The best cookers for frying, baking, roasting, and grilling
Cookers are all-in-one, stand-alone appliances that come with oven and grill sections as well as a built-in hob, making them a kitchen essential. From whipping up full Sunday roasts and baking batches of fairy cakes, to frying pancakes, grilling and beyond, you can make fuss-free meals that are sure to impress.
The best cookers should last you for years so it’s important to find the right model for your home. You can choose between freestanding, built-in, single or double range cookers, as well as a range of sizes and styles.
The Good Housekeeping Institute has rigorously tested four market-leading models in our quest to find the ultimate cooker for every home chef. Here are our results at a glance but keep reading to check out our experts’ in-depth reviews and everything you need to know before buying.
What to consider when buying a new cooker
As a cooker can make or break your culinary experience, it’s important to consider these key factors.
Type: While most are quick and easy to install, the type of cooker you can get will be largely determined by your kitchen’s fuel supply, whether it’s gas, electric or dual fuel with a gas hob and electric oven combined.
Size: You will also need to take into account your kitchen space. Cookers are typically 60cm wide, but you can also get models up to 90cm in width.
Hob type: It’s important to understand the different hob types available on the market. You’ll have to choose between gas, electric, induction and ceramic hobs, and it can be confusing to work out what’s best for you and your cooking needs. Check out our handy guide for more information.
Installing a cooker
Installing a freestanding cooker is relatively uncomplicated, as they’re designed to fit in a space between your cabinets and work surface where there is a fuel supply.
You’ll need to make sure the cooker is the right size for the cavity you intend to use and that the surrounding space will accommodate the oven door when it’s fully open.
You should also check the cavity is near the power supply you want to use, be it gas or electricity, and there’s enough space around the power supply for proper installation.
Electric cookers require installation by a qualified electrician, as they typically need to be wired into a 30amp socket (a conventional electric socket is only 13amps) and gas options should be installed by a Gas Safe registered engineer.
How we test cookers
At the Good Housekeeping Institute, we put each model through a series of cooking trials. We make a full roast dinner including a chicken, roast potatoes and apple crumble, and then use the grill to see how well it toasts a full tray of bread. We also bake batches of fairy cakes and make a rich fruit cake. We look for crispy potatoes, well-risen fluffy cakes, and even cooking across the board.
We look at how hot the oven door gets during use to make sure there’s no risk of burning, and check the temperature accuracy of the oven using a thermocouple.
For the hobs, we time how long it takes to boil water on the different cooking zones and test the heat retention of each hotplate. We cook pancakes too, scoring them on level of browning to assess heat distribution. With gas hobs, we also check how stable pans are on each.
Finally, we see how easy each hob is to clean before evaluating the design, ease of use, and instructions of each cooker and giving it an overall score.
Classic Matte Black Single Cavity Cooker with Induction Hob C9IMN2
Score: 85/100
While this stylish matte black cooker is expensive, it’s a worthwhile investment for large families. It’s the widest cooker we’ve tested, measuring 90cm across and offering up to 115 litres of oven capacity – so cooking a roast dinner should be easier than ever.
Speaking of roasts, in testing, our potatoes were a bit of a mixed bag, with only some crisping up. The rest of our cooking tests were a big success though, with testers achieving fluffy fairy cakes and a beautifully moist fruit cake. The oven door remained cool throughout too, so there shouldn’t be any cause for concern if you have little ones running around.
The control panel on the induction hob is easy to use and the flexible cooking zones offer versatility when cooking with large pans. It boiled water in an average of six to seven minutes (similar to the other cookers in this list) but was slow to cool after use. We did manage to cook some top-quality, evenly browned pancakes though, which certainly won us over.
Richmond Deluxe Dual Fuel Cooker
Score: 83/100
If you don’t like waiting for the oven to pre-heat (or tend to forgo it altogether), then let us introduce you to this speedy design. On test, it took just seven minutes to reach 160 degrees on both non-fan and fan-assisted settings, so it’ll be ready for cooking by the time you’ve finished your food prep. There’s a rapid pre-heat function too, should you cut things even finer.
Testers praised its beautifully moist roast chicken, and our potatoes came out crisp and fluffy, proving there were no pesky hot spots. They recorded a high temperature on the oven door though, so be careful to use an oven glove when cooking.
The hob had room for multiple pots at once and testers were impressed with the evenly cooked pancakes – they were practically perfect.
HDCEC6C20B Ceramic Electric Cooker
Score: 80/100
One major bonus of this Hisense cooker is its extra air fryer and pizza modes, which opens up a whole new world of cooking possibilities. Along with all the normal tests, we cooked a whole chicken on air fryer mode, and, within an hour, the skin had crisped up even better than when we cooked it in the oven. The pizza mode wasn’t as revolutionary – the cheese could have been more melted and the base crispier.
Back to its normal functions though and everything cooked well, delivering moist cakes and a perfectly browned apple crumble. Just note, the oven door was quite hot, averaging almost 53 degrees in testing.
As a whole, the cooker is easy to use, and testers liked the responsive touchscreen panel on the ceramic hob. It lacks the dual-cooking zones and rapid heat functions of some of the premium models but it pre-heated in seven to eight minutes, so you won’t be waiting around long.
Farmhouse 60DF Freestanding Dual Fuel Mini Range Cooker
Score: 79/100
This is another fantastic cooker that performed well in testing. Its gas hob produced pancakes that were brilliantly cooked and evenly browned, and it boiled a litre of water within five minutes.
On to the oven, which has a reasonable 70-litre capacity and cooked a roast dinner in an hour and 10 minutes. There were two overdone potatoes at the back of the oven, but the rest were nicely cooked. Just note, the oven door was hot at 49-degrees, so may not suit families with young children.
You won’t need an air fryer though, thanks to the clever built-in function which lets you crisp up fries without any extra oil – handy if you’re looking for a space-saving solution.
HDM67I9H2CB/U Double Electric Cooker
Score: 78/100
This user-friendly hob features four automatic programmes with set temperatures for boiling, melting, slow cooking and keeping food warm if you’re not quite ready for dishing up.
Even heat distribution helped us achieve near-perfect pancakes and we appreciated the intuitive controls that meant we didn’t even need to refer to the manual. Testers found the hob was slow to cool down once we’d switched it off, though.
Onto the ovens, and the main 77-litre electric oven performed well, nailing a family-sized roast dinner with beautifully crisp potatoes, well-cooked chicken, and a delicious apple crumble, all cooked well within the expected timeframe. Note, the top oven or grill is on the smaller side (the grill pan fits six slices of toast comfortably), so it may not suit larger families.
Electric Freestanding double cooker ID67V9KMW/UK
Score: 77/100
You won’t get all the bells and whistles with this budget cooker but it’s still a reliable buy. Boiling water on the hob took around the same time as the other models we’ve tested (averaging seven minutes) and our experts quickly got to grips with the controls, without needing to refer to the instructions.
You’d be back to cooking in no time though if you did need the manual as it boasts clear safety information, a thorough run-through of the cooker’s functions, clear diagrams, and plenty of troubleshooting tips to help you on your way.
The main oven struggled to achieve the perfect roasties, but delivered a beautifully risen fruit cake and nicely browned roast chicken.
How to clean your cooker
Hob cleaning
Having a hob that’s easy to wipe down and clean is very useful if you cook a lot. Induction and ceramic hobs are usually the easiest to clean as they have smooth surfaces. Induction hobs are also designed to stop food from spilling over or burning on the surface, so they shouldn’t need to be cleaned as often.
Gas and electric hobs are more difficult to clean. If you have a gas hob, some pan-supports and spillage wells are dishwasher-safe. Otherwise, a cream cleaner and damp cloth should be enough. For electric or ceramic hobs, stubborn stains and burned-on deposits should be removed with a special hob scraper that won’t damage the glass.
Cleaning your oven
Most ovens have triple or quadruple-glazed glass doors that can be removed for easy, efficient cleaning. Check the manufacturer’s guidelines for details of your particular oven as this can vary.
Many ovens have enamel liners, which are generally easy to clean as it’s harder for food residues to stick to the smooth surface. With enamel lining, it’s best to clean these regularly to avoid a build-up of food residues that make your oven less efficient. With the right tools and techniques, this can be effortless.
We have a thorough guide on how to clean your oven - and keep it clean.
Pyrolytic cleaning
A pyrolytic cleaning programme is an automatic cleaning mode available on some higher-spec models. Using a combination of pressure and very high temperatures, the oven converts grease and food residues to ash. This collects on the floor of the oven, and you can sweep it up when the cleaning has finished. You can't find this feature on a range cooker, so keep this in mind when weighing up your options.
Catalytic liners
Many ovens have catalytic liners that transform the oven into a self-cleaning machine when it's set at high temperatures. These liners absorb and break down grease and food residues, which then burn away during cooking. Cookers with this feature should never be cleaned manually, and the liners may need replacing during the lifetime of the cooker. You may need to ‘service’ the liners sometimes, by putting the oven on its highest heat setting for about an hour.
Cleaning your extractor fan
Sometimes we’re so busy cooking up something delicious on the hob that we forget all about the extractor fan above us, which has been busy eliminating smoke, steam and odours produced from cooking.
It’s one of those forgotten areas of the kitchen that doesn’t get as much attention in the cleaning routine as it deserves or needs. While we may remember to wipe down the hob after use, the extractor fan gets progressively grimier and greasier and gets clogged with dust and dirt.
For our foolproof guide, here’s how you can look after your extractor fan and keep your kitchen smelling fresh.
Our verdict on cookers
Our winning cooker is Smeg’s Classic Matte Black Single Cavity Cooker with an Induction Hob. It might be pricey but our testers were won over by its large capacity and excellent cooking abilities.
It does measure 90cm in width though, so if you’re looking for something smaller, our runner-up, the Hisense Hi6 Max is an excellent alternative.
For a budget pick, we recommend Indesit’s Electric Freestanding double cooker which was nice and easy to use.
Why you should trust the Good Housekeeping Institute
The Good Housekeeping Institute has been testing products for 100 years and our homes testing team have used this expertise to trial each cooker and hold them all to the same rigorous protocols.
All the feedback from our lab is then handed to our homes writer, Megan Geall, who looks after our other guides on hobs and ovens. She knows what to look for when it comes to these essential kitchen products and processes all the information into easy-read reviews.
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