If you enjoy baking, you'll need one of the best stand mixers to produce consistent and tasty results. But stand mixers are expensive, so you'll want to buy one that has all the functionality you need, gives good value, and provides some eye candy if it's to be displayed on your kitchen countertop.
The best stand mixers are versatile and can offer much more than tasty cakes and bakes. They'll be powerful enough to stir bread or whisk egg whites with ease. But with so many different types of stand mixer available, it can be challenging to choose the best one for your needs. You’ll need to consider bowl capacity depending on whether you mix up small or large batches and whether you need a compact appliance if you lack countertop or cupboard space. And if you’ve got a keen design eye you might want a stand mixer that adds a pop of color to your kitchen countertop.
In addition, how many speeds, features, or various attachments does it come with? Typically, stand mixers come with a flat beater, wire whip and dough hook, while others will have a splash guard or pouring shield. There are also specific attachments for making pasta or mincing, but this depends on the model.
Our top choice for the best overall stand mixer is the KitchenAid Artisan Series 5-quart Tilt-Head stand mixer. It's also my go to stand mixer, and has been part of my baking arsenal for a good few years. However, if your prefer to batch bake or your ambitions are beyond being a home baker, KitchenAid Pro Line Series 7-quart bowl-lift stand mixer, would make a good choice.
Discover some of the best stand mixers to suit all homes, needs and budgets.
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About us
Why you can trust Tom's Guide Our writers and editors spend hours analyzing and reviewing products, services, and apps to help find what's best for you. Find out more about how we test, analyze, and rate.
I started baking from a young age, as soon as I could see over the kitchen countertop. I've been fortunate enough to extend my passion into my work, where I write about homes and gardens and get to test, review and compare kitchen appliances.
Helen started reviewing home and kitchen appliances in 2007 at the Good Housekeeping Institute and has never looked back. She’s now freelance and reviews all sorts of appliances, from stand mixers to coffee machines from her home in a pretty village in the UK.
The Quick List
Here's the best stand mixers you can buy right now based on our comprehensive online research and testing. Scroll on for our full in-depth reviews.
With 10 speeds, a generous 5-quart stainless steel bowl, this stand mixer provides plenty of punch for regular batch baking. Apart from its speed and efficiency it also looks good, and comes in a wide array of delightful colors.
The Hamilton Beach 7-speed stand mixer is a reasonable price and is lightweight and easy to move. Although it has a smaller capacity than other stand mixers, it still offers a decent 4-quart bowl.
With a 5.5-quart capacity, this Cuisinart stand mixer tops our review for the best mid-range model. Plus, it's easy to operate, has 12 speeds and mixes efficiently. It also features an attractive die-cast construction.
With a generous size bowl, with a 7-quart capacity, this KitchenAid bridges the gap between the home and professional baker. It features a bowl-lift design and comes with four attachments. And as our tester revealed, “it should be every baker’s bread and butter”.
This 50s-inspired stand mixer has a large 5-quart capacity stainless bowl, and comes with four mixing attachments. It's intuitive to use and has 10 speeds, perfect for blending, whipping or beating.
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This 7-quart stand mixer offers an excellent capacity and gives an outstanding performance, but you do pay for the professional privilege. However, no additional attachments are available.
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With a large capacity and easy access, tilt-head bowl, this KitchenAid Professional stand mixer offers an excellent performance for batch cooking. You can also boost the functionality with one of 10 attachments.
There's lots of extras with this Breville stand mixer that makes it stand out from the crowd. You get two mixing bowls, a light that illuminates when mixing and a handy integrated timer. Plus it comes with plenty of accessories.
The best stand mixers you can buy today
Best overall
With its iconic design, available in 46 stunning colors — including Orange Sorbet, Green Apple and Dried Rose — the KitchenAid Artisan 5-quart stand mixer is eye candy for your countertop. But it's also a real workhorse that tops almost everyone's list of best stand mixers, due to its fast, efficient mixing and quiet operation. I particularly find it excellent at mixing dough, as the motor is up to the task and the appliance stays firmly put without shifting around. It’s one reason why the KitchenAid Artisan stand mixer is my best kitchen purchase ever, although I ducked on the wonderful color choice and opted for the Almond Cream colorway.
It has the bowl capacity and oomph to mix up nine dozen cookies, four loaves of bread or 7 pounds of mashed potatoes. It has a Slow Start feature to avoid spattering your counter with a flurry of flour or a splash of milk when it first ramps up. Like all KitchenAid stand mixers, it has 10 speeds and a hub for attaching optional accessories, including a pasta roller and a spiralizer. It also has a useful pouring guard, which also prevents light ingredients, such as flour, covering your countertop.
Read our full KitchenAid Artisan review
Best budget
We won't lie. This stand mixer won't dress up your countertop the way a KitchenAid will, but it won't make as big a dent in your budget, either. And you won't sacrifice much in mixing results. This mixer turns out clouds of whipped cream, tender lemon chiffon cake and two tall loaves of whole wheat bread. The Hamilton Beach may take a little longer to mix than a KitchenAid does, but hey, you're not mixing the batter by hand. And when it comes to ease of use, the Hamilton Beach bests them all.
Not only is the speed dial easy to turn, but it also has big numbers, no reading glasses necessary. If you're never quite sure what speed to use, check out the guide matching tasks to speeds right on top of the mixer head. Handles on either side of the bowl make maneuvering the mixer easy, and all of the parts, including the whisk, can be popped in the dishwasher. As the mixer is relatively lightweight and has a handle on top, it's convenient to reposition or carry to a closet for storage.
Best mid-range
While the Cuisinart Precision Master Stand Mixer is solidly built of die-cast metal, it’s not overly heavy, which makes it very convenient to store in a closet or cabinet when you’re not using it. It has a large 5.5-quart mixing bowl and the oomph to mix batter for five dozen cookies. However, it can only knead dough for about two loaves of bread, so if you’re a heavy-duty bread baker, this might not be the model for you. For its capacity, however, it is a very affordable and handsome choice and is a good option if you don’t want to pay out for a KitchenAid Classic or KitchenAid Artisan stand mixer.
When testing, I was impressed with the compactness of the design and the ease of using the speed dial and lever to lift the tilt head. However, it comes with a splashguard that is in two parts, and it can be tricky to remove if you need to step in and give the ingredients a manual stir. Despite this, it gave an impressive performance and easily handled kneading dough.
The Cuisinart is easy to use, and all the parts except the whisk are dishwasher-safe. It is available in a selection of colors, including ruby red, white, black, periwinkle blue, Robin’s egg blue, and silver. You can purchase a variety of attachments, from a pasta roller to a spiralizer.
Read our full Cuisinart Precision Master stand mixer review.
Best for batch baking
If you have lots of mouths to feed and a standard-size stand mixer overflows with ingredients, this large capacity KitchenAid, with a 7-quart bowl, could be just what you need. Our tester thought it straddles the line between a domestic and larger commercial appliance and was capable and sturdy, as we come to expect with the brand. So, if you enjoy making multi-tiered celebration cakes and whipping up mountains of cupcakes for bake sales, this stand mixer is for you.
Unlike the standard KitchenAid mixer, this model has a raised bowl that's secured by two arms, and the bowl is moved up and down by a lever on one side of the machine. There's a knack to it, but our tester found it soon became second nature. It also has 10 speeds, with the first starting at half speed, for when you require an ultra-slow setting. It also comes with four attachments for mixing, whisking, and kneading ingredients. The flex-edge beater is particularly useful, and almost identical to the tool that comes with Smeg's retro stand mixer, and it ensures the mixture on the side of the bowl is fully incorporated. There is also a pouring shield which fits on top of the bowl to prevent messes, although our tested reported it was tricky to attach.
She also thought it didn't quite hit the mark on the looks front like the standard KitchenAid tilt-head mixers, although she said it's “far from boring”, and is still available in a wide range of colors.
Overall, this stand mixer performed exceptionally well and our tester couldn't fault its performance during the testing process.
Read our full KitchenAid Artisan 7-Quart Bowl-lift stand mixer review.
Best retro
Smeg’s retro stand mixer doesn’t win points for style alone. It’s a great performer. It offers a 5-quart bowl capacity — a decent size for batch baking — and comes with four attachments, including a very handy flex-edge beater that’s great at pulling all ingredients into the mix. Plus, it offers 10 speed settings, giving lots of precision depending on whether you want to lightly combine ingredients or quickly whip up some heavy cream. The Smeg stand mixer is also super intuitive to use, although it is a bit on the heavy side, which can be a bit of an issue if you don’t plan to keep it out on your countertop.
Clean-up is easy, as all of the parts can be placed in the dishwasher, apart from the silicon strips on the flex-edge beater, the wire whisk and pouring shield. It also houses a hub where you can attach additional accessories, to make pasta, grind food and slice veg. Overall it’s a great choice, but it does come with a premium price tag.
Read our full Smeg retro stand mixer review
Best professional style
If you have a professional-style kitchen and want a mixer that fits right in, you’ll love the Wolf Gourmet Stand Mixer. It has the same impressive stainless steel design, complete with a red knob, as the Wolf range. And as you would expect, it also costs top dollar. This is one big heavy countertop appliance designed for people who bake often and in large quantities. In fact, the bowl can handle enough batter for 14 dozen cookies or dough for 8 loaves of sourdough bread.
While on most bowl lift mixers, you turn a crank to lower and raise the bowl, on the Wolf you rotate the bowl itself to adjust its height. There are a dozen settings on the speed dial but you can stop anywhere in between for lots of fine tuning. There’s a pulse setting for cutting butter into flour for pie dough or just not overbeating a cake batter when you add in the dry ingredients. When you turn the Wolf on, it starts off slowly so never get a big splatter. There’s a hub up front for optional attachments but to date, none are available. If you’re not a fan of the signature red knobs, black and stainless steel ones are included with the mixer.
Best budget large capacity
With this mixer in your kitchen, you can go ahead and double up on recipes — it has the power to handle the dough for six loaves of bread or 72 cookies. At Thanksgiving, it can mash 7 pounds of spuds, leaving you free to carve the turkey and whisk up the gravy. This mixer is big and heavy and is definitely for bakers who bake a lot and often and want to give a stand mixer pride of place on the countertop. And although it doesn’t have the capacity of Kitchenaid’s Pro Line Series 7-quart bowl-lift stand mixer, it still provides a generous bowl capacity for mixing.
Of course, you can boost the functionality of the stand mixer by using over 10 optional hub powered attachments, from the meat grinder to juicer and the spiralizer. As a multi-functional kitchen appliance it can save space in your kitchen and look good on your countertop at the same time, while ridding your cupboards of other small appliances.
Most innovative
While it’s not the cheapest stand mixer at $399, we love the innovative, heavy-duty design of Breville’s Bakery Chef. It comes with an assortment of accessories including a 5 quart glass bowl and a 4 quart stainless steel bowl, so you have the option to make smaller quantities, which makes mixing different quantities easier. It also features a lamp which illuminates the bowl so you can better see how your recipe is coming along. Plus, the integrated timer allows you to walk away and leave the mixer to get on with it’s job — a particular plus when kneading bread that takes 10 minutes or so.
There are 12 speeds to choose from and with load sensing technology, the mixer will adjust its power based on the resistance of the ingredients – that’s a pretty impressive feature. And although it’s not available in as wide a range of color-popping colors as KitchenAid models, it does come in a choice of 7 finishes — from brushed aluminium, to damson blue, olive tapenade and royal champagne.
How we tested
We use many indicators when reviewing the best stand mixers to see whether an appliance can deliver on performance. It can be a challenge because, in the process, we eat our way through a lot of bread and cake! However, although we put the stand mixers through a range of mixing tests, we also consider other factors.
We’re currently working our way through testing all of the stand mixers in this guide. However, those we’re still to test have been carefully selected through consumer research and by checking online reviews to ensure we’re recommending the best stand mixers on the market today.
Size and weight
When testing each stand mixer, we look at its size and weight, considering whether it will fit under a wall-mounted kitchen cupboard and how easy it is to move around. For instance, if you want to store your stand mixer in a cupboard, will lifting and moving it onto your countertop be tricky? The capacity of the bowl is another aspect — how many cookies or loaves of bread can you make in one batch?
Design
We also consider the overall appearance of the stand mixer, as we realize that looks are important if your appliance is going to be a permanent fixture on your countertop. Plus, we consider the number of color options available, as some stand mixers are available in every color under the sun.
Ease of use
We also assess how intuitive an appliance is to use — can it be unpacked and used without reading the instructions, or do you need more insight before the first go? The positioning of the controls is also important, along with how easy they are to use. And although not many of us like to think about cleaning, this is another important element that we review. Are there any hard-to-reach parts, and which accessories are dishwasher safe?
The appliance in action
During testing, we rate things like power and how well each stand mixer performs at various tasks and speeds. This includes whisking, mixing batter, and kneading bread using the different attachments. During this process, we also looked at how user-friendly and practical the appliance was to use and monitored the noise level.
The dough hook
First, we attach the dough hook and blend the ingredients for a loaf of bread. We check how well the ingredients come together before setting the mixer to knead the dough for 10 minutes. During this time, we measure the noise level in decibels and monitor how much of the stand mixer is moving on the countertop. Once the 10 minutes are up, we check the consistency of the dough to see how smooth it appears and whether any ingredient remnants are left around the edge of the bowl.
The flat beater
We then progress to making a vanilla sponge using the flat beater. While the butter and sugar are creamed together, we note how well the ingredients are incorporated, how much remains on the edge of the bowl, and whether any intervention is needed. The remaining ingredients are added, and we monitor how well the cake batter comes together within a few minutes. If the stand mixer has a pouring shield, we also monitor how easy and effective it is to use. The proof is also in the pudding, and we consider the texture and taste of the final bake.
The whisk
Our final flourish is using the whisk, which we use to whip heavy cream. We time how long it takes for the mixture to hold its shape and form a consistently that could be used for piping. We also note which speed setting was used and whether the heavy cream splashed when being mixed.
Three things to consider before buying a stand mixer
Will it fit?
Stand mixers can be bulky in size, so be sure you have enough room for it on your countertop. To do this, measure out where you plan to place it, taking into account the added height clearance if you’re looking at a tilt-head model.
How much can it mix?
Some manufacturers will mention how many batches their stand mixer can make at once, such as how many cookies or cakes. These are important stats to pay attention to, more so than the bowl size or wattage, because they represent the efficiency of the motor. If you love to bake bread for instance, some stand mixers can only handle one loaf at a time, whereas others can make two.
If you're not sure if you need a full-size stand mixer, be sure to check out our guide on hand mixer vs stand mixer.
Tilt-head or bowl lift?
With a tilt-head design, you tilt the head back so you can look into the bowl and add ingredients. This also allows you to remove the bowl and change the attachments when necessary. On a bowl lift model, you raise or lower the bowl using a crank. Tilt-lift designs tend to be shorter and smaller in size than bowl lift models, but you will need additional height for when you tilt it back. Bowl lift designs wont need the extra height clearance, but are slower and less convenient in terms of checking the bowl and scraping it down.
Tilt-lift models tend to be less expensive and more lightweight, but bowl lift mixers offer more power and larger capacities. If you’re not sure which to buy, consider what you will be making in it. If you want a stand mixer for everyday baking, such as beating cake mix and whipping cream, opt for a tilt-head design. If you love to bake bread or need a mixer which can dish out countless cookies, then a bowl lift model is the way to go because of its power and size.
Which attachments do I use?
Stand mixers now come with a host of attachments and accessories for different purposes, so many that it can be a little intimidating to a new baker. Here’s a breakdown of what the main tools do so you know which to use:
Flat beater: This attachment should come with every stand mixer. It’s used for everyday beating and mixing — great for creaming butter and sugar together for cakes as well as batters and frosting. Some flat beaters also come with a rubber or silicone edge so they can better scrape the ingredients from the edges of the bowl.
Wire whip: Used for whisking, this attachment whips air into ingredients. It’s commonly used to make whipped cream or meringue.
Dough hook: As the name suggests, this attachment helps mix and knead doughs, so it’s what you need to use if you plan to bake fresh bread or pizza. Dough hooks can appear in a ‘C’ shape or can also look like a spiral.
Other useful tools include a splash guard or pouring shield. These sit on top of the bowl while the mixer is running and prevent ingredients from splashing out. Some brands also sell glass bowls in addition to stainless steel. With a glass bowl, you can better see the ingredients being mixed, but they are naturally more fragile.
How to use and care for a stand mixer
- Check the beater-to-bowl clearance. The bottom of the beater shouldn't touch the bottom of the bowl, but it shouldn't be too far away from it either. Getting this just right means better mixing and less stopping to scrape with a spatula. The manual will give you instructions on how to make an adjustment.
- Before deciding to double (or even triple) up on a recipe, look in your mixer's user manual to find out how many pounds of flour your device can handle at once.
- Unless your mixer specifically has a soft-start feature, always start mixing on low, then ramp up to a higher speed, to avoid spattering.
- Don't be tempted to use a spatula while the mixer's running, even if a recipe says to scrape constantly as you beat. If you don't stop the mixer first, the spatula can get caught in the attachment and you'll wind up with a beater or whisk that's twisted out of shape.
- For the loftiest, fluffiest whipped cream, chill the bowl and the whisk before whipping.
- After you're finished mixing, raise the beater or whisk slightly above the surface of the food and run the mixer starting on low, then high, to spin off any excess mixture.
- Check the manual to find out which parts can go in the dishwasher. If you disregard its advice, you could wind up with discolored or damaged parts.
When to replace your stand mixer
You can expect a stand mixer to land six to 10 years, although most will come with a one to five-year warranty. However, if you own a KitchenAid stand mixer, you’re in luck, as this brand claims its mixers will last for at least 15 years. Some KitchenAid owners have reported their stand mixers lasting even longer than this — and mine is certainly on the way to exceeding the expected timeframe too! Although, if you’re a KitchenAid owner, you’re more likely to change your stand mixer as you fancy a different colorway, rather than it’s stopped working.
Some manufacturers give you the option to buy and extended warranty, but this is not something that we recommend. Over the long term you could pay out more than you spend on repairs.
What if your stand mixer won’t start?
If you find your stand mixer won’t start, the head might need a simple adjustment, and this can be completed by following the manual’s instructions.
What if your stand mixer makes a strange noise?
This could be a sign that the parts need lubricating or a worn gear might need to be replaced. All of these repairs are fairly easy to make and inexpensive, making them worthwhile. However, if your stand mixer stops altogether, it could be that the motor has failed. As a guide, if a repair costs more than half the price of a new stand mixer, we recommend replacing it instead.
How much should you spend on a stand mixer?
Domestic stand mixers can range in price from $50 to over $800, so how do you know how much to spend? It will partly depend on your budget but also on how you plan to use it. If you only bake the occasional cake and don’t need a powerful motor to knead dough, a stand mixer at the budget end will be adequate for your needs.
However, if you are a regular baker and want added functionality that makes baking a breeze, such as a large capacity bowl and the option to add attachments, such as a mincer, pasta maker or spiralizer, then you’re better off investing in a pricier model.
