Spaghetti (Italian pronunciation: [spaˈɡetti]) is a long, thin, cylindrical, solid pasta. It is a staple food of traditional Italian cuisine. Like other pasta, spaghetti is made of milled wheat and water. Italian spaghetti is made from durum wheat semolina, but elsewhere it may be made with other kinds of flour.

Originally spaghetti was notably long, but shorter lengths gained in popularity during the latter half of the 20th century and now spaghetti is most commonly available in 25–30 cm (10–12 in) lengths. A variety of pasta dishes are based on it.


Pasta in the West may have first been worked into long, thin forms in Sicily around the 12th century, as the Tabula Rogeriana of Muhammad al-Idrisi attested, reporting some traditions about the Sicilian kingdom. In the 5th century AD, it was known that pasta could be cooked through boiling. The popularity of spaghetti spread throughout Italy after the establishment of spaghetti factories in the 19th century, enabling the mass production of spaghetti for the Italian market.

In the United States around the end of the 19th century, spaghetti was offered in restaurants as Spaghetti Italienne (which likely consisted of noodles cooked past al dente, and a mild tomato sauce flavored with easily found spices and vegetables such as cloves, bay leaves, and garlic) and it was not until decades later that it came to be commonly prepared with oregano or basil.