Best Tea Kettles [Complete Testing]

A nice cup of tea is very fine thing. The process is part of the experience, too. It’s a chance to slow down and let the small movements of tea-making take over your brain. All the pieces matter, too. Do you like bag tea? Whole-leaf tea in an infuser? Loose? Make a whole pot and enjoy the change as it steeps? One cup and go? There’s something meditative about a good cup of tea, and the kettle should be a part of the experience.

In this test kitchen, we’ve looked good and hard at fourteen of the top tea kettles on the market to find the ones that can best fit into your life. If you’ve never thought too much about your tea kettle, well, that would have been two of us. It’s surprising how much variation there is on the market, and how little of it is captured in the price tag. Read on, and find out more than you ever wanted to know about the perfect tea kettle.

Why Use a Stovetop Tea Kettle

To boil water for tea! Or for coffee in a French press, or with a pourover. Beyond beverages, a quick and easy source of boiling water is a great thing to have around the kitchen. A kettle of boiling water is great for cooking couscous or rice noodles. When I make pasta, I speed up the process by cooking half the water in a pot and half in my kettle, then emptying the kettle into the pasta pot — two burners work faster than one. If you’re in more of an instant ramen mood than a cooking mood, fill up the kettle all the way and make your lunch and a cup of tea in one go. Stovetop kettles are versatile and they make great gifts for tea and coffee lovers alike.

Stovetop Kettle vs. Electric Kettle

Electric kettles are great too. I’ve got one at work for making coffee since I can’t exactly install a stove in my office. Folks living in Europe tend to go with their more powerful 240-Volt electric kettles, but here in the US, the stovetop delivers more power.

Stovetop kettles are as simple as it gets. I hesitate to say indestructible, as any small child might prove me wrong, but a good kettle could last you for life. Electric models are hardly disposable, but I’ve had to replace mine a couple of times as the heating elements go kaput.

It’s a matter of taste, of course, but I think a good stovetop kettle looks a lot better in your kitchen. It’s also easier to store than an electric kettle when you’re not using it. Stovetop kettles can fit easily with the rest of your pots, while an electric will occupy a chunk of counter pretty much forever.

What to Look for in a Kettle

Spout Cover

A kettle (or a pot) boils faster when it’s covered. The lid traps the heat inside the vessel so it keeps heating the water instead of circulating off into the rest of the kitchen. All of our test kettles cover the spout with a whistling cover for quicker heating (and the whistle). To pour water from the spout, you need to take the cover off the spout.

Three styles

Our test kettles have three main classes of mechanism, and our testing suggests that having a mechanism you don’t like can be a dealbreaker.

1. 1. The simplest (and my favorite) is the simple lever cover. It opens and closes by pressing the lever. Once opened, it holds itself open. These mechanisms always get hot, since they’re right next to the steam-filled spout, but once opened, you don’t have to fiddle with them at all. You can also just boil the kettle with the cover open if you don’t want the whistle to sound (the conscientious choice for an early riser!)

1. 1. The spring-loaded lever adds an extra linkage to put the opening control under the handle as a trigger button sort of thing. The idea is that your hand will naturally rest on the lever and hold it open while you pour. The manufacturers also hope that the lever you touch is far enough away from the hot parts that it stays cool. Our testing gives both those contentions a certain amount of side-eye. These levers require you hold the stovetop kettle in a fairly specific way, which is not necessarily the one I found comfortable. These levers are, strictly speaking, cooler than the simple levers, but the spring mechanism requires you hold your finger on it for the entire time you’re pouring instead of just for a second.

1. The third style hides some sort of mechanism in the handle and gives you a pushbutton. Some of these are spring-loaded and require you to hold them constantly, while others lock open once you press the button. These vary a good bit in utility depending on exactly where the button sits compared to where your hand needs to go to effectively pour from the kettle.

We recommend you try the different mechanisms yourself to find your personal preference. If that’s not on the table for you, the simple lever style is the most straightforward, and while you might be happier with something else, I can say confidently that you won’t hate it. Alternativity, if you’re looking for gooseneck type kettle, we recommend checking out Fellow.

Capacity and Weight

How much water do you want to boil? Any of the kettles in our roundup can make a pot of tea, but if you want to, say, make a water bath for a cheesecake, you might want a lot more than that. Our testing shows that larger kettles boil the same amount of water slightly slower than smaller kettles, but not so much as to really sway the decision. A lighter stovetop kettle is definitely easier to move around, and while the heavier kettles boil a little faster, we’d rather have something maneuverable.

One thing to watch out for here is manufacturers substantially overstating the capacity of their kettle.

Every tea kettle has a max-fill line or instructions to fill only to the level of the spout, but some of the manufacturers list the maximum amount of water the kettle can possibly hold. Our worst offender claims to hold 3 liters, but can only safely boil 1.5. Don’t trust the boxes — check out the individual reviews for the real information.

Boil Time

Nobody wants to wait around on the tea kettle. Boil times for 1 liter range from just under 5 minutes to nearly 6½. Filled to the max-fill lines, the differences are even bigger, even adjusting for the amount of water involved.

Whistle

The quietest whistles in the test can barely be heard from across the room, while the loudest ones could wake up the whole house. If you like a pleasant steam whistle to announce when your water is ready, take a look at our volume measurements, probably for something in the mid-range. We also note any that seemed especially unpleasant.

Ease of Use

This is the biggest thing we looked for in our testing. If you’re going to use this thing every morning, it should be easy to use and comfortable to hold.

Filling

A good tea kettle should fill easily from any source. Some of the handles really got in the way. We like a kettle where the handle can fold away, or at least leave enough room over the opening for easy filling.

Pouring

You want a kettle that pours with control with the arm in a pleasant natural position and an easy grip. The worst kettles are the ones that force your hand into an awkward position or try to burn you by putting hot parts right where your hand needs to go.

How We Tested

For some of the test days around here, we’ve got a whole battery of tests where we make three or four meals worth of food. For kettles, there’s not much to do but to boil water and drink the occasional pot of tea. The first test was to boil at max-fill on a flat-top electric stove. The second was to boil 1 liter of water on a gas stove. In each trial, we measured the time it took the water to come to a boil. Once boiling, we poured the water into a teapot to get a handle on ease of use. While testing on the gas stove, we measured the volume of the whistle using an A-weighted decibel meter on a tripod 1 meter away.

Overall, there wasn’t a significant difference between performance on the electric stove and the gas stove. We ran this test because my folks have an old copper kettle that became unusable when they got a flat-top stove. It has a rim that holds the base of the kettle off the burner, so now it’s just there for looks. It appears that all modern manufacturers have made their designs to work on a flat-top, but you should bear this in mind if you’re looking at antique kettles.

We didn’t get too much data on which handles got hotter than others. On the electric stove, all of the handles were comfortable, while on the gas stove, none of them were cool enough to grab barehanded. I’m sure there’s a sweet spot on the gas burner where there are differences from kettle to kettle, but we only note where something was especially good or bad.

Best Tea Kettle

[Reviewed, Ranked & Rated]

1. Le Creuset Zen Tea Kettle — ★★★★ Best Overall

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One of our overarching questions for this test is, “does more money buy a better tea kettle?” In the case of Le Creuset, the answer is yes. This kettle is extremely good, and I think anyone would be perfectly happy to have it in their kitchen. Is it worth eighty bucks, though? Maybe not, but there’s something to be said for getting the best. Le Creuset is kind of squat with a round folding handle. The look is a bit French country, and a bit exotic. It’s available in a variety of mute colors, including Caribbean (turquoise), Cerise (red), Indigo, Marine (medium blue), Marseille (light blue), Oyster (grey), Palm (green), Soleil (yellow), and White. The handle and simple lever spout cover are black plastic.

The folding handle and wide opening make filling very easy. The tea kettle comes to a boil quickly, and I noticed that the loud whistle sounded more pleasant than average.

Pouring was very smooth, and the simple handle afforded a good grip in whatever position the fill level required. The shape of the kettle makes pouring easier since it channels water towards the spout when tilting it. Many other kettles have a shape that traps the water below the spout.

I don’t know if Le Creuset is worth the hefty price tag, but it is extremely good. It’s attractive, boils quickly, sounds a loud whistle, and pours neatly and well. This is your Cadillac choice of tea kettles.

2. Cuisinart Aura — ★★★★★ Best Value for Electric Stoves

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The Cuisinart Aura is a solid kettle at a reasonable price. The design is simple and attractive to fit a modern kitchen. The body of the kettle is available in silver, metallic red, or metallic copper. The handle is a large solid loop of black plastic. The spout cover is button-style, and latches open once you press the button.

The Cuisinart Aura is pleasant to use, but definitely better for an electric stove. The handle loops high enough away from the filling hole that it’s easy to fill with any faucet. One small problem with filling is that the max fill line is printed on the outside of the tea kettle, so you can’t see the water against the line.

The base of the kettle is a little small, so it got extra-hot on the gas stove. The button mechanism for the spout cover works well, and is conveniently placed, though my hand clipped the close button while gripping through a towel. The handle is well-shaped and lets you change your grip as the weight of the water in the tea kettle demands. The spout pours well and with control.

Overall, this is a great kettle for people with an electric stove who don’t care about a loud whistle. For folks with a gas stove, it’s still pretty good, and a solid value.

3. Müeller — ★★★★★ Best Value for Gas Stoves

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The Müeller is an all-around good kettle whose most notable feature is an especially wide base. The good and bad features of the Müeller are intrinsically tied to that base. It’s no trouble to recommend this kettle, especially for folks with a gas stove, but you might do better on an electric. The tea kettle is all stainless steel with an industrial style and a spring-loaded spout cover, and includes an infuser.

Filling the Müeller is easy enough, as it features a reasonable amount of space between the handle and filling hole. The wide base lets you use relatively high heat on a gas stove without worrying about flames lapping around the sides.

The handle was the coolest in the test, but the spout lever suffers the usual problem of being directly connected to a steam source, so I still needed a towel to handle this right off the stove. We did run the stove at full blast for all the kettles, so a more judicious heat level would probably give you a cool grip. The pour was extremely smooth, second only to the All-Clad. I especially appreciate how the grip is in exactly the right place for an easy pour. The only downside on pouring is that the very wide base puts a lot of water all but out of reach. You have to turn it almost upside-down to get all the water out, and it’s not light.

Despite a couple of small hitches, this is a really good kettle.  The handle design is excellent and the price is right. While there are faster and louder kettles in the test, the usability pushes the Müeller to the top of the list, especially for a gas stove.

4. Mr. Coffee Claredale — ★★★★★ Best Bargain

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Could the cheapest kettle in our roundup stand up to the competition at five times the price? Yes! The Mr. Coffee is not the best kettle around, but the low, low price makes it an unbeatable bargain. Available in either Brushed Stainless Steel or Red (with stainless peeking out in several spots), both versions have a tall black plastic handle with finger grips. The spout cover is a button style at the front of the handle.

There’s enough room under the Mr. Coffee handle for easy filling. It’s obvious when you handle this tea kettle how lightweight it is compared to the other kettles in the test. All the metal is very thin, and I don’t expect to be passing this one on years down the road. The whistle, though good and loud, sounds a bit unpleasant when it reaches a boil.

Pouring the Mr. Coffee is pretty solid. The handgrip is in exactly the right place for a comfortable pour, and while the thin metal passed plenty of heat up to the handle, it was easy to grip through the towel. The actual mechanics of pouring could be better — the spout is wide and short, so the pour is sloppy and requires finesse it shouldn’t.

Every bad thing I said in the last few paragraphs pales in comparison to the price. At $15‒20 depending on color, the Mr. Coffee is an astonishing bargain. It’s a credible piece of kitchen equipment at an incredible price.

5. OXO — ★★★★

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Early in this article I ran through the three different styles of spout covers that you’ll see on most whistling tea kettles. OXO had their own idea, and it’s a good one. When you grab the handle and pick up the kettle, an ingenious lever automatically opens the cover. There’s no hot lever to push or button/lever that dictates your hand position while pouring. The OXO cuts an interesting figure in the kitchen featuring interesting curves that loop back and forth to form the handle mechanism. The whole kettle is in stainless steel with black plastic handles.

Filling the OXO could be better. There is no max fill line, so I estimated it at just below the spout, which is a bit too much — 2 liters is probably a better fill level. The offset lid offers a good opening for any faucet, though the handle rides a little low for my taste.

When pouring, the automatic handle works great. It was on the hot side, but the simplicity makes using a towel easy. While the pour started out great, it was tricky to pour out all of the water. There’s not really enough handle length to comfortably tilt the OXO all the way over to get the last half liter. I have some concerns about the longevity of the handle mechanism. It’s got to support the weight of the full tea kettle in motion every time you pick it up.

Overall, it all comes down to the handle (which is very good) and the price tag (which is high). This is a good tea kettle that you’ll be happy with, but I think I’d rather have Le Creuset for a little more money, or the Müeller for half the price. Still, that handle is very good.

6. Chef’s Secret — ★★★★

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The Chef’s Secret is so secret that there’s no brand name printed on the kettle itself, but it’s a secret worth learning. This stainless steel kettle is extremely similar to two others in the test, but much lighter in weight and with a slightly different shape. The spout cover is in the spring-loaded lever style.

The design is incredibly close to that of the Müeller and Willow & Everett, and filling is about the same. The large space between the handle and the filling hole gives plenty of room for the faucet. The Chef’s Secret has no max fill line, so you’re stuck estimating at the bottom of the spout. The wide base of the Chef’s Secret helps capture the powerful heat of the gas flame, but the lighter material makes the handle get a good bit hotter.

Pouring was good enough, but with a few issues. First, the spout lever gets extremely hot, and even thirty seconds after taking it off the heat, it was too hot to hold without a towel. Like the Müeller, the wide base means you need a lot of pouring angle to empty the kettle, and while the handgrip is in the right place, the position your index finger has to take to hold the spout open is awkward when the pouring angle gets high.

Overall, I prefer the Müeller to the Chef’s Secret because of the temperature of the spout lever, but that’s a pretty small gap. The Chef’s Secret is a solid choice.

7. Willow & Everett — ★★★

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Here’s our third kettle in the same vein as the Müeller and Chef’s Secret. It has a similar wide base, but tapers quicker than the other two giving it a smaller capacity. Speaking of capacity, this is our worst offender in exaggerating its capacity. The box and website claim 3 liters, but we measured it at 1.5 liters. Like its sister models, the Willow & Everett shows off an industrial style in stainless with black handles, and a spring-loaded leer spout cover. It includes a tea infuser.

Like the Müeller and the Chef’s Secret, filling the Willow & Everett is easy under the high arching handle. There is no max-fill line, but it’s easy enough to see the base of the spout. This whistle on this model is the loudest in the test — lawnmower loud, according to some internet charts.

Sadly, the Willow & Everett doesn’t match the Müeller’s handle heat performance. The handle and spout lever were quite hot coming off the gas stove. The handle is well-positioned, and while this tea kettle has the common problem of water getting stuck at the base, it pours reasonably well. I still don’t like the way the spring-loaded spout lever forces my hand into one position.

This kettle is perfectly fine, but I’d rather have the Müeller for two-thirds the price.

8. Secura — ★★★

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The Secura makes a valiant effort to have the coolest handle in the test, and it almost gets there. The cost: one of the slowest brewing times in the test. This is another modern look, available in a metallic red or metallic blue, that cuts a noticeably tall profile. The package includes a silicone trivet and a tea infuser. The spout cover is a spring-loaded lever.

The handle is fixed, but rises high over the pot for easy filling. The height of the tea kettle is probably contributes to the slow boiling time, but we ran into another problem that isn’t helping. The lid is a bit loose compared to the other kettles in the test, and steam escaped from the lid when it came to a boil.

Pouring was almost great. The high handle with the comfortable silicone grip was cool enough to handle even off the high-power gas stove, but the spout lever was too hot for my hand. The design of the spring-loaded lever means that you have to keep a finger in continuous contact with that lever, so it couldn’t quite pull off the perfect cool handle. The high handle led to another problem. While the pour was generally smooth and easy, you have to move a pretty heavy tea kettle around a pretty long lever arm to get the last half liter of water out. Since you can’t change your hand position because of the spout lever, it takes more strength than I care to apply before I have my coffee.

Adding it all up, I appreciate the effort the manufacturer took to make the Secura cool to the touch, but I’d rather have a lighter kettle that boils faster.

9. RockUrWok — ★★

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The RockUrWok kettle is a small kettle that didn’t perform as well as we’d like. It’s got some good points, like the attractive mid-century-modernish kettle design (available in white, honeydew, or blue) and some bad points like the ugly handle, and its slow boil time. The spout cover is in the simple lever style, in the same fake-wood Bakelite as the handle.

The RockUrWok has one feature I came to love in our testing — a folding handle. For filling, the best thing your handle can do is get out of the way, and this one made filling super-easy. The handle gets canceled out a bit by the lack of a max-fill line on this model.

This kettle has a small base, which hurts it in a couple of ways. First, it can’t use the full power of the big burner, and a good chunk of the heat just floats away. The other way hurts you too on a gas stove, since everything gets really hot, including the ugly handle and spout cover. The pour spout pours easily with good control, and while the handle works well when starting to pour, it becomes questionable when getting to the bottom of the tea kettle. You’ve got to raise the back of the kettle pretty high, but the plastic part of the handle doesn’t let you move your grip back, so the arm makes a more difficult angle.

Summing up, the RockUrWok is not that great, but not terrible. This is one to buy because you like the aesthetic, ugly fake wood and all.

10. KitchenAid 2.0 Quart Kettle with C Handle — ★★

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The KitchenAid is a fairly average kettle brought down one fatal flaw: the price tag. The look is modern, and the interesting handle gives a nice bit of visual distinction. Available colors include Cameo Blue, Citrus Sunrise, Doulton Blue, Empire Red, Mandarin Orange, Onyx Black, Pyrite, Stainless Steel, Sunkissed Lime, and White (what, they couldn’t find a florid color name for white?). The simple-lever spout cover and the lid are plain stainless steel in all color variations.

It’s a good thing the C Handle looks cool, because it could work better. It’s big and relatively low to the lid, so it obstructs filling a bit. There’s also no fill line, so the 1.8-liter figure is measured to just below the start of the spout.

When pouring, the handle is reasonably comfortable and lets you position your hand as needed. You need a fair amount of intentionality when pouring or the water comes out either not well enough, or entirely too much at once. It’s not clear why, but the spout cover lever was one of the hottest things in the whole test.

The whistle on this tea kettle is notably loud and somewhat unpleasantly pitched. Personally, I’m looking for more of a kind reminder than an alarm clock, but this one will reach you anywhere in the house. The KitchenAid, on the whole, is a pretty average kettle with a heart-stopping price tag.

11. Poliviar — ★★

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The Poliviar captures plenty of superlatives in this test: slowest boil time, quietest whistle, fakest-looking materials, and ugliest overall aesthetic. It’s not all bad, though. The button-style spout cover operates pretty easily, and the shape of the ugly handle is nice. It’s hard to pin down a style for this kettle, with a body in fake Grey stone (or Matte Black, Silver, Aqua, Black, Seabed, or a different Silver), handle and lid in super-fake wood, and spout in stainless.

Filling the Poliviar is simple enough, with the high handle staying well out of the way. There is no max fill line, but it’s easy enough to see the spout level. The shape of the kettle is not helpful. The base is too narrow, so it can’t take advantage of the full size of the electric burner. A gas stove gets the flame everywhere, but also heats up the handle way too much.

Pouring is fairly good, except for the extremely hot handle on the gas stove. A towel makes it acceptable, but the towel makes it tough to keep the spout button in the right position.

All-in-all, the Poliviar is not terrible, but it is extremely ugly. I wouldn’t want it in my kitchen, especially on my electric stove.

12. All-Clad — ★

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The All-Clad is a nice enough kettle, but does not come close to justifying its staggering price tag. In a side-by-side comparison, we judged it to be only marginally better than the Mr. Coffee at 20% of the price. It’s solidly built with an attractive industrial style that communicates a professional seriousness. The spout cover is a simple lever in the same stainless steel as the rest of the kettle.

The handle on the All-Clad rises high over the filling hole, so it’s easy to fill it with any style of faucet. The max-fill line is extremely easy to see while filling, which I can say about very few of these kettles.

The handle is good for pouring, and easily affords a towel or hot pad. The spout is excellent, with a very smooth and controlled pour. The big problem when pouring is the extreme weight. When full, the All-Clad is just over 7 pounds, which is a lot to torque around comfortably.

All-Clad’s business is first-class pots and pans that use the best metals in careful combination to heat as evenly as possible for perfectly controlled cooking. I would imagine that if I wanted to sear some meat in one of these kettles for some reason that the All-Clad would excel, and the others would be revealed as inferior cookware. But we’re judging kettles here, and they just don’t need that much sophistication. You’re not going to scorch the water in even the cheapest kettle. This is not worth $100.

13. Pykal — ★

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Some design decisions make you wonder how anyone ever thought they were a good idea. In the case of the Pykal, it’s the spring-loaded button-style spout cover. Someone was extremely concerned that the cover might come open and someone might get their water out, so they put a super-powered spring on the button that’s already in exactly the wrong place. Setting that aside, the Pykal is a modern-style kettle in stainless steel with black plastic handles. It comes with two tea infusers.

The handle on the Pykal rises very high, so it’s easy to fill in any faucet. The handle is so high that it remains relatively cool, even on the gas stove.

When pouring, everything comes back to that button. It’s right on top at the front of the handle, so you have to swing the kettle on a very long lever arm with your hand in front of the center of mass. It’s in the exact wrong place, and it requires actual effort to press. Once actually pouring, the spout is pretty good.

That spout cover is a dealbreaker. This thing just doesn’t work, doubly so for folks with small hands.

14. Circulon — ★

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The Circulon looks cool, but manages to get pretty much everything wrong. I came into this test wondering how much I could possibly love or hate a kettle, but this model broke that scale wide open. The Circulon has an attractive mid-century modernish look in eight color choices (Black, Capri Turquoise, Chocolate, Kiwi Green, Mandarin Orange, Mustard Yellow, Red, and Rhubarb Red (about one notch darker than the regular red)). The defining feature of the Circulon is the handle, which juts out flat over the front side of the kettle. The handle also contains a spring-loaded button-style spout cover.

Lotza stars there in the measurable section, but all the bad stuff is yet to come. Filling is easy enough, except there is no max-fill line, and the dark interior of our Chocolate kettle made it extremely difficult to find the right fill level, even with a flashlight. Max fill should probably be about 2 liters, since it squirted a little water at 2.2.

Pouring is the problem. First, the handle points the wrong direction. You need to be able to back up on the handle as you pour to keep a reasonable wrist angle, and the Circulon runs out of handle pretty much immediately. Even worse, the end of the handle is a metal ring that gets super hot, and you’ve got to plant your hand right on it. The weight balance is also bad, and puts a lot of strain on the wrist when pouring. The spout pours badly too, like a sloppy waterfall over rocks.

I do not recommend the Circulon.

Our Experience

Le Creuset
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Mr. Coffee
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Cuisinart Aura
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Müeller
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I came into this wondering whether there could possibly be enough differentiation between tea kettles to possibly make sensible recommendations, and after three days of testing, I can say that there are some real winners here. Our Best Value picks are the Cuisinart Aura for an electric stove and the Müeller for a gas stove. Both are reasonably priced and easy to use, but the shape of the base should be different for different kinds of stove. The Best Overall pick is Le Creuset. The price tag is big, but it performs basically perfectly for a pleasant cup of tea. The Best Bargain is the Mr. Coffee: a good kettle at an amazing price. It won’t last forever, but grab one for a summer rental and you’ll be more than satisfied.

I think it’s time for another cup of tea.