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Abigail Bailey is the updates writer for the kitchen team. Her subjects have included ice cream scoops and salad spinners. steel coil
After a recent round of testing, we have new picks for a rotary grater and a space-saving grater from OXO. Our picks for box grater and zester remain the same.
I am a hash brown connoisseur, and there is absolutely a right and a wrong way to make them.
The best hash browns are objectively shreds (sorry, I don’t make the rules). After tinkering with frozen and pre-shredded options, I finally achieved Waffle House–level success with a humble box grater. The results were beautiful, crispy patties, made possible by a tool that formed optimal long, even shreds of potato.
During my quest for hash brown perfection, I also learned that there’s more than one way to grate a potato. Graters come in all shapes and sizes, from the standard box style to paddles and rotary drum graters. Each is uniquely suited to different needs and tasks.
We’ve tested 44 models since 2015, so we know what makes a grater, well, great. The Cuisipro 4 Sided Box Grater was the sharpest and most versatile box grater we tested, and it shredded cheeses, carrots, and potatoes with efficiency and ease.
This razor-sharp box grater is the only tool we’ve found that easily handles any kind of zesting, grating, or shredding job.
This handheld zester has sharp teeth and a narrow face so you reach every nook and cranny on a lemon or a block of cheese.
This rotary grater can blitz through lots of food, such as potatoes, carrots, and cheese, with ease.
If you find the Cuisipro grater is intimidatingly sharp, this is a more approachable option that also folds flat for easy storage.
May be out of stock
This razor-sharp box grater is the only tool we’ve found that easily handles any kind of zesting, grating, or shredding job.
The Cuisipro 4-Sided Box Grater is a versatile, exceptionally sharp box grater, with larger etched teeth for jobs like shredding potatoes and carrots, and smaller ones for finer tasks, such as shredding cheese. With a useful slicer and zester—uncommon among other box graters—it can also make a fine parmesan snow or slice cucumbers almost as neatly as a mandolin.
This grater has a significant lifespan—we’ve had one in the test kitchen for at least seven years, and it’s still going strong. It excels, in part, because it combines the versatility of a traditional box grater with the sharp etched teeth often found on rasp and paddle graters. The Cuisipro grater’s superior quality—and its limited lifetime warranty—justify its higher price.
This handheld zester has sharp teeth and a narrow face so you reach every nook and cranny on a lemon or a block of cheese.
The Microplane Premium Classic Series Zester is razor-sharp, zesting and shredding more efficiently than most other paddle or rasp graters we tested. The narrow, easy-to-maneuver plane even has holes on the curved edges, which allow you to get in hard-to-reach spots on a lemon. It also makes quick work of a hard block of cheese to blanket a pasta dish in pillowy fluff.
This rotary grater can blitz through lots of food, such as potatoes, carrots, and cheese, with ease.
At first glance, the Susteas Rotary Cheese Grater looks a little gimmicky, like one of those late-night infomercial gadgets that seems too good to be true. But it lives up to its promise, tearing through potatoes and carrots with remarkable ease.
Instead of the bulky interchangeable drums typical of other rotary graters we tested, this one comes with a single drum frame with swappable blade panels in five sizes. The Susteas grater stuck more securely to our counter than any other rotary grater we tested, and the blades store away neatly in a handy holder when not in use.
If you find the Cuisipro grater is intimidatingly sharp, this is a more approachable option that also folds flat for easy storage.
May be out of stock
While the Cuisipro box grater is the buy-it-for-life option, it’s also wicked sharp, with holes like little blades. If this sounds intimidating and you prefer an effective grater with a little less bite, the OXO Good Grips Etched Two-Fold Grater is a good choice.
Though the holes are not as sharp as that of the Cuisipro grater, it still makes serviceable shreds, and it was one of the smoothest operators we tested. Because its angle is less steep than a regular box grater’s, we were able to run the food up and down over the surface in one swift motion without it getting caught awkwardly on the holes, which was the case with other models we tried. Plus, it folds flat for easy storage.
I’m a member of Wirecutter’s kitchen team, and I’ve written about ice cream scoops, salad spinners, and more. Previously, I worked at Good Housekeeping testing products and writing reviews. This guide also builds on work by Winnie Yang and Anna Perling, who wrote previous versions.
We like to think of a good grater as an analog alternative to a food processor. It’s a compact, inexpensive tool that can perform a multitude of kitchen tasks and is especially convenient for moderate amounts of food prep.
Although it’s easy to pigeon-hole graters as performers of a few basic duties, like shredding cheese and potatoes, they’re actually incredibly versatile.
Box graters can reduce onions into a pulp for sauces, make ribbons of cabbage for coleslaw, or prep carrots for carrot cake. Finer holes are ideal for hard cheeses, citrus zest, and nutmeg. When they’re sharp enough, slicers can do the work of a mandoline.
Rotary graters are even more efficient and are useful for both cooks and bakers. They shred the usual suspects, like potatoes and carrots, and can also grind cookies and nuts for baked goods. The closed design protects your knuckles, too.
When looking for the best graters, we wanted to find tools that excelled at their specific tasks, whether that be zesting, grating, shredding, slicing, or all of the above. We started by considering the types of graters we were testing and the jobs they can tackle.
Classic box graters are most versatile—they have multiple teeth sizes, are comfortable to hold, and contain their own shreds. But paddles and rasps can be more maneuverable for tasks like zesting lemons or grating cheese straight into a pot. And rotary graters are particularly efficient and can do things like grind nuts.
Holes on all styles of graters are made by stamping, etching, or a combination of the two. Stamped holes are mechanically punched out of a steel sheet, and the side of the hole that protrudes catches the food and forces it against the edge to shear it apart. Etching uses a chemical process to corrode thinner, more flexible sheets of metal, creating very sharp, fine teeth that catch and shave off pieces of food. Most of our picks have etched teeth, but the Susteas Rotary Cheese Grater uses stamped blades.
We looked for these traits across all styles of graters that we tested:
In our tests we considered how sturdy each model felt, how intuitive it was to operate, and if it was easy to clean.
To test box graters, we grated potatoes and carrots on the larger holes and Pecorino Romano on the smaller holes. If the box grater had a zesting side, we zested lemons. In previous rounds of testing, we also shredded mozzarella on the coarse holes and grated ginger on the fine ones. We compared the shreds from each grater, noting if they were short and thick or long and thin, and how uniform they were.
We also tested rotary graters with potatoes, carrots, and cheese. We used them for some tasks that aren’t feasible with a box grater, such as crushing graham crackers and cookies for pie crusts, grinding walnuts, and even grating frozen fruit juice for faux snow cones.
We tested each zester by zesting lemons and limes, as well as Pecorino Romano cheese. We looked for zest that was light and thin, able to disappear seamlessly into cooking or baking applications, and for fluffy cheese that would melt away into a sauce. In previous testing, we also grated nutmeg on zesters.
We also worked with a panel of testers, whom we paid for their time. The group includes folks who use a wheelchair; have arthritis, limb differences, or limited hand dexterity; are over 65 years old; or are over 6 feet tall. We invited them to test our picks to see which they found most convenient to use.
This razor-sharp box grater is the only tool we’ve found that easily handles any kind of zesting, grating, or shredding job.
The Cuisipro 4 Sided Box Grater is an exceptional tool with sharp etched teeth that swiftly shred a wide range of foods. It’s efficient and versatile, and the only model we tested that has four sides—coarse and medium holes, fine holes for zesting, and a slicer—that all work well. This grater’s useful extra features—like a non-slip removable base and measurement markings—helped distinguish it from the rest.
It grates quickly and easily. The teeth on the Cuisipro grater are extremely sharp. Grating requires little effort, and food glides down the sides with minimal resistance. Some of the other graters we tested, like the OXO Good Grips Etched Box Grater With Removable Zester, forced us to stop mid-swipe because food got caught on the teeth.
Every side cuts well. The coarse holes shredded our carrots and potatoes easily, leaving thin, long strands that were consistent in size and shape. Grating Pecorino Romano on the medium teeth was a breeze, leaving us with cheesy snow. The zester produced finely shaved lemon rind, though it wasn’t as fine and fluffy as the results from the Microplane Premium Classic Series Zester. (The zest sticks to the inside of the grater though, so you either have to wack it against the counter or fish around in the box grater to swipe it off.)
The slicer on the Cuisipro grater is sharp enough to replace a mandoline in a pinch, producing thin potato slices suitable for a gratin or thick-cut potato chips. In comparison, the slicers on stamped boxed graters we tested weren’t sharp enough to cleanly cut potatoes, and they created lopsided, uneven disks.
It’s comfortable to use. We liked the Cuisipro grater’s grippy silicone handle. It fit nicely in our hand and provided a sturdy hold to keep the box grater stable.
It’s also sturdy. The metal doesn’t bend or warp when you push against it, nor does it bow under pressure while you’re grating.
The design is thoughtful. The grater has measurement markings for both milliliters and cups, so you can eyeball how much food is inside the grater.
The Cuisipro grater is also backed by an impressive limited lifetime warranty.
We’ve been using the Cuisipro grater in our test kitchen for at least seven years. It’s still sharp; in a blind test between the old Cuisipro grater and a new one we purchased, it was hard to identify which was old and which was new.
Much like a mandoline, the Cuisipro grater will eat your fingers and not even feel bad about it.
A few Wirecutter staffers have been using the Cuisipro grater in their own homes since we made it a pick in 2015. Senior staff writer Michael Sullivan told us, “I’ve had the Cuisipro for more than five years, and it’s still impressively sharp. I hate cleaning a food processor, so unless I have a lot of cheese to grate, I reach for the Cuisipro. It’s by far the sharpest grater I’ve used.”
While the sharp teeth are a plus when used responsibly, they can be intimidating. If you want something a little friendlier, check out the OXO Good Grips Etched Two-Fold Grater—it’s effective, just not as sharp. Or, if you don’t want your fingers near grater teeth at all, the Susteas Rotary Cheese Grater might be your speed.
This handheld zester has sharp teeth and a narrow face so you reach every nook and cranny on a lemon or a block of cheese.
The Microplane Premium Classic Series Zester is one of the sharpest zesters we tested. It’s slender, easy to maneuver around curvy citrus fruit, and produces fine, fluffy zest that will melt away in whatever you’re preparing.
It reaches all the spots. The rounded-off edges make it easy to navigate nooks and crannies, and the narrow grating surface is great for precision, so you can even zest the tip of a lemon.
It’s good at fine cutting. The Microplane zester’s sharp etched teeth removed lemon rind while barely cutting into any bitter pith. And if you’re averse to mincing, it can grate aromatics such as garlic or ginger into a near pulp that will melt away in sauces.
It turns cheese into snow. Hard cheeses, like Parmesan or Pecorino Romano, are also well served by the Microplane zester. It transformed firm blocks of cheese into wispy curls that melted in our mouths.
It’s convenient to use. The Microplane zester has a sturdy handle that’s big and comfortable to grip, so it’s easy to zest or shred directly into a bowl or pot. We’ve read a handful of reviews saying that the plastic handle breaks off, but several Wirecutter staffers have owned this tool for years without problems.
hot rolled process It can go in the dishwasher (but probably shouldn’t). While this tool is dishwasher-safe, it’ll stay sharp longer if you wash it by hand. A quick rinse immediately after use will save you from having to scrub off dried-on food.