Medium boiled egg timer

A medium boiled egg takes between 7:35 and 8:55 in boiling water, depending on how big it is. A medium egg needs 8:00. This is the middle setting, firmer than a jammy soft egg and still short of a chalky hard one. The table below covers every size, and the Chef Labs egg timer counts down the same numbers and rings when the egg is done.

What a medium boiled egg looks like inside

The white is fully set and firm enough to slice cleanly. The yolk is custardy: bright, glossy, set at the edge and soft in the middle, and it holds together on a knife instead of running across the plate. It is the doneness that survives being sliced into a salad or a sandwich, which a soft egg does not. Cook it two minutes longer and the centre goes pale and crumbly.

Medium boiled egg time by size

Small is about 45 to 53 g, medium 53 to 63 g, large 63 to 73 g, and XL 73 g and up. Times assume eggs straight from the fridge, lowered into water that is already boiling, at sea level.

How to cook them

Use a pan deep enough to cover the eggs by a couple of centimetres and bring the water to a full boil. Ease the heat back until the surface is still bubbling but no longer knocking the eggs around, then lower each egg onto the bottom on a spoon rather than dropping it in. Keep the eggs in one layer. A crowded pan drops the water temperature when the eggs go in and cooks them unevenly. Start the timer as soon as the last egg is down.

Eggs that are not fridge cold

Every time here assumes an egg straight from the fridge. An egg that has been sitting on the counter starts warmer and reaches custardy sooner, so take off roughly 30 seconds. That is an estimate rather than a fixed rule, since it depends on how long the egg was out and how warm the kitchen is. Cook one egg, cut it open, and adjust from there.

Cooking above sea level

Water boils at a lower temperature as you climb, so the same time gives you a looser yolk than you expect. Above roughly 1,000 m, add time, and add more the higher you are. Test with a single egg the first time you cook at a new altitude, then keep the time that worked.

Stop the cooking

A medium egg carries enough heat to keep setting after it leaves the pan, and the whole point of this doneness is a centre that is still soft. Have a bowl of water and ice ready before you start, move the eggs into it the moment the timer rings, and leave them for 5 minutes. That holds the yolk where you want it and makes the eggs cold enough to peel.

Peeling and storing

Crack the wide end first, where the air pocket sits, then roll the egg gently under your palm to craze the shell and peel it under a thin stream of cold water. Eggs that are a few days old peel more cleanly than very fresh ones. Eat medium boiled eggs the same day. The yolk is not fully set, so they do not keep in the fridge the way hard boiled eggs do. To slice one without dragging the yolk, use a thin blade and wipe it between cuts.

What to use them for

This is the egg for a salade niçoise or a potato salad, where you want halves that hold their shape and a yolk that still tastes rich. It works in a rice bowl, on top of noodles, or halved on toast with salt and olive oil. Marinated in soy sauce and mirin overnight it makes a firmer ramen egg than the soft version.

Other guides: soft boiled egg timer and hard boiled egg timer.