Cape Coral's pizza national ranking in new study is way better than it looks

At first glance, the Cape Coral pizza rating looks bad.

Like too-many-toppings-on-a-floppy-crust-with-watery-sauce bad.

Pizzello’s recent Google-review-based 2024 study to find the 250 best cities and towns in the U.S. for pizza has Cape Coral listed at 78. Pizzello designs, builds and sells pizza ovens.

According to the numbers, the city glistening with pizza gems like Nice Guys and Leone’s isn’t even the best in the state.

Pembroke Pines (21^st), Miramar (26^th), West Palm Beach (46^th) and Palm Coast (57^th) all rank higher.

How could this be?

Left scratching my pizza-loving head, I grabbed a slice of leftover pizza from my fridge and took a closer look at the numbers.

New York City is at the top of the list with a 4.68 average Google rating, followed by Tulsa, Oklahoma, (who knew?) at 4.65 and Los Angeles at 4.59.

Cape has a 4.50 Google review score. I sat back to ponder and took a bite of leftover meatball pizza from Leone’s Italian Market & Pizzeria (which has a 4.8 Google review rating).

With each bite, you get a chunk of homemade meatball which, combined with the melty cheese and just right crusty crust, is essentially like eating mini meatball parm subs. I can see why this SE Cape joint has a loyal following and lines out the door.

But I digress.

Looking at the entire list, Cape is 78^th out of the top 250 in the country. Since math isn’t my strong suit, I texted my statistics-majoring son at UCF.

Those numbers put Cape in the top 28.8 percent in the country for best pizza.

Now that’s more like it.

And there are 37 cities and towns besides Cape with a 4.50 score — from No. 43 Wyoming, Michigan, to Allentown, Pennsylvania, at 80.

So Cape has the same score as No. 43, which puts it in the top 17.2 percent in the U.S.

That’s much more digestible.

Cape Coral has A LOT of pizza places, many of which rank above its 4.50 average, including Leone’s (4.8), Oda (4.8), East of Chicago on 8^th Street (4.8), Lion’s Den (4.7), Nice Guys (4.6), Grado’s (4.6), Luciano’s Too (4.6), Dairon’s (4.6) and Papa Joe’s (4.6).

And keep in mind this is all based on Google reviews where a place can have one review and be ranked a 5. Some of my favorite places aren’t on this list (I’m looking at you, Trattoria Ciao, Matthew’s, Long Island Brothers and High Tide Social House), but I’d recommend them time after time.

In case you’re wondering Boynton Beach (91^st), St. Pete (99^th), Largo (161^st) Plantation (194^th), Palm Bay (196^th), Hialeah (204^th) and Tampa (230^th) also made the list.

Restaurant news: More like Welp: Yelp ignores SW FL in Top 100 Places to Eat, so here's our favorites

Newest of the new: 7 restaurants that opened in December, from Cape Coral to Bonita Springs

But hold onto your slices. Fort Myers — home of beloved Uncle Rico’s and Downtown House of Pizza — is nowhere on the list.

I need a whole pizza to figure that one out.

Robyn George is a food and dining writer for The Fort Myers News-Press. Send news to rhgeorge@gannett.com.

This article originally appeared on Fort Myers News-Press: From Nice Guys to Leone's: Cape Coral ranks 78th in US for pizza