While there has been a bit of a “return to the office” push in the last year or so, most of us are still splitting our work between our homes and the office. And, in many cases, that means a pokey London flat that was never designed for work in the first place. It’s not ideal.

So, whether you’re working from a desk that you need to fold away at the end of the day or trying to make the most of a small space, I’ve got some tips on the products and habits you’ll need that’ll make a big difference to your comfort.

Firstly, though, it’s worth dwelling on just why this is all so important.

“People often ignore the early warning signs, which present as aches and discomfort,” Graham Ashton, Ergonomist at Posturite, told me.

“If ignored, these can progress into persistent musculoskeletal pain, nerve irritation – like tingling in fingers – chronic fatigue and reduced concentration.”

If you don’t yet have back pain or RSI, now’s the time to make sure you don’t get it. Make sure you’re keeping an eye out for any neck and shoulder pain – as a result of looking down at a laptop – lower back discomfort (from a lack of lumbar support), wrist or forearm pain, eye strain, fatigue or headaches.

For elevating your posture

Working while hunched over can lead to pain quite quickly, and while there’s no such thing as perfect posture, staying static and reinforcing an uncomfortable sitting position can leave you hurting.

“If you’re working from a dining table or kitchen island, the goal is neutral posture with minimal kit,” Ashton said.

“My non-negotiables are a laptop riser, so the screen can be set to eye level to avoid neck flexion, and a separate keyboard and mouse… essential once the screen is elevated, otherwise you trade neck strain for shoulder/wrist strain – the key is function over furniture as its about creating alignment, not a perfect office.”

So, to recap: at the very least, you need to elevate your screen to your eye level (with a quality laptop stand or monitor) and get a portable keyboard and mouse.

My all-time favourite laptop stand is the Nexstand K2 (£24.99). It’s light, adjustable and collapses flat for travel. Hybrid workers will love it. If you need something weightier and destined to stay at home, though, I would pick the Twelve South Curve Flex (£79.99) instead. It also has a variety of heights and a very robust base that feels secure.

For typing and clicking

I’m big on accessories that won’t take up loads of space in your bag, so you can bring an ergonomic desk setup with you wherever you go. My mouse of choice would be the Logitech MX Anywhere 3S (£65), which is tiny and excellent, but you can save a little cash by going for the Logitech Pop Mouse (£24.99), which is even lighter, albeit less premium.

When it comes to light keyboards, little has impressed me more than the portable Keychron B1 Pro (£45.99); it’s slim, affordable and has months-long battery life. If the lack of backlighting is a dealbreaker for you, though, Logitech’s MX Keys Mini (£79.99) is a worthy, if pricey, alternative.

I asked Ashton about whether there were any potential pitfalls with small devices, and he mentioned that there could be.

“Compact devices can be helpful in tight spaces and easy to store, but they become problematic when they create poor working postures,” Ashton said.

“Those who use the numbers frequently can find separate number pads to maintain productivity. A general rule of thumb would be that ‘compact’ is fine, however ‘cramped’ is not.”

For charging and connecting

If you’re working with a small desk space, maximising that space is essential. These days, you can charge multiple devices with a single adapter, and as a charging nerd, I of course have a favourite plug. I’d opt for Anker’s Prime 160W charger with three USB-C slots (£129.99). It’ll charge three devices – like a MacBook Pro, iPad and iPhone – at top speed, and tell you how fast it’s going with its screen. Overkill for a charger? Sure. But it’s excellent.

I’d also suggest connecting everything to a dock or USB-C hub. A basic USB-C hub should only set you back a tenner or so, but I’ve been highly impressed by the Anker 13-in-1 Docking Station (£129.99), as it handles every essential connection and has a tiny detachable hub for use on the go. Once again, pricey, but worth it.

For spreadsheets and YouTube

Unless you’re using a screen for gaming, you really don’t need to overspend on your monitor. 27 inches is the ideal size, and the BenQ GW2790E (£99.99) offers everything you need at a sensible price, while having features that reduce eye strain and an anti-reflective finish. I bought this monitor myself, and got around the lack of height adjustment by mounting it on the surprisingly great Amazon Basics Monitor Arm (£22.93).

If you do need to step up to a smarter monitor for productivity, pick the HP E27m G4 (£307.47), which has a built-in webcam, speakers and height adjustment.

For taking calls

Taking calls in a room where you’re constantly hearing the outside world or dealing with loud flatmates? Invest in the Jabra Evolve3 85s (£449). They’re the most impressive work headset that I’ve ever tried, and I love that they now come without the unsightly boom mic that makes them look like a headset.

I’ve taken calls on these in the middle of Oxford Street, with the radio playing at home and in the middle of Pret. Every time, the person on the other end said they heard my voice clearly and, on my end, powerful noise-cancelling kept my environment from distracting me.

Prefer earbuds? I’ve had great experiences making calls using the AirPods Pro 3 (£189) in the middle of busy Canary Wharf, and I haven’t been let down by Bose’s second-gen QuietComfort Ultra Earbuds (£249) either.

For a high-quality dedicated webcam, I’d go with the Logitech MX Brio (£140.91), which makes it much easier for others to see you on calls, even in a darker room.

For comfort and cleanliness

The furniture can be the part that matters most.

If you’re genuinely so short on space that you can’t have a permanent desk, look for a fold-flat desk that you can store behind a door when not in use. If you have space for a desk, try to get one that you can raise up and down, allowing you to stand while working – the KOJI from Posturite (£599.94) is impressively compact.

Want to sit comfortably? The £681 Herman Miller Sayl is hardly cheap, but it may make sense as a long-term investment and as a way to avoid physio bills. Plus, it has a ridiculous 12-year warranty.

Keeping your desk tidy isn’t essential, but it helps! I’d recommend picking up some of Harber London’s excellent leather or felt desk mats, laptop pads or mouse pads. This can be the investment that makes a small corner of your home actually feel like a proper workspace.

Lastly, while it may seem a small thing, Dyson’s Pencil Vac (£429.99) is genuinely useful for keeping a tidy office without hauling out your big hoover. It’s the world's slimmest vacuum and smart, too, cleaning into edges, illuminating your space and running for 30 minutes of cleaning. Surprisingly fun to use (Editor Gerald Lynch swears by it), and one that may end up feeling essential pretty quickly.

Working smarter, not harder

Overall, though, the most important thing to take away from this piece is that you should never just “make do” with a poor setup and hunching over a laptop all day.

“So many people accept the poor working position of just opening a laptop,” Ashton said when I asked about the one biggest mistake we’re making.

“Taking that one minute to set up a laptop stand, keyboard and mouse is so effective in reducing the risk of developing aches and pains.”

It won’t surprise you that it’s important to stretch to avoid getting hurt, too. Ashton recommends you try to move around, and you don’t need loads of space! Aim to “reset” your posture every 20 to 30 minutes, try shoulder rolls, neck rotations, ankle pumps and sit-to-stand transitions (even without a standing desk). And, of course, get up and have a little walk. Use this to justify getting up on your feet and making your much-needed cup of tea.

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For Star Wars fans across the globe May the 4th is an exciting time of year, but no doubt a terrifying one for their bank accounts.

With The Mandalorian and everyone’s favourite chaos gremlin Grogu still riding high as the franchise’s most bankable duo, brands have properly gone in on the May the 4th celebrations.

From slick toys, LEGO and even desk companions, this year’s drops lean hard into that Mando-and-Grogu sweet spot. The bounty hunter and his tiny, soup-sipping sidekick are doing what they do best: quietly stealing the spotlight… and your money. Here are our favourites.

LEGO Razor Crest

Big ship. Big nostalgia hit. Big dent in your wallet.

This 930-piece build gives The Mandalorian’s iconic Razor Crest a proper refresh, with opening panels, a detailed interior and just enough play features to justify actually taking it off the shelf now and then.

You’ve got Grogu in there too, obviously, alongside a few extras to pad out the scene. It’s not the most hardcore collector set LEGO’s ever done, but that’s kind of the appeal. It’s solid, good-looking, and doesn’t feel like homework to build.

Klang Talking Action Figure

The Klang talking figure leans fully into the interactive side of things, packing in a bunch of phrases, sound effects and little reactive touches. And look at that eyebrow and tache combo, how could you not love him?

It’s not trying to be a pristine collector’s item. This is more about instant, slightly chaotic fun, the kind of thing you pick up for a quick play and then realise you’ve been pressing the same button for five minutes straight.

LEGO Grogu

This is very much LEGO’s “let’s make Grogu into a centrepiece object again” strategy, and honestly, it works better than it should.

The set turns Grogu into a fully buildable display model, complete with beskar armour, his satchel, and a selection of poseable joints so you can tweak the expression and stance until it feels just smug enough for your shelf. There’s even a little display plaque if you want to lean fully into collector territory.

It’s less toy, more desk statue with a bit of personality, which feels very on-brand for May the 4th. The kind of thing you don’t necessarily “play” with, but you definitely adjust every time you walk past it.

The Mandalorian Voice-Changing Helmet

Full-size Mandalorian helmet with voice-changing effects and pre-recorded phrases

This is the closest you’ll get to actually becoming The Mandalorian without committing to full bounty hunter career training.

It’s a full-size adult helmet with built-in voice-changing tech and a set of pre-recorded lines, so you can finally say “This is the Way” in a slightly more intimidating tone than you would in real life. The interior is adjustable for fit, and the whole thing is built for proper roleplay rather than just display, even if most people will absolutely end up wearing it around the house for ten minutes and then putting it on a shelf.

It sits in that sweet spot between cosplay and collector piece, which basically means it’s designed to be both mildly ridiculous and completely irresistible.

Grogu Phone Stand

Grogu is doing what Grogu does best: sitting there, looking cute, and now physically supporting your tech lifestyle.

It’s a desktop phone holder shaped around Grogu, designed to cradle your phone (or controller) while he sits in his little Force-sensitive calm pose. It’s officially licensed, which means it’s just about polished enough to live on your desk without looking like a knock-off impulse buy, but still playful enough that it clearly knows exactly what it is.

It’s not trying to be clever or complicated. You put your phone on it, Grogu holds it, and that’s the entire pitch.

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Running is well and truly having its moment. You can’t turn a street corner without seeing an oncoming running club hurtling towards you. Wander into any local park on a Saturday morning after 9am, and you’ll be met with runners of all ages starting their weekend with a 5k jaunt.

If you’ve finally decided to take that leap onto the gym treadmill or are ready to take to the pavements, the main investment you need to make is in a good pair of running shoes. Yes, your usual kicks will likely get you from A to B and then back again, but your feet will likely not have the ample level of cushioning or be wrapped up in material to offer the requisite level of comfort either.

Fortunately, we’ve tested a lot of running shoes and while you might be instantly lured by snaring those bright pair of Nike shoes that all the pros wear, you don’t have to spend big to get a good pair to lace up that can give you some of that faster feeling or let you cruise in the most comfortable way.

If you want to go straight to the finish line, our best value running shoe pick is the Puma Velocity Nitro 4. Our best overall pick is the Adidas Evo SL and if you really need a shoe primed for tackling a speedy marathon that’s more accessible than most, we’d go for the Puma Deviate Nitro Elite 3.

Here are the 10 that have made our running shoes shortlist. Read on to find out why these shoes excelled in our testing.

The best running shoes

• 7 of the best HOKA trainers for men that are as great on the street as they are on the track

Once upon a time, HOKA trainers were merely the secret weapon of serious runners. But times have changed.

These days, you're just as likely to spot a pair on someone doing the big shop as you are to spy them pounding the pavement during a marathon, proving the company mastered the art of blending in – even if the oversized soles don't.

HOKA's ridiculously plush cushioning, feather-light feel, and midsoles that look like clouds, have charmed everyone from Olympic hopefuls to folks who just want to look sporty while grabbing a coffee.

With a lineup that's more diverse than you would first assume, HOKA has become the footwear equivalent of that friend who's good at everything.

So, whether you're logging serious miles or just trying to be comfortable whilst trotting about, these might be just what you need for your everyday shoe.

We’ve scrolled through every pair on the HOKA site - past the good, the bold and the interesting - to come out with our favourites that should cater to your every need. We’ve opted for a range of prices and listed them in no particular order because, well, you’ll know the pair you need when you see them.

7 best HOKA trainers for everyday wear

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Today (24th July) marks National Tequila Day, which you probably most likely didn’t know but is an excuse to a). get out lime and salt, and b). write another article about out mastermind specialist subject: tequila.

There are a lot of great tequilas out there, not to mention mezcal which really doesn’t get the credit it deserves (overshadowed by the other Mescal unfortunately), and we’ve rounded up our top favourites more than once.

However, this National Tequila Day we wanted to share a couple of tips and tricks we actually use day to day (or more accurately night to night). And yes, this includes finally - if reluctantly - letting you in on our favourite supermarket dupe.

1). Get the M&S Silver Tequila

This has to be our best ever find. Most tequilas under the £20 mark have top notes of paint stripper, and usually contain unavoidable flashbacks to hazy clubbing days circa 1990 which we’d rather were left in the past. And as much as we love recommending a Don Julio or a Clase Azul, sometimes, you just don’t want to be spending upwards of £50 on a bottle of tequila.

Enter M&S’ Silver Tequila. This is ridiculously smooth for a tequila of its price, with strong notes of agave and a good sharpness that will still pack your margs with a punch. Our go-to tequila for an at-home cocktail is probably a Casamigos - it’s smooth, deep, with the same rich-but-not-overpowering agave that strikes that perfect note between a Blanco tequila and an ultra-premium tequila. It’s hands down the best dupe we’ve ever found, and we review alcohol for a living.

• Want more recommendations? These are the best tequilas in the world

2). You don’t need any fancy equipment to make a margarita at home

Yes, you can take a blow torch to orange peel, you can shake up some egg white, get chocolate and banana liqueurs, but you don’t need all those bells and whistles to make a good cocktail.

If you’re after a margarita, skip the regular marg and go for the more simple Tommy’s Margarita. All you need is tequila, lime juice, agave syrup (it sounds like an obscure ingredient but you can get it at your local Tescos) and ice. You don’t need a shaker either, if you have an empty jar (think jam, chutney, whatever), just use that. Best life hack to date.

Our go to recipe is 60ml of blanco tequila, 30ml of lime juice, 15ml of agave - but you can whack a bit more agave in if you like it on the smoother side. If you don’t have a jigger or measurer, you can definitely eye-ball it - you can use a 2:1:1 ratio.

3. Get your store-cupboard staples in

There are a lot of great tequilas out there, and it can be hard to know what to choose. We have curated a careful long list of our top tequila brands but it’s good to have a top three down. Also, it’s worth mixing it up and including a mezcal in there.

So as well as our favourite supermarket dupe (thank you M&S), and its alter ego Casamigos, our other store-cupboard staple is Teremana. It’s got your smooth agave richness, perfect kicking tang and lies at the reasonable £40 mark.

• From spritzes to spirits: Jo Malone CBE launches her own vodka

There's always time for tequila in our books, especially when it's available at mega discounts thanks to Prime Day.

Summer is a time for suncream, festivals, barbecues, and obviously a cheeky marg as and when you can. Whether you're mixing it up into a cocktail or looking for a party kick-starter (after all, National Tequila Day is only a couple of weeks away...) we've picked out the three best tequilas currently on offer - both in terms of taste and price drop.

In a whole market of celebrity releases, Casamigos has done the almost unheard of: it's broken into the mainstream. Completely take away the whole George Clooney angle, and this tequila is a knockout in its own right.

It's our personal drinks-cupboard tequila go-to, super smooth with a clean and fresh agave taste. It's at its best in a simple Tommy's Margarita, but even if you drink it straight, it won't give you that eye-watering, whole-body-wince that tequila shots of yore (and by yore we mean uni days) often deliver.

If you're not a blanco kind of person (tequila-wise), you may want the smoother taste of a more aged tequila. A bit like whisky, the longer tequila is aged, the richer and more intense the flavour becomes.

Don Julio's Reposado - whilst it's not the most expensive or oldest in the range - is still our favourite of theirs. It has the flavour of a much more expensive tequila, with that gorgeous golden colour. It's super sippable on account of its premium flavour and manages to strike that balance between being light and fresh whilst also being layered and more complex. It's definitely on the pricier end, but it's worth it.

• Not into tequila? Why not try out Mezcal - tequila's smokier cousin

Amazon Prime Day is here, and with it comes a plethora of deals, covering everything from sneakers to scotch, marking the perfect opportunity to finally make those purchases you’ve been umming and awwing about for months. Fortunately, if you’ve been on the market for a decent timepiece, then the sale has plenty to offer, with both traditional watches and smartwatches receiving big discounts.

We’ve picked out some of our favourites below for you to check out, with none of them coming in above £300, so you don’t feel too guilty for nabbing yourself a well-earned treat during Amazon’s four days of discounts. All of the deals below are only available to Prime members.

Best Prime Day smart watch deals

The modern person needs a watch to do more than just tell the time. The practical side of watches is primarily found in smartwatches, while traditional watches are now more known for sparking conversation and complementing a decent outfit.

That's why we've also included some of the best smartwatches on sale this Prime Day, all of the below watches will aid you in your day-to-day life and of course help you chase your fitness dream.

Check out more Prime Day steals below:

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There are three certainties in life: death, taxes, and panicking about what to wear to a wedding. Not to be dramatic, but they’re all as bad as each other.

Why is wedding attire so dreaded, we hear you say? Because you are immortalised in the photos. Every year those overpriced images are dredged from the archives and strewn across social media for the masses to see, accompanied by sentimental captions like “Three years since me and the hubby embarked on the greatest journey ever”, followed by a series of nonsensical emojis. It makes us sick.

Your style is essentially catalogued on the internet, so you need to make sure your whole outfit is on point – so your children, your children’s children, and (most importantly) absolute strangers think you dressed absolutely fly as hell.

Here are the wedding suits, shirts, shoes and accessories to make sure your legacy is cemented in sartorial grandeur, not shoulder pads and winklepickers.

The suits

Percival, the contemporary menswear brand worn by the likes of Chris Evans, Tom Holland, and The Rock, has gone from strength to strength over the last few years, particularly with their collaborations, from rock ‘n’ roll jewellers The Great Frog to retro sportswear titans Champion. But their real flex? Tailoring.

For summer weddings, linen is your MVP. Lightweight, breathable and moisture-wicking (though prone to wrinkling, so pack a steamer if you’re travelling), it’s perfect for sweltering ceremonies. Percival offers plenty of options in the fabric, blending premium quality with comfort.

In terms of colour, they’ve got your wedding failsafes of navy and cream, but we’re in brighter territory now. A forest green two-piece? Chef’s kiss. It does all the talking, letting you keep things clean elsewhere: white shirt, sage green tie (for that sweet tonal dressing moment), and black loafers to ground the look.

If you're into the fabric but want to keep it classic, Cos’s laidback navy linen suit is a winner. With its relaxed silhouette, it leans into casual cool — ideal for evening guests or beach-adjacent vows. Ditch the tie, throw on a Cuban collar shirt, and you’re golden.

Prefer something a little more structured? This double-breasted suit from Suit Supply in sandy wool hits that sweet spot between formality and summer-ready. Light colours have a higher albedo (yes, we’re bringing science into this), meaning they reflect more sunlight. Translation: less sweat, more style. If your armpits operate like the Louisiana swamp, leave the dark colours behind.

The shirts

Wedding dress codes have become less rigid in recent years, which means ties don’t always need to make an appearance — and your shirt gets to do a bit more of the heavy lifting.

The Peaky Blinders effect gave us some dodgy trends (we did buy a flat cap or two, that’s on us), but the grandad collar shirt is one relic we’re happy to keep. H&M has a solid collection, with our pick being the classic white in a soft weave. Cool, crisp, and surprisingly versatile.

If you want to lean into summer vibes, revere collars (aka camp or cuban collars) are still having a moment. Reiss does a textured blue stripe for a nod to Jude Law in the ‘90s iteration of Talented Mr Ripley, Phix has safari options with double pockets, Japanese streetwear giants Visvim goes full ‘80s in silk, and Sandro delivers a geometric moss green number that screams Miami beach wedding but in a very good way.

For the die-hard traditionalists who need a collar and tie to truly function, we salute you. And more importantly, we’ve got you. Alexander McQueen’s harness shirt is sharp, subtly detailed with a buckle, and has just enough elastane to keep things comfortable while you inevitably sweat/cry through Don’t Look Back In Anger on the dance floor.

The shoes

Derby shoes are the traditional wedding go-to, but in the summer months? It’s loafer time, baby. They’re breathable, sleek, and – most crucially – let your feet air out. Let them dogs breathe!

Duke & Dexter are the undisputed kings of loafers right now, offering everything from wild bespoke designs (think one-of-one exclusives) to slick ready-to-wear styles. Whether you’re into minimal monochrome, snake motifs, gold hardware, or rattan finishes, they’ve got a loafer for every foot and every level of attention-seeking.

Styling-wise, show them off. Cropped trousers or a slight turn-up do the job nicely. Sock-wise, white cotton is a reliable all-rounder, but if you're confident and the forecast is good, sockless is always on the cards. Just prep your ankles accordingly.

The final touches

Accessories can make or break a wedding look, so don’t get lazy here. Remember, we’re in legacy outfit territory.

Ties and Pocket Squares: Although the indie sleaze trend might still be on the scene, skinny ties are not the one. Keep it classic and keep it chunky. A silk pastel or deep earthy tone will elevate things without clashing. Bonus points if your pocket square complements it without being an exact match (this isn’t your sixth-form prom).

Sunglasses: Sunglasses at a wedding can either scream “nominated for best actor” or “no ID, no entry”. No reflective lenses. No Oakleys. No exceptions. Stick to timeless shapes like the wayfarer in black, tortoiseshell or clear — think Persol, Oliver Peoples and Ace & Tate.

Grooming: Not technically an accessory, but absolutely essential. If you’ve got a beard, invest in some beard balm to tame those hairs and get them pointing in the right direction.

Hair on your head? Go for a sea salt spray to add texture and volume without clagging it up. And please, don’t overdo the aftershave. There’ll already be enough people baptising the congregation in Joop. Instead, invest in a summer scent where a spray or two goes a long way, such as Le Labo’s Bergamote 22, a fresh citrus fragrance with a musky edge.

• 5 watches perfect for summer, no matter your budget — from £100 to £3000+

Your alarm didn’t go off. Your bus is on diversion. The tube is like a pressure cooker, and we can send a robot to Mars but can’t keep leaves off a train track. The morning commute can be horrible, so we all like to carry around some distractions to keep us sane as we navigate the 9-to-5.

But picking up the best commuter bag that suits all of your needs can present its own set of challengers to the morning traveller. What’s more important, style or storage? Is a rucksack too casual for the client meeting? Is it a bit much to turn up down the pub with a briefcase?

The average person puts more thought into a pair of trainers they're going to wear for a single season than the bags that work alongside them for years at a time, and the choice can be as confusing as navigating the Circle line.

So we’re here to take the strain off your shoulders with four hand-picked choices. We’ve lived with each of these bags for months (years, in some cases), and can personally vouch for their bus-ready status.

Oh, and try not to be a tube-wanker with any of these picks, please, they deserve better — pop your bag at your feet when standing, and keep it off the seats!

The best commuter bags for men

You don’t have to sacrifice style and forward-thinking design ideals just to survive the 6pm tube crush. Take the Troubadour Apex 3.0, which we crowned the best commuter backpack on the market. Designed by London-based Troubadour Goods, the Apex 3.0 is a sleek and sturdy backpack available in a range of colours, with ‘circular’ design principles in mind. In other words, it’s made from recycled materials (used up plastic bottles in this case), and treated in such a way that, when it reaches the end of its life, it can safely degrade without harming the environment.

With its green-credentials guilt-free, you can then enjoy its practicality. A good size at 48cm x 32cm x 15cm with a 25L capacity, it accommodates up to 17-inch laptops and features numerous pockets for organization, including dedicated pouches for tablet and notebooks, and a mesh compartment for smaller fiddly bits. Exterior features include a key clip pocket, elasticated bottle holders on either side, an AirTag pocket, and a hidden shoulder strap zip pocket.

A lockable main compartment keeps your valuables secure, while a 'NanoCushion' laptop sleeve protects your gadgets from bumps and scrapes. The backpack is well-padded with sculpted shoulder support to make sure weight is distributed evenly, and breathable back panel — a godsend when stuck between stations. It also includes a luggage sleeve for suitcase handles and fits British Airways carry-on size limits. It’s near faultless, and will be your daily commute’s best friend.

If you’re looking to elevate your look without side-stepping storage, a classic leather briefcase is an essential in your wardrobe. If you’re happy to splash a bit more cash, the Carl Friedrik Sonder Dunloe is a beautiful, luxurious option that pairs its confident styling with a capacity that makes it more than just a boardroom statement.

Textured, grained semi-aniline bovine leather is the dominant finish, with smooth Italian vachetta leather detailing around the clasps, piping, handles and the rear luggage strap for securing to your suitcase. It’s soft and supple, but heavy-duty buckles and underside feet ensure its durability too.

Unlike many leather briefcases, the Sonder Dunloe is no slouch when it comes to packing your daily bits and bobs in too. Open up the main zip and you’ll find a smaller secondary zipped compartment on the inside, along with two pouch pockets, held shut with magnetic clasps. An exterior zip-free pocket is great for easy access to non-valuables, letting you slickly tease that paperback favourite you’re reading to nosey commuters around you.

While we’re a sucker for the classic chestnut finish, you’ve also black, and dark olive finishes on offer, too. With a 40.5cm width, 30cm height and 11cm depth, it’s got a 13L volume, and oodles of storage slots among its lining.

If you're looking to ditch the suitcase and jump from the tube to the airport, our pick of the bunch is the newly-revised Horizn Studios Gion Backpack Travel.

We've lived with the original Gion backpack for many years, and though this one ditches its lush faux leather for a more practical nylon weave, it's an absolutely killer travel bag, with the largest capacity of any option on this list.

Available in black or dark olive shades, its unique selling point is its suitcase-like side-opening compartment, complete with mesh cover to hold your belongings in place. It essentially makes it a mini suitcase for your back, but one that can act as carry-on luggage for a flight, and would even slip in as an under-seat bag with more generous airlines.

It's also got all the mod-cons you'd hope for, with its efficient Japanese-inspired design including a luggage handle strap, a hidden back pocket for valuables, room for a 15-inch laptop and plenty of padding. Water resistance keeps everything safe if you're caught in a city shower or a faraway monsoon downpour, too. Great stuff.

The Mous Extreme Commuter is a bit like Mary Poppins bottomless bag, but, you know — EXTREME. It may have the same 25L storage space as the Troubadour backpack up top, but something about its dimensions and design seems to make it capable of carrying more than that — particularly if you need to accommodate oddly shaped items.

With more of a “tech-chic” feel than other items on the list, this rugged pack is particularly good for storing gadgetry, with a bit more give to its 17cm depth making it better suited for carrying chunky items like photography gear.

Mous is pretty bullish about its AirFoam tech built into the lining of its bag — it’s even put together a video where it drops the Extreme Commuter off the top of a crane to reveal its devices inside have survived unscathed. It’s also well defended against pickpockets, with a top-opening flap secured with a ‘Fidlock’ clasp that’s incredibly difficult to open while it’s on your back.

Water resistant with multiple mesh pocket inserts, this is a backpack for road warriors.

You don’t always need to carry the world on your shoulders — figuratively and literally. Troubadour’s Apex Sling is perfect for those moments where you just need the essentials with you on a day out, ready to be slung over a single shoulder and pulled back around to your front for easy access.

Made from an attractive, green-friendly and waterproof FortiWeave fabric made from recycled plastic bottles, its deceptively small size still has plenty of room inside. A front pocket houses an integrated carabiner for keys, while there’s a hidden pocket on the rear for holding a wallet or cards securely.

Inside there are a further two pockets — padded to protect delicate screen-packing devices like an iPad mini, while there’s a mesh pocket too for keeping all your fiddly bits handy.

Great for festival season, a city break, or a daily sling if you’re a travel-light commuter.

What to look for when buying a commuter backpack or bag

It’s no good having a great looking bag that isn’t comfortable, and it’s not much fun having a comfortable, useful bag if it looks like you’ve fished it out of the back of a skip. When we’re looking for a great commuter bag, here’s five important things we keep an eye out for…

• 1. Comfort: Do your back and shoulders a favour — a good backpack needs to distribute weight evenly across your back, and should be well padded to make it easier to carry heavy weights. Look especially for straps that fit the curves of your shoulders, but don’t hug so tightly that your armpits end up chaffing. For sweaty summers, get a breathable back panel so some airflow gets between you and your load. And, if you’re cycling, find a bag with chest straps (both the Troubadour and Mous bags have these) — it’ll stabilise the weight as you lean and turn. Likewise, even a briefcase’s strap needs to be well padded, or whichever shoulder you sling it across is going to moan at you come home time.
• 2. Water resistance and durability: If you’re in the UK there’s one thing you can never rely on — the weather. A gorgeous summer’s day can turn into a monsoon in a matter of minutes, so make sure your bag is ready for all conditions with good weather proofing. Likewise, do pay attention to the zippers — they’re not all made equally, and those with YKK badging can generally be relied on not to pop or get stuck.

• 3. Storage size: This one will vary based on what you’re hoping to carry around with you all day, but it never hurts to have a little more space than you’re planning for, in case you end up picking something unexpected up on your travels. We’d consider something around the 25L size good for a backpack, 12L for a briefcase, and 5L for a crossbody or sling. Just keep an eye on the dimensions for those larger bags — if you’re a frequent flier you’ll want to find something that fits inside as many airline’s guidelines as possible (though some of those budget ones are very stingy in their carry on allowance sizes).
• 4. Pockets, compartments, and organisation: This goes hand in hand with the one above. Without pockets and ways to organise your items, you haven’t got a bag. You’ve got a sack. Think about how you use your bag — what items do you need easy access to? What needs particular protective care? Is there anything you want to keep secret and safe? Check the placement and size of pockets before purchasing — we’re always keen on having a zipped compartment against our backs that now wandering hands can get inside, and one built into a front strap for easy access to moment-to-moment essentials.
• 5. Wardrobe matching: Try not to think of your bag as an item in isolation, but alongside the rest of your wardrobe too. A day-glo colourway might be cool on a shop shelf, but unless you’re a night time cyclist, is that going to work with your trench coat? A rucksack or briefcase can often travel with you from the working day to your extra-curricular activities, so try to find something that matches your fashion sensibilities in both settings.

• Is this the ultimate commuter backpack?

There’s never been a better time to get into drinking a dram, and between the winter weather and winter offers lowering prices across everything from Irish to Japanese whiskies, our list here shows off some of the world’s best whisky, taste-tested over the course of years.

It can be an intimidating liquid to get into — but with more variety of expressions from distilleries all over the world than ever before, and some of the best liquids at pretty decent prices, there’s something to suit all tastes and budgets. Plus, if you're wanting to experiment with a new whisky but not sure how much you want to spend, checking out what's on offer is a great way to find bottles which are perhaps usually out of your price range, trying out some older-aged whiskies or a region you've not ventured into before.

Additional taste testing: Hermione Blandford, Marc Chacksfield, Gerald Lynch and Danielle de Wolfe

What we're drinking at the moment

Our current picks not taking your fancy? Here's our favourite picks from some of the top brands around. You’ll find a wide variety of options from all over the globe represented here. We've got peated whiskies, Scotch, Irish, Japanese, single barrel, small batch, and most importantly, a range of ages, casks, and flavours.

The key is to experiment and enjoy yourself — whatever you like has value. Our team of experts have personally taste-tested each bottle below, and we’ve enjoyed each and every drink listed here, offering up our personal tasting notes to give you an idea of what to expect before you buy a bottle yourself.

Irish Whiskies

Scotch Whiskies

World Whiskies: America, England, & beyond

5 Whisky Tasting Tips: This is how to drink whisky like a pro

“There is only one way to properly drink whisky,” says Richard Foster, the founder of The English Whisky Society, "which is whatever way you enjoy it."

“If you want to mix Coke or Soda water with it, or slosh in tonnes of ice, be my guest."

However, years of hard work have gone into making great whisky, so if you want to first experience what the distiller and blender intended, follow these easy steps says Foster, to taste before you waste:

1. Take a look at the colour in your glass

“It's surprisingly revealing looking at the viscosity, colour & darkness of a dram before you've nosed or sipped it. Over time you can start to tell things like age and cask type just by looking at a Whisky - or, if you're like me, you just enjoy swirling it dramatically a few times before step two…"

2. Carefully nose the glass

“Don't thrust your sniffer straight in there - remember this is high-alcohol booze and all you're going to do is burn your olfactory senses with alcohol vapour. Rather, waft the glass across your nose from a few centimetres away and gradually bring it closer until you hit the sweet (or sour / smokey) spot. Different parts of your nose also pick up different scents so keep moving the glass for a full olfactory experience.”

3. Take a sip

“Don't be shy, get a good glug of the liquid and swoosh it round your mouth. Again you'll taste different flavours across your tongue. When you do swallow, take your time and savour the 'finish' at the end, some drams keep providing warmth and flavour well beyond this moment, so don't rush onto the next sip too quickly (and always drink responsibly!).”

4. Make up your own tasting notes

“You may have read about sun-charred leather chaps on a rodeo cowboys boots, or strange combinations of fruits, kids sweets or even unsavory descriptors used to describe the smell or taste of whisky. Don't worry, everyone's receptors are different and no two people smell alike (unless twins do, who knows) - the point is, most tasting notes are made-up anyway. It's fun trying to discern some of the components of the scent / taste or finish, but if all you get is ‘whisky’ - as long as you're enjoying it, don't worry too much with this dark art. As with anything, practice makes perfect (again with the responsible drinking!)."

5. Time to add that mixer…

"...just don't let me see - unless it's a Smokey Coke with a heavily peated whisky and a premium cola, in which case, make me one too!"

How To Buy Whisky: A Shortlist Guide

We're the first to admit that buying whisky can be super confusing. Between working out what's good value, what the difference is between a bourbon cask and a sherry cask, and what age a 'good' whisky is, it's a minefield. So here are a couple of our best tips to help you out.

What makes a good whisky?

A simple enough question, though perhaps one without a simple answer. It all comes down to your personal preferences. There are sure preconceptions around whisky - Scotch, in particular - that it always has overwhelming flavours of smoke, oak and tobacco. And, while you’ll definitely find these notes in many whiskies - especially in those from the Islay region of Scotland - many Scotch also have flavours of citrus, vanilla and toffee.

The Scottish Lowlands are where you’ll find fantastic flavours of grapefruit, while Speyside whiskies are full of fruity notes such as apples and pears. If you have a sweeter tooth, Bourbons might be more your thing, with many having notes of vanilla, chocolate and honey.

How much should I spend on a bottle?

The price of whisky varies anywhere from £20 to the hundreds and thousands, so it can be hard to know what’s worth paying for and what isn’t. In general terms, though, the longer a whisky has been ageing, the more it’s probably going to cost. This is simply because of how many hours distilleries have put into them, and how long they have to wait for the whisky to age. Most of these whiskies are left in barrels for over 20 years, so it can become a very time-consuming process - something the price often reflects.

For a younger 10 or 12-year-old Scotch, expect to pay anywhere between £25-£45, while you can easily pay upwards of £100 once you’re looking at whiskies that have been aged for 15 years or more. Blended, Irish and Bourbon Whiskies tend to be slightly cheaper, and you’ll easily find a decent bottle around the £30 mark. If you’re planning to mix your drink, one of these is your best bet. The single malt and aged whiskies are best enjoyed neat or with one single ice cube.

Should I add ice?

There are plenty of traditional whisky drinkers who frown upon adding ice to their whisky. In fact, ice can be a great way of diluting whiskies and making them a bit more palatable. We’d suggest adding one large ice cube to your dram of whisky for the best results. These Ticent ice cube trays are an excellent size for this sort of ice cubes, and they even do spheres if you want to make your whisky extra special.

If you’d prefer not to add a whole ice cube to your whisky, we’d suggest experimenting with adding a couple of drops of water into your drink. That may make some scotch drinkers baulk, but adding a small amount of water has been found to ‘open up’ the whisky, bringing out completely different notes from your typical dram.

If you’re partial to a splash of Scotch every now and then, we’d also suggest getting your hands on some whisky stones. These Sagaform Whiskey Stones are cut from recycled granite and are designed to cool down your drink without diluting it. They’re reusable, so you simply wash them each time after use and then place them back in the freezer, ready for your next drink.

What is best to mix with whisky?

If you’d prefer to drink your blended or Irish whiskey with a mixer. There are a couple of options for you to consider. Ginger ale, cola and soda water are the most common pairings, though there are more bespoke mixers coming into the market, including Sekforde Botanical Mixer. This sparkling water mixer has been created specifically to complement the flavours of whisky with flavours of Sicilian orange, rosemary and spicy oak.

London Essence Ginger Ale is also a fantastic option if you like whiskies with a bit of a kick. Irish Whiskey and Ginger Ale is a classic pairing because the mixer adds sweetness while still bringing out the spicier notes in the whiskey. Soda Water is also fantastic if you prefer a longer drink. Double Dutch Soda Water is an award-winning brand that uses natural spring water from the North of England. Soda water still has a bitterness (as opposed to tonic water, which is sweeter), so it pairs well with all blended and Irish Whiskies as well as Bourbon.

The final option is a cola - the pairing you most likely had as a newly-turned 18-year-old. We would avoid the cheap 30p cola you were probably drinking then, but there are some more premium brands - such as Fentiman’s Curiosity Cola - that are great for mixing with blended whiskies. It’s a small batch cola and has a more herbaceous flavour than most big-name brands. A great option if your whiskey has the sweeter notes of honey, vanilla and caramel.

• These are the best gins from around the world
• If you are after American whiskey, then this is our best bourbon list

Get a decent office chair. It's one of the first pieces of advice you'll be told if you start working from home.

We also often hear folks recommended a Herman Miller Aeron. It's the chair you seen most often in fancy offices in movies. There's just one problem. Those chairs cost a fortune.

You don't have to spend £1000 or more to avoid back pain, though.

Our list of the best budget office chairs starts at under £100, and tops out at £150 - a budget that's hopefully manageable, even in these tightest of tight times.

This price bracket is a pretty happy place to be in office chair land. It’s enough to net you proper height adjustment and seat tilt, lumbar support and a solid metal core seat post construction that will take some beating.

One of the key decisions you have to make here is “to mesh or not to mesh?”

A mesh back will help keep you cool and avoid sweating because the back of the chair itself is super-breathable. In this more affordable price bracket, mesh is often a good idea because one of the key alternatives, synthetic leather, can feel sticky and tacky in its lower-cost guises.

However, we have both styles to show below. And one of them is a chair, below £100, we’ve been testing recently right inside Shortlist towers.

If you're in search of an office chair with no budget constraints, we also have a guide to the best office chairs, featuring options ranging from £100 to £1,000.

Best budget office chairs in the UK under £150

• If you have already purchased your desk, then we have the perfect Shortlist for you. We've just updated our best desk accessories guide.
• These are the best desk toys to help make working from home a little more fun
• These are the best coffee table books - awesome reads every single one of them.

When you think about getting kitted out for work, you might consider a new laptop, maybe a monitor and even a business email address. An office chair needs to be among those tier-one buys.

Sitting in a chair that doesn't let you achieve an optimal working position will lead to aches, pains and potentially longer-term injury.

It's not just about lower-back (lumbar) support. You also want an office chair that lets you sit at the right level, so you can look at your laptop screen or monitor without having to bend your neck in a way that will cause strain over time.

We think of these office chairs as splitting into three categories you need to consider. There are the high-profile seats big companies tend to buy for their workforce. They come from brands like Herman Miller and Steelcase, and are fantastic… if you can afford them. Top models often start at around £1000, rising even higher if you opt for extras like leather upholstery and additional seat adjustment.

In the middle ground is where most people should probably shop. These are seats made for ordinary folks like us — for the home office rather than offices of great shining skyscrapers.

Their build will often be a little bit less over-engineered. But does it really matter? If you treat your stuff with even a drop of care, not really.

Gaming chairs are the final category. And we don’t tend to recommend these too often. The quality varies, and the racing seat styling isn’t for everyone. However, one of our favourite office chairs ever, the Herman Miller x Logitech Embody seen below, is technically a gaming chair. There are exceptions to every rule, right?

If you want some more advice on what you should look for when buying an office chair, then head to our handy guide below our shortlist, which is packed with useful buying advice. Happy hunting!

Best office chair UK

How to buy an office chair

5 tips to make sure you get the right office chair for you

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Welcome to the wonderful (and sometimes frustrating) experience of buying an office chair. Making sure you have the best office chair for you is vital as it needs to do a number of things.

It needs to be the right fit for your office (or wherever you want it), it has to be long lasting and, most importantly, comfortable for you. If you are going to be working from home for the foreseeable, then you need to be damn comfy doing it. Here are five things to look out for:

1. Choose the right material

An office chair is often made from a number of key materials. Leather is one of the most popular materials (or leather look, which has been given the brilliant rebrand of vegan leather). This offers extreme comfort and is usually found in executive chairs.

A mesh seat and back is another popular choice, which is the most breathable choice, so if you see yourself sitting down for long periods of them, then this could be a good fit for you.

Then there are fabric-based chairs. These are usually the cheapest, but are simple and, above all, comfortable.

2. Think about the ergonomic features

While the way a chair looks is important, you should also think about how it might feel to sit in it for hours at a time.

An office chair will usually be adjustable to a point and the amount you can adjust it will usually up the price. But there are some essential adjustments you need to be able to make. We recommend looking for a backrest tilt, which will change the angle of the chair and take the pressure off your back.

An adjustable seat is important as you need to make sure that both your feet are on the ground when sitting at a desk. Also look for adjustable height options, and the ability to shift your headrest.

Other things to consider are armrests that help with back support, as well as good lumbar support.

3. Think about the type of chair you want

Yes, it's an office (or at least a makeshift one) but is a huge executive chair really going to fit the look? Maybe, but it might be that a gaming chair fits the vibe of your room better or a swivel chair will help you feel like you’re back in the office. It might be that you’re happy with a fixed chair and that's what you want. Understanding the type of chair you like and that suits your space will help focus your buying.

4. Have a price in mind

We would love a Herman Miller, too, but if your budget doesn't stretch then you have to think realistically about the type of office chair that you want. You can get a decent chair for under £100 if that's what you are looking for – add another hundred to the price and it really does open up your options. You can't spend too much on an office chair, as you’ll be paying for style and brand but just make sure it's what you need before you splash the cash.

5. Ask yourself how lazy you are

If you’re really lazy, then make sure that you go and get a self-assembled chair. It will be a pain to try and fit it into your room, but it does mean that the thing is ready to use right away. If you’re happy to spend a little bit of time putting things together then you’ll find that there are far more office chairs available to you.

• Keen to shake up more of your office set-up? Then check out our list of the best standing desks.
• Want something a bit cheaper? Then head to our best budget office chairs guide.
• Once you have decided on which is the best office chair for you, then head to our best desk accessories guide.
• These are the best coffee table books for your home
• The best desk toys revealed - have some fun while you work.

SOMETHING MISSING FROM OUR SHORTLIST?

Tell us about it, and if enough people agree we'll add it in.

The rum market is booming. It's worth over £12 billion a year, roughly equalling gin revenues and is only continuing to grow. But we'd argue that it's a far more versatile drink, and the different types of rum, from aged to spiced, excel in totally different situations.

In its simplest form, rum is a clear liquid distilled from different forms of sugar, including demerara and molasses. However, this is often followed by barrel ageing in oak casks, and, like some modern craft beers, some also have fruit or spices added.

This means you can get all sorts of different kinds of rums, like white, golden, dark, navy, spiced and fruit rum - and even combinations of those key types. Traditionally, rum comes from the Caribbean, but these days you can get it from all over the place, including Devon.

Here’s our taste-tested selection that we think every rum lover should try, which we have separated by region.

Additional reporting and taste testing: Marc Chacksfield

What we're drinking

From the ocean-aged complexity of Goslings Spirited Seas to the honey-spiced warmth of Wildjac Premium Honey, and the rich, conservation-driven Karisimbi Golden Rum—we're constantly exploring different styles, flavours, and traditions. Here's our current favourites:

Caribbean Rums

The Caribbean, for many, is the home of rum. This liquid sunshine is baked into the region's soul, thanks to sugarcane fields that stretch as far as the eye can see, a climate that's always in vacation mode, and a rum-making legacy that dates back to the 1600s. These islands weren't just dabbling in the global sugar trade; they were owning it! And what do you do with all that leftover molasses? Turn it into glorious rum. With conditions perfect for fermentation and ageing, the Caribbean is considered the rum capital of the world, churning out an incredible array of styles, each one a tasty reflection of its island home.

Central and South American Rums

South and Central American rum is highly regarded for its smoothness, rich flavours, and adherence to traditional production methods. The ideal climates found in countries such as Guatemala, Venezuela, Nicaragua, and Panama contribute to the complex notes of vanilla, spice, and caramel that develop during the ageing process. Many producers utilise high-quality sugarcane and time-honoured techniques, frequently ageing their rum in oak barrels at high altitudes. This commitment to craftsmanship, coupled with increasing global demand for premium and artisanal spirits, has led to a surge in popularity among enthusiasts and collectors of South and Central American rum.

Rums from the Rest of the World

The good thing about almost everything now is that it's no longer restricted to a specific region. Yes, certain ingredients are necessary to produce a quality rum, but key elements like sugar and climate can be either imported or recreated through various methods. It means we can now get a great rum from all around the world, ranging from the Philippines to right here in the UK.

What is rum made of?

This is an easy one: sugar cane. Rum isn’t like vodka, where many things can be used to distil the spirit. Rum has to come from sugar cane, and depending on where it is distilled and what technique is used, this will change the colour of the rum.

Classifying rum by its colour isn’t great

Imagine if we classified whisky as being amber, red or yellow. That would be doing the spirit a massive disservice. But that’s what many do with rum: break it down by colour.

Yes, there is dark rum in the market and white rum in the market (simply put, this is down to maturation) but look beyond the colour when buying and more at where the ingredients come from and, most importantly, where they have been distilled.

Look at rum by the region and the provenance instead

This is something we learned while on a rum tasting session with Black Tot.

Mitch Wilson, Black Tot’s global brand ambassador, told Shortlist that: “We have been bad at educating people. Rum is sometimes described as white, gold and dark - this is a shit way to describe anything.

“Try and drop the simplification and chat about the regions themselves and the provenance of the rums. For example, Black Tot uses Jamaican, Barbados and Guyana for its classification.”

Taking this rather brilliant advice, a really simple rule of thumb is as follows (and don’t forget that most rums will actually be a mixture of rums from different regions):

How does rum age? Does this affect the colour?

It’s worth noting that rums made in a colder climate will take longer to mature. It’s all about the ‘angel share’ here - the amount of evaporation that takes place.

When something is aged in somewhere like the Caribbean then this is called, rather obviously, tropical ageing. Here the climate, heat and humidity play a big role in how it ages in a barrel.

To put this type of ageing into context: 5 years’ ageing in Barbados is around the same as 10-15 years if it was aged in somewhere like Scotland.

This means that the angel share in somewhere like Barbados would be around 6% compared to 2% in a colder climate.

Ageing rum in a barrel makes the rum darker, although some rum brands will also throw in some burnt sugar to make the colour appear darker, too.

Tequila! A distilled liquor so beloved it's been the subject of many songs, but unless you have a shot of the best tequila, you can be put off the drink for the rest of your life – we speak from experience.

The thing about tequila is it makes a fantastic shot, especially when it's followed by salt and a slice of lime. But this agave-based tipple is quickly becoming a long drink of choice for many people. Which is why we've put together this list and selected our top picks of the best tequila you can buy today.

UPDATE:We don't think tequila lovers need a reason to pick up their favourite drink, but on the 24th of July it's World Tequila Day – what better excuse to get some friends round and create the best tequila-based cocktails before moving onto shots.

Did you know that tequila production is actually quite rare? Much like champagne, it can only be produced in specific regions in Mexico: Guanajuato, Michoacán, Nayarit, Tamaulipas, and Jalisco.

Fancy another fun tequila fact? All tequila can be classified as mezcal, but not all mezcal can call itself tequila. In order to be classed as mezcal, the drink must come from the agave plant. However, tequila is distilled using only the blue Weber variety of agave. There's one to crack out at your next cocktail party.

Whether you’re after something to down in one, add to a fancy cocktail or would prefer to savour straight, like they do in Mexico, then discover our budget-spanning pick of the best tequila below. If you want to know more about how to drink it, then head to our tequila drinking tips.

• Prefer the taste of gin? Take a look at our best gin list while we’re on the subject.
• How to drink tequila, according to the experts.

Additional tasting: Marc Chacksfield and Hermione Blandford

The best tequila

How to drink tequila: ultimate tequila drinking tips

We recently sat down with Proximo Spirits tequila educator Oli Pergl to get some tequila drinking tips. Here he explains just how to get the most out of your tequila tasting and why you should sip, not shoot...

"These are tips I have stolen from my trips many trips to the Jose Cuervo distillery and will hopefully help people taste tequila better...

Don't use a shot glass

"The first is the glass - use something like a champagne flute and that will really let you taste and examine what you are drinking.

Neutralise your senses before sipping

"You are surrounded by aftershave, food so you want to neutralise both smell and taste. To do this, crack some coffee beans, then cup your hands and take a big smell of the coffee. This is a very intense smell so will neutralise your nose

"To neutralise your sense of taste, then just have some water."

Try putting some tequila on your hands before tasting

"Before you smell the tequila in the glass, you will want to smell the agave first. In the town of tequila there about 24/25 distilleries and they are producing tequila 24 hours a day, six days a week. Sunday is 24-hour siesta and nobody is working. So none of the ovens are cooking, none of the distilleries are producing. But every few minutes during the six days, there is a huge aroma fo the agave cooking. Once you know what it is, you will be able to discover it in tequila.

"Because we aren’t in Tequila, there is another technique: pour three or four drops of the tequila in your hand, wash your hands with the drops. The quality of tequila can be tested by how it feels. 100% agave shouldn’t feel sticky as there is no sugar. If it’s silky and coating the skin then that’s an indicator that it’s 100% agave.

"What also happens is that the body temperature of the skin is warm enough to evaporate the ethanol. All that is left is cooked agave. Smell that on your hands and you get an olive cooked in honey type smell. This is blue agave at its core."

This is how to properly understand the smell of tequila

"When smelling, dip your nose into the bottom of the glass, with the glass at a slight angle as that is where the aroma is strong. At the top it is lighter. And because you have trained your nose, you should be able to smell the agave notes.

"The first thing you get is the buttery sweetness of agave, then floral notes of honeysuckle and at the end there is a grassy, salinity to it. There is a sea water smell in there, so you don’t need an extra bit of salt in there.

"Your sense of smell and taste is as unique as your fingerprint so if you don’t smell those notes, don’t be alarmed but you will be able to smell difference and generic flavours in the tequila."

And these are the steps to properly taste the tequila

• Take a big breath, hold it in through the entire drinking process of the tequila
• Take a sip, but don’t take all of it - don’t swirl it about but make sure it coats your tongue for about three, four seconds.
• Swallow, still not taking a breath
• Breathe out but exhale through your nose

SOMETHING MISSING FROM OUR SHORTLIST?

Tell us about it, and if enough people agree we'll add it in.

You can get just about anything delivered to your door on a regular basis. Beer is no exception and there are a number of different services on the market for you to choose from, all vying to become the best beer subscription box around.

UPDATE: It has been a tumultuous time in the brewing business and, sadly, some of our favourite subscription boxes have been wound down. We've given our best beer subscription boxes shortlist a thorough re-working, cutting out the legacy subs and adding some new favourites. These include North Brewing's and Duration Beer's Beer Clubs.

The common denominator, of course, is that you get beer. The type of beer you get and whether there are extras thrown in like a magazine and the best beer snacks, varies.

Not all of them are monthly, so you needn’t be trying to drink through an entire box every month if you just want an occasional beer.

Here are our picks of the moment.

• Want an AF alternative? Why not take a look at our best alcohol-free beers for something different
• Or need some food inspiration? Check out our best meal delivery service list

Best beer subscription boxes

SOMETHING MISSING FROM OUR SHORTLIST?

Tell us about it, and if enough people agree we'll add it in.

• Now you have subscribed, these are the best craft beers to try
• Also head to our best real ales and best American beers guides

Additional reporting: Marc Chacksfield

A kettle is an essential for any modern kitchen. If you’re in the market for a new one, you want to make sure it’s up to the task, time and time again. Given our obsession for a brew, the best kettle in the UK will be used at least three times a day - add that up over the lifetime of a kettle and it's obvious that this is one gadget that has to be rather durable.

This is why we’ve spent weeks and weeks putting the best electric kettles on the market through their paces, timing how long they take to boil, negotiating special features and testing their durability, to find the best value options and the kettles that really perform.

Below you can read what we liked and disliked with all the kettles we tested but, for clarity, the best kettle for value was the fast-boiling Russell Hobbs Inspire Kettle. The best kettle overall was the expensive but excellent Dualit Classic.

There are some more great choices in our list but whatever you want from your boiler, you’ll find it here.

Finding the best kettle is nothing without a great cup of whatever you want. We've been extremely busy testing the best tea brands and best coffee brands the world over. And if you want coffee on tap, these best coffee subscription services are ideal. If you are looking for a dedicated machine, then we recently updated our best Nespresso machines guides - there are some great coffee makers to go alongside your kettle purchase.

Award winners: our best kettles revealed

When it comes to the best kettle in the UK for value, this is great budget option, this fast-boil kettle has some nice touches at the price point, including hidden cup measurements inside so you can fill to one cup only, an easily removable limescale filter and stainless steel accents. Also comes in black and white.

If you can afford to pay that bit more this stainless steel kettle is the best overall kettle in the UK we'd recommend. It comes with Whisper Boil technology making it one of the quietest kettles out there. It’s a fast boiler with a non-spill spout and a repairable and replaceable element, meaning it’ll last years.

• the shortlist
• our expert
• The test selection
• how we tested
• test results
• best overall
• best value
• the rest compared
• Feeback

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The ShortList: the kettles we considered

Upvote of downvote to have your say on our shortlist, or scroll down for the expert's view.

Author Bio

Charlotte Thomas

Charlotte Thomas is a former holiday rep and travel agent who has edited three travel magazines. She now writes about health and lifestyle and spends her spare time travelling to the Alps and across the UK looking for trails to run.

The Expert's View

25

Hours tested

34

Products considered

1

Experts Consulted

2

Shortlist best buys

How we selected the kettles to test

You might think your kettle-buying choices are pretty basic. Is the colour going to fit with your kitchen theme? How much does it cost? And how long does it take to boil? If only it were that simple. Kettles these days come packed with features, meaning there’s much more to consider than just the ability to heat water. Particularly if you’re serious about your cuppa.

Manufacturers have cottoned onto Britain’s growing obsession with swanky coffees and teas that stretch beyond builders’. As such, many kettles now offer variable temperature settings designed to help you get that Sencha green tea at the perfect degree without damaging its delicate flavour (that’s 85°C since you ask).

At the mid-to-top-end of the kettle kingdom you’ll find quiet boil features – ideal if that bubbling rocking sound is too much first thing in the morning – stay warm options that keep your water ready to go for an extra 20 minutes (hello meeting room), patented spill-free spouts and hidden one-cup measures. It’s a crazy world of electrical appliances out there.

Also worth taking into account when you’re looking for a new kettle is the material. Plastic kettles are usually cheaper than steel or glass but might not fit with your design aesthetic. Some people also say they find metal and glass kettles give a cleaner water taste, although that may be applicable to those with a more refined palate than ours.

One advantage of plastic kettles, though, is that they’re usually cooler to the touch after boiling. If you have small people in the house or pets who like to slink along the kitchen surface (we’re not judging) this may be a better option.

Whether you can get a matching toaster and other appliances could also be a consideration – collar and cuffs and all that.

If the waiting time for your water to boil is important, you’ll want to look for a kettle marked as rapid or fast boil, this means it’ll have a 3KW element for speedier heating.

You might also want to consider ease of use – kettles with 360-degree rotational bases are just as easy to lift and pour for left and right handers. Markings showing how much water you have inside can be handy if you want to avoid wasting energy by boiling more than you need. And then there’s that pesky blighter: limescale. If the water in your town is hard enough to have Chris Eubank Jr in a fight, a kettle with a removable, washable limescale filter will save you the rather stinky hassle of boiling vinegar to get rid of those hard deposits.

When choosing kettles to test we took into account all of the above as well as the boiling habits of different types of kettle users – the coffee and tea aficionados, the design connoisseurs and those who just want something that heats water and doesn’t go bang within a year.

And we aimed to provide a range of price points, from value options to the more expensive all-singing all-dancing multi-temperature über kettles. We looked at popular offerings from major manufacturers such as Breville, Russell Hobbs, Cusinart, Smeg and DeLonghi and chosen kettles from basic to whizz-bang.

We’ve included steel, glass and plastic models to cover every taste. All come with a minimum one-year warranty and have a 360-degree rotational base so they can be used by left and right handers.

How we tested the kettles

We did away with the labs and trialed the kettles where they’re most likely be used – in a home kitchen with a bit of Jeremy Kyle on in the background. There was a lot of boiling, a lot of timing, many hot beverages consumed and a low-hanging cloud of steam blanketing the room for a few days.

In amongst the coffee breaks (and accompanying biscuits) we looked for a number of features from our kettles. We tested each appliance by boiling a litre of water from cold – enough for around four cups – to see how long it took to reach the desired temperature and whether or not it matched the manufacturer’s claims, if they’d made any.

We did the same test when the kettle was at full capacity because, when you’re about to knock up some pasta, it’s useful to know if you can fit enough water into your kettle for the pan and if you’ve got time to chop your onions before it boils.

Alongside boiling time we were also looking for ease of use. Were the kettles simple to set up straight from the box? Where there were special features, such as variable temperatures, were these intuitive? And, more importantly, were those special features actually useful?

Were they easy to fill? Some kettles have removable lids while others have buttons to press to lift the lid – and could you pour without dribbling, spilling or contorting your wrist? No one wants a sloppy saucer after all.

We were also testing for quality, robustness, durability and noise. While no kettle is going to be completely silent, you probably don’t want one that drowns out Loose Women. (Did we mention we watched a lot of telly with our tea?)

The test results which kettle is best?

Nine of our kettles were ready to plug in straight from the box, although it’s advisable to boil a full kettle of water to remove any dirt or dust from the packaging before you first use it.

The only one that required a bit of thought was theMorphy Richards Brita Filter kettle. It’s hardly flat-pack furniture territory, but the Brita filter needs to be soaked in water before being inserted into a holder in the kettle. It’s straightforward enough, but the instruction manual took some deciphering.

As the Smeg Variable Temperature Kettle is the only one without a speedy 3KW element we were expecting a close race in the great Shortlist boil off, and we weren’t disappointed. Each of these is going to boil enough water for four cups in under three minutes.

The fastest boiler was the Dualit Classic Kettle, heating our cuppas in just two minutes and 17 seconds (although the manufacturer states it should take two minutes 14 with room temperature water).

Only one second behind was the Delonghi ArgentoFlora at two minutes 18 seconds and third fastest was the Swan Nordic kettle at two minutes 23 seconds. You’re not going to have to wait too long for your caffeine hit with any of these kettles, though – the remainder of the fast-boil options all took between two minutes 26 and two minutes 36 to reach boiling point. Even the slowest in our trial, the Smeg, which isn’t advertised as fast-boil, heated the water in less than three minutes, taking two minutes 50 seconds to boil.

Two of our kettles, the Cuisinart Signature Collection Multi-Temp Kettle and the Smeg Variable Temperature Kettle, allow you to choose different temperatures for your beverage. The Cusinart is simple to use, with two buttons marked 85 and 100 degrees and a plus sign allowing you to add 5°C increments all located on the handle.

The temperature of the water is displayed at all times on an LCD screen, so if you want a lower temperature you can hit the off switch when it reaches the appropriate number – although who wants to stand and watch a kettle boil?

The Smeg offers a greater number of temperature options – seven in total from 50°C through to boiling. To choose the temperature required you nudge a small lever on the base and lights corresponding to each option will be illuminated.

The Smeg also has a stay-warm feature, keeping your water heated for an extra 20 minutes – useful if you’re a serial coffee drinker. The only issue here is that the thermometer button to turn on the stay-warm feature needs to be pressed before or during heating – this means if you’ve just boiled your kettle and the phone rings you can’t hit stay-warm and have that hot water waiting when you’ve finished.

All of our kettles were easy to fill and pour, no spillage anywhere. If you have weaker wrists then the plastic kettles – the Breville Flow, Russell Hobbs Inspire and Morphy Richards Brita Filter – are the lightest among our selection, while the Delonghi Argento Flora is the lightest stainless steel kettle. Nothing weighed in at over 2kg though, so all are lighter than your average two-litre bottle of water.

If you’re making tea for one person and want to save energy we liked the fact that the Russell Hobbs and Dualit kettles had markings for one cup. In fact, if being able to see water measurements in general is important to you then the Russell Hobbs Illuminating, Dualit Domus and Dualit Classic all have markings on the front, making them easier to see than those under the handle.

All kettles, with the exception of the Morphy Richards Brita Filter, had removable limescale filters which can be washed under the tap. However, the filter in the Swan Nordic was quite hard to remove and made from fabric, so it probably won’t last as long as some of the others.

All of them seemed durable enough to stand the test of time, with the exception of the Swan Nordic Kettle. Ours was slightly wobbly on its base, meaning it took two or three presses of the on/off switch to turn on at first. While this settled down after a few uses it may mean a couple of knocks could throw this kettle off kilter.

When it came to noise, there were no real screamers, so our ears weren’t overly offended. If you want a quiet kettle, though, the Dualit Classic is the winner – its Whisper technology means it does, actually, sound like a whisper when it boils.

We were also impressed with how quiet the Smeg Variable Temperature Kettle was, although it beeps when it’s turned on and when it’s boiled – a useful notifier if you’re busy doing other things while you wait for it to boil, not so good if you want something as quiet as possible.

Overall winner: our ultimate kettle choice

Dualit 1.7 litre Classic Kettle review, £145.99

Let’s get the obvious out of the way straight off – this is not a cheap kettle. But if you’re able to fork out the extra coin then what you get is attention to detail, quality design and finish, and a fast-boil kettle that’s built to last.

The retro stainless steel styling is, as the name suggests, a design classic. It’s going to look good for years to come. If you want to add a hint of colour, there are five different options for a coloured band around the bottom and on the handle, all in tasteful hues with names like powder, feather and shadow. There are four different varieties of toaster to match, too, including one made specially for buns and teacakes.

The stainless steel limescale filter is much sturdier than most we tested so won’t fray or bend (as cheaper options can) and is easily removed for washing. The hinges on the lid are sturdy beasts made from stainless steel so they won’t break or snap.

This was the fastest boiling kettle we tested and the covered spout makes it pretty much impossible to spill hot liquid even if you try. And it means no dribbly limescale marks either.

It’s quiet, too. So quiet, in fact, it has a Quiet Mark award from the Noise Abatement Society for its patented Whisper Boil technology. While it's not completely silent it never reaches the crescendo most kettles do as they near boiling point.

It has dual water gauges, one in litres (handy for cooks) and one in cups. These are easily able to view on each side of the body, rather than hidden under the handle as many are. And it really will last for years. Whereas cheaper kettles often end up in landfill when the element wears out, the Classic Kettle has a replaceable, repairable heating element.

On the downside, the lack of variable temperature and stay-warm functions may be an issue if you like speciality teas heated to a certain degree. That sturdiness does come with a bit of extra weight, too – this was the second heaviest kettle we tested (although it was still less than 2kg, the average weight of a two-litre bottle of water). The main con really is the price, which makes it an unlikely option for most budgets.

Our choice of the best kettle for value

Russell Hobbs 1.7 litre Inspire Kettle review, £39.99

If you’re looking for a quality kettle without splashing too much cash then the Russell Hobbs Inspire is a solid option. Robust and durable, this plastic kettle comes in three different colours – white, black and red – so it’ll fit in with most kitchen colour schemes. Stainless steel accents make it look classier than many other kettles in this price range and you can get a two- or four-slice toaster to match if you fancy.

The little touches are what makes it stand out for the price. There’s a washable limescale filter that’s really easy to remove, which is particularly handy if you’re in a hard water area. Hidden inside the kettle you’ll also find little plastic markers showing one, two and three cups. This means it’s very easy to get exactly the right amount of water without craning your neck to see the external measurements, which are hidden under the handle. Saves you wasting water and energy as well, innit.

While it doesn’t offer variable temperatures or a stay-warm feature, and we wouldn’t expect them at this price, it does the basics well. It’s fast-boil – the manufacturer claims it can boil a cup in 45 seconds, we found it to be slightly quicker – and it was among the five fastest boilers in our selection.

Easy to fill with a wide removable lid, it was one of the lighter kettles we tested so there’s less chance of breaking your wrist when lifting it if that’s a concern. And it feels as though it could take a bit of a knocking about.

The only thing we weren’t too keen on was the ridged plastic. While the ridges help to camouflage any greasy finger marks they can mean you’ll spend a little bit longer wiping it clean.

Comparing the rest on test

If our test winner and best value options don’t take your fancy, here’s everything you need to know to find your perfect kettle from the rest we tested.

The best kettle for hard water areas

If you have a real issue with limescale or find water that the in your area has a taste you’re not keen on, the Morphy Richards Brita Filter kettle filters water as it boils, ridding it of any impurities and leaving cleaner tasting water. It’s not the best looking kettle out there (it’s very plasticky), but it is fast-boil at a budget price. It’s worth bearing in mind that you will have to replace filters every four weeks, though they’re not too expensive at around £12.50 for three on Amazon, but this is an added cost.

Best for minimalist kitchens

The Swan Nordic Kettle is a great-looking option for less than £50. We really like the clean lines, slate grey rubberised coating and wood effect handle – it’s not actually wood but rubberised coating instead, so it won’t warp and bloat when it comes into contact with water. It was also one of the fastest boilers we tested. It’s basic on the function front, however – the water gauge starts at four cups, the limescale filter is hard to remove and doesn’t seem too durable and it also took a couple of gos to turn it on at first.

Best all-rounder and best quiet kettle tested

We were really impressed by the Breville Flow for the price. It was only just beaten to our best value choice by a very slim whisker. It’s basic but does what it does very well. The plastic body is solid and durable and it was the coolest of our kettles to the touch after boiling, good if you have small children around. The lid is easy to remove and there’s a large space for quick and easy filling, as well as a nice wide easy-pour spout. The limescale filter is super easy to remove and it’s fast-boil to boot. A good choice for a family kitchen.

The best glass kettle for looks

The fast-boil Russell Hobbs Illuminating Kettle stands out for its reassuring glow. Turn the kettle on and the body lights up blue as it boils and you can see the water bubbling and boiling like a lava lamp. There isn’t really any point to this but it’s mesmerising to watch. Nice one-cup marking on the body, too. The downside to glass kettles is that you can see any marks or limescale build up immediately so you might have to descale your kettle more often. Condensation is also visible after boiling, but if that’s a bother you can just ping the lid open for a couple of minutes.

Best for multiple temperatures

If you want to choose your water temperature, theCuisinart Signature Collection Multi-Temp Kettle is a good choice at a not too hefty price – £80, and often available for less. Water temperature is displayed on an LCD screen at all times so you can watch it change as it boils. You select the temperature by pressing an 85 or 100 degree button on the handle, while a plus button allows you to add on to the 85 in 5°C increments. For anything lower than 85 degrees, though, you’ll have to watch the temperature and turn it off manually.

Best for retro kitchens

The Delonghi Argento Flora is a nice retro-look steel kettle that was the second fastest to boil out of those we tested. This is a decent, durable boiler that doesn’t go in for fancy features. What it do go in for, though, are looks. It comes in a number of ice-cream shades including pink, green and blue.

Best travel kettle and one for smaller work spaces

If kitchen counter space is tight a slightly smaller kettle like the Dualit Domus is a good choice. You’re still going to get 1.5 litres – around six cups – out of it but it’s just that bit more compact. It’s also a lovely looking, quality, fast-boil kettle. We really like the dual water gauges in litres and cups, the one-cup mark and the attention to detail – the plug is round to complement the kettle’s design.

Best kettle for Instagram

Yes, it can offer you seven different temperature options and keep your water warm for 20 minutes after boiling, but the real beauty of a Smeg appliance is the design. This kettle looks like it’s been plucked from a 1950s’ Airstream trailer. Get the matching fridge, blender, toaster etc and show off to all your mates. The kettle pings when you turn it on and when it’s boiled – some people might find this irritating but we found it a useful reminder to make our tea.

What did we miss?

Tell us, and we'll feedback to our reviewers so we can include it going forwards.

Now that we are allowed to do far more traveling, finding the best travel mug to join you on your commute is essential.

Not only are travel mugs a great way to keep your hot drink of choice warm for hours, the best reusable cups are also sustainable and far better for the environment.

When you’re on the go and in a rush, it’s easy to pick up a cheap coffee and chuck the cup away when you’re done. But while it might be convenient, it’s also two other things – bad for the environment and bad for your wallet - which is why you need one of the best travel mugs around.

For a start, if you choose wisely, they look great, can be used over and over again, are good for the environment and can even save you money. Even if you don’t make your drink at home and take it with you, many coffee shops now offer a discount if you bring your own cup.

With many of us actually getting back out in the world, there's never been a better time to buy yourself a reusable cup - and we've spent a lot of time brewing brews to try out our picks below.

Here’s our pick of the best travel mugs on the market. Don't forget to upvote your favourite and if you fancy a brew, then head to our best tea brands and best coffee subscriptions guides.

Best travel mugs

SOMETHING MISSING FROM OUR SHORTLIST?

Tell us about it, and if enough people agree we'll add it in.

Here’s a collection of desirable items, the best desk toys, to make the hours and Zoom calls melt away. Whether it’s surrounding your break time, mental health, creativity or just plain boredom, here are a whole host items that will improve your 9-5... whatever that is.

These are the best desk toys you can surround yourself with. They won't teach you how to use Excel properly, but they will make the work day go that little bit faster.

Additional reporting: Marc Chacksfield

The best desk toys

• Now your desk is looking awesome, get the best office chair - your back will thank us later.

SOMETHING MISSING FROM OUR SHORTLIST?

Tell us about it, and if enough people agree we'll add it in.

Gone are the days of having to wait for the ice cream van, or heading to the supermarket to get your fix – the best ice cream makers have been designed so that creating ice cream at home is now incredibly easy to do.

Not only are they convenient (no getting up and going to the shop when you have a craving), they let you create whatever ridiculous flavour combination tickles your fancy. And now, with summer fast approaching, there's never been a better time to up your ice-cream game.

While the best ice cream maker will get more use in the summer, we've found it's a year-long gadget - even in the coldest months there is nothing like whipping up some homemade ice cream and having a treat when in the warm.

And with your own ingredients, you can also create a slightly healthier version of your favourite indulgent treats if you fancy something lighter.

Here’s our guide to the best ice cream makers on the market.

Best ice cream makers

• The ultimate best kitchen gadgets guide

It doesn't matter what time of the year it is, sometimes you just need to find the best fan to keep you cool.

There’s one bit you need to get your head around when buying a fan, though. Few of them actually cool the air. They just blow it around a bit. This has a cooling effect, though, as it helps the sweat evaporate from your skin. And that’s how we, as humans, cool down.

Science lesson over, what do we want from a fan? The main concerns are: will it fit in the space? Will it look good in there? Is it too noisy? And do we want a fanless design to make it safer for wandering infant fingers? That's right, you can buy fanless fans.

Here are some of the best fans to consider. Upvote the one you’d choose. And if you are really hot, then you may want to invest in the best ice cream maker.

Best fans

SOMETHING MISSING FROM OUR SHORTLIST?

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If like many people in the world, you have yet to get a PS5, then don't fret: upgrading your PlayStation 4 controller will make you feel a little bit better.

We're huge fans of the official DualShock 4 PS4 controller, but even we have to admit there are some reasons to look elsewhere for the best PS4 controller.

For a start, there's no official Elite controller like the Xbox One's, but other companies do make pads with extra buttons and customisable features.

Or perhaps you just want one with a design closer to the Xbox gamepad design, or a controller the kids can use without struggling to reach the buttons.

Here are some of the best PS4 controllers you'll find. While none of them are a patch on what Sony has done with the PlayStation Sense controller for the PS5 - which is an absolute wonder of technology - these will help your PS4 gaming, until you are ready to upgrade.

Oh, and it's worth noting that Sony’s PS Remote Play app means that you can stream your PlayStation game playing to an iOS device. Sony recently revealed that you can now use the PS5 controller to control your games. So if you are ever thinking about upgrading then it's good to know that you won't need to use the best PS4 controller to play your iOS streamed PS5 games going forward.

• Next, read up on the best PS4 games
• PS5 review: a stunning console with a fantastic controller

Best PS4 controller

SOMETHING MISSING FROM OUR SHORTLIST?

Tell us about it, and if enough people agree we'll add it in.

Side gigs, increased working from home and remote working will continue even when the pandemic goes away, so why not make the thing you sit at for eight hours a day work a little better for you now?

That's where our best desk accessories guide come in. Whether it is practical, for show or entertainment, a desk accessory is an essential bit of WFH kit.

Now you have your shiny new desk - and if you don't yet have a chair, then may we recommend out best office chair and best budget office chair guide - these are the things, the gadgets, the gizmos that will elevate your setup from bland to bloody marvellous.

The best desk accessories

• The best desk lamps, revealed: first-rate desk lamps to light up your life with.

While we had a few rare BBQ-ready days of fine warm weather, here's hoping that we will get plenty more. With all of us spending much more time in our homes as well, having the best BBQ in the garden is a must - so nabbing yourself the best barbecue you can is, well, an essential purchase.

Now that we can start to have big(ger) gatherings again, a BBQ is a great way to have people around but also a good reason for everyone to stay outdoors.

If you don’t already have a BBQ, then we’ve done a bit of the leg-work for you so you can get a better idea of which one to spend your hard-earned money on.

It may well be a good idea to buy your BBQ out of season, so check out our best barbecue guide and see if any of these hot things take your fancy.

Once you've done with the grilling, head over to our best craft beer guide. And if you head to the bottom of this article, we offer expert buying advice on the type of BBQ you should be buying, as well as offering up some fantastic BBQ cooking ideas.

Oh, and ass much as you need to sort out your BBQ situation, if you are cooking your food in the middle of a hell hole then you also need to head to our best garden tools guide. In the list you will find a whole host of goodies that will help get your garden into decent shape, and some that will just frankly be very cool to use - a weed burner, anyone?

Best BBQ guide

How to buy the best BBQ

The type of BBQ you are on the lookout for all depends on a number of things, including: size, ease of use, the fuel you want to use.

There’s no point buying a four burner with a mountain of chef accessories if you only have half a small patio and are cooking near your house.

On the flipside, you’ll be disappointed if you but a simple kettle BBQ and are looking to cook for a small army of people.

To help whittle down your buying choices, it’s best to choose the type of fuel you want to cook with.

Here are your options:

Charcoal BBQ

If you are after taste, then charcoal may be the way forward. Charcoal BBQs are messy and tough to maintain. Although firelighters and the like have helped reduce the time needed to prepare the BBQ, you will need to put in at least 20 minutes preparation time to get the coals white hot, and then you will have to make sure that the heat from the BBQ doesn’t instantly charcoal the meat and vegetables you put on it.

Saying that, the taste you get from a coal BBQ is hard to replicate with an electric or gas option.

If you are looking to use charcoal, then maybe also consider a smoker (which will infuse the meat with a smokey taste) or even a pizza oven.

Best charcoal BBQ: Landmann 31421 - Taurus 660

This is a fantastic BBQ with added smoker functionality. You can cook meat for up to 10 people on it and the smoker can be used with different fuels (logs, wood chips) to give your food an intense, American-style BBQ flavour. The main chamber is just the same as a regular BBQ grill with ample room for your BBQ.

Buy the Landmann 31421 - Taurus 660 now

Gas BBQ

One of the most popular BBQ choices, a gas BBQ is really easy to maintain, takes minutes to prepare and acts much like your oven in the home with dials to get the grill to the right heat. One thing to consider with a gas BBQ is the added cost of a gas cylinder. These are readily available from your nearest hardware store but there will be a premium the first time you purchase one - this is because you are effectively paying for a barrel that can be refuelled. When you bring it in to get refilled, the price will be a whole lot cheaper.

There are myriad options for a gas/charcoal hybrid BBQ which is definitely something you should consider.

Best gas BBQ: Weber Genesis II E-310 GBS

This is the ultimate gas BBQ, hence the price. The cast iron cooking gates are coated in porcelain, the ignition is instant and there is plenty of space for utensils and areas to put the meat when you have cooked it.

Buy the Weber Genesis II E-310 GBS now

Electric BBQ

Again, these are like the stoves in your home - easy to use and cook meat fast. The biggest issues here are making sure that you have an electrical outlet for your BBQ, one that is safe from the elements outside.

You can always opt for the extension lead approach but this probably isn’t a good idea in the long term.

The advantages of an electric BBQ are that it is instantly on and you can have varying temperatures on different grills. Electric grills are usually smaller and more portable, too.

Best electric BBQ: Weber Pulse 1000

Price: £449

The Weber Pulse 1000 is one of the smartest BBQs around and has been built for balconies. It uses a lid-on approach to cooking so there’s no unwanted smoke and it uses cast iron gates, which means you get that nice griddle look on the meat and veg you are cooking.

Buy the Weber Pulse 1000 from Weber

Best BBQ Ideas

If you fancy some ideas on how to cook your food on the BBQ, then here they are...

• What the food you bring to a BBQ says about you
• 20 best vegetarian BBQ ideas from top chefs
• How to make BBQ Ribs
• Revealed: 17 best summer BBQ burger recipes
• 8 things you're doing wrong with your barbecue

5 best BBQ tricks, tips and hacks

1. Clean Your Grill In Seconds

The absolute last thing you want to do after one too many icy-cold brewskis and a belly full of sausages, burgers, steaks, chicken thighs and ribs is get to work cleaning your trusty old Weber BBQ. But really, it’s not the break-a-sweat chore it seems. It can easily be done the day after and requires tools that are already in your kitchen. Firstly, scrunch up a large ball of tin foil and scrub the warmed-up bars, before rubbing them with half a lemon or a cloth doused in cider vinegar. Use another ball of foil to bring your metal bars back to their former shiny glory. It’s that simple.

2. Arrange Your Coals Properly

There’s a reason why everything that goes onto your grill comes off it looking blacker than your ex-girlfriend’s heart – you’re coals are a bloody mess, mate. You need to arrange your heat source so that you can cook some meats directly over the coals (direct method), and others using only the atmospheric heat under the lid (indirect method). That pic up there is a pretty decent way of looking at it, really. How to know what meats need what cooking space? Use the rule that anything ready in less than 20 mins can safely go over the coals, and anything more needs the indirect method.

3. Avoid Saucing Too Early

A real simple one this, but one we’re all guilty of. That delicious BBQ sauce you’ve just proudly slathered over your raw meat? Error. Big, fat error. There’s a whole lot of sugar in that there sauce, and sugar burns. Only add it to your meat when you’re approximately 15-20 minutes away from taking it off the heat. That way you’re stopping that sugar burning off and stinking up the flavour.

4. Keep Your Kebabs Juicy

Dry kebabs are a huge F next to your grilling name. Is that what you want? An F? An F for FAIL? No, you do not. The simple way to avoid your meat and veg skewers from losing all their moisture is pretty straightforward, actually – make sure every ingredient is pushed up to another on the stick. Don’t be temped to cram them on though, as that’ll slow down the cooking time and risk burning.

5. Make Your Steaks Scream

If you’re adding beef steaks to the heat and they’re not yelling in pain, you’re moving too fast. Steaks should make that sweet sizzling noise when you slap them down, so you know you’re searing in that moisture and keeping it from weeping out. You know the grill is hotter than hell and ready to go if your hand can only survive two seconds 12cm above the heat.

Rather play Assetto Corsa instead of Mario Kart? Getting the best racing wheel is the number one upgrade we recommend.

If you haven’t used one before you may assume it’s all about the simple immersion of a wheel between your hands, rather than wiggling a thumbstick. There’s a lot more to it.

All but one of the entries in our best racing wheel round-up below has force feedback. This is where a motor fights your turns, to simulate the effects the tarmac would have on a real car.

It feels bloomin’ marvellous, and makes realistic racing games about 10 times more enjoyable.

Upvote your favourite to crown the winning wheel.

• While you're buying some new gear, why not try one of our best gaming headsets
• These are our best racing games - did you favourite make the list?
• Got a birthday coming up? Take a look at our best gifts for gamers for inspiration

Best racing wheels

SOMETHING MISSING FROM OUR SHORTLIST?

Tell us about it, and if enough people agree we'll add it in.

With a food processor keen cooks can blitz their veg in myriad ways, create crushed ice, even whisk your egg whites up for you. The best food processors have variable speeds and the sharpest slicing discs and slicing blades around. In short: they do a lot.

After considering 50 products, we've spent the the past month, chopping, slicing, kneading, baking and blending using 10 of the best-selling processors from established brands – Magimix, Kenwood, KitchenAid – and more obscure makes such as LINKChef.

But which food processor should you buy? Our in-depth testing is below, but here's an at-a-glance look at our results and which food processor is right for you.

Magimix’s 5200 XL achieved the highest score in tests, despite dropping points for its high price and bulky design, because it can handle pretty much anything you throw at it. The £33.49 Kenwood Compact is our best value choice because what it lacks in style it makes up for in substance, offering great performance at a decent price.

Food processors tested: Best buys

It isn’t the most stylish of food processors but the Kenwood Compact is a pleasant surprise. It made light work of chopping swede, blending smoothies and grating cheese while being small enough for most kitchens and incredibly easy to clean. All of this at one of the lowest prices of the group.

There is no denying Magimix’s dominance. Achieving near-on perfect marks in the majority of tests, the Cuisine 5200XL is a versatile piece of kit from a long-standing master of the food processing industry. Small touches, like a handy storage box and multiple bowls, finished it off nicely.

• Best kettles tested, for every budget

• best buys
• best buys
• the Shortlist
• Our expert
• Test selection
• How we tested
• Test Results
• Best overall
• Best value
• Best value
• Comparing the rest
• One to Avoid

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Best food processors: the Shortlist

The expert's view

50

Products considered

45

Hours of testing

1

Experts consulted

2

Best buys

We have good news. You don't have to spend hundreds of pounds to get a great food processor. There are solid options under £50 from brands like Kenwood and LinkChef.

What do you miss out on? A little style here, some accessory flexibility there. But if you simply want to get your food processing jobs done quickly and reliably, you don't have to spend big on the models used in the kitchens of TV shows.

Read on to discover what paying more offers. We put our 10 food processors through several real-life tests, including the prep of baking, soup-making and cooking flatbreads.

Author Bio

Vicky Woollaston

Victoria Woollaston is a technology and beauty freelancer with more than a decade of experience reviewing and comparing gadgets, appliances and services at MailOnline, Wired, Alphr and Expert Reviews.

How we selected the food processors to test

Finding the best food processor in the UK wasn't easy as not all food processors are created equal. Some only chop, others blend, knead, slice and dice. Some weigh more than a small child, others can be packed away in a cupboard. Some are so expensive you buy them on credit, others cost less than a magazine subscription.

To guarantee we were putting the best food processors to the test, we scoured online reviews to build a shortlist of 50 of the highest-rated, most popular food processors across Amazon, Robert Dyas, Argos and John Lewis. As there is a wide variety of machine types – from blenders to blender mixers and choppers – each offering slight variations on features, we included any product labelled as a food processor.

The rationale is this will include machines with enough features to satisfy most people’s needs, even if one type performed better at some tasks (i.e blending) than others. We also devised tasks that would cover a wide range of uses to make sure all the machines’ strengths, and weaknesses, were tested.

From this list of 50, we narrowed down the top-rated processors from individual brands; selected the highest-scoring model from each; and handpicked our top 10 based on features and price. Our feature criteria was that each machine should easily fit on a countertop and have the capacity to chop, blend and knead dough – the three jobs likely to be most popular among people looking for the best food processor.

Machines built to blend, for example, have the capacity to chop and knead dough, and even choppers can blend. We also wanted to cover a range of prices, from low-end to mid-range and premium.

The types of slicing, dicing and grating attachments varied wildly. Some machines offered multiple slice sizes, shredders, whisks and spatulas whereas others didn’t offer attachments at all. This wasn’t, therefore, used as part of our selection criteria in an attempt to create a more level playing field. We have highlighted where machines offer these extras, and tested them where appropriate.

The final top 10 list shows where the machines rank based on the scores from all tests. However, we also ranked how the top 10 looks when the scores from the attachment tests have been removed. The top and bottom two food processors remained in the same positions.

There was a little bit of movement among the middle machines but the scores didn’t jump wildly enough to make a significant difference to the order of things. Ultimately, when choosing the best food processor, it will come down to what you need it to do and we’ve detailed it all to help you make this choice.

Food processors: how we tested

Each of the food processors were scored out of 10 for price, capacity, power, the number of speeds, and their size and weight. They were also judged on how easy they were to use and clean, and their design. The cheapest model, the LINKChef Mini Chopper, achieved a price score of 10, for example. The Magimix, scored 10 for having the highest total capacity, but lost points for being the heaviest.

The food processors were then individually tested for their chopping, blending and kneading prowess. For the chopping tests, hazelnuts were placed in the largest capacity bowl and processed on the lowest power setting for a minute. As the nuts were chopped, noise readings were taken using an app.

Next up, swede was chopped using the same bowl and blade. We chose Swede because of how difficult it is to cut with a knife. We chopped onions, as these are a popular hard food item used in recipes, and parsley as a soft food item. The bowls and blades were cleaned and dried after every trial and we weighed each food item to make the tests consistent.

This process was repeated to test the attachments. We sliced and grated hard food (potatoes and carrots) followed by soft food (bananas and cheese) and placed all the chopped, sliced and grated items into bowls.

The name of each machine was written on the underside of the bowls and they were judged blindly before being scored from best to worst. We were looking for an even consistency across the tests; no lumps of food or stalks leftover, no squashed cheese or banana left in the processor and so on.

Chopped vegetables were boiled and then blended in each machine to make soup. If machines offered a separate blending pitcher, these were used. If they didn’t, the main bowl and blade was used. The same amount of liquid and veg were blended in each machine for two minutes and the soup was again transferred to bowls for blind judging.

This time we were looking for soup that wasn’t too thick or thin and had a smooth consistency. Following the soup test, the chopped banana was combined with raspberries, strawberries and orange juice in each processor to make smoothies. Like with the soup, we were looking for a smooth finish that was easy to drink and had retained the vibrant colour of the fruit.

The final tests involved using each processor to mix chocolate and pear muffin mix, and make dough for flatbreads. If a plastic dough blade was available, this was used. If it wasn’t the main metal blade was used.

We scored each machine on how well it combined the ingredients, as well as blindly judging the final baked result.

For the muffins we were looking for the pear to be evenly chopped and an even spread of chocolate chips as well as a light and fluffy texture. The muffins were all processed and baked at the same time. Similarly, the dough was processed at the same time to avoid a change in room temperature skewing the results. The total scores from all 25 food and specification tests were combined to reveal the winners and losers.

Food processor reviews: The test results

Across our tests, the Magimix Cuisine 5200XL rarely faltered; scoring either full marks or coming in the top three in almost every category. This was the case even when the slicing and grating scores were omitted. It was also one of the quietest machines.

Following a close second was the KitchenAid 2.1L. It looks similar to the Magimix, albeit it in a more compact design, and matches its rival in terms of how quiet it is. It performed particularly well for kneading, slicing, and chopping onions but its smoothie and soup were poor.

In third place was the Ninja Smart Screen food processor. It is the only machine in the top three to include a dedicated food processor and separate blending jug, and it scored just a point behind the KitchenAid. The touchscreen is a nice break from buttons and dials and it certainly looks the part, although is noisy.

Whereas its rivals are tall, fourth place Kenwood Compact has a wider, more ugly design. But what it lacks in style it makes up for in substance. It performed fantastically well at chopping and blending. In fact, it handled the swede better than any other processor and outperformed blenders that are almost 14 times the price when making soups and smoothies.

In the middle of the pack is the Tefal DoubleForce Compact. It was the best at slicing potatoes and was almost as good as the Ninja at chopping nuts. It placed top three for combining the muffin mix and dough but the rest of its mid-range scores match its mid-range price.

With its pastel colour look, the Fearne by Swan processor's design is understated. And it was one of the quietest machines on test, next to the Magimixand KitchenAid. It’s a heavy machine and performed poorly across multiple trials including chopping onions and nuts, combining the muffin mix and blending the smoothie and soup. It was the only machine to feature full lumps of banana, and potato after blending.

Approaching the bottom of the pile is the LINKChef Mini Chopper. Despite this position, credit has to be given to LINKChef. For such a small, cheap, food processor, it more than held its own against its expensive rivals. It ranked seventh overall because it doesn’t have any attachments, effectively scoring zero in these tests. However, when the scores involving attachments were removed, the LINKChef outperformed every machine bar the Magimix and KitchenAid.

In a similar boat to the LINKChef in terms of a lack of attachments was the Vitamix Ascent 2500i. But unlike the LINKChef the Vitamix didn’t perform as well in the rest of the tests. It’s a blender at heart, with tools that can be used for food processing and, despite its eye-watering £549 price tag, didn’t even score top marks for blending. It came behind the half-the-price Ninja for soups and smoothies.

One of the cheapest food processors on the list, the Tower failed to chop the swede, simply cutting into the slices before giving up. Similarly, it didn’t have the power to mix the muffins, leaving the ingredients in-tact. A small silver lining is that it is fantastic at grating and looks stylish.

This is our favourite food processor:

Magimix Cuisine 5200XL, £399.99

It’s a beast of a machine, in size, height and weight, and this makes the Magimix 5200XL a powerhouse of a food processor. It offers everything you could need a food processor to do, and performs the majority of those tasks with ease. This goes some way towards justifying its £400 price tag.

In our tests, we used the largest capacity bowl on each food processor to keep the results consistent, yet the Magimix additionally offers a small “midi”, and mini bowl with smaller blades. The mini bowl is for small quantities, such as herbs; the midi bowl is recommended for slicing and grating. The large bowl can be used for all of the above but is best used for large quantities.

This bowl choice not only gives the Magimix the highest capacity of the food processors tested, it makes it a highly versatile machine. The ability to stack the bowls and blades on top of each other in the machine also lets you carry out multiple tasks simultaneously. You can complete three separate tasks without having to clean and dry a single bowl between uses.

The downside is that the Magimix doesn’t have a separate blending jug, and while this didn’t dramatically hinder its performance when blending soup (coming in third), its smoothie-making skills left a lot to be desired. Even with its BlenderMix attachment.

Its chopping skills were only beaten by the LINKChef Mini Chopper, and it gave the most consistent slices of potatoes and grated carrots. It was also fantastic at kneading bread, coming only second to the KitchenAid, and all of its many attachments can be stored neatly and easily in a tidy storage box. We didn’t test this particular tool, but it can also be used for whisking eggs and cream.

Where the Magimix lost points was on its size and weight, as the largest, heaviest of the lot. It won’t suit smaller kitchens and we just about managed to get it to fit under our cupboards. Its chunky design certainly makes a statement but seems a bit much when other machines cram in similar motors and features into smaller frames.

The Magimix Cuisine 5200XL is also a little fiddly to use, due to its many moving parts, which adds to the time it takes to clean. If you can afford it, the 5200XL is a worthwhile investment that should last for years to come. If you can’t, it’s worth considering buying one of its older or more compact siblings. They offer the same motor, and similar features meaning they should offer similar performance while in smaller packages. Plus they can cost up to £300 cheaper.

This food processor is the best for value:

Kenwood Compact, £39.99

If style is less important than price when choosing the best food processor, you can’t go wrong with the Kenwood Compact. Any misconceptions we had about this somewhat ugly machine vanished once the tests started. Plus, at £40, the way it performed against its much more expensive rivals was even more impressive.

Its chopping skills, for instance, were second to none, handling both soft and hard food with the same consistency and speed. Despite not having a dedicated blending jug, it scored top marks for making smoothies, ahead of the Ninja and Vitamix, which are both marketed on their blending expertise. Elsewhere, the Kenwood Compact excelled at grating cheese.

As its name suggests, the Kenwood Compactweighs very little and takes up a small amount of space. Its design means it fits easily under or inside cupboards and you don’t have to pull it out to use it.

That said, it’s far from perfect and does have a number of touches that reveal its cheaper price. The safety connection between the bowl and the unit, which is used to stop all of the processors from being used if the bowls aren’t locked into place, is weak. When chopping large, hard items, the bowl had a tendency to move and unlock itself and turn off, meaning we had to hold it in place.

It does offer a decent range of attachments, but the slicing and grating discs in particular need to be swapped in and out of the plastic plate between uses. This is fiddly, time consuming, not to mention a little nerve wracking having to manhandle the sharp corners and blades.

There is also no storage box for these sharp discs, nor do they sit comfortably in the bowl when not being used. The plus side to this is that they’re easier to clean and there are fewer plates and discs to wash.

The cheaper price was also apparent in the other food tests, with the Kenwood Compact achieving average scores for mixing muffins and kneading bread dough. It’s also not the quietest of machines, but then neither is it the loudest.

There is a lot to love about the Kenwood Compact and while, yes, you can get a more consistent performance across the board with a wider range of tools in more expensive models, the performance you get versus the price is brilliant.

Comparing the rest on test

If it’s an all-rounder you’re after; one that ticks many of the Magimix boxes without the hefty size and price, we recommend the KitchenAid 2.1L. It’s our favourite when it comes to design and swaps the Magimix’s storage box for a clever system of being able to store all the attachments within the main bowl when not in use.

It was the quietest machine we tested, was the best at kneading bread, and it sliced bananas and chopped hard foods effortlessly. It fell a little when chopping softer, smaller items and lacked the blending skills of its more expensive rivals but all-in-all it’s a worthy contender against the Magimix, while costing half the price.

At the opposite end of the scale is Amazon best-seller, the LINKChef Mini Chopper. If all you want is a fast and easy way to chop ingredients for sauces and recipes, it’s a fantastic little machine. It doesn’t have any bells and whistles, but this makes it extremely easy to use, easy to clean and easy to store. All for just £19.99. It didn’t perform badly at blending either.

Results from top left: Ninja nuts, Kenwood Compact parsley, Kenwood compact swede, Haden nuts, Vitamix parsley, Tower swede

The best of the blenders award goes to the Ninja Smart Screen food processor. It uses a so-called FreshVac system that sucks oxygen out of the cups and pitcher before blending to help maintain the goodness and vibrancy of the fruit and vegetables. This may seem like a gimmick but the proof is in the pudding. The touchscreen additionally makes it easy to switch between tasks. It’s not cheap but it outperformed its closest blending rival, the Vitamix, in nearly every like-for-like category.

Ninja's nuts, from our testing

Speaking of the Vitamix, we had high hopes given its price and the swathes of positive online reviews yet found it to be lacking. It was strong at blending, but not as strong as the Ninja, plus it’s not as attractive and compact as its nearest rival.

The Vitamix is easier to clean, and the smaller sizes of its blending cups make it easy to transport smoothies and soups to work, but at this price we would struggle to justify buying it just for that. We found the digital timer a fantastic addition, but rarely used all 10 of its speed settings.

In a sea of monochrome food processors, the pastel colours, cursive font and chrome detailing makes the Fearne by Swan range, endorsed by presenter Fearne Cotton, standout. If design is key when choosing a food processor, this is the one for you. Sadly, the performance made it also stand out for the wrong reasons. Large slices of banana in smoothies and lumps of veg in soups are far from ideal. It sat at the bottom end of the pile for chopping, kneading bread and mixing muffins.

The Tefal DoubleForce was similarly mid-range in terms of performance, but at a lower price. As the tests were carried out blind, this price didn’t influence the results. But with hindsight, it’s a little easier to forgive the Tefal’s misgivings given its cost. The best way to describe the Tefal is jack of all trades, master of none, and if you want a machine to carry out most of the popular food prep tasks without paying through the nose for them, it’s a decent candidate.

While the Magimix excelled in almost every test, the Tower T18004 struggled. It looks the part from a distance, but feels cheap up close and was the second loudest machine we tested, behind the Haden. For all but two of the tests – grating cheese and carrots – it ranked in the bottom half and it failed to chop the swede or mix the muffins.

Are there any food processors to avoid?

At the very bottom of the pile was the Haden 6-in-1 Champion. Firstly, it’s loud. The loudest machine on test. It’s tall, curved, white design is ugly and cheap-looking, with attachments to match.

We cut ourselves numerous times attempting to swap the slicing and grating blades in and out of the plastic plate, and the main blade wobbled during use and gathered food underneath.

You call those processed nuts, Haden?

If that’s a little too nitpicky for you, the test scores should be enough to convince you of its poor performance. It scored zero, or just a single point for four of the tests, and scored lower than five for the majority of the rest. When blending the smoothie, for example, the liquid managed to split and was almost frothy water by the time it had finished blending.

Very little separated the Haden and the Tower – just 2.6 points to be precise – but the poor design and how difficult the Haden was to use and clean was enough to land it in last place.

You can buy all the throw cushions you like, change the curtains or even rearrange your furniture, but there’s one thing and one thing only that really impacts the mood of a room – the lighting.

If you've never thought about investing in smart lighting before, then taking a look at the best smart lights and lightbulbs to illuminate your home might be a good idea.

Whether you’re trying to concentrate on work or dimming the lights for a night of romance (or, more realistically, Netflix), lighting means everything – and with the advent of smart technology, setting the mood has never been easier.

It's now possible to pick the perfect hue, set timers, add effects and anything else you can imagine, all from an app on your phone.

Here’s our guide to the best smart lights on the market

Best smart lights and lightbulbs

• The best wake up lights revealed - wake up in the most natural way possible.

• Upgrade your home office without spending a fortune with the best budget laptops.

• The Shortlist
• The Test Selection
• The Test Results
• The Winners

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10

Standing Desks considered

56

Hours of testing

1

Experts consulted

2

Best Buys

Author Bio

Basil Kronfli

Basil Kronfli is a journalist of ten years’ standing, working across sites like TechRadar, Gizmodo and T3, as well as print titles including Metro, Shortlist and Total Film. He specialises in computing, smartphones and cameras, dabbling in kitchen tech, too.

The Best Standing Desk: The Shortlist

Best standing desk: How we chose the ones to test

There are so many standing desks available right now, that it is something of a daunting task to whittle them down. But that's exactly what we did by considering a handful of options for each price point and even looking at standing desk add-ons to see if they matched the dedicated versions.

We also took a number of factors into consideration - including budget and value for money (these aren't the same thing).

The most expensive standing desk we trialled was around the £500 mark but we also considered a an add-on standing desk option that was under £50.

It is worth noting that the Shortlist above takes into consideration 10 desks - all of which have their plus and minus points. For the sake of this test, we shortlisted the Shortlist to five desks:IKEA Skarsta, Deskmate Standing Desk Converter, Oploft, Jarvis Bamboo Adjustable Standing Desk and the The Varidesk Pro.

Best standing desk: how we tested

Given writing and reviewing is our full-time job, the best way to review the desks was actually do our work on them! This means trialling them all in a standing and sitting position. We also considered the overall size of the desks and whether or not they were built for single monitor or dual monitor displays.

Durability was also a big factor - when moving the desks from their sitting to standing positions, we checked to see how easy this was and if there was any noticeable wear and tear. We gave each desk the same allotted time and took into consideration comfort and one of the biggest factors was ease of use, as well as how easy it was to put together.

Best standing desk: test results

The underdog of this shortlist is the Deskmate, but despite being made of recyclable cardboard, we love what it does and what it stands for. The fact it’s got a stepped design means your keyboard is in a well-suited position for standing and typing with elbows at right angles - similar to the Varidesk. Converting your space back to a sitting desk isn’t particularly elegant, it’s simply a case of picking up the Deskmate and moving it, but if you’re okay with that, then this £29.90 investment is worth every penny, even if we don’t see it as an ideal long-term option.

In our opinion, the Varidesk range isn’t attractive; in fact, it’s pretty ugly, but it’s not designed with looks first, it’s primarily about ergonomics and in that department, it’s our winner.

The Varidesk ProPlus’s build quality can’t be faulted thanks to incredibly solid, robust construction - once you put it down on a surface, it isn’t going anywhere. As for the keyboard tray, it sits below the main portion, putting you in the perfect standing position to type with your arms at a right angle - as with the Deskmate, only better. Its transforming motion is also super smooth - easy up, easy down - and it worked like a dream for a 5’6 and a 6’4 reviewer alike.

The IKEA Skarsta is probably the right choice for an office on a budget in need of something more robust than the Deskmate, while the Jarvis Bamboo Adjustable Standing Desk is the best looking, performing complete desk solution we’ve ever used. It isn’t cheap, but it wouldn’t look out of place in a corner of a photography studio, with the rising motion being so smooth, it could replace a vertical videography slider.

Finally, the Oploft is the best looking small-scale solution available in our opinion, and its build quality and weight were both reassuring. That said, it’s a bit too heavy to be truly portable, so is ideally suited to permanent cubicle use at an office, or home unless you’re comfortable carrying a 12KG slab from room to room.

Best standing desk: overall

While our design winner is without a doubt the Jarvis Bamboo - it’s absolutely beautiful and seeing it go up and down by itself never gets old, if you’re looking for a desk that will guarantee you the best posture, that award goes to the Varidesk ProPlus 48, which, despite being comparatively ugly, left us noticeably more limber after just a few days of use.

Best standing desk: for value

The Deskmate desk converter took us by surprise. This thing is made of cardboard, costs less than £30 and can’t get wet or it will disintegrate, and we always have coffee on our desk - high risk zone! Almost a month in though, and ours is in a great state save for a couple of bumps, and while we wouldn’t use it forever, we’re pretty confident it could see you through at least three months of stand-up working, until you’re ready to upgrade to something more permanent that is.

You’ve probably heard of ‘courgetti’ as a perennial culinary favourite for the more health conscious among us but do you know which is the best spiralizer to make it?

Of course, courgettes are not the only vegetable you can put through a spiralizer – carrots, sweet potatoes, cucumbers and more can all be used to make delicious strips for salads, stir fries or more. You can even use fruit, adding apples, pears or more to breakfasts, desserts, and to decorate baking.

Want to start spiralizing but not sure where to start? Here’s our guide to some the best out there. Upvote the spiralizer you'd put in your shopping basket.

• Want something more upscale? How about one of the best food processors? We tested 10 of them.

Best spiralizer

SOMETHING MISSING FROM OUR SHORTLIST?

Tell us about it, and if enough people agree we'll add it in.

You can buy all the gadgets you want. But sometimes all you really need to excel in the kitchen are good, high quality basics - such as the best kitchen knives.

UPDATED: Once you are finished with our best kitchen knives list, then you may well be interested in our best kitchen gadgets guide. We've hand picked some fantastic new kitchen gadgets that we think will help anyone become a better cook.

Investing in a really good set of kitchen knives is something that will really set you apart from other home chefs. After all, most tasks completed with a knife still have to be done by hand – you can’t get a machine to chop your veg or slice your meat.

Decided to upgrade that blunt, five-year-old set of knives currently languishing on your kitchen worktop? Here’s our list of the best kitchen knives you can get.

Upvote the knife you'd rather have in your kitchen.

• These are the best food processors, tested by our expert
• Keep cool with the best ice cream maker

Best kitchen knives

SOMETHING MISSING FROM OUR SHORTLIST?

Tell us about it, and if enough people agree we'll add it in.

Hand, jug, stand, single-serve. There are many types of blenders at wildly varying prices. Despite them all effectively doing one thing – turning solids into liquids – finding the best blender can be a minefield of conflicting reviews and jargon.

For the past month we've put the blitzing power of 10 of the most popular blenders to the test from brands including Ninja, Nutribullet, Sage, and KitchenAid in an attempt to simplify your choice.

The clear winner, storming ahead in almost every category was the Ninja Blender Duo. Our best value choice is the Nutribullet Magic Bullet. It is cheap and cheerful but does the job as well as, and in some cases better than, its more expensive rivals.

• Want more versatility? Don't miss our best food processor test. If you are looking to use that energy from your smoothie to do some cleaning then our best cordless vacuum cleaner and best robot vacuum cleaner guides.

It may be loud and simple but it does the job better than many of its rivals for a pleasingly low price. For £40 you get a compact, single-serve blender, with a separate cup, that makes light work of smoothies and juices.

The Ninja Blender Duo not only offers great value, with its high-capacity jug and separate single-serve Nutri Ninja cups, it outperformed more expensive models in almost every test and comes with a host of speed settings to suit every occasion.

The expert's view

30

Blenders considered

15

Hours of testing

2

Best buys

1

Experts consulted

Author Bio

Vicky Woollaston

Victoria Woollaston is a technology and beauty freelancer with more than a decade of experience reviewing and comparing gadgets, appliances and services at MailOnline, Wired, Alphr and Expert Reviews.

The shortlist: best blenders

Best blenders: how we selected them

The terms blenders and food processors are used almost interchangeably online, yet they have different pros and cons. The majority of food processors can be seen as "jack of all trades, masters of none". They’re typically good all-rounders, able to handle most kitchen tasks thrown at them, including grating and slicing but aren’t built with one particular task in mind.

If it’s a processor you’re after, check out our test of the best food processors. Blenders, on the other hand, offer less versatility but are designed to excel at a specific set of liquid-based tasks. At their most simple, the best blenders are those with enough capacity to handle multiple fruit and vegetables for smoothies and juices, and that turn those ingredients into smooth liquids quickly and quietly.

In selecting our shortlist of best blenders to test, we automatically discounted hand blenders. Hand blenders have their uses, being most suited to aerating, beating and emulsifying, but they don’t offer the versatility of jug blenders. Little separates stand and jug blenders, divided only by the shape of the container, so we included both in our search, alongside single-serve (also known as smoothie-making) blenders made popular by the likes of Nutribullet.

We began by selecting the 50 highest-rated blenders within these categories from leading homeware sites AO.com, Argos, John Lewis, Currys and Amazon before reading hundreds of customer reviews to pick out the 25 most popular blenders based on real-world use. The highest-scoring models from each individual brand in our list of the top 25 was chosen before we handpicked models based on features and price.

In terms of features, we were looking for blenders with enough capacity and power to make a batch of carrot and coriander soup, a blueberry and banana smoothie, and cucumber and red cabbage juice. We wanted the ability to crush ice too.

Each blender needed to fit comfortably on our kitchen top and within the £200 budget we set. Within this budget, we wanted at least two premium models and two cheaper brands, with the other blenders providing an assortment of options in the mid-range.

This left us with blenders from Ninja, Nutribullet, Smeg, Swan, Sage, Dualit, Russell Hobbs, Tefal, KitchenAid and Wilko ranging from £30 up to £200.

Best blenders: how we tested them

We judged each blender on both quality and quantity across a total of 14 criteria. Half of these scores ranked the blenders based on their specifications and features including price, capacity, the number of speed settings, power, size, weight and colours. The other scores were taken from performance tests, each blender’s design, how loud they are when crushing ice, and how easy they are to use and clean.

The cheapest blender, the £29.99 Russell Hobbs’s Desire Matte Black Jug Blender, achieved the maximum score of 10 for price, for example. But this bargain cost means it has low power and offers few colour options, which law it drop points. The Sage Fresh and Furious excelled at making soup, scoring full marks, but lost nine of these points for being the most expensive.

We began by crushing the same amount of ice in each blender for 30 seconds before tipping the crushed ice into individual plastic cups. The name of each blender was written on the underside of the cups so we couldn’t see which ice came from which machine. We then ranked the samples based on their consistency. This test was repeated to measure the decibel levels of each blender as the ice was thrown around the jug.

For the smoothie test, we added the same amount of milk, bananas and blueberries to each blender and blitzed the ingredients for a minute. These ingredients were chosen because they offered a variety of textures and sizes. The smoothie mixture was poured into labelled cups and judged blind on colour, texture and taste. The individual scores of these three rankings were combined to get the total smoothie score.

This process was repeated for making juice, this time adding blueberries, cucumber and red cabbage to each blender. These ingredients were similarly chosen for their different textures and sizes, but also because of the vibrancy of the red cabbage.

The blended liquid was passed through a cheesecloth into labelled plastic cups and each juice was judged on taste and colour. Again, these scores were combined to get the total juice score.

Finally, a single batch of carrot and coriander soup mixture was divided into 10 and blended in each machine for two minutes. The soup was similarly blind-judged based on texture, colour and taste and the scores were combined. Each model was used on its lowest setting, and for the Ninja model we carried out testing using the jug blender but have also since repeated the tests with its single-serve container for reference.

Best blenders reviews: The test results

In previous appliance group tests, little has separated the best performing models but before we’d even scored the blenders on specifications, one model was a clear winner – the Ninja Blender Duo with AutoIQ. It scored top, or in the top three, for every performance test and in three of the seven specifications rankings.

In second place was the Dualit VortecS blender. It’s lighter than it looks and is surprisingly quiet. This is also impressive given its high power. It performed admirably in most tests but dropped points for being a little confusing to use.

Coming in third was the KitchenAid Artisan. It’s huge and heavy but this affords it a large capacity and high power motor, putting its performance up there with the Ninja and Dualit blenders.

We had expected the Nutribullet to take a podium place, given the brand’s popularity when reading customer reviews. However, its Magic Bullet is the only single-serve blender in the top five, rivalling much more expensive and powerful models for performance and specs, so it still performed well. Its marketing on the box promises a simple, quick blend and that’s exactly what you get.

The most expensive model in our list, the £199.95 Sage Fresh and Furiouscame fifth. It looks similar to the Dualit but is a little sleeker and offers a great range of settings without being too difficult to use. A built-in timer is also a great addition. Sadly, while it nailed some tests, it fell flat in others and we expected more for the price.

Sixth place went to the Wilko Power Plus blender. Despite its name, it lacks some of the power and finesse of the more expensive models but we were impressed with just how well it performed for such a cheap, compact single-serve blender.

Smeg’s retro blender aesthetic is fantastic; its retro design looked great on our worktop and its score was boosted by the range of colours available. Sadly it offers more style than substance and its performance results were wildly inconsistent, knocking it into seventh.

If it was judged purely on its specifications, the Swan Retro Stand blender would have scored higher as it’s light, compact with a large capacity and a good range of colours. Its performance dragged it down to eighth, though, after failing to fully blend basic ingredients.

Tefal’s Blendforce II Glass blender was terrible at crushing ice, the worst on test, but redeemed itself with a decent soup and how easy it was to use, managing to just avoid last place.

With the cheapest blender, Russell Hobbs’s Desire Matte, you get what you pay for. Its black design is inoffensive, and it has a decent capacity but it’s performance was largely poor, sadly affording it our One To Avoid award.

The best blender reviewed:

Ninja Blender Duo with AutoIQblender , £149.99

For a small appliance you’re not likely to use every day, paying £150 for the Ninja Blender Duo may seem a little steep but it’s worth almost every penny. Second only to the KitchenAid Artisan in terms of power, it has enough oomph to be the best blender for crushing ice by quite a distance. It was the only blender to completely turn the cubes to a consistent slush and did so quickly with one of the lowest sound levels of the lot.

It made the smoothest, freshest tasting smoothie without any lumps, and its juice was delicious, albeit lacking some of the vibrancy in colour of the juices produced by the Sage and Dualit blenders. Similarly, its soup was almost perfect. The only thing that separated it from the top-scoring Sage model was a single lump of carrot found at the bottom of the Ninja soup.

This fantastic performance was undoubtedly due to the Ninja’s blender jug having the largest capacity on test, coupled with having a tall, six-blade design – a unique feature of the brand. For reference, we performed each of these tests using the accompanying Nutri Ninja blender and it more than held its own. Its performance wasn’t as good as the Ninja’s jug blender but regularly ranked in the top three places when compared to its rivals.

The trade-off for this performance, and the reason the Ninja Blender Duo is only almost perfect is that it’s not the easiest of blenders to use and it’s a chunky, heavy piece of kit. Its AutoIQ feature determines which container –the jug or the single-serve – is attached and highlights the most appropriate settings.

For example, when the juice ingredients were added to the single-serve blender, the Low, Med, High and Pulse settings lit up, as did the Puree button. The Frozen Drinks/Smoothies button did not, neither did the two dedicated Nutri Blend buttons, which provide more power to the jug blender when its attached.

Once an option has been selected, the technology will automatically run the pulse, pause and blend patterns needed for the particular drink or food you’re making. While this sounds easy, and it does produce great results, knowing which button to press in the first place isn’t always straightforward and takes some getting used to. Other blenders simply have a dial with numbers that correspond to the amount of power, and these are easier to control.

On the plus side, Ninja’s system does have a timer, and it gives you a wider range of options meaning you can be much more precise and tailor the type of blend to the recipe, rather than just blitzing the food and hoping for the best.

Elsewhere, the Ninja lacks the style of some of its rivals. Its chunky and heavy design suits its industrial-style performance. You also have to store the extra jug and cups when they’re not in use, and they’re not small either. This means the Ninja Blender Duo may not suit smaller homes or where space is at a premium. But if you have the room, we’d sacrifice a little style for the power and versatility.

The best blender for value reviewed:

Nutribullet Magic Bullet, £40

Buy a Ninja Blender Duo and you’re paying a slight premium for its versatility and power. But if you’re not interested in bells and whistles, and just want a blender that does the job without breaking the bank, we highly recommend the Nutribullet Magic Bullet. For almost a quarter of the price of the Ninja, you get an easier to use, more compact single-serve blender without sacrificing too much on power and performance.

Its small size and low weight mean it can easily be stored in a cupboard when not in use or will tuck in tidily on your worktop between a kettle and toaster. It doesn’t have a power button on the blender itself. Instead, you press and hold the jug in place for the desired length of time. Alternatively, you can achieve a pulsing motion by pressing and releasing the jug multiple times.

If you want hands-free blending, before turning the Magic Bullet on press and twist the jug to lock it in place. Turn the power and the blades will rotate automatically until you untwist the jug or turn it off at the mains. We liked this ease of use but can imagine the lack of varying speed options, and the hands-on nature of the Magic Bullet may soon feel restrictive if you’re planning to make a variety of meals or drinks.

In all the performance rankings, with the exception of the ice crush test, the Nutribullet scored in the top half of the table. It made an above average smoothie, a tasty soup and a vibrant juice. In fact, it ranked top for the taste of its smoothie, but dropped points for having a thicker, lumpier consistency than some of its rivals. It has a limited capacity – the smallest on test – and while this didn’t seem to impact its performance with softer ingredients, the Nutribullet struggled to effectively crush ice, leaving large lumps. This may also be a downside if you want a blender to batch cook for the week.

The Nutribullet’s closest rival in our group test, in terms of design and functionality, is the Wilko Power Plus blender. The two models look almost identical, spare some branding differences, and the Wilko blender is a fiver cheaper, but it’s incredibly noisy and doesn’t offer pulsing features. Both come with two spare cups. If space, or money is tight, we recommend getting the Nutribullet over its larger rivals and paying the extra compared to the Wilko model will give you better results.

Comparing the rest on test

With the second largest capacity of the group, a wide range of settings and its flat (as opposed to Ninja’s tall) six-pronged blade, the Dualit VortecS got the closest to the Ninja in terms of performance, albeit still 12 points off. It came second only to the Nutribullet for how quiet it is, which is impressive given its hefty motor, and it made a great juice. Dualit has crammed a lot of tech and power into a narrow frame, meaning the VortecS would be comfortable addition to most homes.

Undoubtedly the most striking looking blender of the group, the KitchenAid Artisan is large and heavy, and is seemingly designed to stand out rather than blend in. Excuse the pun. Its highly powerful motor made it great for crushing ice, coming second only to the Ninja, and it’s smoothie was almost up there with Ninja’s taste and consistency. This was all done with relatively little noise, too. The KitchenAid lost points for a lacklustre juice and for leaving lumps in the soup.

Proving price doesn’t always match performance, the Sage Fresh and the Furious fell short of cheaper models, sitting in the middle of the pack. It excelled at both the smoothie and soup tasks, and offers the most speed settings without being overly complicated.

Its timer is a welcomed addition too. However, its juice mixture had large pieces of cabbage and cucumber left in it, it was one of the loudest machines and came second only to KitchenAid’s Artisan in terms of its large size and weight.

It may be the loudest blender in the list, with a capacity only marginally larger than the Nutribullet, but the Wilko blender is still a decent choice. It does the job if you don’t want anything fancy and for £35 you get a compact single-serve blender with spare cups. It lost points for its lack of colour and speed options and it made an awful soup.

How the Smeg BLF01BLUK 50s-styleblender could be so wildly inconsistent confounds us. In the smoothie and ice crushing tests, the Smeg was brilliant, achieving a score of nine and eight respectively. Yet put juice ingredients in, or attempt to make a soup, and you wouldn’t know it was the same blender. Both tests lacked taste and had poor consistencies. For its price we’d also expect more power. We did like the measuring cup in the top of the lid, though.

The Swan Retro Stand blender completely failed in making juice, only managing to cut the very bottom layer of ingredients and leaving the rest intact. Its smoothie didn’t fare much better, the ice wasn’t crushed and its soup was lumpy, although the overall consistency of the vegetables that were blended was good. It gained points for being a good looking, compact, quiet machine. Similar to the Smeg model, the Swan Retro Stand blender offers more style over substance. But unlike Smeg, its price is not sky-high.

Tefal’s Blendforce II Glass scored largely down the middle in the majority of tests, which matches its mid-range price. The blender wasn’t overly loud and it has a large capacity, offering a decent range of speed settings. It fell into last place, however, for making a terrible soup and smoothie and failing to crush the ice at all, merely cutting a few shards off the cubes.

Any blenders to avoid?

Russell Hobbs’s Desire Matte Black Jug Blender is cheap, and it shows. It’s a fairly chunky machine without the power that accompanies some of its other, similarly large rivals, namely the KitchenAid Artisan, and this meant it struggled with many of the performance tests. Its juice ranked among the worst, as did its ability to crush ice.

A couple of silver linings. You do get a large capacity for the price, and its smoothie was one of the smoothest and tastiest we made, so it’s not all bad, but we can’t recommend this machine when others which aren’t that much more expensive – the Nutribullet and Wilko – and do a significantly better job.

It's the New Year, so what better time to invest in a juicer and kick off that health, er, kick? Supermarkets are filled with pre-packed juices, but we all know fresh is best. Invest in one of the best juicers and not only can you guarantee the tastiest juice around, you can get creative with your combinations. Blueberry, pineapple and kale? Done.

If you’ve never bought a juicer before, it can be tricky to know which type is right for you. There are fast and slow designs, plus ones that look great but require more cleaning than others. It's also worth bearing in mind that there are juicers and then there are food processors and smoothie makers – all do a slightly different thing with a slightly different result.

Fortunately, we’ve put 10 of the best juicers through their paces, spending weeks peeling, chopping and blitzing fruit and veg.

You can read our in-depth reviews below and how we came to our best juicer conclusion. But, after much testing, the L'Equip 215 XL juicer is our best value pick and Philips Avance Collection MicroMasticating juicer our favourite overall. Kuvings EVO820 Evolution Cold Press Juicer came a close second – the only reason we haven’t chosen it as our top pick is its £500 price.

• These are the best blenders around right now
• The best hand mixer revealed
• Want the best food processor? Then this guide is for you

In terms of delivering bang for buck, the L'Equip 215 XL Juicer is our best choice – it balances consistently efficient juicing with a price tag of just over £100. It is a great buy for juicers newbies and enthusiasts alike. Plus it’s a cinch to put together and take apart.

The best juicer tested was the Philips HR1947/31 Avance Collection MicroMasticating, chosen because of its minimal pulp waste, compact worktop footprint, effortless assembly and ability to tackle a range of fruit and vegetables. It’s still something of an investment but if you want a juicer that continually delivers, and won’t end up gathering dust, it’s worth it.

• best buys
• The shortlist
• Test selection
• How we tested
• Test results
• Best overall
• Best value
• The rest compared
• One to avoid

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The shortlist: Best juicers reviewed

The expert's view

36

Oranges juiced

29

Hours of testing

18

Products considered

2

Best buys

There are three important questions to ask when thinking about buying a juicer. Do you want a "fast" or "slow" extraction model? How much space do you have to spare? And are you willing to pay a bit more for convenience and easier cleaning?

Even low-cost juicers can do the job well, if you choose carefully. It's one of the benefits of a genre of kitchen gadget that is now fairly mature, rather than part of a trendy fad.

Author Bio

Rachel Ogden

Rachel Ogden is a freelance journalist specialising in testing small appliances, from coffee machines to slow cookers and everything in-between. Her kitchen has been a temporary home to multiple juicers over the years, meaning she has used, cleaned, assembled and disassembled more than most people, and juiced a vast amount of fruit, vegetables and nuts.

Best juicers: how we selected

Every brand under the sun used to make a juicer. That variety has narrowed with the rise of smoothie makers and pro-style blenders. The market now mostly consists of models that tend to be more than £100, but produce a high yield with less maintenance, and affordable ‘fast’ juicers with few bells and whistles.

Slow juicers (also known as cold press juicers, or masticating as they ‘chew’ the ingredients to extract more juice) have risen in popularity. Fast, or centrifugal, juicers (where ingredients are shredded, spun and strained) often have to emphasise their time-saving qualities, such as rapid juicing and reduced food prep.

For these tests, we’ve tried to select a varied mixture of fast and slow juicers, at a range of prices. Our cheapest is a budget-friendly sub-£50 VonShefcentrifugal model. There are 10 different manufacturers, ranging from specialist juicer makers that you may not be familiar with, such as Kuvings and L'Equip, to companies that mainly make small kitchen appliances, such as Dualit and Magimix. There are also companies that offer a range of other products, such as Philips and Panasonic.

Juicing at home is the best way to maximise your drink’s vitamins and nutrients but no amount of tasty fresh OJ will lure you into making it if a machine is messy or difficult to use, assemble and clean. We prioritised designs that are easy to take apart and put back together (you’ll still find older juicer models available that are like 3D jigsaw puzzles), can be cleaned in a couple of minutes or are dishwasher-safe and come with useful features, such as non-drip stoppers and different settings for different produce.

We also chose models that would minimise food prep time with wider feed chutes (so you can juice a whole apple without chopping for example) or a large pulp bin (for reduced emptying during weekend juicing sessions), and those that have more than one speed, so can adapt to soft and hard textures.

Accessories were also a plus point. We looked for brushes to help with clean-up afterwards, recipe books (to inspire you to get the most out of your juicer), lidded juice jugs (so you don’t have to juice every day and can store a few days’ worth in the fridge) and different strainers (for making thicker juice, coulis or even frozen fruity desserts).

At the more expensive end of the market, performance tends to be fairly consistent. If you have a couple of hundred pounds to spend, the chances of buying a poor-performing juicer are low. At this price, the buying decision will be mostly about features, design and aesthetic. If you keep these machines clean and well-maintained, they should last for years without any major hiccups.

However, for less than £100, quality varieties more and you’re limited to centrifugal designs, Many include more plastic parts than metal, which may be less durable over time and can stain. They’re fine for occasional juicing, or as a first juicer, but may not be suitable for everyday heavy use. Budget colour choices tends to be black, white or silver. Designs are more functional than stylish, and features reduced to a minimum.

Best juicers: how we tested

Assembling a juicer shouldn’t be a special skill so the first thing we were looking for were machines that were quick to slot together, and ideally had lock symbols or arrows on applicable parts. A quick-start guide or separate diagram showing how to assemble the juicer, which you can keep handy until you’re up to speed, was also a plus.

Another feature on our wishlist was clear, concise instructions, as too often manuals can be overwhelmingly wordy. Or, conversely, too brief to get a real sense of what the machine can do.

Each juicer we tested was given four foods to assess its capabilities. These were a hard vegetable (carrot), soft vegetable (spinach leaves), hard fruit (apples) and soft fruit (peeled orange segments). Speeds were adjusted for each where available, and food introduced whole where possible. We then looked at how much juice was produced from each food, how much waste pulp ended up in the bin (including if it contained any unjuiced lumps of the food), and how damp the waste pulp was.

After juicing each food, we also looked inside the machine to see how much waste pulp or food remained in the bin, whether any lumps or clogs were present and if filters looked congested or fairly clear (and so if they would require cleaning in-between different foods or if we could carry on using the machine without any clogs forming).

Following each juicing session, we also marked each juicer on how much mess there was around the machine, from either splashes and spurting while in operation or drips on the worktop in lieu of a resealable spout. More mess equals more clean-up time, so even if a juicer is relatively low maintenance to use, constantly cleaning up around it can be a deterrent to a regular juicing routine.

Finally, we evaluated how easy each model was to take apart and clean after use. A good juicer design shouldn’t have any nooks or crannies that can’t be reached with a cloth or brush when cleaning by hand (and so could become sticky or unhygienic over time), and any seals should be easy to unplug and re-seal.

The best models tend to come with a brush or cleaning tool in the box specifically suited to removing clogs or fibres from that machine, so we awarded extra points to those that made washing by hand as fuss-free as possible.

Entirely dishwasher-safe parts were also a plus. A few of the models we tested still had one or two parts that had to be cleaned by hand and remembering which ones these are when a juicer’s in regular use would be tricky. It’s worth noting that most machines still advise a quick scrub of filters before placing in the dishwasher and that most go on the top rack for reduced wear and tear from the water jets.

Best Juicer Reviews: The test results

The Philips AvanceCollection MicroMasticating juicer scored highly in almost all areas so we’ve chosen it as our best juicer. Ease of cleaning is the clearest positive – its parts only needed a quick rinse to flush out fibres and were all dishwasher-safe.

We also found it very easy to assemble – the parts that come into contact with food all slot together into one unit, which then locks into place on top of the machine. Another slow juicer, the Kuvings EVO820, produced a slightly better yield but, in comparison, took far longer to assemble and disassemble and clean, and took up more room on the worktop.

We tested two other slow juicers. One was the Panasonic MJ-L500, which performed well, except with spinach leaves. It was straightforward to put together but some of its parts weren’t dishwasher safe. We also liked its ability to make frozen desserts.

The other was Smeg’s slow juicer– an efficient machine with a high juice yield that was easy to assemble. It performed especially well with citrus fruit and made short work of leafy greens but as the highest priced model in our selection, this slightly better performance might not be worth the extra expense.

On the fast juicer front, we tested six models – theL’Equip 215 XL, which didn’t look much different than many from the outside but performed exceptionally well, making it our best value choice. We liked everything about it, from the good advice about how best to maintain it and clean it by hand, to the fact that it was also dishwasher safe should you not have time to scrub.

The L’Equip 215 XL faltered a little with spinach leaves and would have benefited from having a cleaning brush in the box, but for the price we felt it delivered on most key points.

Also ranking highly was the Sage Nutri Juicer Cold XL – similar in design but with more control over speeds and an incredibly useful storage jug. More of its parts are constructed from metal, too, ensuring a long lifespan but also increasing its weight – not ideal if you have to move it around the kitchen or in and out of a cupboard.

Our cheapest model in the selection had a similar design – the VonShef 800W juicer. While its build quality meant we had a small leak while testing, it nonetheless made short work of everything but the spinach, which produced a negligible amount of juice.

Our final two were the Dualit Dual Max Juicer and the Magimix Le Duo Plus XL – both relatively compact and elegant centrifugal machines, but both prone to drips from their spouts once the glass or jug had been taken away.

The Dualit model tended to gather pulp in the lid, rather transferring it to the pulp container, while neither performed as well with spinach as they did hard fruit. These were both good, hard-working machines but definitely more suitable for citrus and hard fruit than leafy veg.

Best Juicer overall:

Philips Avance Collection MicroMasticating juicer review, £199.99, Amazon (RRP £295)

Kitchens rarely have space for a one-trick small appliance, so the sheer size of this juicer won us over. It’s compact enough to store at the back of a worktop underneath a wall cabinet and its juice jug and extra filter can be stored inside the waste pulp bin when you’re done. There’s even cord storage around the base of the machine for the generous one-metre cable.

Inside, a long thin auger screw (rather than the chunky ones you’ll find on larger upright slow juicers) crushes fruit, vegetables and nuts in three stages before the juice makes its way to your glass. It then ejects the pulp into a container below. In our tests, it performed brilliantly with every food, processing spinach as easily as citrus and producing minimal, only slightly damp, pulp.

While juicing it was quiet, meaning it’s also a good choice if you’re the first person up in the morning, work unsocial hours or don’t want to disturb a child’s nap time. The juice it produced was consistently great quality, with intense flavours, a good consistency (which can also be thicker with more pulp by switching to the fibre juice filter) and barely any foam. An included recipe book had some ideas for blends to try, although not a huge amount of guidance.

It was prone to was juice surges if food was pushed through too quickly, or if chunks became stuck, and had to be nudged through with the pusher. The feed chute isn’t that wide, so more prep was required than with other machines, and if you were juicing in a hurry, this might prove frustrating. However, the lidded jug does at least mean you can juice ahead of time if this becomes an issue.

Another reason we’ve chosen it as our favourite was that it was incredibly simple to assemble and comes with a separate diagram you can keep to hand until it’s second nature. Taking it apart was mess-free – the non-drip spout clicks to stop splashes of juice on the worktop, plus its pre-clean function leaves the interior fibre-free. It took less than a minute to rinse all the parts, none of which had sharp edges, and they were all dishwasher-safe as well.

Of all the juicers we tested, we felt the Avance Collection MicroMasticating model had the best balance of convenience, easy storage, efficiency and minimal maintenance.

Best juicer for value

L'Equip 215 XL Juicer review, £169.95, Amazon

The L'Equip 215 XL might not have the most exciting name, only has one speed, and it is not the sleekest model in our round-up. But in terms of being a hard-working juicer that’s quick and easy to use, clean and assemble, it fits the bill perfectly.

Some of the reasons we chose it as our best value buy include its large pulp container and wide feed chute. You can juice for as long as you like without stopping to empty it – great for large batches — and it can take small whole apples and carrots (although larger apples can be obstructed by the fin halfway down the chute).

There are some bundled recipes to try, but no juice jug.

We liked that theL'Equip 215 XL's spout didn’t spurt as we juiced, even though its powerful motor processes fruit and veg in a matter of seconds, and that after we were finished, there were no clogs inside the machine – all the pulp made it into the container, with some sticking to the lid.

Juicing the apples produced a clear drink with a small amount of froth and moist, but not soaking, well-processed pulp. We had similar results from carrots, with each one creating about a quarter of a glass of juice with substantial, but quite dry, pulp.

Oranges gave a good yield of about a third of a glass of juice per fruit, with slight froth and damp pulp. We found that trying to ease food through the L'Equip 215 XLslowly translated to the best results, although it was hard to do this with soft citrus. Where it didn’t perform as well as hoped was with the spinach leaves. Even when rolled or juiced with apple, they only produced a small amount of juice. The spinach pulp was minimal but this machine still didn’t feel like the best choice for leafy veg.

Taking the L'Equip 215 XL apart and cleaning up was straightforward. While there’s no brush included for cleaning the mesh filter basket, fibres can be removed quite easily and all the parts are dishwasher-safe. A non-drip spout would improve this juicer, as we disliked having to wipe up splashes as we took it apart.

In terms of size, while the L'Equip 215 XL is not the smallest we reviewed, it’s still more compact than models of a similar design. It can be stored easily. Many of the internal parts are made from stainless steel too, which should result in a longer lifespan.

Overall, the L'Equip 215 XL is good value considering its mostly efficient performance, and an excellent buy if most of what you plan to juice is hard fruit or veg.

Comparing the rest

Best for serious juicing fans

Kuvings EVO820 Evolution Cold Press Juicer, £479.00, Amazon

An incredibly well-designed slow juicer that frankly, could probably squeeze juice out of anything, but there’s no getting around that this is an investment machine. However, it offers more than most: high juice yield and a minimal amount of pulp, a clever feed chute that comes with a flip-gate rather than a fin, which makes juicing whole apples easier, drip-stop spout and wrap-around cleaning brush for effortless maintenance. There’s also an optional citrus attachment, which adds another £30 to the price, but turns it into an efficient reamer.

Best for batch juicing

Sage the Nutri Juicer Cold XL, £299.00, Amazon

Slow juicers might not be the snail-like appliances the name suggests but for those who don’t want to wait around for a cold press, there’s the Sage the Nutri Juicer Cold XL. It's a weighty no-nonsense machine that aims to combine the speed of a centrifugal juicer with the quality of a slow one. In some respects it delivers, producing minimal dry pulp for hard fruit and veg. We would have liked to see more from the softer stuff, considering it has a dedicated speed for it but loved the design otherwise. A large pulp bin and lidded jug with a seal means you can make days’ worth of juice in one go, plus a flexible nozzle gives the option of juicing into a glass.

Best for retro style

Smeg Slow Juicer, £359.99, Amazon

However useful an appliance is, if it lives out on your worktop, why not have something attractive to look at too? That’s the reasoning behind Smeg’s slow juicer, which combines style with a durable juicing machine. Two filters mean you can have drinks with more pulp should you wish to, while a drip-stop spout prevents all that lovely juice dribbling over your surfaces. Plus, unlike many juicers that only come in monochrome, there’s a choice of pastel blue, red or cream instead of the standard black.

Best for versatility

Magimix Le Duo Plus XL Juice Extractor, £179.99, Amazon

Considering its motor comes with a 30-year guarantee, you can be sure the Le Duo Plus XL was just itching to be put through its paces. We especially liked it for its two-cone citrus press, which worked as well for oranges as it did limes (a fruit that can be stubborn to produce juice), the SmoothieMix attachment that makes everything from coulis to baby food and the spatula. It lets you scoop out pulp easily when you are finished juicing. A simple design, quiet motor (though it’s still noisy when juicing) and entirely dishwasher-safe parts also made us score it highly. However, while it produced a good yield from apples and carrots, getting sufficient juice from leafy veg proved tricky.

Best as a first juicer

Dualit Dual-Max Juicer, £59.99, Amazon

Proving a solidly built machine doesn’t need to blow the budget, the Dual-Max is probably one of the best models for someone starting a juicing habit but who isn’t ready to lay out hundreds just to dip a toe in the water. It has two speeds for getting the most from soft and hard fruit and was very fast – so much so, that our juice was always foamy. Fortunately, its juice jug’s separator served to skim most of it off when we poured it out. It was messy to clean up after disassembling it, as pulp gathered in the lid, and you’ll need to buy a separate brush to clear clogs from the metal filter before chucking in the dishwasher. But other than that, there’s a lot to like.

Best for a budget

Vonshef 800W Stainless Steel Juicer, £49.99, Amazon

As the lowest priced juicer in our round-up, we weren’t sure what to expect from this pocket-friendly number. But it was a pleasant surprise. It works almost as well as juicers that cost twice as much, and although there was a tiny leak from the side of the lid (despite it being firmly clamped in place), and a bit more mess during disassembly, these felt like niggles given the price. The build quality is less robust than others we tested but considering you can spend the saving on lots of fruit and veg for juicing, it’s hard to find much fault with it.

Best for frozen desserts

Panasonic MJ-L500 Slow Juicer, £399,00, Amazon

With a fair few parts, it’s a little bit of a puzzle to put this juicer together but persist with the MJ-L500 and your reward can be everything from juice to icy desserts. It will even crunch its way through frozen fruit, turning berries and chunks of fruit into ‘oh I just whipped this up’ sorbet – great for dieters craving a sweet fix as well as healthy puddings for kids. It performed especially well with apples, turning them into slightly foamy yet crisp juice with compacted pulp that was almost dry to the touch, but leafy greens didn’t produce much yield. However, for under £200, there’s a lot of functionality.

Best for families

Braun IdentityCollection Spin Juicer J500, £129.00, Amazon

A good basic juicer that’s noisy but fast, its notable features include an anti-splash spout that doesn't spurt or drip, quick powering up and down, and two speeds for hard and soft fruit. We were able to fit apples into its wide feed chute too, only deferring to the pusher to ease the last few pieces of fruit through. There was quite a lot of foam on top of the juice but a separator in the jug helped to sieve this out. The remaining pulp was fairly dry. Oranges produced a good amount of juice, but wetter pulp. Smaller pieces of food were trickier to juice, and had a habit of spinning away from the filter.

One to avoid?

All juicers have their failings. There isn’t yet a design that does away with food prep altogether, produces a large yield and needs little maintenance. So rather than pinpoint a model to avoid, we’d suggest making sure you buy the juicer that’s right for how you plan to juice and your everyday lifestyle to avoid falling out of love with it.

If you like speedy OJ and apple juice, choose a centrifugal model, or if veggies, soft fruit and nuts is more your thing, go for a slow juicer. And if you think it’ll end up getting relegated to a cupboard, never to see the light of day again, buy one that’s compact enough to have out on the worktop so you’re more likely to use it.

While none of the juicers we tested were especially difficult to clean, some were definitely more straightforward than others, so if you find yourself often short on time, pick one that’s dishwasher-safe or has as few parts as possible.

If you think that the best slow cookers are just for stews and soups, then think again.

From baking cakes to roasting chickens and cooking an entire Full English (or a stack of pancakes!) ready for the next morning, the best slow cookers are more versatile than you can imagine.

For the past month we’ve put this versatility to the test, preparing meals and desserts using 10 of the best-selling slow cookers. They come from established brands like Morphy Richards, Crock-Pot and Russell Hobbs, as well as models from relatively unsung manufacturers including Drew & Cole, Swan and Wilko.

There was a surprise result. The bargain Wilko slow cooker came out victorious. It makes the most moist chicken we’ve ever tasted, while also performing admirably at baking cakes and stews.

Drew & Cole’s Clever Chef is our best value choice because the design, performance and range of options it provides far outweigh its price.

• These are the best food processors around.

Slow cooker best buys

It looks unlike any slow cooker we’ve used but that’s not a criticism. The CleverChef is a slow cooker, frying pan, steamer, and rice cooker in one. We only tested its slow cooking capabilities – for which it came third overall – but if you’re in the market for a slow cooker anyway, spending slightly more will get you this all-singing, all-dancing multicooker, representing fantastic value for money.

In our blind taste tests, the Wilko 3.5L slow cooker made the most delicious roast chicken, plus its chocolate cake and beef stew were so tasty they made the top three. This, coupled with its absolute bargain price, its choice of settings and its size made it a deserving winner.

• best buys
• The shortlist
• Our expert
• Test selection
• How we tested
• test results
• Best overall
• Most versatile
• The rest compared
• One to avoid

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The Shortlist: Best slow cooker

The expert's view

50

Products considered

65

Hours of testing

2

Experts consulted

2

Best buys

Our testing proves you can buy an excellent slow cooker for less than the cost of a Pizza Express bottle of wine. However, there's more to consider. Some of the slow cookers we tested can do more kinds of cooking. And others look much better than our Wilko winners, which matters a lot to some.

Read on to find out how our 10 best slow cookers handle cooking a chicken, baking a chocolate cake and making a classic slow-cooked stew.

Author Bio

Vicky Woollaston

Victoria Woollaston is a technology and beauty freelancer with more than a decade of experience reviewing and comparing gadgets, appliances and services at MailOnline, Wired, Alphr and Expert Reviews.

Best slow cookers: how we selected

Despite the myriad recipes that can be made in a slow cooker, the machines themselves are simple pieces of kit. On paper, little separates the majority of slow cookers in terms of size, temperature settings and design. In reality, however, there can be a vast difference in how one performs compared to a rival.

To create a shortlist of the best slow cookers, we studied customer ratings for 50 models across leading homeware sites Lakeland, Andrew James, AO.com, Argos, Wilko and Amazon.

Any product labelled as a slow cooker was included, which (depending on the site) also pulled in multi-cookers. From this list of 50, we read hundreds of reviews to find the 25 most popular, well-regarded slow cookers based on customer experiences. To narrow the list down to the top 10, we first selected the highest-scoring models from each brand and then handpicked the final models based on features and price.

In terms of features, we looked for slow cookers with at least two temperature settings – high and low – because these are the most common settings used in the majority of slow cooker recipes.

Each slow cooker had to have a minimum capacity of 3.5L because this size can typically create meals to feed a family of four, and is large enough to roast a whole chicken. All of the slow cookers needed to fit comfortably on countertops, too. In terms of price, we wanted at least two budget and two high-end, premium models with the others providing an assortment of options in the mid-range.

This left us with models from Crock-Pot, Swan, Russell Hobbs, Drew & Cole, Tower, Andrew James, Lakeland, Wilko and two Morphy Richards slow cookers – one in the budget category and a mid-range model. The Crock-Pot and Drew & Cole models are classed as multi-cookers so, to level the playing field, we only tested their slow cooking capabilities and comment on their other features purely for reference purposes.

Best slow cookers: how we tested

Across our tests, the slow cookers were ranked out of 10 based on features and performance.

When scoring the best slow cookers for features we assigned points based on price, capacity, the number of temperature settings, their size, weight and colour options. They were also judged on how hot to the touch they got during cooking, how easy they were to use and clean, and their design.

The cheapest model, the Wilko 3.5L slow cooker, achieved a price score of 10, for example but lost points for not offering a range of colour options. The Crock-Pot scored 10 for having the highest capacity but lost points for being the most expensive and largest of the lot.

The slow cookers were then individually tested on their ability to roast a chicken, make a beef stew and bake a chocolate lava cake.

For the roasting challenge, a whole chicken was placed on onions, carrots, garlic and chicken stock and cooked on low for five hours. The stock was removed and the chickens were cooked on high for the final 60 minutes.

Meat from each chicken breast was put into bowls, on the underside of which the name of each slow cooker had been written, and they were blind tasted before being ranked from best to worst. We were looking for a moist texture and strong flavour.

To make the beef stew, we fried the ingredients in the slow cookers to test how well they could brown onions and beef before adding stock and vegetables and cooking on low for eight hours.

The blind tasting process was repeated but this time each bowl was ranked three times – once for sauce, once for meat and veg, and once for overall flavour. When ranking the sauce, we were looking for a vibrant colour and thick consistency.

When ranking the meat and veg, we wanted pieces of tender beef that had been cooked evenly, and soft vegetables that held their shape and hadn’t been overcooked to point of mash. The scores from each were combined to get a total.

When making the chocolate lava cake, we put a chocolate sponge mix in each slow cooker before pouring over a fudge mixture and cooking on high for an hour.

Spoonfuls of the cake were transferred to the labelled bowls and were judged on how well the sponge was cooked, the consistency and amount of fudge sauce, and overall taste.

Feeling hungry?

As a rule, a high temperature on a slow cooker averages around 150-degrees Celcius mark, while a low temperature is in the region of 90-degrees Celcius.

This can, of course, differ by model but it’s fair to assume temperatures are similar because slow cooking recipes tend not to list different cooking times for different models.

If a recipe says it will cook in eight hours on low, for example, the results of whichever slow cooker you use should be similar, or certainly not different enough to warrant a substantial change in timings. In our test, Drew & Cole’s CleverChef was the only slow cooker to show the exact temperature of its high, medium and low settings, and in this instance we left this temperature at whatever its default was.

To test how hot each one was to the touch, we used a thermometer placed on the outside of each slow cooker. The total scores from all 12 food and specification tests were combined to reveal the winners and losers.

Best slow cooker reviews: The results

Topping our list of best slow cookers, beating competition from appliances that cost almost nine times its price, is the Wilko 3.5L slow cooker. It consistently impressed us, cooking food evenly and with ease, and it looks the part.

In second place, we go from the cheapest to the most expensive model in our list – the Crock-Pot 5.6L Family multi-cooker and slow cooker. It’s a beast of a machine, in terms of capacity, size as well as what it’s capable of. Plus it’s incredibly easy to use, despite its vast array of options.

The second of the multi-cookers in our list, Drew & Cole’s CleverChef, took third place for its precision heat settings as well as its unique design and safety features. Its cooking skills didn’t quite match this versatility but it was a well-rounded appliance and it offers far beyond any of the others in this list without an extortionate price tag.

Only one point separated each of the slow cookers in our top four, and Morphy Richards’s Evoke Sear and Stew scored highly for how lightweight and compact it is. It didn’t perform quite as well as our podium places at cooking the food evenly, but wasn’t far off.

Sitting in fifth place, Lakeland’s 3.5L slow cooker fell slightly flat for producing average scores across tests while not offering much in the way of standout features. It’s a mid-range slow cooker for a mid-range price and does the job, just not as well as some of its other rivals on test.

The Tower 3.5L was the most striking of the slow cookers in this list (we reviewed the red model) from a distance. Close up, however, it looks cheaper than it should for its high price. Its overall performance was also lacking, although it did redeem itself by baking the best cake.

The Tower's chocolate lava cake

Approaching the bottom of the pile is the Andrew James Sizzle and Simmer. On paper, having a digital display and delay timer in such a relatively cheap model should have pushed it closer to the top in terms of use, yet these features are unnecessarily confusing.

It was the only slow cooker to burn us when moving it and was average at cooking cake. It did make a cracking stew though; the best of the bunch.

Towards the back of the pack is the Russell Hobbs Chalk Board 3.5L slow cooker. It made a decent stew, a below average chicken and a terrible cake but scored well for its tall design and compact dimensions. This makes it perfect for smaller kitchens. It was also one of the safest on test, not getting too hot to the touch.

Swan’s Retro 3.5L slow cooker is in a similar boat to the Lakeland model. It didn’t do anything particularly well, sitting near the bottom of the pile for how evenly, or not, it cooked the three food items. As much as its ivory pot looks great – and it really does – it is a pain to clean and it quickly looked discoloured.

Finally, we were surprised the Morphy Richards 6.5L Oval slow cooker scored so low considering the much stronger performance of its sister model. This was down to the fact it came last in the stew and chicken taste tests and its design is a little basic. We do have to give it credit, however, for offering the largest capacity on test for such a low price.

The best slow cooker reviewed: Wilko 3.5L slow cooker, £15

The first thing that struck us with the Wilko 3.5Lslow cooker was its ceramic bowl. Typically, ceramic bowls are the reserve of more expensive models because they cost more to manufacture.

They retain and spread the heat more evenly than metal pots. Plus, ceramic pots offer the same, or similar, non-stick properties as coatings found on metal pots without the chemicals.

To find a ceramic pot in a slow cooker that costs just £15 is impressive, and we’re not sure how Wilko makes a profit on these. This addition may go some way into explaining why the slow cooker punches so well above its weight, beating rivals that cost much more.

It is super simple to set up and use and a single dial on the front switches from Off to Low, High or Keep Warm. When the slow cooker is on, a red light above this switch is illuminated. This is far from unique to the Wilko slow cooker – and if you’ve ever used a traditional slow cooker you’ll know this is standard – but it’s worth highlighting when other models in this list aren’t as straightforward, namely the Andrew James model.

Out of the three cooking tests, the Wilko slow cooker achieved top, or close to top marks. Its roast chicken was succulent and full of flavour, scoring maximum points. It came away from the bone easily and was still moist while other models overcooked the chicken until it was dry, such as the CleverChef, or failed to cook it all the way through, as was the case with the Morphy Richards Oval slow cooker. The Wilko model also produced the best tasting cake sponge but dropped a single point because its fudge sauce was thicker, and therefore less molten, than its rivals, particularly the Tower.

The Wilko model’s stew similarly impressed. As with the chicken, it cooked the beef evenly until tender. It pulled apart easily but still held its shape, whereas the beef on the CleverChef was chewy and the Swan Retro’s meat almost melted away and disintegrated into the sauce. The Wilko sauce was decent. It was flavoursome and vibrant, but lacked a little consistency when compared to the winning Andrew James stew. The Wilko stew’s overall taste was also great, again just losing out to Andrew James’.

Onto the negatives. You can’t put the Wilko slow cooker pot in the dishwasher, or at least you’re not advised to. The manufacturer says it is wipe clean only and we can only assume that using it in the dishwasher may cause the pot to crack or for its non-stick properties to deteriorate over time. This makes it a little harder to clean than dishwasher-friendly models.

The design of the Wilko slow cooker isn’t much to look at either. Its metal exterior does get hot during cooking but not as hot as the majority of other similar designs in our test. Its dial and lid knob are made of plastic and look a little cheap, but that’s because they are and there had to be a trade-off somewhere considering this slow cooker’s fantastic performance.

The best slow cooker for versatility reviewed: Drew & Cole’s CleverChef, £59.99

Let’s face it, slow cookers aren’t the most attractive of kitchen appliances. Even those such as Swan’s Retro model which attempt to elevate this aesthetic still fall a little short of being attractive. So it’s refreshing to see Drew & Cole offering a break from the norm with its CleverChef multi-cooker.

Its compact, plastic design could not be further from the metal designs of its rivals. It has a large digital display and hides a large 5L capacity pot inside a streamlined exterior. There’s even room for a handy steaming tray.

This design does give it a slightly space-age feel; poles apart from Swan’s Retro design, and if you prefer the latter the CleverChef may not be for you. If you like your gadgets though, it’s great, plus by housing the pot inside its plastic casing, it got only slightly warm to the touch making it the safest of the machines we tested.

The CleverChef offers a staggering 14 settings – slow cook, stew, steam, roast, poach, rice, soup, pasta, fish, sauté, brown, bread rise, bake, yoghurt – which technically increases to 17 when you consider you can set the slow cook function to cook on low, medium or high. We only tested how well the slow cooking features worked for our test, but having since experimented with its other settings we can confidently say it’s a highly versatile machine.

The downside to this is that it can be tricky to use. The CleverChef, along with the Andrew James model, were the only slow cookers we had to read the manual for before using. The digital display is activated by touch, and you have to press relatively hard to register a press.

Pressing the Menu button repeatedly to scroll through the cooking settings is tedious, especially if the one you want is at the end of the list. The Crock-Pot with its physical buttons and mutiple settings is far more intuitive and user-friendly.

The pay-off is that once we’d got our head around how to use the CleverChef, we were cooking a wide variety of meals with ease. Getting back the time cooking that we’d lost learning how to use it.

The performance of the CleverChef wasn’t bad either. It couldn’t match the cooking skills of the Wilko or Crock-Pot but scored a respectable 8/10 for the chicken, and middle-of-the-road scores for its cake and stew.

Its main flaw, when compared to others in our list, is that its design made it a little too efficient. It cooked all three food items faster than its rivals and without a glass lid this wasn’t easy to spot. This isn’t necessarily a positive because it meant the food dried out quickly. The CleverChef lost points for its chicken because the breast meat was dry. The cake was overcooked and the stew didn’t taste as well-rounded as others because it hadn’t had the time to infuse with flavour.

We have since experimented with different settings to achieve the optimum conditions for each recipe and it has performed better. Plus it comes with a book, and website, full of recipes designed with the CleverChef in mind. If you were already willing to spend around £50 for a slow cooker, it’s definitely worth paying the extra to get such a versatile, futuristic machine.

Comparing the rest on test

Crock-Pot has been a leading name in the slow cooker industry for decades. Its so synonymous with one-pot cooking, slow cookers are often called crock-pots so it’s no wonder the model we tested performed so well. Its digital display is easy to use, as are its delay and countdown timers.

The Crock-Pot 5.6L Family Multi and Slow Cooker cooked succulent chicken and rich stew, scoring 9/10 for both. It dropped points because its cake was a little dry and its price will likely put it out of reach of many. We only tested its slow cooking capabilities but as a multi-cooker it has a huge range of other skills, too.

At the opposite end of the scale price-wise is the Morphy Richards Evoke Sear and Stew. We tested the black and rose gold model and it looks great.

Its metal pot, which helps make the slow cooker so light, feels cheap, as does the large plastic dial. And it performed terribly at roasting a chicken (2/10). That said, it produced the best tasting stew and its cake had a good mix of sponge and sauce.

The Lakeland’s 3.5L model is decidedly mid-range. It has a mid-range price, offers mid-range features and gave a mid-range performance scoring 6/10 for each of the three food tests. At least it’s consistent.

It would have placed higher if the Andrew James model hadn’t made such a great stew, and if it hadn’t been one of the heaviest slow cookers we tested.

Tower’s chocolate lava cake was heavenly; it tasted superb with a great ratio of sponge to sauce. The slow cooker roasted a chicken well, too. But that’s where the successes ended.

With an average score for its watery stew and plastic-looking, cheap design, not to mention being one of the hottest to touch during cooking, the Tower’s performance doesn’t justify its £70 price tag. Especially when the Wilko model, at almost a fifth of the price, beat it in almost every category.

The chalkboard design of the Russell Hobbs Chalk Board 3.5L Slow Cooker slow cooker may have a place in some homes, but we felt it was gimmicky. It’s not easy to write on, especially when the slow cooker is hot, and we just don’t see the point.

The tall design is great, but may also not appeal to everyone. True, it’s great if space is at a premium, but it’s not the easiest to use for roasting a chicken, and with a smaller flat surface area, you can’t cook many muffins in cases, for example.

What Swan’s Retro range offers in style, it lacks in substance. The grey exterior, ivory pot and silver retro dial really do look the part yet, it scored just 2/10 for the stew and cake.

The meat was tough and the sauce weak, and the cake was undercooked. The ivory pot also got dirty and discoloured easily and had to be treated with specialist stain removers. Its affordable price did help us forgive some of these shortcomings but it wasn’t enough for it to rank higher.

Bringing up the rear is the Morphy Richards 6.5L Oval slow cooker, an iconic model from a well-known brand that is consistently a best-seller on Amazon.

Like the Lakeland slow cooker, it doesn’t offer anything in the way of bells and whistles. But where Lakeland’s made decent work of the cooking, this Morphy Richards model came last for the stew and the chicken, and performed only marginally better with the cake.

It was almost as hot to the touch as the Andrew James model and its RRP makes it the most expensive of the traditional slow cookers in this list, without the minerals to back it up.

Any slow cookers to avoid?

We had high hopes for the Andrew James model. A slow cooker with digital features and timers for less than £35?

Consider our interest piqued. Sadly, it let us down. It gets blisteringly hot to the touch and comes with small handles that make moving it without touching the pot difficult.

We burnt ourselves on a couple of occasions. It’s also one of the heaviest on test, adding to these woes.

The digital display is overly complicated – you have to press and hold the dial to turn it on, which is far from obvious – and you only have a limited amount of time to make your temperature and time settings. If you make a mistake or want to change it, you have to turn the slow cooker off and back on again.

When it came to the cooking tests, it performed admirably, achieving a perfect score for the stew and mid-range scores for the chicken and cake. This is why it ranked higher than others yet is still our slow cooker to avoid.

Life is hectic. Family, work and everything in-between, who has time to bake bread? It's a labour of love, after all, and a really good loaf takes time - even in the best breadmaker.

That's why most of us make do with shop-bought loaves. Sub-par sarnies and smashed avocado on floppy, spongy slivers that turn into listless mush after not very long. Stop settling. You can get a meaty, thick slab of crunchy goodness you've sliced yourself to load up or fill to perfection - just get a breadmaker.

Starting at less than £45 for the Cookworks Breadmaker from Argos, buying one of the best breadmakers saves time, energy, and if you make enough loaves, money too. It needn’t cost the earth (although some can), and you’ll never have to deal with mediocre toast ever again.

Not all breadmakers were created equal though. The Panasonic SD-ZX2522 will set you back £239.99 and is our ultimate do-it-all machine. It has the biggest pan and promises the most gluten-free features for celiacs, and includes the most modes of all our machines and is also the quietest too.

• Best buys
• Our expert
• The shortlist
• test selection
• How we tested
• Test results
• Best overall
• Best value
• The rest compared
• Buying advice
• Others to consider

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If all you want is a decent homemade loaf of bread every day or two, you can get it from Cookworks’s Breadmaker. It isn’t perfect. The evenness of the bake makes for a slightly dryer, thicker crust, though if you refine your recipe and opt for a lighter crust setting, it makes a fantastic tasting, fantastic value loaf.

Kenwood’s BM450 breadmaker balances premium design with chrome trimmings, a sizeable loaf tin and plenty of modes and features. While we wouldn’t recommend it for anyone looking to make cake in their breadmaker, for a sensational loaf and the best-looking breadmaker on-test, the BM450 is our choice.

Our expert

40+

Hours of testing

14

Products considered

3

Experts consulted

2

Best buys

If you’ve never used a breadmaker and are wondering how they work, all five of the ones we’ve tested have a core method in common.

You load up the pan with ingredients, usually starting with the liquids - oil and water, followed by the flour and salt, and finally, yeast. Next, put the pan in the breadmaker, let it do its thing, and let your nose guide you back to it when your home smells like a bakery.

Author Bio

Basil Kronfli

Basil Kronfli is a journalist of ten years’ standing, working across sites like TechRadar, Gizmodo and T3, as well as print titles including Metro, Shortlist and Total Film. He specialises in computing, smartphones and cameras, dabbling in kitchen tech, too.

The shortlist: best breadmaker

Best breadmakers: how we selected

The main thing we wanted to do when choosing breadmakers was to test out a spread across a range of prices. That’s why we opted for the affordable Cookworks breadmaker, which costs £39.99, through to the priciest breadmaker of the bunch, Panasonic’s SD-ZX2522, which costs £239.99.

All the breadmakers make different-sized loaves, so we also want to break down the options for singletons tight on time through to families in need of a three or four-person loaf. Their designs are also totally different, and given none of these breadmakers are small, these large appliances will have serious design implications on your kitchen - something we’ve tried to take into account.

Need a gluten-free option? The Panasoni SD-ZX2522 breadmaker has you covered. Want to set the breadmaker to have your loaf ready in 15 hours? Kenwood is the only option that gives you more than can do so.

Best breadmakers: how we tested

Every breadmaker comes with a recipe book and, unsurprisingly, each includes a white loaf recipe. That was the first test - five white loaves using the machine’s suggested recipes.

Some recipes recommend you use skimmed milk powder. This is to prevent fresh milk going sour when the breadmaker’s on a timer of in excess of 12 hours. These generally result in slightly heavier loaves, with the Cookworks and Russell Hobbs default recipes generally being denser than the others.

Once we made the recipes included with the machines, we tested out each breadmaker with our own tried and tested bread recipe which always makes a light, crusty but bouncy loaf, which was a much more even round. The more affordable options fared much better here.

Once we got a feel for each breadmaker’s baking style, we were able to tweak the recipe to better match.

If lightness is the name of the game, then the wetter the dough, the better. Given there’s no hand-kneading required when using one, breadmakers can knead a wetter mixture and make for the most pillowy loaf possible. This rang true of all our machines, including the cost-effective Cookworks, our budget choice.

There are also device-specific highlights. The two priciest breadmakers have compartments to drop ingredients in mid-knead or rise. The Morphy Richards breadmaker also makes an incredibly speedy loaf that actually tastes great - just 90 minutes if you use the Fast Bake mode.

When it comes to cakes, what’s interesting is that the only breadmaker that doesn’t suggest you mix the batter in the mixer makes the best cakes - that’s the Panasonic SD-ZX2522.

Instead, Panasonic suggests you combine the ingredients in a traditional mixer and just use the breadmaker for baking. We would generally avoid making cake with breadmakers if you have an oven. You can’t pre-heat them and they just aren’t as well suited to the nuances needed for a good sponge - but Panasonic’s SD-ZX2522 beat the rest on this front.

We also tested out the dough settings, making pasta from scratch and gave a few speciality breads a go - a fruity quickbread, a gluten-free option and a rye and linseed loaf, for example.

Best breadmakers review: The test results

The easiest tell-tale clue as to which breadmaker made which loaf was the size of the loaf produced. The Kenwood BM450 and Panasonic SD-ZX2522, the most expensive on test, produce the biggest loaves, while the Cookworks Breadmaker produces the smallest loaf. Russell Hobbs's 23620 Compact Fast Breadmaker and theMorphy Richards Homebake fall somewhere between on the size spectrum.

Families of four or five who eat a fair bit of bread would be better off with a bigger machine. If size is your primary concern, the Kenwood BM450 will give you the biggest loaf for your dough.

All the bread machines are big from a kitchen or cupboard space point of view. Unsurprisingly, the Cookworks machine is the smallest, though. While the Panasonic SD-ZX2522 would look most at home in an industrial kitchen, the Kenwood BM450 is our favourite for fitting in a family home from a design and shape point of view.

Onto the loaf tests, and first thing’s first - crust.

Each of our five machines has three crust settings - light, medium and dark, but which matched the colour to the setting the best?

The Kenwood BM450 came first, followed very closely by Panasonic’s SD-ZX2522. The Cookworks Breadmaker darkened the crust too much, and even on medium setting it was thicker on the bottom, making sawing through it a bit of a chore at times.

We were impressed on this front by the Morphy Richards Homebake too, which was about on par with the Kenwood BM450.

As for the meat of the bread, or the crumb (the white part), Panasonic took the lead. It baked a light, bouncy core that complemented the golden, caramel loaf perfectly. Once again, the top spots are dominated by the priciest breadmakers, with Kenwood coming in second. But, in a turn for the books, the Cookworks breadmaker came in third. Once we got through the considerable crust, the meat was a beautiful texture and flavourful.

Side note: when bread cools, heat escapes out and cool air actually passes into the loaf. This air picks up the caramel notes of the crust, and flavours the white inside the loaf. That could be why the darker Cookworks breadmaker actually created such a flavourful loaf, and it’s also why you should wait until your bread cools to slice it - so the maximum crust flavour can be carried into the crumb.

Back to our tests, and it’s time for toast. For this round, we sliced our loaves, toasted them, then loaded them up with peanut butter on one quarter, jam on another, marmite on the third and left the final quarter naked.

Our bigger breadmakers make loaves that are too big for most toasters - so they would be ideal for griddle toasters or grills. Alternatively, you can make a slightly smaller loaf in them, which is what we ended up doing. Or you can slice them horizontally once the loaf is cooled.

As for the results, Kenwood claimed victory here once again. Its loaf produced an evenly toasted slice, and because its crust was so good, it darkened proportionately to the crumb when it crisped up.

If sandwiches are the goal, the bigger breadmakers are definitely the ones for you. Their size means you can get more slices. It’s that simple. Smaller breadmakers' loaves cut into about six to eight slices, larger breadmakers up to 14 slices.

The best breadmaker overall reviewed:

Kenwood BM450, £199 RRP, available from £139

If we could pick any breadmaker to use ourselves and money was no object, we’d go for the Panasonic SD-ZX2522. It has more advanced features and we love geeking-out in the kitchen. That said, if we had to recommend one that balanced price with design, results with ease of use, and loaf size with versatility, the Kenwood BM450 would be it.

For starters, it looks gorgeous. The wraparound stainless steel body, glass top and its unique viewing window light which means you can see what’s going on with your loaf are all excellent highlights.

Then there’s the loaf size. It’s big, perfect for a family of bread eaters or anyone with a freezer that can take a few slices for toasting when needed, so you get home baked bread even when you haven’t been baking.

The Panasonic SD-ZX2522 is much quieter when kneading, and it also features a separate yeast dispenser. If neither of those are vital for you, however, then you can confidently pick up the Kenwood BM450.

The best breadmaker for value reviewed:

Cookworks Breadmaker, £39.99

If you want the most affordable breadmaker on-test, then the Cookworks is it. While your first few bakes from it might not be your finest, once you get comfortable with its nuances, you can get very tasty, light and crusty loaf at a bargain basement price.

Our top tip would be to go beyond the recipe book included with the breadmaker and find some of the excellent suggestions available online - that’s how we were able to get the best from the Cookworks breadmaker.

It’s also the most compact machine in our list, which will make it ideally suited to smaller kitchens. There are dough and jam settings, which do their jobs very well. We’d steer clear of making cake in it, but it's a steal for a quick, cheap and cheerful loaf.

Comparing the rest on test

Unlike most tests, there were no duds when it came to the breadmakers we reviewed. Each machine warranted its price - not least of all because of the stepped size increase that went hand-in-hand with a price increase.

The Russell Hobbs Compact Breadmaker produces a better crust than the Cookworks Breadmaker and, in turn, toast quality is superior. It also features two fast bake settings - 60 minutes and 80 minutes. While the Cookworks breadmaker makes a faster loaf, the 80 minute setting on the Russell Hobbs machine made a better-tasting loaf.

Additionally, the Russell Hobbs machine is the most affordable option with a gluten-free setting, and we were also impressed by how many celiac-friendly recipes were included for the program in the instructions. There are five in total: white bread, rosemary and garlic bread, dill and onion bread, cheese and chive bread and multi seeded bread.

Spend a bit more on the Morphy Richards Home Bake and you get more size and evenness. There aren’t as many gluten-free suggestions in the recipe book, but there is a yoghurt setting, which is absent from more affordable options.

We saw a couple of mixed reviews of the Home Bake online, but couldn’t recreate the bad bakes other users experienced. We’d be happy with its bread every day of the week - perhaps Morphy Richards tweaked the hardware for 2019?

The most expensive breadmaker on-test, the Panasonic SD-ZX2522, features the most accessories, including sourdough-specific tools (2x sourdough cups and a sourdough starter spoon), as well as two kneading blades - a traditional blade and a rye blade for coarser mixes.

It’s also the only bread machine to include a yeast dispenser as well as a nut, fruit or seed dispenser. Why would you need one? If yeast combines with salt or an acid, it can lose its rising power, so keeping them as separated as possible until the mixing and kneading starts is the best way to guarantee a good loaf.

The Panasonic SD-ZX2522 also includes the most comprehensive instructions of the lot - it’s the breadmaker to really sink your teeth into if you’re a baking fiend. Its recipe book is extensive, with delights including a linseed and quinoa loaf, oregano and olive Italian bread and a lemon and poppy seed spelt speciality bread to name a few.

Combined with its quiet operation, there’s no better breadmaker for a refined (or indeed celiac) baker, even if you pay a premium for it.

Things to look out for

First thing’s first - size. If you want a big loaf you have to pay bigger bucks, up to a point. The Kenwood BM450 and Panasonic SD-ZX2522 make similar loaf sizes, and they’re your only options if you’re feeding a family of four or more.

Next up, gluten-free choices. The Cookworks Breadmaker doesn’t have any options for celiacs. Fundamentally, with no gluten, bread will need a different baking preset, so this feature is a must if you think you’ll want to dabble with gluten-free baking. In turn, the Russell Hobbs, Morphy Richards, Kenwood and Panasonic options are the only choices here.

Design - are you going to stick your breadmaker in a cupboard and only pull it out when in need of a loaf? Or, will it take pride of place in your kitchen and be used daily?

The Kenwood BM450 was only breadmaker with a design we loved. That said, the Panasonic SD-ZX2522 has a premium industrial feel, so would look great in a utility room. Meanwhile, the more affordable three look just that - more affordable, and aren’t kitchen showpieces by any stretch of the imagination. But they are more compact so could be kinder to cupboard space.

How long do you need your bread mix to stand before your loaf is baked? Most breadmakers offer a 13-hour delay timer, but the Kenwood BM450 holds things up for as long as 15 hours, so a 7am loaf can be set at 4pm the day before.

Other choices

Here are some other popular options to consider from the world of breadmakers.

Best breadmaker

Kit out your kitchen with the best appliances for cooking, dining and everything in-between, and it's easy to add a touch of Michelin-star style to your home with the best pod coffee machine. Pod, or capsule, coffee machines are particularly clever at creating professional-quality drinks that look like they could have been made by a top barista.

Investing in one of the latest pod coffee machines will not only save you time and money that may have been spent at the local Costa, it opens up a world of flavour and control, right on your doorstep. Serve Nespresso’s limited-edition ‘Long Black Over Ice’ coffee with a biscotti post-dinner at a party, for example, and we guarantee guests will be left suitably impressed.

Unlike filter or bean-to-cup coffee machines, pod coffee machines limit you to a certain brand of coffee. But on the plus side the coffee pod machine is the less messy option. There’ll be no bean grinds to clear out or ground coffee spills over your worktop, but just a simple pod that can be disposed of easily and/or recycled.

To make deciding which model to buy simple, we’ve done the testing and researched the best coffee pod machines. Over the last month, we’ve put the latest designs through their paces and drank a shed load of punchy espressos come rain and iced lattes come shine. We’ve managed to whittle down a list of the best coffee pod machines that create pretty decent coffees, and the least amount of hassle in the process.

The design that came out as our best overall choice was Nespresso Creatista Plus by Sage. We love its professional stylish, digital control panel and temperature precision, which helps create the ideal milk for latte art.

The machine we’ve crown best value for money is the Nescafé Dolce Gusto by De'Longhi Eclipse Touch, which costs £169.99. We think its impressive range of hot and cold drinks and its eye-catching design and functionality are definitely worth highlighting.

• The best coffee machines revealed
• The best Nespresso machines - find the right one for you

• best buys
• Our expert
• the shortlist
• test selection
• How we tested
• test results
• Best overall
• best value
• The rest compared
• One to avoid

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At £143.99 we’ve marked the Nescafé Dolce Gusto by De'Longhi Eclipse Touch as our best value buy. It ticks a number of boxes providing a powerful 15-bar pump pressure for fast and effective results and offering an impressive range of drinks such as Starbucks-branded cappuccino to Nesquik hot chocolate

Compact and stylish on the kitchen worktop, the 19-bar pressure pump Nespresso Creatista Plus by Sage is simple to use and keep clean. As well as instant touch buttons on its digital display for coffee favourites such as flat white and espresso, its eight milk texture froth settings and 11 milk temperature settings create milk that is ideal for latte art. It’s not the cheapest design on the market, but if you’re serious about joining the Nespresso ‘club’, it’s not a bad place to start.

The expert's view

15

Products considered

20

Hours of testing

1

Experts consulted

2

Best buys

Author Bio

Emily Peck

Emily Peck is a consumer journalist with over 20 years’ experience reviewing everything from bee hives to biscuits. She has written for a range of publications including Wired UK and Ideal Home.

• 15 PRODUCTS CONSIDERED
• 20 HOURS OF TESTING
• 1 EXPERT CONSULTED
• 2 BEST BUYS

Best coffee pod machine

Best pod coffee machines: how we selected

With so many pod coffee machines to choose from, it’s hard to know which coffee ‘club’ to join. Google ‘coffee pod machines’ and there’s an ample number to sift through.

Perhaps - like us - when you think of coffee pod machines Nespresso and its cute and compact capsules spring to mind. And for good reason - the company are like the Apple of the coffee industry, presenting their coffee pods like sweets in user-friendly candy colours that easily indicate the coffee flavour and strength.

Nespresso dominates the coffee pod market. You’ll find a number of well-known appliance brands online - such as Delonghi, Krups and Magimix - that do their best to create a stylish and ergonomic machines to get the best from Nespresso pods.

Each of these designs has its own USP. Some have ergonomically designed milk frothers, others concentrate on providing the perfect eye-opening espresso.

Dig a little deeper, however, and you will find healthy competition online with companies such as Nescafe Dolce Gusto, Lavazza and Tassimo. These sell a good range of ergonomic and versatile coffee pod machines too.

Some of the designs are rather adventurous – the circular Nescafé Dolce Gusto by De'Longhi Eclipse Touch looks like a piece of modern sculpture, for example, while the curvaceous body of Lavazza A Modo Mia Desea stands out from standard boxy coffee machine designs.

When choosing a pod machine to buy it’s worth remembering you’ll be tied into a certain pod brand. So, it’s a good idea to go online and look through the ‘libraries’ of coffee capsules available and think about what you expect from your coffee.

We discovered each brand has its unique range of flavours in tall and short drinks. Some companies have teamed up with well-known coffee houses such as Starbucks and Costa to provide coffee-shop inspired drinks.

Perhaps for you, however, nothing beats the signature scent of illy coffee, or maybe you prefer Lavazza-style? Whatever your preference, however, having some idea of which brand of coffee you enjoy and what type – be it macchiato, flat white, espresso or latte - is a good place to start when you make your choice.

Consider the price of the pods too. Once you buy into a certain brand, there’ll be ongoing costs for the capsules – a pack of 50 original Nespresso Coffee capsules currently costs £23.85 on Amazon, for example.

To ensure a fair test, we’ve picked out 10 of the most popular coffee pod machines online, and paid particular attention to the most popular models on Amazon.co.uk. We chose them for their promise of a delicious drink, quick and easy operation and cleaning-friendly parts. We’ve chosen a range of Nespresso machines as well as those from the leading competitors too.

We were looking to represent a number of prices, designs, functions and variety in the models we have chosen and we were pleasantly surprised by the great mix available. Read on to discover what attributes make for a decent brew.

Best pod coffee machines: how we tested

Buying a coffee machine that makes amazing tasting coffee may be the ultimate aim, but choosing a model that looks good, works with ease and doesn’t take up too much room on your worktop is a bonus.

To sort the wheat from the chaff, we made each coffee machine in our test work hard to impress us over the course of a month, scoring each design on a range of criteria we’ve outlined below.

First up, we assessed each model on its coffee settings and looked to see how many types of drinks the machine could make – from those that simply offered short espressos and tall Americanos, to those with a number of settings for more adventurous drinks such as a flat white.

We wanted to know how vast each range was, or how limiting. We also wanted to know how many types of coffee and flavours we could access in the machine’s capsule range. Dolce Gusto has its own Starbucks flavours for example, while Tassimo champions Costa coffee. We also considered the ongoing cost of the coffee pods and how many came with the machine on purchase.

Next up, we tasted espresso, a lot of it. We wanted to know how well each design faired at making a rich, full-bodied espresso, with that oh-so-desirable thick and dense crema on top. Taste may be subjective, but it’s easy to tell the difference between a good and bad hit of caffeine.

We also thought about the ergonomics and design of each model. We looked at how easy on the eye each machine was, considered how stylish the material and how well it is made and feels to touch.

We asked ourselves how it looked on the worktop – would we want to show it off? Is it clunky and awkward looking, or slim and sleek? Then we explored how well each model was to set up, insert a pod and navigate the controls.

We scored each model on how clever the design, how sharp the navigation and whether it featured any fiddly, and quite frankly annoying, parts that would test our patience - who has time for lengthy instruction manuals anyway? We also took note of the water tank capacity and, where relevant, how big the milk compartments are on each model as this indicates how many coffees you can create in a single fill.

We also monitored speed and overall performance, to find out how fast they perform from the moment a coffee pod is inserted to the moment we were poised to take a sip of espresso. We noted how quickly the water heated up to ensure the coffee was ready to make.

We also thought about how noisy the machine was its size – whether it could be easily housed on a compact worktop or simply stored. We looked for added extras such as jugs, milk frothing wands and options to recycle the pods too. And finally, we thought about how easy each design was to clean.

Best pod coffee machines: test results

Over the last month we whipped up frothy cappuccinos at dawn and concocted smooth espresso martinis at dusk, all in the name of research, and we were pleasantly surprised with the results. What’s reassuring is that if you’re looking to buy a coffee pod machine, you can look outside the Nespresso bubble, as there are quite a few serious contenders for the tastiest coffee drink.

The most versatile machines in our test were those that came with a range of pre-set coffee buttons and included a milk frothing option. Lavazza’s A Modo Mio Desea for example, comes with a One Touch interface that has options for four coffee doses and five milk recipes.

Slip the glass milk mug under the spout and you can prepare coffee and froth milk in one. Very clever.

The Nespresso Lattissima Touch by Delonghi is also a flexible design with six beverage buttons for ristrettos, cappuccinos and more. Its milk-frothing compartment is neatly housed within the design, just to the right of the coffee spout so you don’t have to remove your mug to get the milk ready.

The majority of machines in our test were fast to heat up and had produced a coffee within the one-minute mark, but the Nespresso Creatista Plus Coffee Machine by Sage has a particularly impressive three-second heat up time. The Nespresso VertuoPlus by Magimix had one of the largest water tanks in our test, measuring 1.7 litres, which means less water refills and it can also take up to 10 large capsules before needing to be emptied.

In terms of creamy, dense espressos, we particularly enjoy the smooth flavours of the Lavazza and Illy coffee pods, which both produced delicious, creamy espressos. Lavazza sells a good range of coffees online with varying strengths and you can pick up a box of 16 capsules for a reasonable £4.40.

In contrast, Illy’s IperEspresso capsules will set you back £47.94 for a can of 21 capsules, and Nespresso averages around £19.50 for a pack of assorted original pods. The Nespresso VertuoPlus by Magimix on the other hand has its own unique Vertuo line of pods, which created the thickest and most generous espresso cremas in our test - 50 Vertuo capsules will cost you around £27 online.

Meanwhile, the Dualit Cafe Cin benefits from being able to take Nespresso and Dualit-branded capsules, and even has its own line of tea capsules including Earl grey and green tea. You can pick up a box of 60 dark roast Dualit capsules online for around £13.80.

While the models mentioned above are ideal for espresso coffees, we think the machines that take Dolce Gusto and Tassimo pods are best suited to longer drinks such as tall Americanos and milky lattes.

Considerably cheaper than the Illy and Nespresso pods, a Dolce Gusto Starbucks Americano house blend pack of 12 pods costs £3.99, while Tassimo’s Costa Americano pods cost £4.99 for a pack of 16.

Not that we’re superficial or anything, but looks do matter and the design we’d most like like to show off on the worktop was the Nespresso Creatista Plus coffee machine.

This design benefits from Sage’s signature sturdy, steel styling and its built-in digital display and dial made navigation very easy too.

We also admire the curvaceous ergonomic design of the Lavazza A Modo Mio Desea - its slim build measured a compact H28 high x W145.5 x D28cm and its touch interface with ‘acoustic feedback’ that alerts you when your coffees ready was a bonus. In terms of aesthetics these two designs were closely followed by Illy’s iconic red Francis Francis X7.1 IperEspresso and the unique form of the Nescafé Dolce Gustoby De'Longhi Eclipse Touch.

Best pod coffee machine: overall

Nespresso Creatista Plus coffee machine by Sage, £309, johnlewis.com

Nespresso has an impressive range of coffee makers compatible with its pods, but it’s one of the latest models – the Nespresso Creatista Plus Coffee Machine by Sage – that impressed us the most.

This is the machine you’d expect to see George Clooney standing alongside (although sadly he wasn’t) and from the moment you turn it on, the machine oozes authority. Within minutes it had prompted us to dip a water hardness testing strip into the tap water to set it at the ideal range, for example.

The Creatista comes with a free set of Nespresso pods to get you started, but there’s a vast range of flavours that you can experiment with depending on your taste. Choose from the ‘round and balanced’ Livanto espresso for example, or the ‘intense and spicy’ India coffee. Or, choose from an ample selection of decaffeinated options such as the sweet and light Volluto and the ‘powerful and contrasting’ Ristretto.

What’s great about the Creatista is its unique digital display and rotating dial that is easy to follow and guides you through the options – from a 25ml ristretto, to a 40ml espresso and 110ml lungo coffee. The design is tall enough to house a number of cup sizes, and like most Nespresso designs comes with a pop-out cup support and removable drip tray.

What this machine prides itself on however is its ability to froth milk to eight different textures and with 11 milk temperature settings you can tailor the milk to just how you like it – whether you prefer a silky smooth latte or a creamy cappuccino. Being able to froth milk in this way means it’s a good choice if you’re keen to try your hand at latte art. The Nespresso website currently has a tutorial on how to create the perfect ‘Rosetta’ latte design, for example.

The Nespresso Creatista has a 19-bar pressure system, which makes it fast and powerful. Its dial lets you flick through the eight drink options easily providing an instant option for a flat white, café latte, cappuccino, latte macchiatao, ristretto, espresso, lungo or milk frothing. It also comes with a stylish stainless steel barista-style milk jug to enhance its attractive frame.

It’s worth noting Nespresso pods can be recycled in their own recycling bag and handed into your local store that supports CollectPlus – check online for details.

Best pod coffee machine for value:

Nescafé Dolce Gusto by De'Longhi Eclipse Touch, £169.99, amazon.co.uk

The Nescafé Dolce Gusto by De'Longhi Eclipse Touch doesn’t look like your average coffee machine, so we had our reservations about how well a model with such a novelty design would work.

We were pleasantly surprised by how much we enjoyed using the De'Longhi Eclipse Touch however, and by how easy it was to create such a varied range of drinks with one machine. While it’s not a machine you’ll want to buy if you’re after that dense crema an Illy or Nespresso model could provide, it does offers a decent variety of drinks which makes it a versatile option.

It took us a while to work out how to open the enclosed circle design, find out where to place the mug and pod and how to fill the water reservoir, but once we’d mastered the process we couldn’t stop experimenting with different flavours from the Nescafe portfolio of pods.

Starbucks's caramel macchiato was a particular favourite and the 15-bar pump pressure manages to pack quite a punch and provide a decent amount of froth to the drink. The Eclipse Touch comes with a pack of six pods in the box. You’re not limited to coffee either.

Go online and browse the Dolce Gusto range and you’ll find options for hot chocolate, Marrakesh style tea and Citrus Honey black tea.

The touch technology control pad is situated at the top of the machine and lights up when the machine is turned on. Unlike the Nescafe Dolce Gusto Oblo by Krups we tried in our test, there is no manual switch to flick and the Eclipse Touch will stop when the drink has been made.

The pods are easy to extract when you’ve finished your drink, although the spout can drip a little during clean up. On the plus side, the pods can be recycled at a local store – you’ll find details on line, which involves printing a label and dropping them off at a local store that is involved in the scheme.

Pod coffee machines: the rest compared

We’ve pinpointed our favourite overall and best value models in this test of the best coffee pod machine for 2019, but the other eight machines we’ve mentioned in our shortlist are also well worth a try.

The most ergonomic machine that wasted the least amount of milk in operation was the Lavazza A Modo Mio Desea. While most machines that froth milk tend to have the steam wand positioned to the side of the design, the Desea includes a built-in whisk that froths milk in the slide-in glass jug.

In order to create a milky coffee you simply pour in your milk, slide the glass jar into position and hit the appropriate button. Slow and smooth on extraction, it was also one of the quietest models in our test.One of the most compact designs in our test was the Francis Francis E&C BT Bluetooth Illy Y5. Measuring just 14.5 x 24 x 28cm, its sleek build features two settings for either espresso or filter-style long coffees.

Its smart Bluetooth function allows you to connect to your device via an app and register for Amazon Dash Replenishment to automatically reorder capsules when running low.

In comparison, the Illy Francis Francis X7.1 is the most iconic design in our test. Inspired by Italian design of 1960s, we think its powerful design - which lights up and gets quite loud when gearing up - is best suited to large open-plan kitchens.

If one shot of espresso just doesn’t cut it first thing, try the Nespresso VertuoPlus by Magimix. Its ‘centrifusion and barcode technology’ adjusts the brewing parameters to each coffee blend and capsule size.

It makes four different sized espressos for 414m full-brew Alto, a 230ml coffee, a 150ml Gran Lungo and a 40ml espresso. Remember that this machine doesn’t take original Nespresso pods and you’ll need to invest in the unique Vertuo line of capsules that comes in a variety of coffee aromas and strengths.

If you’re keen on smooth frothy coffees the Nespresso Lattissima Touch by Delonghi is ideal. It features six buttons for ristretto, cappuccino, latte, espresso, long and hot milk and has a fast heat up time of 25 seconds.

What’s more, its programming mode remembers how much coffee or milk you like in your drink ready for the next time you use it.

For those looking to pay sub £150, the Bosch Tassimo My Way TAS6002GB is a convenient option. It costs 139.99 (or a red hot £69.99 at the time of writing) and gives you access to a host of well-known brands using Tassimo T Discs.

Choose from Kenco Americana Grande, Costa Caramel Latte, Baileys Latte Macchiato and more. While it took a little longer to heat up that some of the Nespresso machines in our test, and and wasn’t as quiet in the process, the smooth and flavoursome drinks it produced were worth the wait. It also comes with a coupon inside the box for £20 off Tassimo coffee on your next purchase.

If you have kids you might want to try the Nescafe Dolce Gusto Oblo by Krups, which costs a reasonable £34.99. While you can use it for caffeinated drinks from the Dolce Gusto offering, kids will love making hot or cold Nesquik chocolate drinks.

In our test, we enlisted the help of 5-year-old Bethany who enjoyed navigating its user-friendly design and enjoyed it so much she even asked for seconds. A grown up will need to assist closely, however, as you’ll need to manually stop the drink dispensing.

If you like you like your drink piping hot, consider the Dualit Café Cin, which features a "temperature boost". The machine will take Nespresso capsules as well as its own-branded, compostable, Dualit capsules, which includes tea options too. It also includes a milk frother that slides in neatly to the right of the main spout.

One to avoid?

Francis Francis E&C BT Bluetooth Illy Y5, £175, amazon.co.uk

The Francis Francis E&C BT Bluetooth Illy Y5 is one of the most intuitive designs we have featured in our test - it pairs with the My Illy Espresso app so you can monitor the machine via your smartphone and automatically order replacement pods when stocks are running low, for example.

What lets it down however, is how noisy it is when producing coffee, so if you’re keen on buying a design that should be seen and not heard, this model is probably not for you.

During the extraction process, the volume definitely got a little shrill. On the plus side, however - and it is a big plus - it arguably produced the best tasting espresso we tried in our test.

Finding the best mattress for you may not be the most exciting purchase. In fact, we're pretty sure that when you hand over your cash or your bank details for your next one you'll be wondering whether it's really worth it. Of course, the night time then rolls around and you realise you'd have paid double for the soft, cosy, supportive feel of a brand new sleep experience.

UPDATE: We have added a handy guide to the bottom of this list that focuses on the best ways to keep cool while sleeping in the summer heat. Buying the best mattress for you is one thing but making sure you are comfortable in bed heat-wise is another. Hopefully our expert tips will help.

Although that may sound dreamy, finding the best mattress for you does mean weighing up a lot of different choices. For example, do you need to opt for pocket strung? Foam? Hybrid? There are a lot of choices out there – as well as a lot of bold marketing claims.

Whatever your mattress choice, an upgrade is bound to result in a better night’s sleep, plus, if you invest in one with good support, you'll have fewer aches and pains in the morning. Given the rise of box-fresh designs delivered straight to your door, there’s also no excuse not to upgrade because it's a hassle - now it really doesn't have to be.

That said, the market is crowded. You’ll find everything from those made of natural materials (ideal for regulating your temperature as you slumber) to memory foam marvels. Often touted as a recent innovation, memory foam was actually developed in 1966 for NASA, before making its way into mattresses in the 1980s.

Memory foam is supremely squishy and comfy, but as it retains heat well, it may not suit sleepers who like to stay cool, as well as those who may needed a firmer mattress to keep their back ache-free. With that in mind, head to our list below and choose a new bedfellow. Listed prices are for standard doubles.

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• Now you have the best mattress, you will also beed to find the best pillow. Sleeping soundly,? Good. Wake up with the best coffee machines

Best mattress

Four ways to keep cool while sleeping

Given how hot it is right now, we all need tips on how to stay cool while sleeping. Lucky, then, that Robert Lancaster Gaye, co-director of Tielle Love Luxury, has some tips:

1. Use cotton sheets

Gaye notes: "Cotton may have a natural beauty and luxe factor 5* hotels love but it’s also one of the most breathable fabrics, cleverly wicking moisture away from the skin... the man-made fibres of polyester won’t repel or absorb moisture, making you more likely too sweat."

2. Swap your duvet

"The higher the tog rating, the warmer the duvet," explains Gaye. "For hot summer nights, a good quality 4.5 tog down or luxury microfibre quilt is ideal." Also it's worth getting rid of blankets on the bed.

3. Keep it natural

Natural filled duvets and pillows make for the best night’s sleep because they breathe more easily. Try Tielle Love Luxury’s new Eco Pillow, a hotel quality pillow crafted from recycled plastic bottles and blended with Tencel

, a botanical fibre. They are non-allergenic, machine washable and breathable, thanks to the natural cellulose fibres inside, which keeps you cool and dry whilst you sleep.

4. Avoid late night drinking and eating

"Be carefully with alcohol, caffeine and late night meals," says Gaye, as "they can all take time to digest, disrupting your body’s natural sleep patterns." If you want something before bed, the calming effects of a cup of camomile tea before bed may help initiate sleep.

How To Buy A Mattress: 5 expert tips

1. finding the right mattress for your needs is really important?

Everybody’s body is different and therefore mattress requirements differ from person to person. Finding the right mattress can mean the difference between helping reduce existing problems with the right level of support and making those aches and pains worse by not offering the right level of firmness.

“Mattresses play a massive role in the quality of our sleep given the fact that we spend 7.5 hours a day, 229 hours per month, 1/3 of our lives asleep. Putting it simply: sleep is a prerequisite for life!” notes Joe Molloy, Founding Director of Tielle Love Luxury. “Our general aim is to achieve a minimum of two hours a night in the deepest of our sleep patterns to allow our bodies to recuperate from the day.”

2. Understand what makes a good mattress

“It should provide the correct amount of tension to allow the body to rest,” notes Molloy. According to the founder, the perfect mattress should provide “movement and support in equal measure, making sure shoulders and hips are able to sink into the mattress for maximum all-over support.”

“The unique thing about mattresses is that it isn’t a case of one size fits all. Depending on your body type, the way that you move during your sleep and the amount of support you require, the ideal mattress can vary massively from one person to the next. Unfortunately, there really are no shortcuts for picking the right mattress.” In other words, it’s a case of testing out mattresses relentlessly until you get to know what you’re looking for and what’s comfortable for you.

3. These are the factors you should consider when buying a mattress?

“When choosing a mattress that it is best for us, height, weight and shape should all be factored into making the correct choice,” notes Molloy. “Irrespective of composition, the mattress must comfortably support the entire body and keep the spine as straight as possible. Your hips and shoulders should sink into the mattress whilst waist and lower back are equally supported. Take time to ensure movement during sleep is free and easy.

“Broadly speaking there are three main types of mattress that are currently purchased: continuous coil, pocket sprung and memory foam. All offer support but do so in slightly different ways. The traditional continuous coil type uses a series of coil springs and is the oldest and most traditional form of sprung mattress. The generally more expensive method of pocket sprung mattress uses a large number of independent pocket springs allowing different levels of support in the same bed frame and is particularly good if the weight varies widely between sleeping partners.

“The most recent development of ‘memory foam’ mattresses mould and shape themselves to an individual’s body to offer the necessary support . The downside in my personal view is that they do tend to create more heat and be less breathable and arguably limit freedom of movement. Like everything in life, there are few pros and a few cons to each option,” Molloy notes.

4. Know the difference between a rolled box mattress and shop brought spring mattresses

“The most recent development in mattresses for sale are in the offer of a rolled mattress in a box which expands on opening,” notes Molloy. Examples of these are offerings like the Casper Hybrid and Casper Essential mattresses that come delivered in a compact box and offer extended returns policies after a trial period.

“This is certainly innovative and of course super convenient from a transport point of view, but it does by its very nature severely limit the choice of filling that construction of the mattress allows.”

5. Know your spending limits

In simple terms? According to Molloy, “the short answer is: as much or as little as it takes to get the correct level of support needed.”

“If you wanted a good each way bet, why not choose a slightly firmer mattress in the full knowledge that if you want to soften it a bit at any stage down the line, that extra softness and unashamed luxury can be added after with the purchase of a luxury mattress topper. Go on have your cake and eat it too!”

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Arm yourself with the best coffee machine and you can give top baristas a run for their money without leaving home – saving you time and money. But with such a variety of models on offer, be it bean-to-cup, ground coffee or capsule designs, deciding which one to invest in can be daunting.

Luckily we’ve done the legwork for you by testing the finest machines available – and nearly drowning in coffee in the process.

We’ve discovered what makes for a great brew, highlighted our favourites and pinpointed precisely what you need to know to pick the perfect model to grace your worktop.

Below you can read what we liked and disliked with all the coffee machines we tested but, for clarity, the best coffee machine for value we tested was the Magimix Nespresso CitiZ. The best coffee machine overall was the Dualit Bean to Go.

• These are the best Nespresso machines
• Tested, the best pod coffee machines
• Look no further: this is the best coffee to go in your cup

Best coffee machines: value and overall

The Magimix Nespresso CitiZ is the best value coffee machine we tested. It is affordable but has a Aeroccino3 milk frother on its side and 19-bar pressure for rich espresso crema. At the time of writing, a quick internet search could find it for just £189.99, which is a total bargain for such a consistently high-performing capsule design.

The Dualit Bean to Go is our best overall coffee machine. This is due to its streamlined design, great tasting espressos and simple to navigate control panel. We found the double shot button – that produces extra strength black coffee – particularly useful on deadline day.

• Fancy another sort of brew? This is the best kettle around

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Best Coffee Machines: the ShortList

The Expert's View

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EXPERTS CONSULTED

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SHORTLIST BEST BUYS

In our test, the overall winner is the Dualit Bean to Go coffee machine due to its compact body, intuitive design and fresh-tasting coffee.

The best value coffee machine is the Magimix Nespresso CitiZ, chosen for its stylish design, easy to use controls and variety of flavours available. We also gave eight others a spin. Read on to find out which one is best for you.

Author Bio

Emily Peck

Emily Peck is a consumer journalist with over 20 years’ experience reviewing everything from bee hives to biscuits. She has written for a range of publications including Wired UK and Ideal Home.

Best coffee machines: How we selected

Two billion cups of coffee are consumed each day worldwide. It’s no surprise the choice of coffee machines online is vast – from thousand pound all-singing, all-dancing models to coffee makers that are simple but satisfying.

Perhaps you’re the type of person who enjoys the frothy texture and sweetness of a skinny vanilla latte? Or maybe you just want an intense kick of espresso with an impressively smooth crema? Either way, we’ve included a model in our test to cover all bases, catering for a range of tastes, lifestyles and budgets.

Some offer simple filter coffee. Others have pre-set features for a host of styles. We picked from popular models on Amazon and combined them with newly launched machines from respected brands.

First up are the bean-to-cup designs. These are the largest and heaviest machines and take up the most worktop space. They do, however, produce the freshest tasting coffee as they grind whole beans within the appliance. We have picked a varied range of price points in our test from well-known and respected brands including Krups, Jura and Dualit. Although not all do, you will find some of these bean-to-cup machines can take ground coffee too.

We also included a selection of capsule machines. Although they are the easiest to use – you’ll have no ground coffee to contend with or bean waste to clean out – these machines tie you to a certain brand of coffee, such as Nespresso. Some of the capsules are recyclable, but they still generate considerably more waste than traditional designs.

If you’re buying into a capsule model, it’s worth bearing in mind that you’ll need to consider the price of the pods as well as what you pay for the machine.

We also included some ground coffee machines. These make traditional black, espresso coffee – tall and short. We chose designs with and without milk frothing capabilities. Ground coffee machines are not as expensive as bean-to-cup or capsule models, and they don’t tie you into a certain type of coffee. Ground coffee machines also make it easy to refill your coffee cup at your leisure.

Best coffee machines: How we tested

To get an idea of how well the coffee machines performed over the course of a month, we set about grinding beans and attempting to produce latte art like a true barista.

Although we had a varied selection of different machine styles – including bean-to-cup, filter coffee and pod machines – we were keen to discover how each model fared in terms of ease of use, speed and performance. So, for each model, we timed how long it took to set up and make a drink – from getting it out of the box to producing the first cup of coffee.

To measure how much variety was on offer, we noted how many types of coffee each machine can produce, including extras such as hot chocolate and tea.

You’ll be living with the machine on show, day in, day out, so looks do matter. Therefore we rated each design on style as well as substance. That said, no amount of sophisticated bodywork can make up for disappointing functionality and horrible coffee.

For those machines in our test that have specific espresso settings, we timed how long it took to produce a shot of coffee. We then used a fork to assess the thickness of the espresso crema. Likewise, for machines with milk frothing capabilities, we timed how long it took to produce a decent amount of froth for a cappuccino and assessed the thickness.

Over the course of a month, we assessed how easy they were to fill and keep clean, and how much mess they made. For any parts that were dishwasher friendly, we marked the coffee machine up.

In terms of ergonomics, we made a note of how comfortable each machine was to use and also judged each model’s material and finish. In terms of safety, we also wanted to know how hot the reservoirs, compartments and exteriors became.

We also noted how large the water reservoirs are in each design, which ultimately leads to how much coffee it can produce at any one time – the larger the capacity, the less you’ll have to faff around refilling the machine. We were also keen to know what added extras, such as water filters, they include, and whether we think they are value for money.

Finally, we drank a crazy amount of coffee and marked each machine up or down on their ultimate aim – to make a decent cup of Jamaican Blue Mountain.

Best coffee machine reviews: The test results

The good news is there’s a wide variety of machines to suit a range of tastes and budgets. In our test we have featured those that are compact, fast and convenient for a great tasting Americano first thing in the morning.

There are machines that require a little more thought and, as well as offering a wide range of coffee styles and intensities, they let you personalise the settings to suit your taste.

The ground coffee machine we found the easiest to set up was Russell Hobbs’s Luna Copper Accents Coffee Maker. Meanwhile, Dualit’s bean-to-cup design was the easiest to navigate – we were impressed it took just a few minutes to make an espresso straight from the box. Smeg’s Drip Filter was also very simple to set up, although trying to fill the built-in water reservoir was fiddly.

The majority of bean-to-cup machines produced espressos in a couple of minutes and the capsule designs were also surprisingly quick. When using the manual modes on Breville’s One-Touch Coffee House, however, you’ll need to stay close to ensure you switch off the coffee otherwise it will overflow.

When it comes to the best-tasting espresso, we discovered the secret lies in the machines that freshly grind their own beans. In our test we were particularly impressed with the density of cremas in the Jura S8, Dualit and Krups models. The Dualit Bean-to-Go’s double-shot button, which grinds and extracts twice for a stronger, ‘true’ double shot, is particularly satisfying. That said, the variety of pod flavours on offer from Nespresso had our taste buds in a frenzy – we couldn’t get enough of the sweet biscuit notes of Volluto and the velvety aromas of Vanilio.

In terms of how many drinks you can create, the bean-to-cup models offer the most variety. The Jura S8, for example, has up to 15 drinks at the touch of a button and lets you programme the machine to save your favourite coffees to the exact intensity you like.

Meanwhile, the Krups New Barista Age offers up to 17 drinks. Capsule machines also give you flexibility to choose from a number of drinks and coffee strengths – Nescafé Dolce Gusto pods for the Infinissima by Delonghi, for example, come in chai tea latte, flat white, mocha, Marrakesh-style tea pods and more.

As for frothing milk, on some models you need to ensure the steam wand is pointing the right way to avoid spillages. Breville’s One-Touch Coffee House, for example, caught us out, which resulted in a leaky mess on the worksurface.

On the plus side, we particularly like the way the Krups model features a retracting steam wand – you simply fill your cup with the desired amount of milk and it will automatically appear while your coffee is being made to produce a creamy, café-style froth. The steam nozzle rinses itself after each use, too.

Looking for extras? Any of the bean-to-go machines came with PH strips for testing the water hardness in your area, as well as a water filter. Although it is the most expensive machine in our test, we particularly appreciated the starter pack in the Krups model that features a handy jug, measuring spoon and coffee cups – it’s all in the detail, after all.

Best coffee machine for value reviewed:

Magimix Nespresso CitiZ review, £209.99

With few control buttons on the main body, the Magimix Nespresso CitiZ is very easy to set up and use – simply take it out of the box, plug it in, fill the back 1ltr reservoir with water, the control button lights come on and you’re good to go.

Nespresso is to coffee machines what Apple is to smartphones – you won’t need the instructions, but you’ll have to buy into their products to enjoy the best results. We tried a bunch of third-party-made pods, but none of them produced as good a coffee as the Nespresso originals.

Even with the Aeroccino3 milk frother built into the side of the machine, its black, understated body takes up minimal space on the worktop. It features a 19-bar pressure system, which means it draws the full richness and aroma from each pod, and while doing so is surprisingly quiet – we were particularly surprised with how meek the milk frother sounded.

There are two buttons on either side of the machine that indicate which size espresso you’d like, and once you insert the pod and start creating your drink – either tall or short coffee – you can simultaneously froth the milk by simply pressing a button. This can take anything up to two minutes depending on how warm and frothy you’d like the milk.

You will need to keep an eye on how much milk you pour into the frother, however. It took us a while to discover just how much was needed to avoid milk spilling out at the top – things did get a little heated when we found milk leaking out from under the lid on our first attempt. However, this isn’t a problem once you’ve wised up to exactly how much milk you need.

Handy extras include an integrated power-saving mode that ensures the machine turns off after nine or up to 30 minutes, which is handy if you’re in a rush in the morning.

On the downside, you’ll be tied into using Nespresso pods and you’re limited somewhat to shorter drinks rather than long Americano-style cuppas. But if you’re a fan of the delicious flavours on offer, including decaffeinated drinks, you won’t feel limited.

Best coffee machine overall reviewed:

Dualit Bean to Go review, £499

On first view, the Dualit Bean to Go looks ultra stylish and has a compact and sturdy body that won’t feel too bulky on the worktop, even in the smallest of kitchens. All parts are contained within the machine with no fiddly accessories protruding out. Clean lines and slick surfaces all round.

In our test we reviewed a number of bean-to-cup machines, but at £499 this was significantly cheaper than the Jura and Krups models – both over the thousand pound mark – and we were keen to see how it compared.

The Dualit Bean to Go comes with five adjustable grind settings so you can make your coffee as strong as you like. The one-touch buttons let you create espressos, tall coffees and double-shot drinks with ease – ideal for when you need an extra pick me up.

It didn’t take us long to get to grips with the machine. Opening the box, setting up and making a coffee took under three minutes. This is probably due to its built-in thermobloc heating system, which ensures the coffee machine is ready in 40 seconds. The Speed mode also grinds and extracts quicker if you’re pressed for time.

Unlike some bean-to-cup models that have longer hoses for frothing milk, such as the Melitta Solo & Perfect Milk, the steaming wand on the Dualit Bean to Go is short and neatly housed next to the adjustable nozzle. It took us just under a minute to produce a decent amount of froth for a tall latte.

At 1.2 litres, its water tank isn’t the largest – the Jura S8 can hold 1.9 litres, for example – but the Bean to Go does make a few coffees before it needs a refill.

And while this machine doesn’t come with an accompanying app that provides coffee inspiration like the Jura and Mellita, it does what it promises and produces great tasting coffee. The crema on our espresso was thick and dense, which at the end of the day, is all you really want from a coffee.

Comparing the rest on test

While we thought Magimix Nespresso and Dualit Bean to Go were worthy of a special mention, all these machines have plenty going for them.

If you want the flexibility ground coffee offers and like milky drinks, try the 19-bar pressure Breville One-Touch Coffee House. It has a large 1.4-litre water tank, as well as a 0.6-litre milk tank with steam wand, which is ideal for making lattes, cappuccinos and hot chocolates.

As well as a few pre-programmed buttons for cappuccino, espresso and lattes, it also has custom modes so you can tailor the drink to find the strength you like. The only downside is that if you fill the milk tank and don’t use it all in one go, you may end up with sour, wasted milk.

Those who want to try capsule coffee should consider the Infinissima by Delonghi. The design is inspired by the infinity shape. It will create a talking point in your kitchen.

While it has a large library of pods on offer – including flat whites and mochas, and can make up a cold drink such as the cappuccino ice – it doesn’t however come with a fresh milk option or a manual steam wand. In some cases you’ll have to use two pods to make a drink – for a cappuccino you’ll need a white capsule, made up of milk powder which tastes rather sweet, and a black capsule that includes roast and ground coffee.

We got caught out leaving this machine unattended a couple of times and the water flow didn’t naturally come to an end, so we don’t recommend wandering off while it’s in use.

For a classic design that will complement your kitchen, take a look at the retro Smeg Drip Filter Coffee Machine. It comes with a stylish glass carafe with handle and lid, so you can enjoy American diner-style bottomless refills – up to ten cups at a time to be precise.

The Jura S8 bean-to-cup design, which takes ground coffee and beans, is equally stylish. It does in fact look so attractive on the worktop that anyone inviting a date back to theirs for ‘a cup of coffee’ will find themselves actually wanting to show it off. With 15 speciality coffee settings, the option to personalise drinks and control the machine via a dedicated app on your smartphone, it’s a great investment buy if you’re serious about your coffee and have the space.

The Russell Hobbs Luna Copper Accents coffee maker’s stainless steel and copper body is also a head turner, and comes in red and grey finishes. It has ‘advanced showerhead technology’, which sprays water through ground coffee evenly to make it taste better, while you can use the 1-4 button to increase the coffee strength. It has a large water tank that can produce up to 18 cups of coffee, and will keep it warm for up to 40 minutes.

Solo & Perfect Milk by Melitta UK is a similar price to the Dualit, and is a great looking bean-to-cup model. We like its ability to make two cups of coffee simultaneously most. While the milk frothing wand is a little fiddly to install, it produces great results. The smartphone app also comes in handy when you need inspiration or help with navigation, although you can’t use it to control the machine.

If you’re happy to pay a bit more for a bean-to-cup machine the Krups New Barista Age is your best bet. It features a steam wand hidden within the front of the design, so there’s no messy milk tank.

Simply fill your cup with as much milk as you like, choose your drink and the machine will do the hard work. It comes with an automatic switch-off button – for up to two hours – and takes ground coffee as well as beans should you decide to experiment. We loved this model but the only downside is the price.

Any coffee machines to avoid?

While the Russell Hobbs Brew & Go has its benefits, if you fancy yourself as a bit of a coffee connoisseur it probably isn’t the machine for you. While the coffee it produces is as good as any standard cafetière, for anyone looking for coffee with dense, rich cremas you’ll need to spend significantly more.

It does offer eco benefits, however, as it comes with a stainless steel 400ml travel mug that you can use to brew your coffee and take with you when you’re on the go.

The LCD display isn’t the most inspiring of designs, although it does the trick – as in turn the machine on and off and start the filter process. It also comes with a 24-hour programmable timer, although we’re not sure why you’d want to use it – surely no one can be in that much of a rush that they can’t hit the on button themselves? But its automatic shut-off feature is a handy plus, and at £32.99 we can’t complain that it isn’t a value for money buy.

What did we miss?

Tell us, and we'll feedback to our reviewers so we can include it going forwards.

The word baby is like the word wedding. Even though buying the best baby monitor around doesn't necessarily mean paying a premium, as it's focused on your baby, pound signs flash up everywhere. If having a small human in your care wasn’t overwhelming enough, the sheer volume of products available to new parents will be.

Don’t panic. For the past month, we’ve tested the best baby monitors, comparing how each of them performs. Want to know if you should get an Arlo, BT or Motorola baby monitor? You're in the right place.

Remember to upvote or downvote to have your say, or scroll down to get our expert's view on the best baby monitors

Below you can read what we liked and disliked with all the monitors we tested but, for clarity, the best baby monitor for value we tested was the Smart WIFI Arlo Baby. The best monitor overall was the 5-inch Video BT Smart Baby

There are some more great choices in our list but whatever you want from your monitor, you’ll find it here.

Best baby monitors for value and overall

The Arlo Baby monitor is our best value choice. It’s not the cheapest of our ten, but for its price it offers unrivalled picture quality, excellent audio, a lovely design and plenty of other great features, including smartphone control wherever you are (providing you have a good internet connection).

The BT Smart Baby Monitor is a little more expensive than the Arlo Baby but it offers both smartphone control and a separate monitor, delivering the best of both worlds. The monitor has a large, clear display, great audio and several useful functions, including the ability to adjust the camera remotely.

See our list of Best FitBit Fitness Trackers and best smart scales

• best buys
• the shortlist
• our expert
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• Feedback

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The Shortlist: Best baby monitor

The Expert's View

96

HOURS TESTED

18

PRODUCTS CONSIDERED

1

EXPERTS CONSULTED

2

SHORTLIST BEST BUYS

The best baby monitor we tested is the BT Smart Baby Monitor thanks to its range of features, remote control and crisp, clear screen.

Author Bio

Britta O'Boyle

Britta O’Boyle is features editor at technology website Pocket-lint.com and has years of experience writing about and reviewing a range of different products. She also has a baby girl, so knows from first-hand experience the features that make for a good or bad baby monitor.

Best baby monitors: how we selected

The baby market is huge. There are hundreds of products available to buy, many of which promise to make your life that little bit easier as a new parent. Who doesn’t want that? Baby monitors are just one part of that huge range of products, but they are particularly important as they offer peace of mind.

The problem is, there’s far too much choice. Go on Amazon, for example, search for baby monitors, filter by average customer review and you’ll be confronted with an endless list of devices.

Some on that list will be trusted brands – the Motorolas and BTs of this world. Others will be names you might never have heard of until you had a baby – the Angelcares and Nuks. Then you’ll find the completely obscure brands that are far cheaper than the more popular ones but with four- or five-star reviews. Are they really that good? Should you take a chance on them?

We took a selection of the best-rated devices and tested them. In our list, you’ll find a range of manufacturers, from those with a long-standing presence in the baby monitor sector, like Motorola and Angelcare, to those that are newer to the field, such as Arlo.

There are two Motorola devices at different price points on our shortlist, along with the best-rated or most highly recommended baby monitor from each other brand. We’ve included Philips, BT, Kodak, Nuk and Angelcare, along with Hello Baby, Arlo and a company called AOGE.

To keep tests fair, we chose the monitors that offered both visual and audio capabilities rather than just audio. At the time of writing, all the baby monitors we tested came in under the £250 price bracket based on RRP. There are a couple of sub £90 devices on our list, too - Hello Baby and AOGE – which were chosen as they had great reviews elsewhere and we wanted to see how they'd match up to the more expensive monitors.

We looked at all aspects of each product, from ease of use to display quality and audio capabilities. A baby monitor should be simple to set up, easy to use, offer a good signal range and enable you to see and hear your baby clearly.

If you’re paying between £100 and £200, you want something that offers that peace of mind. You want a device that allows you to easily keep tabs on your little one without disturbing them. God forbid you wake a sleeping baby by accident – that could be invaluable ‘you’ time you miss out on.

Being able to check on your baby through a monitor or your phone, day or night, and see and hear as if you were physically in the room is the most important attribute a baby monitor should offer in our view. That’s what we wanted from each monitor on test.

Best baby monitors: how we tested

To test the baby monitors we have shortlisted, we used each model for a number of very long, often sleep-deprived nights and days. This was important as it not only allowed us to test how each performed during natural daylight, but how well they performed after dark when their night vision capabilities were required. There is no point in having a baby monitor if you can’t see how your baby is doing half the time they are supposed to be in their cot or crib.

If anything, we felt good night vision was more important than daytime viewing because if your baby is crying at 3am, you want to be able to see what might be wrong before you drag yourself out of bed.

During our testing period, we ran two baby monitors concurrently, one on each corner at the foot of our baby’s cot. This allowed us compare two models like-for-like, with similar viewing angles, enabling a fairer test.

Having them running alongside each other also meant we could test specific features side-by-side, presenting a clear winner each time. We were looking at picture quality, audio quality, battery life, range, the way each monitor reacted to our baby and what extra features each monitor offered over the next.

These extra features include everything from remote camera control, adjusting the camera positioning from the monitor itself, to playing lullabies and setting alarms. Some also let you add additional cameras for better viewing angles, though we didn’t test this specific feature.

We also tested for ease of use. You want to be able to zoom in quickly if you need to, change the brightness of the display for more clarity or increase or decrease the audio volume without too much hassle. Each baby monitor has different menu settings and different ways of accessing those menus. Some monitors are very simple to use and navigate. Others are a little more complicated – something no sleep-deprived parent needs.

At the end of the four-day test period, we selected the device we preferred to remain on our baby’s cot, while the other was replaced with the next baby monitor on our shortlist. The one that was chosen to remain became our benchmark for the next baby monitor and we continued this process until we had completed testing for all the products.

By doing this, we ended our entire test period with the two monitors we thought were the best overall and the best value. We were able to see quickly those we didn’t rate as highly, those we would not recommend, and those we wouldn't be able to do without.

Best baby monitor reviews: The test results

The BT Smart Baby Monitor is the best performer on test, for several reasons. Both app control and handheld monitor control provide great flexibility. Its display is excellent, audio is great. Picture quality and good camera features, including remote adjustment of the camera position, are also important.

AOGE’s baby monitor also offers remote control of the camera, as do a couple of the others including both Motorola baby monitors and the Kodak Cherish. The Motorola, BT and Kodak options offer much smoother operation than the AOGE, though the AOGE does allow for a 360-degree field of view, meaning no blind spots.

The Arlo Baby was also one of our favourites and the device we selected for best value choice. It’s worth mentioning that the Hello Baby HB32 was a strong contender in this field, too, so perhaps a consideration if the Arlo Baby is out of your price range.