Split bone-in chicken breasts are hard for most people to grill correctly to 165° without burning the skin. With just a few easy tips and 3 ingredients, you can master grilling BBQ bone-in chicken breasts for a wonderfully moist and tasty meal.
🐓Ingredients
Split bone-in chicken breasts
Oil—vegetable or olive oil
BBQ Sauce of choice
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Featured Comment by SparkCo:
"This turned out great! ...they were all juicy and very good. thanks!"
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
This is as simple as it gets. And you will have a moist and tender barbecued chicken dinner.
- Trim the chicken correctly.
- Use the correct grill temperature and have a cooler zone.
- Brush with great sauce near the end of cooking.
- Use a meat thermometer to cook to the minimum safe internal temperature.
👨🍳How to Grill BBQ Split Chicken Breasts—Step-by-Step Photo Instructions
1. Preheat a gas grill to a surface temperature of 425°-450° with one area of the grill on lower heat.
2. Pat dry the split chicken breasts. Trim off any loose fat and the rib section.
3. Cut the breasts into 2-3 equal pieces each.
4. A light brushing with oil.
5. Grill chicken skin side up for 5 minutes and flip for 4 minutes. Keep repeating until the internal temp is 165°.
6. When the chicken is nearly done, brush it with BBQ sauce. The total cooking time is about 30 minutes.
For more details, keep reading. See the Recipe Card below for complete instructions and to print.
How long to grill split bone-in chicken breasts
Grilling time will average 30 minutes, assuming medium-sized chunks of chicken breasts and a grill surface temp of 425° to 450°. But you will end up with smaller and bigger chicken pieces, so time is variable. Check each piece individually for a final internal temperature of 165°.
Seasoning
This recipe depends entirely on your favorite BBQ sauce for seasoning; no salt, pepper, or other ingredients are needed. All the flavor is from the barbecue sauce. You can easily add or replace the sauce with different herbs and spices.
Make it right every time
Temperature is vital to any cooking—the cooking temperature and the final internal temperature. Cooking at too high a temperature will burn the outside and leave the center unsafe; too low and you will dry the meat.
According to the USDA safety guideline, chicken must reach 165° with an instant-read thermometer to be safe. Do not overcook for juice results.
We don't recommend rinsing chicken anymore. Pat dry only. Please see Chicken… To Rinse or Not To Rinse? for a more detailed discussion.
The grill setup
Grill temperature is critical to cooking any chicken correctly. It is easier to control grill temperature on a gas grill. You can use a charcoal grill but must accurately control the grill temperature and set up a cooler zone while keeping the direct heat zone from overheating.
The grill surface temperature needs to be 450° or a bit less. Most chicken is grilled in the range of 450°-500°. With the skin issues, try to use a range of 425°-450° for most of the grill surface.
That is a little above medium on most gas grills. For more details, please look at my guide to controlling grill temperature.
📖Other Bone-in Chicken Breast Recipes
For an oven-based version, please check out Baked BBQ Split Chicken Breasts.
There are other ways to enjoy this economical cut of chicken. Try some Crispy Baked Split Chicken Breasts, Crispy Grilled Split Chicken Breasts, or Herbs de Provence Chicken Breasts.
📖Serving
Serve with Grilled Corn on the Cob, Grilled Mixed Vegetables, or Grilled French Fries. Finish your BBQ chicken meal with a scoop of ice cream with Glazed Grilled Pineapple.
Storage of leftovers
Leftovers should be stored in an airtight container. Refrigerate for four days or freeze for four months. Reheat in the oven or air fryer.
❓FAQs
Your chunks of chicken breast will be of different sizes and shapes, plus chicken skin can burn quickly.
The cooler area should be under 300°. You can leave a burner on low or turn it off. If you only have two burners, turn it down at about 10-15 minutes into the cooking. If you have three or more burners, turn one down at the beginning of cooking.
On a charcoal grill, use a side of the grill with no coals.
A sweeter BBQ sauce like Kansas City or Memphis-type sauce is an excellent choice for chicken.
There's no salt, black pepper, or other seasonings on the chicken before adding the sauce. We are using the sauce as the entire seasoning here. So, a great sauce makes for great BBQ grilled chicken.
You can use the BBQ sauce of your choice. I love Gates BBQ of KC sauce but sometimes use Bulls Eye Original, which Cooks Illustrated likes. My Memphis BBQ Sauce would be the best choice, but some work.
According to the FDA, all chicken needs to reach 165° to be safe. Less will be unsafe, and higher will dry out rapidly. You must use an instant-read thermometer or another type of meat thermometer.
🐓What are split bone-in chicken breasts
Split bone-in chicken breasts are also known as just split chicken breasts or skin-on-bone-in chicken breasts. They are the whole breast just split down the middle. It will have part of the breast bone, the skin, and a section of the ribs.
Most feel they have more taste and moisture than the more popular skinless version. But they are usually too big for a serving for most people and are hard to get entirely done cooking without burning the skin.
📖 Recipe
Grilled BBQ Split Bone-in Chicken Breasts
Ingredients
- 2 split chicken breasts - AKA bone-in skin-on chicken breast
- 1 tablespoon oil - for brushing
- ¼ cup BBQ sauce of choice
Instructions
- Preheat a gas grill to a surface temperature of 425°-450°. That is medium to medium-high on most grills. Clean and oil the grill grates.
- Pat dry chicken. Trim loose fat and rib section.
- Cut the split chicken breasts into 2-3 equal pieces each.
- A light brushing with oil, and you're good to go.
- Place the chicken pieces skin side up and grill for 5 minutes. Flip over with skin down for 4 minutes. Continue cycles of 5 minutes when the skin is up and 4 minutes when the skin is down. You can also grill some with the cut sides down.If you only have two burners, turn one burner down at about 10-15 minutes into the cooking. If you have 3 or more burners, turn one end burner down at the beginning of cooking.
- With smaller pieces and pieces browning too fast, move them to the lower temperature area as needed.When the chicken is nearly done, brush with BBQ sauce about 5 minutes before the end of cooking and then again during the last few minutes. Grill until internal temp of 165°. The total cooking time is about 30 minutes.
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Recipe Notes
- Get grill surface temperature correct—450°or a bit less.
- Trim and cut up the chicken. Whole split chicken breasts don't cook well.
- Keep skin up as much as possible to prevent burning.
- Have a cooler zone to move smaller pieces to while grilling.
- BBQ near the end to prevent burning.
- It is done when the internal temperature is 165°.
Your Own Private Notes
To adjust the recipe size:
You may adjust the number of servings in this recipe card under servings. This does the math for the ingredients for you. BUT it does NOT adjust the text of the instructions. So you need to do that yourself.
Nutrition Estimate
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Originally Published June 7, 2011. Updated with expanded options, refreshed photos, and a table of contents to help navigation.
SparkCo says
This turned out great! I only have two burners so it turned it as low as i could and followed instructions. the smaller pieces got to 165 first but the largest were close. once i let it all rest for 10 minutes, they were all juicy and very good. thanks!
Michael Cord says
clearest instructions in most appealing tone...thankyou!
vlizzle says
I don't understand why people think that grilling split chicken breasts is difficult. For me, it is the EASIEST type of chicken to grill. There is NO need to flip the chicken over either. Grill it bone side down the entire time and the top will still brown nicely. I have a 4 burner grill. I heat all burners and then shut down the two end burners. I keep the middle burners on medium and I marinade my chicken in whatever I am in the mood for that day. Every so often, just brush your chicken with additional marinade and it will come out nice and juicy on the inside and crispy on the outside. Usually takes 45 minutes for me and then I let the chicken sit for about 10 minutes before serving.
Mother Rimmy says
Great tips for grilling the perfect chicken. I'm a big chicken fan, so when everyone else is grilling steak, I make sure I have some chicken on the grill.
Drick says
now that's some good looking chicken, grilled to perfection... nice to see so many grilling posts, just outstanding
- thanks for stopping by and do try those burgers, they are some kind of good....
Jeffrey and Juli says
Chariton is just down the road from us! You must have taken the hot weather with you, because it's been in the mid-70's for the last couple of days. Raining like all get-out, though. The road we take through Carlisle is on its way to getting flooded over in one low spot.
We saw our daily viewers (not page views) increase from 50 a day on average to 180-200. I thought maybe Blogger was making a mistake! But I don't see anything on the forums.
Maybe there's something to that recipe reformatting after all! I think you may be right, we're getting a second-hand benefit from your blog, as well as several other blogs.
Dr Dan says
The chicken was right down my alley, very simple..
I don't really know why but my traffic is up a lot the last several weeks. As for coming to your site, they are trying to escape me and you publish so frequently, you're at or near the top of the blog list most of the time.
Also off topic, I just got back for 4 day in Chariton and Des Moines. Boy was it hot.
Jeffrey and Juli says
These look really great! I love a good barbecued chicken breast.
Offtopic: We've seen a HUGE number of people coming to us through your blog. Have you seen your hits spike radically? I've been trying to figure out what's different!
Thanks,
Juli
Christine's Pantry says
Love chicken! Great recipe!