Instant Pot Conversion Calculator

A pressure cooker works by raising the boiling point of water. Sealing the vessel lets steam pressure build, and at the high setting of a typical electric multicooker, about 11.6 psi above atmospheric, water boils near 244 degrees F (118 degrees C) rather than 212; the low setting of roughly 7.2 psi corresponds to about 229 degrees F. Because reaction rates climb steeply with temperature, the collagen in tough connective tissue hydrolyses into gelatin several times faster than it does in a simmering pot, which is the entire point of the appliance: a chuck roast that needs three hours in an oven becomes tender in about one. That ratio is the basis of the conversion rules used here, roughly a third of oven time, half of stovetop simmering time, and a small fraction of slow cooker time. Three practical constraints shape the numbers. The pot needs about 1 cup of thin liquid to generate steam, and thick sauces do not count toward it; they belong layered on top and unstirred, or the base sensor will register scorching and stop the cycle. The pot must not be filled beyond two thirds, or beyond half for foods that foam heavily such as beans, split peas, oats, and pasta, since foam can obstruct the vent. And the displayed cook time excludes both ends of the cycle: 10 to 30 minutes for pressure to build, and the release afterward, where natural release continues cooking gently for 10 to 25 minutes while quick release stops it in 1 to 3. Total elapsed time is the fair comparison against the original method.

Pressure cooking begins with the French physicist Denis Papin, who built a sealed steam digester fitted with a safety valve and demonstrated it to the Royal Society in London in the 1680s, showing that bones could be reduced to something edible at temperatures above the ordinary boiling point. The safety valve he devised to keep the vessel from bursting remains the defining component of every pressure cooker built since. Domestic versions took another two and a half centuries. Industrial retorts for canning arrived in the nineteenth century, and saucepan-style home pressure cookers were commercialized in the United States around the time of the 1939 New York World's Fair, selling strongly through the wartime and postwar decades before a reputation for spectacular failures drove them out of many kitchens. European manufacturers such as Kuhn Rikon and Fissler kept the category alive with spring-loaded valves and interlocks that make it impossible to open a pressurized pot. The electric multicooker revived it outright: Robert Wang, an engineer in Ottawa, Canada, founded the company behind the Instant Pot in 2009 and shipped its first model in 2010, pairing a microprocessor and pressure sensor with layered mechanical interlocks so the machine regulated itself rather than relying on the cook. Sold largely online, it became a mass-market appliance in the mid 2010s, and the flood of oven and stovetop recipes owners wanted to adapt is what created demand for conversion charts.