The Best Pizzeria in the World 2026 Is in London
The best pizzeria in the world for 2026 sits in Chiswick, west London. Naples announced it. The ceremony took place on September 15, inside the red and gold horseshoe of the Teatro Mercadante. There, the guide 50 Top Pizza gave the global title to Napoli on the Road, run by Michele Pascarella. Second place went to Una Pizza Napoletana in New York, the reigning champion. Third went to Confine, in Milan. For the first time, the two highest positions in the world sat outside Italy. The theater applauded anyway. So here is what happened, and why almost no Italian in that room was surprised.
The verdict, and the numbers behind it
What the ceremony decided
The Spanish journalist Verónica Zumalacárregui hosted the evening, and the network streamed it live. The 2026 world list covers 100 positions. Because of ties, it actually holds 108 pizzerias, drawn from 36 countries. In fact the guide has named a best pizzeria in the world every year since 2017.
The country and city counts
Italy still holds 31 of those places, more than any other country. The United States holds 22, up sharply from 16 in 2025. Brazil follows with six.
Among cities, the numbers are blunter. New York leads the entire ranking with seven pizzerias. Naples has six. São Paulo has five.
That single line is the story of the 2026 edition. Naples has not declined. Rather, New York, London, Madrid, Tokyo and São Paulo have caught up. The top of the list no longer has a fixed postal code.
The top ten
- 1. Napoli on the Road — London
- 2. Una Pizza Napoletana — New York
- 3. Confine — Milan
- 4. I Masanielli di Francesco Martucci — Caserta, and Seu Pizza Illuminati — Rome (tied)
- 5. Pizzeria Sei — Los Angeles, and Tony’s Pizza Napoletana — San Francisco (tied)
- 6. Leggera Pizza Napoletana — São Paulo
- 7. RistoPizza by Napoli sta ca — Tokyo
- 8. Baldoria — Madrid
- 9. The Pizza Bar on 38th — Tokyo
- 10. Razza — Jersey City
Four of the top ten are American. Pizzeria Sei and Tony’s climbed from ninth and tenth the year before. Razza, in Jersey City, made the most violent jump on the whole list, from 69th to 10th. The full ranking of 100 sits free on the guide’s own site.
From a three-wheeled van to first place
Napoli on the Road started in 2016 as a Piaggio Ape. That is the small three-wheeled van that normally carries crates of tomatoes in Italy, not an oven. Pascarella sold pizza from it at London farmers’ markets. Then came a restaurant in Chiswick, then Richmond, then Soho.
He was already named the world’s best pizza chef in 2023. His restaurant had also won the separate European ranking three years running, from 2024 to 2026. Then came the title of best pizzeria in the world. A second London address, 50 Kalò, placed 23rd and won the award for best fried food.
So whatever you make of the verdict, it did not arrive from nowhere. It arrived after a decade of qualifying rounds.
Why nobody in Naples was surprised
Italy had already moved in July
The title of best pizzeria in the world left Italy, and the room clapped. However, the Italian ranking had said it first, and Italians had already had their argument.
On July 21, at the Teatro Manzoni in Milan, 50 Top Pizza Italia 2026 gave the national title to Confine. Francesco Capece and Mario Ventura run it. No Milanese pizzeria had ever won before. The result also ended seven straight years of dominance by I Masanielli in Caserta. That pizzeria dropped to second, tied with Seu Pizza Illuminati in Rome. Palazzo Petrucci, the highest-placed Neapolitan pizzeria, came third.
By September, therefore, the map had already shifted at home. The world result confirmed it rather than caused it.
Pizza is a process, not a place
The deeper reason an Italian shrugs is simple. Pizza has never been a place. It is a process, and processes travel.
So consider what actually makes the product. Dough hydration. A fermentation schedule. A flour specification. An oven that holds its floor near 450 degrees Celsius for a bake of sixty to ninety seconds. Those are parameters, not a birthright. Any obsessive pizzaiolo anywhere can hit them, given enough capital and enough years. The last fifteen have supplied both.
Still, what Naples has, London does not. Naples has a dense, ordinary, everyday pizza culture, built over centuries of habit. That is a different asset. It is also not what this kind of guide measures.
The part Italians say quietly
There is one more observation, made privately and rarely in print. The historic center of Naples in August is one of the most tourist-saturated food environments in Europe. Volume is the enemy of a product that depends on one person watching one disc of dough for ninety seconds.
Some of the best Neapolitan pizza I have eaten in the last five years came from twenty minutes outside the city. People with time made it.
What 22 American pizzerias mean
Twenty-two American addresses in the world’s hundred. Four in the top ten. New York as the city with the most entries on earth. The tempting conclusion is that you no longer need to cross an ocean for serious pizza. On the narrow terms the ranking measures, that is close to true.
The wider conclusion would still be wrong. By this guide’s definition, the best pizzeria in the world is one specific kind of place: ambitious, booking-driven, built to be noticed. That kind of place now exists, just as good, in a dozen countries.
What the guide cannot rank is the thing that still only exists in Italy. It is the ordinary neighborhood pizzeria that no inspector has ever visited. A pizza costs eight euros. Meanwhile the room fills every Thursday with three generations of the same families. No list shows that gap. Yet it remains the real reason to eat pizza in Italy rather than near it.
Want to know exactly what the ranking sees and what it misses? I have written a separate guide to how 50 Top Pizza works. It also explains the qualifying system that decides who even reaches the world final.
The special awards, often more useful than the rank
The ceremony handed out thirteen special awards. These are the ones worth noting when you plan where to eat.
- – Pizza Maker of the Year: Daniel Semrani, gigi’s, Sydney
- – Pizza of the Year: Pomodori, by QT Pizza Bar, São Paulo
- – Performance of the Year: Palazzo Petrucci Pizzeria, Naples
- – Pizza Maker Mentor: Giulio Adriani, Slice & Pie, Washington, D.C.
- – Best Fried Food: 50 Kalò, London
- – Green Oven: Seba’s, Uvita, Costa Rica
- – Best Dessert List: IMperfetto, Puteaux, France
- – One to Watch: Stretch Pizza, New York
- – Best Cocktail List: Audace, New York
- – Customer Satisfaction: Giorgia Caporuscio, La Fenice, Pistoia
- – Best Marketing: Baldoria, Madrid
The Associazione Pizzaiuoli Napoletani also won a prize for its work on Neapolitan pizza at home and abroad. In other words, the ceremony saluted the tradition while handing the trophy to London.
What this changes for your trip
Three practical results follow, and all of them are urgent.
First, book now. Tables at every Italian address in that top ten got harder within days of September 15. If Confine in Milan, Seu Pizza Illuminati in Rome or I Masanielli in Caserta matters to you, book today for a trip next spring. Do not wait until March for an April dinner.
Second, treat the best pizzeria in the world as one meal, never as an itinerary. A ranked pizzeria is worth an evening. It is not worth a train ride across a region you then fail to see.
Third, look past the top ten as soon as you leave the big cities. The 2026 Italian edition reviewed 472 pizzerias and certifies excellent addresses in places like Senigallia, Civitanova or San Benedetto del Tronto. That is where the list stops being a trophy cabinet and starts being useful.
FAQ: the 2026 world pizza ranking
Which is the best pizzeria in the world in 2026? Napoli on the Road, in Chiswick, west London, run by Michele Pascarella. The result was announced by 50 Top Pizza on September 15, 2026, at the Teatro Mercadante in Naples.
Which is the best pizzeria in Italy in 2026? Confine, in Milan, run by Francesco Capece and Mario Ventura. It won the Italian ranking in July 2026 and placed third in the world list, the highest-ranked Italian pizzeria.
How many American pizzerias made the 2026 world list? Twenty-two, up from 16 in 2025, second only to Italy with 31. Four are in the top ten, and New York is the most represented city in the ranking with seven entries.
Who decides the 50 Top Pizza ranking? Anonymous inspectors who visit as paying customers, coordinated by continental editorial teams under curators Barbara Guerra, Luciano Pignataro and Albert Sapere. There is no public vote and pizzerias pay no fee.
Why was the 2026 ceremony held in Naples if an Italian pizzeria did not win? Naples is the historical home of pizza and the guide’s base of operations. The world final is staged there each September as the culminating event, after the continental rankings have been announced.
How far ahead should I book a top-ranked pizzeria in Italy? For the Italian national top twenty, several weeks, and longer in high season. Rankings move reservations sharply in the weeks after publication.
Does the 2026 result mean Italian pizza is getting worse? No. The Italian guide reviewed 472 pizzerias in 2026 and Campania alone accounts for 103 of them. What has changed is that the highest individual scores are now spread across Milan, London, New York and Tokyo rather than concentrated in Campania.
The takeaway
A London pizzeria won a prize handed out in Naples, in a theater full of Neapolitan pizzaioli, and they applauded. They understood something the headlines missed. The craft they exported has come home to compete with them, which is the most flattering thing that can happen to a tradition.
Nobody in that room believes London is now the place to eat pizza. They believe Pascarella made the single finest pizza the inspectors ate this year. That is exactly, and only, what the title of best pizzeria in the world says.
Do you want an Italian’s read on where to eat in central Italy, rather than a list to tick off? That is what the rest of Tastes & Wonders of Italy is for.
