Meat Yield Chart: Raw Weight to Cooked Servings

Updated 2026-08-14 Researched, not tested in person

Quick answer

Plan 0.5 lb of cooked meat per adult and 0.25 lb per child, then divide by the cut's yield to get the raw weight to buy. A whole packer brisket yields about 50 percent, so it takes roughly 1 lb of raw brisket per adult; bone-in pork shoulder yields about 55 percent, or 0.9 lb raw per adult. Yields across common smoked cuts run from about 45 percent for plate short ribs to 80 percent for salmon.

Meat yield is the fraction of the raw purchased weight that reaches a plate after trimming, bone, fat rendering and moisture loss. It is the number that decides whether you have enough food, and it is the one thing almost nobody accounts for at the butcher counter. Across the cuts in this chart the average yield is about 58 percent, ranging from 45 percent for beef short ribs, plate up to 80 percent for salmon fillet, skin on.

The planning rule underneath every table below is 0.5 lb of cooked meat per adult and 0.25 lb per child for a main course. Divide that by the yield and you get the raw weight to buy. For a whole packer brisket that works out at about 1 lb of raw brisket per adult, which sounds absurd at the counter and is exactly right at the table.

Cooked yield by cut, with the raw weight you need to buy per person. Yield is the fraction of raw purchased weight that reaches the plate.
Cut	Yield	Total loss	Trim loss	Cooked from 10 lb raw	Raw per adult	Raw per child	Raw for 10 adults	Where the weight goes
Beef brisket, whole packer	50%	50%	20%	5 lb	1 lb	0.5 lb	10 lb	Trim roughly 20% of fat and hard fat, then lose about 35% of what remains to rendering.
Beef brisket flat	58%	42%	10%	5.8 lb	0.9 lb	0.4 lb	8.6 lb	Less fat to trim, so the trim loss is smaller and the cook loss dominates.
Pork shoulder, bone in butt	55%	45%	5%	5.5 lb	0.9 lb	0.5 lb	9.1 lb	Bone is roughly 8% of the raw weight and comes out clean when it is done.
Pork shoulder, boneless	60%	40%	5%	6 lb	0.8 lb	0.4 lb	8.3 lb	No bone loss, slightly higher yield, slightly less flavour.
Pork spare ribs, St. Louis	50%	50%	15%	5 lb	1 lb	0.5 lb	10 lb	The St. Louis trim itself removes the rib tips and skirt, which is most of the loss.
Pork baby back ribs	55%	45%	5%	5.5 lb	0.9 lb	0.5 lb	9.1 lb	Already closely trimmed at the butcher, so most loss is rendering.
Beef short ribs, plate	45%	55%	10%	4.5 lb	1.1 lb	0.6 lb	11.1 lb	Heavy bone, roughly a third of raw weight, plus substantial fat render.
Beef chuck roast	55%	45%	8%	5.5 lb	0.9 lb	0.5 lb	9.1 lb	Behaves like a small brisket. Shreds well and holds moisture better than a flat.
Whole chicken	55%	45%	0%	5.5 lb	0.9 lb	0.5 lb	9.1 lb	Edible meat off the carcass, skin included.
Whole turkey	52%	48%	0%	5.2 lb	1 lb	0.5 lb	9.6 lb	Big carcass, so plan on roughly half the purchased weight reaching the table.
Turkey breast, bone in	68%	32%	0%	6.8 lb	0.7 lb	0.4 lb	7.4 lb	Much higher yield than a whole bird because there is no frame to discard.
Pork loin roast	75%	25%	5%	7.5 lb	0.7 lb	0.3 lb	6.7 lb	Lean and dense, so very little is lost. This is the highest yield on the list.
Salmon fillet, skin on	80%	20%	0%	8 lb	0.6 lb	0.3 lb	6.3 lb	Minimal loss, mostly moisture. Skin is usually left behind on the plate.

Where does half a brisket actually go?

Two separate losses stack up, and people usually only account for the second one. Take a 14 lb packer as the worked example, using the trim and yield figures in the table above.

Trimming removes about 20 percent, or roughly 2.8 lb of hard fat, silverskin and the ragged edges that would never render. That leaves about 11.2 lb going onto the smoker.
Rendering and moisture loss during twelve to eighteen hours in a hot chamber removes about another 4.2 lb.
What reaches the board is roughly 7 lb of sliceable brisket, which is 50 percent of what you paid for.

That is not waste, it is the process. Fat has to render for the meat to be good, and the trim is what stops the finished slices being half fat cap. It does mean the honest price of brisket is roughly double the sticker price per pound of finished food, which is worth knowing before you decide brisket is cheaper than buying it from a barbecue joint.

Bone is the other invisible loss. A bone-in pork butt carries roughly 8 percent of its weight as blade bone, which slides out clean when the meat is properly rendered and is the single best doneness test on that cut. Boneless butts yield a little more and give up a little flavour, and plate short ribs lose roughly a third of their raw weight to bone alone, which is why a rack that looks enormous feeds fewer people than you expect.

How much meat do I need for a crowd?

The table below runs the arithmetic straight through for the five cuts people actually cook in quantity. Every figure is raw weight to buy, computed as 0.5 lb cooked per adult divided by that cut yield, with no leftover allowance built in.

Raw weight to buy by headcount, for adults eating a main course of 0.5 lb cooked each. No leftover allowance included.
Cut	Yield	4 adults	6 adults	8 adults	10 adults	12 adults	16 adults	20 adults	30 adults	50 adults
Beef brisket, whole packer	50%	4 lb	6 lb	8 lb	10 lb	12 lb	16 lb	20 lb	30 lb	50 lb
Pork shoulder, bone in butt	55%	3.6 lb	5.5 lb	7.3 lb	9.1 lb	10.9 lb	14.5 lb	18.2 lb	27.3 lb	45.5 lb
Whole chicken	55%	3.6 lb	5.5 lb	7.3 lb	9.1 lb	10.9 lb	14.5 lb	18.2 lb	27.3 lb	45.5 lb
Whole turkey	52%	3.8 lb	5.8 lb	7.7 lb	9.6 lb	11.5 lb	15.4 lb	19.2 lb	28.8 lb	48.1 lb
Pork spare ribs, St. Louis	50%	4 lb	6 lb	8 lb	10 lb	12 lb	16 lb	20 lb	30 lb	50 lb

A worked mixed example, because most gatherings are not all adults. For 12 adults and 6 children you need 12 times 0.5 plus 6 times 0.25, which is 7.5 lb of cooked meat. That is about 15 lb of raw packer brisket or 13.6 lb of bone-in pork shoulder. Buy the next size up rather than the next size down: a 16 lb packer and a 10 lb butt are both easy to find, and leftovers freeze.

Once you know the raw weight, check it fits. Grate area, not hours, is the real ceiling on cooking for a crowd, and the smoker size calculator works out whether your cooker can hold what you just worked out you need. Two pork butts on a bullet smoker is a normal Saturday. Four is a different cooker.

How do sides, sandwiches and leftovers change the number?

The 0.5 lb figure assumes meat is the centrepiece with a couple of sides alongside it. Move that assumption and the number moves with it.

Serving adjustments, applied to the cooked weight before you divide by yield.
Situation	Cooked per adult	Raw packer brisket per adult	Raw pork butt per adult	Why
Meat as the centrepiece, two sides	0.5 lb	1 lb	0.9 lb	The default assumption behind every table on this page.
Full spread of four or more sides	0.33 lb	0.7 lb	0.6 lb	Beans, slaw, mac and cheese and bread displace a meaningful amount of meat.
Sandwiches rather than plated slices	0.33 lb	0.7 lb	0.6 lb	Bread stretches meat by roughly a third and portions become self-limiting.
Two meats served together	0.35 lb	0.7 lb	0.6 lb	Per meat, not in total. Most people take some of each rather than a full portion of both.
Barbecue-focused crowd, few sides	0.75 lb	1.5 lb	1.4 lb	A gathering of people who came specifically to eat brisket will eat brisket.
Children, any format	0.25 lb	0.5 lb	0.5 lb	Half an adult portion, and often less in practice.

Add 25 to 50 percent on top if you want leftovers, and be more generous with pulled pork than with brisket, because pulled pork vanishes into sandwiches at a rate that surprises people every time. Over-buying costs money. Under-buying costs the party.

Buying more means holding more, and holding is where cooks get caught

A larger cook means more food sitting out for longer, and the 40°F to 140°F danger zone applies to every minute of it. Food must not accumulate more than 4 hours in that range across its entire life, and only 2 hours when the surrounding air is above 90°F, which is exactly the weather most large cookouts happen in.

Hold cooked meat above 140°F until you serve it. A wrapped cut in a dry cooler packed with towels does this for hours. Serve in batches from a covered pan rather than putting everything out at once. Refrigerate leftovers within 2 hours in shallow containers so they cool quickly, and reheat them to 165°F, which is the USDA figure for leftovers and casseroles.

Texture targets do not change any of this. Brisket and pork shoulder run to about 203°F for collagen, not for safety, and they passed the 145°F whole-cut minimum hours earlier. Poultry is 165°F and ground meat is 160°F regardless of how much of it you cooked. Verify with a calibrated thermometer, every time.

How do you buy for yield rather than for price per pound?

Compare cuts on cost per pound of finished food, not on the shelf price. A boneless cut at a higher sticker price frequently beats a bone-in one on the only measure that matters, and a cheap plate short rib at 45 percent yield is not cheap at all once the bone comes out. Take the price per pound, divide by the yield fraction, and compare those numbers instead.

Grade also moves yield in the direction people do not expect. A higher grade brisket carries more intramuscular fat, which renders, so a prime packer can finish at a slightly lower yield than a choice one while eating far better. That is a good trade, but it means buying by grade without adjusting the weight leaves you short.

Finally, remember the second bite problem. Trim from a brisket is not waste if you grind it for burgers or render it for tallow, the bones from short ribs make stock, and a picked turkey carcass is a pot of soup. Working cooks count that value, which is another reason the yield number is a planning tool rather than a verdict on a cut.

Related charts and tools

Meat yield calculator to run your own headcount and cut
Smoking time and temperature chart for how long the weight you just bought will take
Smoker size calculator to check it all fits on the grate
How to smoke pork shoulder, the highest-yield crowd cook
Whole packer brisket for trimming and the anatomy behind these losses

Frequently asked questions

How much brisket do I need per person?

Plan half a pound of cooked meat per adult and a quarter pound per child. A whole packer brisket yields about 50 percent of its raw weight after trimming and rendering, so you need roughly 1 pound of raw brisket per adult. Twelve adults means a 12 pound packer as the bare minimum and a 14 to 16 pound one if you want leftovers, which you should, because brisket reheats better than almost anything else you can smoke.

Why does brisket lose half its weight?

Two separate losses stack. Trimming removes roughly 20 percent as hard fat and silverskin before the cook even starts. Then rendering and moisture loss during 12 to 18 hours in a hot chamber removes about another 35 percent of what remains. A 14 pound packer typically leaves the trimming board at about 11 pounds and comes off the smoker at around 7 pounds of sliceable meat.

Which cut has the highest yield?

Salmon fillet at about 80 percent, followed by pork loin roast at about 75 percent and bone-in turkey breast at about 68 percent. The pattern is consistent: lean, boneless, low-collagen cuts lose the least, because there is little fat to render and no frame to discard. The lowest yields belong to bone-heavy, fat-heavy cuts such as plate short ribs at roughly 45 percent.

Do I buy meat by raw weight or cooked weight?

Butchers sell raw weight, recipes and serving guides talk in cooked weight, and that mismatch is why people under-buy. Work out your cooked requirement first at half a pound per adult, then divide by the yield fraction for that cut to get the raw weight to buy. For a 50 percent yield cut that means doubling the number, which feels excessive at the counter and is correct at the table.

How much extra should I buy for leftovers?

Add 25 to 50 percent if the food is the centrepiece rather than one item among several, and add more for pulled pork than for brisket because it disappears faster in sandwiches. Smoked meat also freezes and reheats well, so the downside of over-buying is small. Cool leftovers quickly, refrigerate within 2 hours, and reheat to 165F, which is the USDA figure for leftovers and casseroles.

Does the number of sides change how much meat I need?

Substantially. Half a pound of cooked meat per adult assumes meat is the main event with a couple of sides. With a full spread of beans, slaw, mac and cheese and bread you can plan a third of a pound and be comfortable. Serving sandwiches rather than plated slices also stretches meat by roughly a third. Scale down cautiously: running out of barbecue is a memorable kind of failure.

How we choose gear: we compare published manufacturer specifications, capacity and temperature ranges, materials, warranty terms and verified owner reviews. We do not test gear in person and we do not publish hands-on claims we cannot support.

Cook times and temperatures are researched guidance, not a food-safety authority. Every figure on this page is an estimate: smokers, ambient weather, humidity and the individual cut all move it. Food is safe when a calibrated instant-read thermometer says so, never when a clock or a chart does. Keep food out of the 40°F to 140°F danger zone, observe the 4 hour rule, and follow current USDA safe minimum internal temperatures. If you are cooking for anyone pregnant, very young, elderly or immunocompromised, cook to the USDA minimums rather than to a preference-based doneness temperature.