolitan kitchens earning national attention from the suburbs in. Ranked here on the pie itself, the room and what the bill buys, with the order to make at each.
1.Regina Pizzeria
The 1926 North End brick oven that defines Boston pizza; queue at the original Thacher Street room for the city's benchmark pie.
Pizzeria Regina's original location at 11½ Thacher Street is the oldest restaurant in the North End and the source of Boston's reputation for thin, charred, brick-oven pizza. The oven that was installed when the room opened in 1926 is still in use, and it produces a crust that is crisp, blistered and a little smoky in a way the dozens of Regina branches around New England cannot match. Order it plain or with sausage and let the char do the work. The room is small, cash-friendly and almost always has a line, which is the cost of the best traditional pie in the city. Skip the mall outposts and come to Thacher Street or it does not count.
Walk-in only at the Thacher Street original; the cheese pie or the sausage, from the old oven.
2.Posto
The area's only 50 Top Pizza pick, a certified Neapolitan room in Davis Square; book for a leoparded, wood-fired Margherita.
Posto, at 187 Elm Street in Somerville's Davis Square, is the Greater Boston pizzeria the international rankings single out: it placed around number 35 in the 2026 50 Top Pizza USA guide, leading the local trio that made the list. The kitchen works to the Neapolitan standard, baking soft, charred, leoparded pies in a wood-fired oven, and the Margherita is the test pie to judge it by. Unlike the walk-in institutions, Posto is a proper sit-down restaurant with a bar and a wine list, which makes it the pick when you want pizza as a dinner rather than a slice on the move. Book a table on Resy, especially on weekends.
Reserve on Resy; the wood-fired Margherita and a seasonal special.
3.Santarpio's Pizza
The century-old East Boston bar pie with lamb skewers on the side; go for the no-frills institution locals defend to the death.
Santarpio's, at 111 Chelsea Street in East Boston, has been in business more than a century and is Regina's great rival for the title of best traditional Boston pizza. The pie is thin, well-charred and topped simply, and the move here is to pair it with the grilled lamb skewers and sausage that come off the barbecue in the same room. It is gruff, cash-friendly and resolutely unglamorous, a few minutes from Logan Airport and worth the harbour crossing. Bostonians fall into the Regina camp or the Santarpio's camp and argue about it forever; the only way to take a side is to eat both. Walk in, order a pie and a skewer, and skip anything fancier.
Walk-in only; a thin-crust pie plus the grilled lamb skewers and sausage.
4.Galleria Umberto
A cash-only Hanover Street lunch counter and James Beard classic; arrive early for the thick Sicilian square before it sells out.
Galleria Umberto, on Hanover Street in the North End, is a counter-service Sicilian institution the James Beard Foundation named an America's Classic in 2018, citing the Deuterio family for keeping the character of their neighbourhood. It serves a thick, oily, gloriously simple Sicilian square slice alongside arancini, panzarotti and calzones, all cash only, and it opens for lunch and closes when the food runs out, often by mid-afternoon. There are no tables to speak of and no dinner service; this is a snack-counter legend, not a sit-down dinner. Get there before the lunch rush, order a square and an arancino, and treat it as the best cheap bite in the quarter.
Cash only, lunch until sold out; the Sicilian square slice and an arancino.
5.Coppa
Ken Oringer and Jamie Bissonnette's South End enoteca bakes blistered pies between the salumi; book for pizza with a real wine list.
Coppa, the tiny enoteca on Shawmut Avenue in the South End from Ken Oringer and Jamie Bissonnette, is the pick when you want a thin, blistered pizza as part of a proper Italian meal rather than on its own. The small kitchen turns out charred, thin-crust pies, and the move is to pair one with a board of Bissonnette's house-cured salumi and the pork tagliatelle. Bissonnette won a James Beard Best Chef: Northeast award in 2014, and the same precision runs through the short menu. The room is genuinely cramped and reservations matter. This is the most grown-up pizza on the list, served with cocktails and a wine list rather than a paper plate. Book on Resy.
Reserve on Resy; a thin-crust pie, the house salumi board and the pork tagliatelle.
6.Picco
A family-friendly South End room pairing thin-crust pizza with house ice cream; go for an easy weeknight dinner with kids in tow.
Picco, the Pizza and Ice Cream Company at 513 Tremont Street in the South End, is the easygoing entry on this list: a neighbourhood room that makes a solid, thin-crust, slightly crisp pie and then sends you out on house-made ice cream. It is not chasing a Neapolitan certification or a national ranking, and it does not need to; it is the reliable, sit-down, family-friendly pizza dinner the South End leans on. The pies are well made and the sundaes are the reason kids and adults both leave happy. Take a table on a weeknight, order a pizza and salad, and save room for the ice cream counter. Book on Resy when it is busy.
Reserve on Resy or walk in midweek; a thin-crust pie and a scoop from the ice cream counter.
How Boston eats pizza
Boston's pizza identity was built in the North End and East Boston, in brick and coal ovens that arrived with Italian immigrants a century ago, and the thin, charred bar pie those rooms make is still the city's default. Regina and Santarpio's are the twin institutions, and choosing between them is a local rite of passage; Galleria Umberto holds down the Sicilian-square corner a few doors from Regina. None of these take reservations, all of them run lines, and that is part of the deal.
The newer energy is in the wood-fired Neapolitan rooms and the chef-driven kitchens, which is where Posto and Coppa come in, and they sit further out in Somerville and the South End rather than the old quarter. The smart way to eat the city is to mix the two: a walk-in slice at an institution one day, a booked Neapolitan dinner the next. For the rest of the city beyond pizza, the Boston dining guide maps it by neighborhood and occasion.
Where not to look for it
Skip these for real Boston pizza
The Regina branches in malls and food courts. The name is the same and the pie is not. The brick oven that makes Regina worth the trip is at the Thacher Street original in the North End; the New England outposts are a different, lesser product. If you are not on Thacher Street, you are not eating the pizza this list is about.
Galleria Umberto for dinner. It is one of the best bites in the North End, but it is a cash-only lunch counter that closes when the day's food sells out, usually by mid-afternoon. Turn up at 7pm hungry for a sit-down meal and you will find the gate down. Go at lunch or do not go.
Frequently asked
What is the best pizza in Boston?
For traditional Boston pizza, Regina Pizzeria's original North End location on Thacher Street is the benchmark, a thin, charred brick-oven pie baked in the same oven since 1926. For the Neapolitan style, Posto in Somerville's Davis Square is the city's strongest, the only Greater Boston room to make the 2026 50 Top Pizza USA ranking. Pick by style: Regina for the old-school Boston bar pie, Posto for a leoparded, wood-fired Margherita.
Which Boston pizzeria is nationally ranked?
Posto in Davis Square, Somerville, led the area's showing in the 2026 50 Top Pizza USA guide, placing around number 35 nationally and topping the local trio that made the list. It is certified for the Neapolitan style and bakes in a wood-fired oven. Regina draws the louder reputation and frequent best-in-the-country headlines for its North End brick-oven pie, but Posto is the room the international pizza rankings single out.
Is North End or East Boston better for pizza?
Both anchor the city's pizza history. The North End has Regina's 1926 brick oven and Galleria Umberto's Sicilian lunch counter, the dense Italian quarter where Boston pizza began. East Boston has Santarpio's, the century-old room near the airport famous for its thin bar pie and grilled lamb skewers. Go to the North End for tradition and a walk, cross the harbour to Eastie for Santarpio's no-frills, cash-friendly institution.
Do you need a reservation for pizza in Boston?
Mostly no. Regina, Santarpio's and Galleria Umberto are walk-in only and run lines, especially on weekends, and Galleria Umberto sells Sicilian squares and arancini at lunch until it runs out, then closes. Posto, Coppa and Picco take reservations on Resy or OpenTable and are the ones to book if you want a table and a glass of wine with the pizza. For the institutions, go early or off-peak and expect to queue.
What style of pizza is Boston known for?
Boston's signature is the thin, crisp, slightly charred bar pie baked in a hot brick or coal oven, the style Regina and Santarpio's have made for a century. Alongside it the city has a strong Sicilian square tradition, best at Galleria Umberto in the North End, and a newer wave of wood-fired Neapolitan rooms led by Posto. The enoteca pizzas at Coppa and the thin pies at Picco round out a city that does several styles well rather than one signature pie.
More pizza, by city
More from RFK
Browse the full Boston dining guide, compare the global picks in the best pizza restaurants worldwide, read the best Italian restaurants in Boston, find a room for a first date worth remembering, or open the full RFK cuisine index.
Restaurants for Kings is reader-supported. Some reservation links are affiliate links with OpenTable, Resy or Tock; we earn a small commission at no cost to you, and a link never buys a place on a ranking. Editorial scores and ranking order are independent of any commercial relationship. See our ranking methodology.