About
We cook the same three recipes in every pot
Simmer & Set exists because appliance listings are written by the people selling them. A slow cooker that “heats fast” and a pressure cooker that is “whisper quiet” are claims, not numbers. So we bench them.
The method
Every cooker runs three fixed jobs: a six-hour chuck braise, a weeknight white rice, and a 40-minute bean stew. During each run we log time from cold to serving temperature and peak sound pressure at one metre, on the same meter, in the same room. Those two figures are the ones marked measured across the site.
The score
The lab score out of 10 is a flat average of three axes — build, value and precision — that exist for every pot regardless of type, so a rice cooker and a pressure multicooker can share a column without either printing a dash. Owner star ratings are shown separately and never folded into the lab score.
What we test
- Pressure Multicookers — 18 tested
- Slow Cookers — 15 tested
- Multi-Cookers — 9 tested
- Rice Cookers — 4 tested
- Air-Fry Multicookers — 4 tested
Money
Retailer links are affiliate links. We earn a commission when you buy through them, at no cost to you. No brand is shown a score before publication, and no placement in any ranking is for sale. The fastest pot on the site (Ninja Foodi 9-in-1 Deluxe XL Multicooker, 7.5 minutes to temperature) got there by being fast.
Corrections
Specifications change between production runs. If a figure here no longer matches the unit you received, tell us and we will re-bench it.