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A kitchen investment with powerful performance

Vitamix blenders are among the best blenders you can buy. They're popular among chefs and home cooks alike for their high-power performance and intuitive operation. And while a Vitamix isn't cheap, it's worth the investment if you blend up a smoothie every morning, love a pureed butternut squash soup or prefer your coffee with freshly made nut milk.

But there's more than just one model of Vitamix, so you'll have to determine which features are right for you. Some have presets and others have built-in timers, but all of them are backed by Vitamix's full warranty program. Another signature feature of all Vitamix blenders is their tamper tool for blending ingredients with little to no liquid like hummus or peanut butter. "They’re designed to not accidentally be caught by the blade when used with the proper lid," says Nicole Papantoniou director of Good Housekeeping Kitchen Appliances and Innovation Lab.

In the Good Housekeeping Institute Kitchen Appliances and Innovation Lab, we’ve tested all sorts of kitchen gear from immersion blenders to food processors and more than 100 blenders over the past couple of decades. Most recently we performed side-by-side Lab testing on eight of Vitamix's 13 blenders to determine the best Vitamix blenders of 2022 for your budget, culinary needs and kitchen space.

You can read more about how we evaluated Vitamix blenders in our Lab — plus everything you need to know to shop for a Vitamix blender — at the end of this guide.

Not only was the Vitamix A3500 Ascent Series Smart Blender the best-tested Vitamix in our testing, but it features a touch interface, five program settings, a programmable timer, variable speed and a pulse switch. This blender also pairs with all of Vitamix's self-detect containers which will recognize the cup and automatically adjust blend settings for its size.

In our tests, this model produced the best-tasting kale and strawberry smoothie that completely went through a sieve without any flecks of kale or pieces of strawberry remaining. Milkshakes were creamy, frothy and had great body; homemade peanut butter was silky smooth without any peanut chunks remaining; and margaritas were restaurant-quality with a super fluffy consistency. Overall we were very impressed with this blender's ability to break down even the toughest of ingredients. If you wanted to make a personal margarita or milkshake, you could also purchase the Self-Detect Blending Cup for this model. In our tests, we did find it a little difficult at first to position the cup on the blending base and for it to be detected.

This blender was loud while grinding tough ingredients (Don't make peanut butter while someone is sleeping!) and the self-cleaning function with soap and water wasn't a complete match for sticky nut butter. You will still have to scrub it down additionally after this function, though it does help a little. But the overall results are unmatched by the other models we tested. Throw in a 10-year warranty and you've got extra security that you will get years of great use out of this blender.

While the Vitamix 5300 Blender isn't the cheapest Vitamix model on the market, it is $250 less than our top-performing pick. And it still gives you great features and performance for the price. This model features an on/off switch located underneath the front of the appliance that glows when it is on, a dial with 10 different speeds, a pulse switch and a 7-year warranty for additional peace of mind.

In our tests, this model blended up a creamy smoothie with zero flecks of kale and only a few small pieces of frozen strawberry remaining. What really stood out to us was the stellar margarita it produced with a silky smooth and velvety consistency that went completely through a sieve with absolutely no grit from the sugar that was used in the recipe. This model also created a very smooth peanut butter, but the friction from the blade caused it to heat up more than any other blender we tested, giving the nut butter some small pockets of peanut oil and a slightly bitter flavor. While this blender does not have a clean function, you can still blend it on high with soap and water to loosen tough ingredients before you hand wash the rest.

The Vitamix A2500 Ascent Series Smart Blender belongs to the same Vitamix series as our best overall pick. It features three presets — smoothie, frozen dessert, hot soup — and 10 speeds all located on a dial (unlike the A3500 which has buttons above the dial for presets). Not to forget, this model also comes with a 10-year full warranty and pairs with any of Vitamix's self-detect products.

We love that you can utilize this model's smoothie preset designed to blend frozen ingredients or you can choose your own speed and time for the blending process. In our tests, this model produced a kale and strawberry smoothie that was thick and creamy with zero flecks of kale left behind. And if you like adding nut butter to your smoothie, this model produced smooth peanut butter with a good consistency and body and only a tiny bit of leftover grit from the peanuts.

The Vitamix Professional Series 750 Blender has a manual blender interface with five presets: smoothie, frozen dessert, soup, purée and self-cleaning. It has 10 speeds on the dial and a useful pulse switch. While most of the other models we tested had a 4-foot power cord, this one is 6 feet – helpful if your outlet choices are limited.

We put the commercial-grade 2.2-peak horsepower motor to the test and were able to blend tough ingredients like kale into a creamy strawberry smoothie and 3 cups of ice cubes into a silky smooth margarita with zero grit. This model was able to grind peanut butter without the help of the included tamper, but it was unable to grind peanut butter as smoothly as other models we tested. Milkshakes were nice and frothy with a creamy body.

The Vitamix E310 Explorian Blender was the smallest model included in our test but is not the smallest Vitamix blender on the market. It comes with a 48-ounce capacity blender jar compared to the other models with 64-ounce blender jars — but this model was still able to perform the same tests with comparable performance. At a fraction of the price of other models we tested, this is also a great introductory model or nice for those who often blend smaller batches. This model features a manual dial with 10 settings and a pulse switch useful for coarsely chopping.

In our tests, we were particularly impressed with the margaritas that it produced. They were silky smooth and creamy with great texture and absolutely no grit from the sugar. If you would like to make peanut butter with this model, you'll have to utilize the included tamper and it won't be as creamy as the other models we tested – but that might be a pro if you're a chunky peanut butter lover. This blender has fewer horsepower compared to other Vitamix models (2.0 instead of 2.2) and the blender jar also has shorter blades (3 inches instead of 4 inches). But we were able to make use of the tamper to get things moving when necessary.

While this is the only immersion blender in the Vitamix line, it performed well in our immersion blender testing. This immersion blender from Vitamix created a thick and smooth berry smoothie in our tests. But what really impressed us was its ability to create a quick mayonnaise that was silky and flavorful: It emulsified the mixture easily within two minutes. While it had the heaviest motor in our tests, we found the grip comfortable to hold. We also appreciated that the speed settings are clearly marked with lighted indicators. It has a scratch-resistant material on the tip of the blade guard that allows you to puree soup directly in the pot without damaging it.

In our recent side-by-side test at the Good Housekeeping Institute Kitchen Appliances and Innovation Lab, we tested eight Vitamix blenders (including one immersion blender). We have tested more than 100 blenders over the years, including numerous immersion blenders and personal blenders to find the best high-performance models. We test each with the same standardized recipes to see how they stand out among the rest.

In our most recent test, to see how well Vitamix blenders could handle hard ingredients, we ground 7 pounds of peanuts and nearly 2 pounds of coffee beans, blended 3 pounds of frozen strawberries and pulverized over 12 pounds of ice cubes. This photo shows what remained in the sieve after a strawberry kale smoothie was blended with a Vitamix blender.

To help mimic how a home consumer would use a blender, we also made vanilla milkshakes and frozen margaritas. During Lab testing, we weighed the final product and strained it through a mesh sieve to evaluate whether all ingredients were fully blended and whether each grind or puree was uniform. We made sure that our frozen margarita didn't have chunks of ice or grit from sugar and that the milkshake hadn't separated or curdled during the blending process.

While we don’t recommend grinding coffee beans in a blender because of the oils that can be left behind, they’re a good indicator of how well a blender can evenly grind and the hardness of the ingredients it can handle. We ground coffee beans in each blender and evaluated how consistent the grind was. We passed the coffee grounds through a sieve and weighed out any remaining unground coffee beans, as you can see in this image.

If the blender was equipped to blend hot ingredients, we made a broccoli leek soup. If the Vitamix blender had a soup preset, we used that in testing. This test helps to evaluate how well a blender can puree stringy leeks, tough broccoli stems and red potatoes with their skins still intact.

For Vitamix blender testing we put Vitamix's own peanut butter recipe to the test to see how smoothly each blender would churn out peanut butter. After blending was complete we evaluated its temperature and how it tasted and spread it out to evaluate the consistency.

To assess Vitamix's immersion blender, we blended a smoothie, made mayonnaise and pureed soup directly in a pot.

✔️ Blender jar (shape and size): Take a look at the included blending jar, especially if you don't want to purchase additional accessories right away, but keep in mind that there are other blending jars available for purchase.

✔️ Accessories: All Vitamix blenders come with a blending jar, lid and tamper, but you can purchase additional accessories for some of their models. If you want to use a certain Vitamix accessory, ensure that it pairs with your Vitamix model.

✔️ Warranty: Vitamix offers a full warranty for all of its blenders — the number of years varies depending on the blender model. According to the Vitamix website, the warranty covers blenders that "fail within 10 years from the date of purchase due to a defect in material or workmanship or as a result of normal wear and tear from ordinary household use."

Eva Bleyer has tested everything from ranges to juicers to kitchen scales to blenders. As a trained chef from the Natural Gourmet Institute with a background in health-supportive cooking, she has a great deal of experience using blenders, especially Vitamix blenders. Eva has used a Vitamix as a personal chef in people's homes, as a research and development cook in a large commissary kitchen and in her own home. Eva has conducted multiple side-by-side blender tests within the Good Housekeeping Institute Kitchen Appliances and Innovation Lab, including side-by-side testing of Vitamix blenders.