Pressure Cooker Hard Boiled Eggs

Name: Pressure Cooker Hard Boiled Eggs
Prep time: 7 min
Cook time: 7 min
Total time: 21 min
Ingredients: 1 cup (240mL) of cold water1; 12 large eggs2

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5 from 22 votes

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Make fool-proof hard boiled eggs in the Instant Pot with my tried-and-true 7-7-7 method. Using a pressure cooker is the best way to guarantee easy-to-peel eggs with the perfect texture every time!

Two halves of a hard boiled egg on a surface with a moss colored cheesecloth around it.

Why we love Instant Pot Boiled Eggs

As a family that consumes 12-18 hard cooked eggs every single week, believe me when I say we have tried all the ways of cooking them! The Instant Pot is the only method we’ve found to produce reliable, repeatable results, and we’ve been relying on the same exact method for literally hundreds of dozens of eggs since our Instant Pot purchase in 2017.

By using a pressure cooker, you eliminate the need to stand over the stove to boil eggs in a giant pot of water or the need to preheat the oven just to have eggs burst all over a muffin tin. Aside from providing a super simple method, hard cooking eggs in the Instant Pot is the only method we’ve found that makes peeling an absolute dream.

7, 7, 7 Method for Making Boiled Eggs in Instant Pot

My tested and perfected technique for cooking hard boiled eggs in the pressure cooker is the 7-7-7 method (I like to call this the Monica Method… #IYKYK).

The steps in this method are:
• heat/allow to pressurize
• cook
• rest/warm/allow to release pressure naturally
• manually release remaining pressure
• ice bath

HOW TO MAKE INSTANT POT HARD BOILED EGGS

STEP #1

Add the cold water, the wire trivet, and the eggs to the pot.

Instant Pot Perfect Hard Boiled Eggs: The 7-7-7 rule gets hard cooked eggs that are easy to peel and the perfect texture every time!

STEP #2

Place the lid on the Instant Pot and be sure the lever is pushed down and turned to “sealing.”

STEP #3

Press “manual.” A number will appear (the number you set to cook last time you used the Instant Pot). This is your cook time. Use the buttons to adjust the time to 7. You’ve now set your cook time to 7 minutes (this is the first part of the 7-7-7 method).

STEP #4

After a few seconds, your Instant Pot will accept 7 minutes as your cook time and then start heating and pressurizing. The display will say “On.” This process takes about 7-8 minutes, but is not part of the 7-7-7 method.

STEP #5

When your Instant Pot is ready to cook, the little metal knob will be completely raised, indicating pressure in the pot, and it will start counting down the 7 minutes of cooking time.

STEP #6

When your 7 minutes is up, it will BEEP and the display will read “L 0:00.” This is your “keep warm” setting and it will start counting up. You’ll want to count up to 7 minutes (this is the second part of the 7-7-7 method).

STEP #7

Since your pressure cooker will sit until you manually stop it and not beep to let you know your 7 minutes of resting/natural pressure release is up, you will either need to be able to watch it or set a separate timer for yourself to let you know when the 7 minutes has passed.

STEP #8

After the 7 minutes of resting, you will carefully move the knob to “venting,” at which point the Instant Pot will release the remaining steam and pressure. When it has finished hissing, remove the top and use tongs to retrieve the eggs for their ice bath.

STEP #9

Your eggs will take their icy bath for (at least) 7 minutes, which is the last part of the 7-7-7 method.

After the ice bath, you can store your eggs or peel them immediately. I’ve done both, and both ways yield easy-peel eggs that are perfectly cooked on the inside.

SERIOUSLY. Look at those fluffy, perfect eggs!

Aerial photo of hard cooked eggs on a surface.

Instant Pot Boiled Eggs Cook Times

In our house, the 7-7-7 is how we prefer our eggs, but if you find that the doneness isn’t just right for you with this method, take a look at this chart to determine what texture might be the best for you. The only step that gets adjusted is the cook time. The natural release and ice bath times will remain the same.

Regardless of which time you pick for doneness… It is guaranteed to work perfectly every time.

An aerial photo of 4 different hard cooked eggs cut in half to reveal the inside with text overlay on the photo to indicate cook time on each doneness.

WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE IN DONENESS WITH DIFFERENT TIMES?

ONE MINUTE: this yolk is not runny, but it is just cooked. There is a lot of moisture in this yolk and the white is also still soft.

THREE MINUTES: this yolk is a bit more done than the one cooked for 1 minute, but still moist, and the white is sturdier still.

FIVE MINUTES: there is still a bit of moisture, but the egg is fully cooked. I like this doneness for deviled eggs as the white is nice and sturdy and the yolk still has some moisture to work with for the filling.

SEVEN MINUTES: this is the most done you can get your eggs before they are unappealingly dry or get green rings. As I’ve mentioned, this is our preference for eating, but if you are not happy with your hard cooked eggs after this timing, your Instant Pot may cook warmer than ours, so reduce the cook time by 2 minutes and reassess.

Our favorite ways to use Pressure Cooker Hard Boiled Eggs

While we enjoy hard boiled eggs as is, there are so many uses for them! You can use them for egg salad, sliced or shredded on top of a salad, in tuna salad or potato salad, as a quick breakfast, for Easter, as deviled eggs… Endless opportunities for hard boiled eggs, and you did them beautifully in your Instant Pot. Pat on the back, friend!

Eggs on a surface that also has a dark brown cheese cloth on it.

Hard cooked eggs cut in half on a surface to reveal the inside doneness of the yolks.

Hard Boiled Eggs Instant Pot FAQs

You can cook up to 12 eggs at a time in a 6 quart size Instant Pot. I do not recommend cooking fewer or more than 12 as the cook time would need to be adjusted to accommodate a different number of eggs.

I do not recommend freezing hard cooked eggs. The egg whites will become rubbery.

You can store hard cooked eggs with the shell on or off. With them on, hard cooked eggs will stay fresh for about 7-10 days. If you store them peeled, consume within 3 days.

See my chart above for reference of what the inside will look like with different cook times. Since every pressure cooker can perform differently, you may need to find the time that works best for you.

Green rings in hard boiled/hard cooked eggs means the eggs were cooked for too long. If you used the 7-7-7 method and still got rings, you may just need to adjust the cook time as every Instant Pot or pressure cooker can act differently (even between brands or even sizes within the same brand).

Using a trivet will help keep your eggs from crashing into each other while cooking, and also keep them off of the surface of the pot which can expose it to a more extreme temperature since the heating element is right under the pot. Even with these preventatives in place, I occasionally have an egg that cracks, but the good part is, it’s still safe to eat!

5 from 22 votes

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