A pizza made with white sauce, cheese, pineapple, and chicken. Greek-Canadian Sam Panopoulos (1934–2017) claimed to have invented the Hawaiian pizza and first made it at the Satellite Restaurant in Chatham, Ontario, Canada, in 1962. Based on his experience with Chinese dishes, which usually combine sweet and savory ingredients, Panopoulos experimented with adding pineapple, ham, bacon, and other toppings that were not originally popular for pizza. The recipe, which involves adding pineapple to a traditional pizza mix of tomato sauce and cheese using ham or bacon, soon gained popularity in Canada and then spread to pizzerias around the world. Panopoulos chose the name "Hawaiian" after the brand of canned pineapple he used to make the dish.
In Germany, Hawaiian pizza is considered a type of Hawaiian toast with ham, pineapple and cheese, first made by Germany's first television chef Klemens Wilmenrod in 1955.
In 2014, Time magazine included Hawaiian pizza in its list of "thirteen most significant pizzas of all time" at number 13.

Hawaiian pizza was the most popular pizza in Australia in 1999, accounting for 15% of sales of all pizza varieties.

A 2015 survey of independent take-away businesses selling their products through Just Eat claims that Hawaiian pizza is the most commonly available pizza.

A 2016 Harris poll of U.S. adults found pineapple as one of the top three favorite pizza toppings, ahead of anchovies and mushrooms.

According to a 2019 YouGov Omnibus survey, 12% of Americans who eat pizza say pineapple is one of their top three favorite pizza toppings, and 24% say pineapple is one of their least favorite toppings (only 2 ingredients: anchovies and eggplant).

In 2017, attention to Hawaiian pizza was attracted by the President of Iceland, Gvydni Johannesson, who, at a meeting with schoolchildren, when asked if he liked pizza with pineapple, replied that he was disgusted with it and he would gladly ban it. In Germany and Russia, lovers of Hawaiian pizza are often accused of lack of taste🤷‍♀️🤷‍♀️.