Lost in all the hubbub surrounding 50 Top Pizza’s recent guide to the best pizzerias in the nation was a much smaller—but highly prestigious—list that gave operators around the country another bragging point: the best U.S. restaurants for a pizza slice.
Of course, you can’t make an award-winning slice without a whole pie for starters, but never mind that. The 50 Top Pizza Slice USA guide, which made its debut last month, indexed 10 U.S. spots serving slices that are a cut above the rest.
Topping the list: L’Industrie Pizzeria in Brooklyn, New York, founded in 2017 by Massimo Laveglia. Laveglia has often said he purchased the shop before he even knew how to make pizza, but he must have learned quickly. L’Industrie is one of the Big Apple’s best-known pizza joints and was also singled out by website EatThis.com in a May 2024 article titled, “Where to Get the Best Slice of Pizza in America, According to Chefs.”
Related: How 50 Top Pizza selects the best pizzerias in the world
In that article, Fiore Tedesco, owner of Bambino in Austin, Texas, said Laveglia’s food hit him like a revelation. “I have had a few moments in my life where my path of existence was forever altered by a slice of pizza,” he said. “No slice has left quite the impact on me in recent memory as the first slices I ate from…L’Industrie. The pizzas are a textural masterpiece.”
For its part, 50 Top Pizza declared L’Industrie “a solid point in [New York’s] pizza scene,” where “the products are exceptional as well as the dough, a perfect mix of American flavors and Italian traditions. Special mentions should be made to the Burrata Pie with tomato, mozzarella and burrata; the New Yorker Pie with tomato, mozzarella, pepperoni, sausage and ricotta; and the Fig Jam & Bacon Pie with fig jam, mozzarella and bacon.”
Celebrated pizzaiolo Giulio Adriani’s Slice & Pie, located in Washington, D.C., took the No. 2 spot in the guide to America’s best slices. “Slice & Pie has a strong American character, recognizable from the majority of products used, which aims to maintain as much Italian identity as possible,” the guide states. “In addition to the classic slices Cheese and Pepperoni, on the menu you can find the Truffle Pie with Parmesan cream and mushrooms; the Burrata Pie with California tomato; and the Square Pie, a very tasty Detroit-style square pizza with provolone, honey and pepperoni.”
Rob Cervoni claimed the No. 3 designation for Taglio, his Mineola, New York eatery where the Roman-style pizzas are baked up in rectangular blue-steel pans after a fermentation process of 48 to 72 hours. “The result is a soft and crispy pizza filled with good and fresh ingredients,” according to 50 Top Pizza.
Ranked at No. 4 was Mano’s Pizza in Queens, New York, where owner Nick Manopella says he ferments his dough for a whopping five days, yielding “a very soft, well-developed crumb that melts in your mouth” and a “crust that is crispy and flavorful,” 50 Top Pizza reported.
Miami Slice, with locations in Miami and Las Vegas, came in at No. 5. Owned by a trio of pizzaiolos—Alejandro Diaz, Jose Maria Cardenas and Santiago Huen—Miami Slice is known for its long lines and for sending carryout customers home “with a fragrant treasure in hand.” The menu serves as an example of focusing on a few items and doing them beautifully. The five pies offered there include the Margherita de la Casa, Pepperoni Proper, La Salsera, Leeks on Bacon and Mushroom Truffle.
Rounding out the guide’s top 10 spots to find the best slices in the U.S.:
No. 6: Palazzo di Pizza, Royal Oak, Michigan
No. 7: Tivoli, Seattle
No. 8: Mama’s Boy Pizza, Oakland, California
No. 9: Jimmy’s Pizza Café, Chicago
No. 10: L&B Spumoni Gardens, Brooklyn