In my hometown of London, you can walk into any professional kitchen and hear the word 'Magimix' used to describe a food processor. It’s the brand I use at home to dice onions and make pastry in seconds. I know chefs who’ve had their Magimix machines for over 20 years – they’re built to last.
But after moving into the American kitchen scene, I quickly learned that the more affordable Cuisinart reigns supreme. Peer into the kitchens of TV chefs like Ina Garten and Martha Stewart, and you'll see Cuisinart right on the counter (Martha herself famously quipped that she'd like to put her critics in one, which tells you something about its power).
With the help of my expert team of product testers, we’ve put the best food processor brands to the test – and we picked the Cuisinart Core Custom as the best choice for the home cook. We also evaluated newer machines from Ninja and Nutribullet, KitchenAid’s small, cordless models, and even cheaper attachments that can transform your trusty mixer or blender into the best food processor.
Quick List
After hours of testing and research, here are the top picks. If one piques your interest, you can find more details further down the page.
We think this is the best food processor for home cooks. It's powerful enough, easy to use, and very lightweight. A smart investment – since you can use the base with juicing and blending attachments too.
Small but mighty, KitchenAid's cordless model is under $100. You can use it anywhere – even outside at the grill. We love it for breadcrumbs, pesto, and mayonnaise dips.
Powerful and incredibly durable, this is famous in professional kitchens. If you're batch cooking or hosting, you won't have any troubles. It's also perfect for pastry.
If you can't decide between a blender and a food processor, choose this. The immensely powerful motor can handle almost every single kitchen task.
A vintage design for the iconic Cuisinart. With a 14-cup capacity, it can chop, dice, slice, blitz to perfection – and look good doing it.
If you already have a Vitamix Ascent or Venturist blender, you can add this handy attachment and get blitzing right away. It's a cinch.
Best food processor 2024
You can trust Homes & Gardens. Our expert reviewers spend hours testing and comparing the latest products, helping you choose the best for you. Find out more about how we test.
Best food processor overall
The Cuisinart Core Custom 10-Cup Food Processor is actually quite unique. It’s part of the brand’s new Core Custom Collection, which is compatible with other attachments besides just the food processor work bowl. The brand currently offers a blender jar, juice extractor and dicing accessory (sold separately) – which opens up a world of possibilities with just one appliance.
As a food processor, I think you will be hard-pressed to find a better one. In the test kitchen, we agreed that it was lightweight but felt secure, with a bowl that fully seals to prevent any messes while mixing wetter ingredients.
On testing, it performed well on everyday tasks. We diced carrots, guacamole, made energy balls and I even used it to blend chickpeas to make homemade falafels. The controls are simple – you can either mix on low or high, or pulse. However, if you want to perfect pastry, you'll prefer the Magimix since it comes with dough attachments.
One of our favorite things about this food processor is that everything can be stored inside the main mixing bowl. That includes the blade (which comes with its own protective cover) and the reversible shredding and slicing discs. Plus, all the removable parts are all dishwasher-safe. The only tricky part is choosing from the range of colors when you buy.
Our Cuisinart Core Custom 10-Cup Food Processor review has more details
Best value
When our tester Camryn put the KitchenAid Cordless 5 Cup Food Chopper through its paces, it truly converted her to cordless food processing. 'Suddenly I could make sauces and dips while standing outside with the grill, and move around the kitchen with complete freedom,' she says.
Camryn used this five-cup food processor for blitzing up onions, carrots, tomato sauce, guacamole, and even to make a delicious aioli using the mayonnaise attachment. It impressed her at every turn. 'It delivers strong processing power that can handle most tasks, and includes an awesome whisk attachment, as well as an oil drizzle basin that will come in handy for recipes like pesto or hummus,' she says, 'though it doesn’t do as good a job creating uniform pieces as larger food processors.'
Camryn loved its ease of use and cleaning: you turn it on by simply twisting the lid into place and pressing the perfectly thumb-sized groove at the top (though you need to unscrew and reattach the lid to add new ingredients), and the cup is dishwasher-safe. Of course, she points out that you will need to remember to recharge it, but the battery lasted a long time during testing and she anticipates needing to recharge every month, at most.
Our KitchenAid Cordless 5 Cup Food Chopper review has more details
Best for large meal prep
The Magimix 14-Cup Food Processor stands out as a top choice for serious home chefs and professionals alike. It's the one I use at home for pastry – it can cut butter into flour and blend up the ingredients for a shortcrust pastry tart. The machine comes with a dough blade that’s designed to gently mix dough without overworking it, so you get a nice flaky texture.
It's made by Robot-Coupe, the French company behind industrial-grade food processors for professional kitchens. This model is built with durability in mind and features a robust 1,100-watt motor that’s both powerful and pretty quiet for the size.
I'd recommend this machine for batch cooking, since it can take on big tasks like kneading dough, shredding large quantities of vegetables, and pureeing sauces. I regularly used it to chop my weekly fridge salads. Ideal for big families or meal prep enthusiasts.
It's easy to use, with a simple three-button control system (off, auto, pulse) and will last a very, very long time. I know chefs who have had theirs for over 20 years.
My full Magimix review is coming soon (I've had it for around 2 years, so I just need to clean it up for a photo shoot in the kitchen).
Best design
Apart from the stylish, vintage re-design, what sets the Cuisinart 14-Cup Food Processor apart I hear you ask? Firstly, the power. It tackled just about everything our tester, Camryn, threw its way with ease: 'The pesto I made was evenly chopped and there was no need to go in and scrape any un-mixed ingredients into the sauce; my energy balls came out very well mixed and I found that it was easy to add and remove the blade because the bowl was so large,' she says.
Secondly, the large capacity: it's got five cups more than the industry standard. 'I can see this appliance being useful for someone who frequently does big-batch cooking. If you regularly double or triple the size of recipes to accommodate a large family or frequent hosting, the extra-large size of this appliance may be worth the splurge,' says Camryn.
For those who want a statement design piece as well as a workhorse in the kitchen, look no further. It's outfitted with a slicing disc, shredding disc, and chopping/dough blade, and you can buy other shredding and slicing discs as well as a whisk attachment separately.
It is heavy and fairly bulky, so think twice about buying it if you'll need to transfer it from cabinet to countertop regularly. But it looks so good, you'll probably want to display it all year round.
Our Cuisinart Custom 14-Cup Food Processor review has more details
Best food processor blender combo
If you're looking for a hard-working appliance, you've found the one. Not only can this cover a range of blending and food processing options, it comes with an enormous capacity. The Ninja comes with a 72 oz pitcher and 64 oz food processor as well as two 24 oz cups for any drinks that you'll take on the go.
When we tested this on blending, we were impressed. It came close to knocking the Breville Super Q from its spot as the largest blender, but missed out on the accolade due to the small seed residue it left when blending berries. Don't let that deter you, because this made delicious smoothies, soups, and ice cones. We just aim for perfection and this fell a little short.
As for the all-important food processor tests, this was faultless. We threw some tough and fibrous vegetables at it, asking it to chop zucchini, celery, and carrots. Our experts were suitably impressed at how it performed on the low, medium, high, and pulse settings, even if they were on the noisy side.
It's important to note that this is a big appliance. The large attachments are brilliant for batch cooking, but when it comes to storage, finding the space can be tricky. Also, the lids won't close until the attachments are on the blender, so they're not easy to store in the cupboard.
Our Ninja Professional Plus Kitchen System with Auto-IQ review has more details
Best food processor attachment
I tested a few different options for this category, including the KitchenAid food processor attachment which you can tack onto your stand mixer. But the Vitamix's power and precision was unparalleled. So, if you already own a Vitamix blender, you can save time, space and money with this handy attachment.
Switching from blender to food processor mode is surprisingly simple. The attachment slots securely onto the base, and it’s designed to be intuitive. Once you attach it, you’ll find it just as stable and secure as a dedicated food processor.
The Vitamix food processor attachment comes with a variety of blades and discs that allow for chopping, slicing, shredding, and even dough kneading. I blitzed up some chickpeas for hummus, cheese for a pizza and cabbage for a salad. I'm already in love with my Vitamix, but this attachment gets another round of five stars from me.
Read our guide to the best Vitamix blenders and attachments here.
The ones that just missed the list
When we tested this, our experts were impressed with the huge capacity and consistently excellent results across different functions. It's great quality, but it's eye-waterinlgy expensive and tricky to store. Plus, you'll need to wash it by hand.
This is surprisingly great for a processor that costs under $100. I wasn't keen on the plastic-y materials and lack or precision, but for a cheap purchase, it does the job. However, I'd be more inclined to buy a KitchenAid chopper in the sales.
There's more detail in our full Magic Bullet Kitchen Express review.
How to choose the best food processor for you:
The best food processor can be an invaluable tool for prepping dinners and desserts. Whether you're whipping up a batch of fresh pesto, kneading dough, or chopping vegetables, a good food processor can make cooking easier and less stressful.
Choosing the right one depends on how often you'll use it and the tasks you'll perform, as different models excel at different jobs. Here's my guide to help you decide:
Motor
For heavy-duty tasks like chopping root vegetables, shredding hard fruits, or kneading dough, you’ll need a processor with a powerful motor. For instance, the Magimix or Cuisinart 14-cup food processor. Their robust motors can handle tough ingredients, making it ideal for serious cooks or large families.
Features
High-end food processors often come with a range of attachments for added versatility. You can make juicers with the Cuisinart and the Magimix is a pastry lover’s dream, capable of kneading perfect doughs or emulsifying sauces.
The KitchenAid Mini Chopper comes with a whisk for whipping cream, which is a great choice if you frequently make desserts but don't have an electric mixer. It's also perfect for smaller, simpler tasks, such as chopping nuts or mixing mayonnaise, without the bells and whistles.
Capacity
When choosing the best food processor, consider its capacity. The Cuisinart 14-Cup Food Processor is ideal for large households or anyone who loves to batch cook, while smaller options like the KitchenAid Mini Chopper are better suited for one or two-person households or lighter tasks.
Design
The best food processor is not just a kitchen tool; it's a stylish kitchen companion. The Cuisinart 14-Cup Food Processor has a timeless design that you can proudly display and show off.
If you have limited counter space, a storage-friendly design is essential. The KitchenAid Mini Chopper is compact enough to store in a cabinet, but I also think it's cute enough to leave out without dominating your space.
How we test these food processors
Our food processors have been thoroughly tested in our test kitchen and at home, to make sure they are useful for real home cooks. Having trained at culinary school, I stay up-to-date on the latest technology by consulting with my chef colleagues and other industry experts, so we can bring you the best food processor recommendations.
As well as hands-on testing, we also research customer reviews and bear them in mind when we're ranking the products in our hot list.
When testing the best food processors we made sure to use every attachment on offer, meaning we will often slice, chop, grate, spiralize, and even make pastry and pizza dough. We also like to work with a mixture of personal and brand-supplied recipes. A lot of brands include recipes with their products, which can be a great way of getting to know a food processor, but it's also important that the machine will work with our own recipes. We also test each food processor for weeks, not once, to ensure we offer you more than just a first impression.
For more insight into our hands-on review process, refer to our Homes & Gardens review guidelines.
Meet The Team
Lydia is the Kitchen Appliances Editor for Homes & Gardens, testing everything from mixers and juicers to air fryers and frying pans. Lydia trained in cookery at Leiths School of Food & Wine and was previously Recipe Editor for Mindful Chef. She’s also worked for healthy food brands, like Deliciously Ella. Lydia is professionally trained, but she tests all products in her home kitchen, making sure they're perfect for real home cooks.
Millie Fender is the Reviews Editor on the Homes & Gardens Ecommerce team. Millie specializes in reviewing cooking appliances, and has built up a deep knowledge of food processors, mixers and blenders in particular. Millie loves to bake, so she will take any excuse to review stand mixers and other baking essentials. All of Millie's reviews are conducted at home, meaning she uses these products in her own kitchen, the way they're designed to be used.
Camryn Rabideau is a product reviewer who has been testing small kitchen appliances (as well as other home goods) for several years. She’s tested everything from toasters to oil infusion machines, and as an avid baker, she loves trying out any gadgets that promise to make her creations more delicious or easier to bake, especially food processors. Camryn does her product testing from her small homestead in beautiful Rhode Island.
Food processor FAQs
What size food processor is best?
Our advice is to never buy something your kitchen can't accommodate. Yes, it's tempting to buy the largest and most impressive food processor out there, but if it won't fit onto crowded counters or in kitchen cupboards, you'll grow to resent it very quickly.
Not all food processors take up a lot of space though. The KitchenAid options in our guide have a small footprint and a good value price tag to match.
Often it's the motor found in the base of a food processor that makes it so space-consuming, so opting for a mighty Ninja food processor could be costly in terms of space, but worth it for the high-powered functions.
Food processor vs blender: what's the difference?
If you've ever tried to make a smoothie in a food processor or chop veggies in a blender, you'll know they're very different machines. Because food processors have flatter bowls they're best suited to chopping dry ingredients, whereas the vertical design of a blender's pitcher means you'll have perfectly smooth drinks in seconds.
If you're trying to choose between a blender versus a food processor, there's always the option of buying a model that can do both. We have a whole buying guide dedicated to the best food processor blender combos.
How much does a food processor cost?
The best food processor doesn't have to cost much. In fact, the models in our guide start at around the $100 mark, which really isn't bad for a powerful kitchen appliance that will last you for years. As they get smarter though, food processors also get more expensive. The typical food processor could cost as much as $250 for a truly multi-functional and high-end model.
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