My question...do you know how long I would cook Instant Pot Pinto Beans at an altitude of 5000 ft?
Commenter Rhonda V
The rule of thumb for high altitude pressure cooking, Instant Pot or otherwise: For every 1,000 feet above 2,000-foot elevation, increase cooking time by 5 percent. In metric, that's 5% for every 300 meters above 600 meters.
Pressure Cooking Adjustment By Altitude
| Altitude | Increase % | Multiply Cooking Time By |
| 3000 ft / 900 m | 5% | 1.05 |
| 4000 ft / 1200 m | 10% | 1.10 |
| 5000 ft / 1500 m | 15% | 1.15 |
| 6000 ft / 1800 m | 20% | 1.20 |
| 7000 ft / 2100 m | 25% | 1.25 |
Pressure Cook America
Because I’m a habitual map looker, I stumbled across this list of the cities in the United States by elevation. Here are the cities with a population over 100,000 by elevation (according to Wikipedia):
| City | State | Altitude | Population | Increase % |
| CO Springs | CO | 6035 feet / 1839 m | 465,101 | 20% |
| Centennial | CO | 5830 ft / 1777 m | 110,250 | 15% |
| Lakewood | CO | 5518 ft / 1682 m | 154,393 | 15% |
| Aurora | CO | 5403 ft / 1647 m | 361,710 | 15% |
| Westminster | CO | 5384 ft / 1641 m | 113,479 | 15% |
| Thornton | CO | 5351 ft / 1631 m | 136,703 | 15% |
| Arvada | CO | 5344 ft / 1662 m | 117,453 | 15% |
| Boulder | CO | 5328 ft / 1624 m | 107,125 | 15% |
| Albuquerque | NM | 5312 ft / 1619.1 m | 558,545 | 15% |
| Denver | CO | 5278 ft / 1609 m | 716,492 | 15% |
| Fort Collins | CO | 5003 ft / 1525 m | 164,207 | 15% |
| Pueblo | CO | 4692 ft / 1430 m | 111,127 | 10% |
| Greeley | CO | 4675 ft / 1425 m | 105,448 | 10% |
| Provo | UT | 4551 ft / 1387 m | 117,335 | 10% |
| Reno | NV | 4505.6 ft / 1373 m | 248,853 | 10% |
| West Jordan | UT | 4373 ft / 1333 m | 113,905 | 10% |
| West Valley City | UT | 4304 ft / 1312 m | 136,170 | 10% |
| Salt Lake City | UT | 4226 ft / 1288 m | 200,544 | 10% |
| Las Cruces | NM | 3900 ft / 1200 m | 101,759 | 5% |
| El Paso | TX | 3740 ft / 1140 m | 683,577 | 5% |
| Amarillo | TX | 3605 ft / 1099 m | 199,248 | 5% |
What do you think?
Questions? Other ideas? Leave them in the comments section below.
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My Instant Pot Pressure Cooker Recipes list
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Matt says
Flagstaff - 7,000 feet 25% more time - will give it a try! Thanks
MELA Mcginnis says
I live at 8,240 feet in the Andes mountains. When I moved here 7 years ago I noticed that using all my old times from the states, things weren’t getting done. I found this formula and started adding 30% to all my cooking times. Now it’s perfect!
Mike Vrobel says
Glad it helped!
Greg says
So at elevation the only PC adjustment is time, but no need to adjust water amount?
Mike Vrobel says
Correct.
Dave Whittaker says
I live outside of Denver at about 6,300 ft above sea level and have a ski house over 9,k ft above sea level. I have never adjusted any of your pressure cooker recipes, or those from any other site.
Steven says
I have the same experience - I've lived in both Virginia and Denver, and the only adjustments I ever make to pressure cooker recipes are when the original called for a 15psi stovetop PC. But I can pour boiling water right onto coffee grounds without waiting for it to cool to 205 first 🙂
Great site BTW - as a fellow dad cooking dinner and instant pot aficionado, I respect and appreciate the effort you've put into this. Tip of the hat to you sir and thanks for the recipes!
San says
In your first paragraph you say "2,000-foot", Everything else is 3 000.
Mike Vrobel says
Fixed - thanks