How many eggs can a hen lay per day?

Yes I know they can sometimes lay twice a day....mine never have but I have heard of it. I wouldn't think they could lay much more but lets see what others say.....

I am also getting 6 or so eggs from 4 EE's oullets a day, and I SWORE I had someone else sneaking into the barn at night ... lol

I feed 21%, scratch, black oil ss, calf manna and oyster shell.

A hen is suppose to lay about every 25 hours.  I have ocassionally had more eggs than hens in my coop but I attributed that to me possibly missing one the day before.

Are they all eggs with hard shells? I only ask because I have one of those 'freak' chickens who superovulates - some days she lays up to four eggs, but usually only the first of the day has a hard shell. The soft shelled ones cause her terrible problems - they get stuck, she strains terribly to get them out, and they sometimes break inside her.

So she's been really poorly actually, so it's more of a pathology than an interesting one-off laying event, so please don't worry about your odd extra egg. Our vet (who is an avian specialist) has never seen this level of superovulation in a chicken before in his entire career! We're looking into getting her a hysterectomy to put an end to her laying days once and for all.

So, to answer the original question: a hen can lay up to four eggs per day, in my experience... but she really shouldn't.

Ours laid once a day when I was little.  My Rouen was laying two in a 24 hour period, not the same day technically, until she got established.  She'd go 3 or 4 days without laying, then lay 2 or 3 in a hurry, then nothing again, like she didnt know the "gotta go" feeling and was getting backed up in there or something...

Thanks for this info.  I have 3 Hyline Browns who up until a few days ago laid one egg each pretty much every day. They are all about a year old.  Then one morning I found 3 broken eggs below the perch (not in the nest box) with paper thin shells. Later in the day I found one perfect egg in the nest.

For the past few days I have been getting 2 normal eggs and one either soft shelled ( and light colored) sometimes broken sometimes not. So I put them under surveillance today to see who it was. I think I have figured out who it is and watched her today and she went to the nest several times and put straw on her back and went into laying position many times but didn't lay an egg. It sure looked like she was trying.  Early in the morning there was one of the light (and rough) eggs with a little hole in it on the floor of the coop - which I assume was hers.  The other two hens laid normal eggs today.

So, is it possible this hen laid all three of those soft ones the other day??? Is she laying one soft and then trying to lay another?  Is this a serious problem?  She seems fine in all other respects and I have been trying to diagnose the problem.  Any help appreciated!

S.