A Blender Bonanza

In this guide, you’ll find all of our favorite blenders, along with a few tools that make blending tasks easier and more efficient.

This quiet, high-powered blender has simple, intuitive controls. As for its blending capability, it was top-notch. It was able to produce fine-textured foods without incorporating excess air, thanks to its narrow blender jar. The tamper accessory was helpful when blending thicker foods, and the blender’s 7-year warranty insured our investment. It’s tall, at 20.25 inches, so it can’t be stored on a counter beneath a standard 18-inch-tall cabinet, and its narrow jar made scraping out its contents a minor challenge.

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We love this midpriced blender from Breville, which makes smoothies and almond butter that are just a touch less fine-textured than our top choice’s but still impressively smooth. It even has a dedicated “green smoothie” button that completely blends fibrous ingredients into a silky drink. It’s reasonably quiet and compact, and it combined ingredients efficiently with minimal pauses to scrape down the sides. It automatically stops every 60 seconds, which can be a little annoying during longer blends, but this wasn’t a big issue during most tasks. Its timer makes tracking recipe stages very easy. 

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This relatively inexpensive blender had very basic, easy-to-use controls (Low, Medium, High, and Pulse) and a comfortable handle. It did a good job with most tasks, crushing ice well and even making great almond butter. Due to this blender’s wide jar, it made somewhat frothy smoothies that had the occasional chunk of unblended fruit. The downsides? It can’t make mayonnaise, and it’s very loud during use.

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Our favorite blender capably turned out smooth margaritas and smoothies and creamy salad dressing. Like those of the other models in our lineup, its narrow cup opening was difficult to fill, but we appreciated that it came with a small silicone funnel to help. We also liked that this blender was easy to turn on and off with one click of a button. It withstood being placed in a duffel bag and dropped five times onto concrete. It did begin to leak on the 45th smoothie, but that was a lot to ask of a machine likely intended for simpler tasks, such as making one smoothie a day or a few batches of frozen drinks at the beach.

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We’ve recommended this model for more than a decade, and it’s easy to see why. Its lightweight construction and comfortable grip made it a breeze to maneuver around any vessel. Its ventless, bell-shaped blade guard kept food flowing freely and prevented splattering. Its two speeds, which were both powerful enough to pulverize frozen pineapple, are controlled by two simple buttons that we could operate with one hand. This machine was also durable: It blended 25 smoothies in a row without breaking a sweat. We also liked its clearly labeled, easy-to-operate eject buttons. This reliable model would be a great addition to your kitchen.

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This model can feel oversized, but the long handle offers good leverage in deep bowls and pots. The large, flat blade makes quick work of folding whipped egg whites, which would suffer from too much agitation. You may not use it every day, but it can’t be beat for certain tasks. It lost points for staining, but it eventually did come clean.

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This straw set came with two 8-inch-long and two 10.5-inch-long straws. Both were very comfortable to drink from, thanks to their 3-inch-long silicone tips. Because the silicone tips were detachable, both the straws and the tips were easy to clean. The 8-inch straw fit comfortably in a glass, a to-go cup, and a travel mug and came with an effective cleaning brush that had plentiful bristles and a grippy handle. These sturdy straws did not dent when we placed a weight on them for an hour and ably punched through the lid of a plastic to-go cup. The 10.5-inch-long straw is ideal for to-go cups and tumblers larger than 16 ounces. The downside is that this set did not come with a carrying case (OXO said it plans to release a set with one later this year); however, we felt that its performance, easy cleanup, and durability outweighed this drawback.

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