does water boil quicker at higher elevations?

Question

I read a couple articles that talk about the different temperature requirement at different elevations, but does this change the time required to boil said pot of water? if the temperature to boil the pot of water i’m assuming the time to boil it will also be lower? but perhaps the air pressure changes something that i’m not aware of

also chemistry? is that the right flair? sorry if it’s not

In: 0

Answer 1

The boiling temperature is lower. Quicker, not necessarily.

For the same amount of heat put into it, yes!

Basically, the boiling point of a liquid goes down as the pressure goes down. Atmospheric pressure is lower at high altitude, hence the boiling point of water is at a lower temperature.

Note that this can affect cooking as sometimes doing something in boiling water is more about the temperature than the water actually boiling. If it’s about boiling something off, it’s different obviously, but if you want to make pasta at high altitude, you might have to keep the pasta boiling for a little bit longer unlike you like them very al dente.