Most prolific laying hen breeds?

Leghorns. The hatcheries sell their own special production strains with names like "Pearl White." The leghorns lay white white eggs. If you want brown eggs, I would recommend getting the production bred sex link hens.
 
Our very best layers are ISA Browns which lay large brown eggs. For production, you just can't beat those sex link hens. Wyandottes also lay quite well even in cold weather.
 
I LOVE my pearl white leghorns from McMurray. They are very prolific, early layers. And when people talk about flighty leghorns, I never quite get it because my pearl whites have always been relatively calm, friendly birds.

If I had to choose just one breed for eggs, it would be them.
 
As you've noted, everyone has their favorites, based on their own experience.
Statiscally, however, the Leghorn breeds are the champion egg layers.
Other solid laying breeds are the RIR, NH Red, Austrolorp and the many DP hybrids like Comets, Browns, etc.
 
Australorps hold the record - 364 eggs sin 365 days!!! I know ours is a laying machine.
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The A-lorp record you refer to was set back in the early 20th Century in Australia and was highly contrived, a product of competitive breeding practice. Nations were competing at the time to show how good they could be in agriculture, in particular trying to beat the Americans.

It was a shock to American egg farmers at the time, who were still using rather laggard practices nationwide. In essence, we had always relied on flock numbers, not egg laying quantity to meet our market demands.
Losing to the Australians served as a real kick in the pants to the American poultry business to improve thier efforts.

Ultimately, these sorts of competitions led to the "egg a day" standard we now apply to hens across the board, both in the commercial biz and the barnyard.

The Australorps commonly available from hatcheries today are removed from these intensive methods, but genetics run strong. The A-lorp was a champion egg layer all the way into the 50's, even having postage stamps issued in it's honor. They are top barnyard producers to this day.
 
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