Work out salt in brine percentage instantly with clear inputs, formula shown and shareable results.
Brine strength is salt as a percentage of total brine weight. The salometer scale expresses this as a percentage of saturation, where fully saturated brine at 26.4% salt reads 100 degrees. For a target salt level in the finished product, the salt required is the target percentage of the total finished mass.
Brine strength
Brine % = salt / (salt + water) x 100; salometer = brine % x 100 / 26.4
Salt for target
Salt = target % x total product mass / 100
Salt level is a preservation hurdle in cured products. Under-salting compromises safety, and nitrite-containing cures must be dosed to regulated limits.
It is the traditional curing scale and directly indicates how close the brine is to saturation, which governs both preservation strength and the risk of salt crystallising out.
Equilibrium brining calculates salt as a percentage of the combined weight of product and brine, so the product cannot become over-salted no matter how long it sits. It is far more forgiving than timed immersion.