| Cut | Rest | Gains |
|---|---|---|
| Steak, ¾–1 in | 5 min | 2–4°F |
| Steak, 1.5–2 in | 8–10 min | 5–8°F |
| Chicken pieces | 5 min | 2–4°F |
| Pork chops | 5 min | 3–4°F |
| Pork tenderloin | 5–10 min | 3–5°F |
| Roast, 3 lb | 15–20 min | 5–10°F |
| Prime rib, 5 lb+ | 20–30 min | 8–12°F |
| Whole chicken | 15 min | 5–8°F |
| Whole turkey, 14 lb+ | 25–30 min | 10–15°F |
| Brisket, pulled pork | 30–60 min | — |
Rough rule: 5 minutes per inch of thickness, or about 10 minutes per pound for a roast, up to half an hour.
Two things happen during a rest
The temperature keeps climbing. Heat already in the outer layers continues moving toward the cooler centre after the heat source is gone. This is carryover, and it is the reason the pull temperature is lower than the serving temperature — 3°F on a thin steak, 15°F on a turkey.
That is the half most cooking advice leaves out, and it is the more important half. Cook to the serving number and the rest pushes you past it.
The muscle relaxes. Heat contracts muscle fibres and squeezes liquid toward the centre under pressure. As the meat cools slightly, the fibres loosen and reabsorb some of it. Cut too early and that liquid runs onto the board instead.
The second effect is the famous one and the smaller one. A steak cut immediately loses visibly more juice than one rested five minutes, but the difference in eating quality is modest. Getting the pull temperature right matters more.
On a rack, uncovered
Foil is usually a mistake. It traps steam against the surface, and steam softens whatever crust you spent effort building. A seared steak tented in foil for ten minutes comes out with a damp exterior.
It also adds heat you did not plan for — a foil-tented roast can gain several degrees more than the table above, which matters when the target is 130°F.
On a wire rack lets air circulate underneath so the bottom does not steam in its own juices. On a plate, the underside sits in liquid the entire time.
The exception is a very large cut in a cold kitchen, where losing serving temperature is the real risk. A turkey resting 30 minutes can be loosely tented — loosely, so steam escapes — and it will still be hot when carved.
Cuts that do not follow the rule
Brisket and pulled pork rest for a completely different reason. Those cuts are cooked to 195–205°F to convert collagen, and a long rest — an hour, sometimes several in a warm cooler — lets the gelatin distribute and the meat relax after many hours of cooking. Slicing brisket straight off the smoker produces dry meat regardless of how well it was cooked.
Fish barely rests at all. A fillet is thin and has little connective tissue; two or three minutes is all there is to gain, and any longer costs serving temperature.
Ground meat needs no rest. A burger gains 2 to 3°F and there is no fibre structure to relax. Rest it as long as it takes to build the rest of the burger.
Where the carryover goes wrong
The gain depends on thickness and surface temperature, not weight. A thick cut has more stored heat and a longer path to the centre; a cut seared in a screaming pan has a steeper gradient driving heat inward than one brought up gently in a low oven.
That is why a 2-inch reverse-seared steak gains less than a 1.5-inch pan-seared one, despite being larger. The gentle method never builds the gradient.
Every cut on this site lists a pull temperature and a serving temperature separately for exactly this reason — see steak, pork and chicken.