Ultrafast heating (UFH) experiments have been carried out in cold rolled ultra low carbon (ULC) steel, followed by quenching. The selected heating rates are in the range between 10 and 800 °C s⁻¹. The recrystallization curves are slightly shifted to higher temperatures as the heating rate is increased. The average recrystallized grain size and texture are virtually unaffected by increasing the heating rate. Nucleation took place at grain boundaries as well as inside deformed grains. Electron backscattered diffraction (EBSD) analysis reveals that the texture of grains nucleated inside deformed ferrite grains prevails at later stages of recrystallization. The results obtained in this work demonstrate that similar microstructure and textures are obtained after very short annealing cycles.