Best Stand Mixers

Evaluated's top picks for stand mixers that will last through more than one season of holiday baking.

The stand mixer has been a fixture in kitchens since the 1910s with the Hobart Manufacturing Company bringing the first models to the market. In the 1920s, these began to be utilized more widely in the home. There’s nothing like it for making any number of culinary delights, but especially baked goods.

Some of the most well-loved models on the market today are commercial appliances, but the most commonly known is the KitchenAid. Not all KitchenAids are alike, as we explain below, and there are other stand mixers that hold their own against the kitchen classic. Some cooks rely on stand mixers to do a lot of heavy lifting in the kitchen, and others may only need them for occasional, light use. Make sure you are choosing a model with enough power for your needs. There is nothing worse than a mixer burning itself up in the middle of a batch of bread full of expensive ingredients. Believe me, I’ve had it happen.

KitchenAid was stand-mixing before it was cool, and over a hundred years later retains a strong identity and brand on the market. You might have noticed that quite a few people refer to every stand mixer as a "kitchen aid" even if it's another brand entirely.

So in our quest to be fair, we'll start off with some popular non-KitchenAid choices:

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Our Top non-Kitchenaid mixers:

GOOD

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At first, I was a skeptic about this one. Our in-house baker who insists this is The One broke it down this way: the kneading mechanism in this one is gentle and doesn’t beat the heck out of your dough, so you add less flour to it, resulting in lower gluten and a better quality dough. It is also easier to add ingredients to as you’re not maneuvering around a mixing head. Comes with a stainless 7.4 qt bowl and a 3.7 qt plastic bowl for things like whipping cream. Great color options and there are lots of accessories available to make it as versatile as a KitchenAid, including pasta making, meat grinding, vegetable slicing, and my favorite, the citrus press. It has a different look than the classic stand mixer but it’s certainly not ugly!

BETTER

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If you are looking for a mixer that looks even sexier than a Kitchenaid in the perfect shade of whatever it is you wanted in your kitchen, the SMEG will be that bit of eye-candy for the countertop.  This one actually looks more like a vintage appliance than anything we’ve seen with beautiful colors that will go with most décor schemes, including plain silver. It has a smaller bowl size than some of the larger models but makes up for this with power. At 600 watts it is more powerful than the Kitchenaid Artisan series, is stainless steel, and can also be used with attachments. The lower speeds make it easy to fold dry ingredients into a mixture without creating a giant cloud, and we love the throttle like control on the top of the unit. Bonus- have you SEEN the matching SMEG kitchen goodies?

BEST

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This mixer is big! It will dominate the average kitchen with a more commercial and spartan look. It's ideal if you are looking for some serious performance without buying a full-on commercial unit. It looks exceptional with stainless steel appliances. While this one has fewer accessories/attachments, the mixer itself has great features like a gentle “fold in the dry ingredients” pulse option. This thing chewed through every heavy task we threw at it. The knob on the side isn’t as easy to control but it was not a dealbreaker for our tester. Because this unit is so tall, I was grateful it has a bowl-lift function vs. having to tip the head of the mixer back because there wouldn’t be much room for that on the counters. It comes with a spiral dough hook, paddle mixer, and wire whisk attachment.

All About KitchenAid Stand Mixers:

There are a lot of variations of the classic stand mixer on the market. Here's which KitchenAid is best for you:

Let's face the facts here: KitchenAid has the most colors, accessories, attachments, and add-ons to make this one of the most versatile appliances in the kitchen. There are many models of the classic KitchenAid stand mixer out there, and I know I’m going to have rocks thrown at me for saying this… but I honestly don’t feel most of them stand up to the hype.

KitchenAid’s current line-up of entry-level models have plastic or nylon gears inside instead of metal. If you just want something colorful and shiny on the counter to mix up a single batch of cookies or banana bread here and there and use some of the accessories and attachments, get the Artisan. However, for our testing team, the Artisan also had some weak points. I’ve actually had to dispose of an Artisan KitchenAid that burned up on me less than a year after its warranty expired and I felt downright betrayed after growing up with the bulletproof one that had a Hobart motor in it.

Our baker (who has also burned up a few KitchenAids) said if you’re going to get a KitchenAid, get a commercial KitchenAid. This one, the KSM8990, is about a hundred dollars more than the commercial ProLine but that may price it out of the budget for most consumers. For the purpose of this evaluation, we’re sticking with the consumer models.

Tilt-Head Style Models

KitchenAid's line of tilt-head mixers work like this: the mixer's head tilts back to allow the user to attach or remove the bowl from the base. When tilted forward and in place, the head is locked in place with a lever.

  • Capacity: 3.5 -5 quarts
  • Lower Profile: 12-14 inches tall
  • Over 40 color choices
  • Best for "low-impact" cooking and baking and very small spaces
  • Plastic gears
  • 1-Year Warranty

Bowl-Lift Style KitchenAid Models

KitchenAid's bowl-lift mixers have stationary heads and a wider base, with the bowl attached to two arms that raise and lower with a lever. Lowering the bowl offers access for adding ingredients or changing out your mixing accessories.

  • Capacity: 5-7 quarts
  • Higher Profile: 16.5 inches tall
  • 5-10 color choices
  • Best for thicker batters, doughs, and frequent use
  • Only the Pro-Line Series 7 has all-metal gears and a 5-year warranty

Back to what’s presently on the market: most stand mixers burn up because they don’t have metal gears. Among current models, only the bowl-lift ProLine Kitchen Aids have metal gears, the others have plastic or nylon. If you plan to actually use your mixer for things that might need some muscle, like bread or stiffer doughs, we recommend a KitchenAid with metal gears.

We Recommend:

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Of the tilt-head KitchenAid models we've tried, this one is universally a favorite, and not just because of the amaaaaazing colors it comes in. Some retailers even sell their own exclusive colors. But before we get too excited about the upgrade this will give your kitchen just sitting on the counter, remember that these are not going to hold up to the abuse a sturdier model will, so think about how often you're going to be making stiff doughs and batters. Even for infrequent users, we still recommend this one over the cheaper models. If your wrists hurt just thinking about mixing that bread dough by hand, you don't want your mixer to struggle either. Lower-end models do not have the 5-quart capacity and most cooks and bakers are going to get extremely frustrated trying to make it work with something as small as 3.5 quarts. Think all-the-flour-blowing-out-of-the-bowl-small. The Artisan 5 quart is a good choice if colors are important, you really don't have the counter space or budget for the bigger model, or you lack the ambitions to start your own sourdough bread company in your kitchen.

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The Pro Line 7 has a sturdy 7 quart bowl (the biggest non-commercial size Kitchen-Aid offers) that lifts up to the mixer and back down using a lever. Its 1.3 horsepower D/C motor should get your attention. And if that wasn’t enough, it also has a 5-year total replacement warranty compared to the 1-year warranty you get with a lower-end KitchenAid.  Now this baby does only come in 6 colors and some of them can be hard to find, but we love that Candy Apple Red. There was a brief and glorious time when it was available at select merchants in real copper. Nonetheless, this one prioritizes function over form with 3 lock points on that bowl to be sure it does not jump around or fling flour around. The generous 7-quart capacity is the largest consumer-grade size KitchenAid has to offer and it can really come in handy for making large batches of whatever it is you're mixing up. It's big though, coming in at nearly 30 lbs. For the serious cook who is still mourning the loss of their gorgeous soft teal stand mixer that blew up mixing up a batch of cookies, but not ready to invest in the commercial version... this is a nice consolation prize.

KitchenAid Model Comparisons

KitchenAidBuyingGuide
Ed- TLDR
  • Don’t buy an underpowered stand mixer if you’re planning to use it often and/or to mix thick doughs, candies, and recipes.
  • KitchenAid is the most popular brand of stand mixer but they have varying levels of quality and features, with entry-level models utilizing plastic instead of metal gears.
  • There are a lot of other good brands to consider, such as our top 3 listed above.
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