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Even if you don’t think there’s any way your little kitchen could need one, the best stock pot is an essential piece of cookware that is the solution to a lot of cooking needs. It’s simply the most practical vessel for boiling pasta and making big batches of sauce, steaming corn, whipping up lobster boils in the summer, or boiling russets for mashed potatoes at Thanksgiving—as well as for simmering beans, stews, and chili, and, of course, making stock.
The gulf between the best stockpot and a bad stockpot is wide. Pick the wrong one and you could end up with a clunky pot that you curse every time you lug it out of storage. A good stockpot stores easily, is durable and sturdy, not too heavy, and offers versatility.
We tested seven highly rated stock pots—all with a capacity of eight quarts, which we think is the perfect size (more on that later)—to find the very best model on the market. Read on for our top picks. For more details on how we tested our stockpots and the models that didn’t make the cut scroll further down.
Best overall stockpot: All-Clad Tri-Ply Stainless-Steel Stock Pot
The All-Clad eight-quart stock pot is the shortest and widest model we tested, more the shape of a Dutch oven than a traditional stock pot, which is something that originally seemed like a negative—it could be harder to get on a burner. But when making stock with larger bones and carcass pieces—like those from a Thanksgiving turkey—the width is a welcome feature, helping to keep everything submerged. And with smaller volumes of food, the shape is much easier for reaching into corners, flipping cubes of meat while browning, or nudging a mirepoix around while steam is billowing from it.
Additionally, its squatter shape is significantly better for using in the oven, making it the most versatile option if you don’t yet own an oven-friendly vessel like a Dutch oven for your braised short ribs, baked beans, and carnitas.
The shape is also the easiest one to store: It stacks nicely with the other pots, so adding it to our kitchen didn’t require moving things around to make space for a tall, bulky new piece. And the shorter shape means that it’s more likely to accommodate standard shelf heights in cupboards and pantries.
The All-Clad’s riveted handles aren’t as big and looping as those of some of the other pots we tested, but we love their trademark flat shape, which we find particularly sturdy and easy to grip when transporting a full pot from the sink to the stovetop to the oven and back again—solid and durable even with oven mitts on.
The three-ply construction, an aluminum core and layers of stainless steel, that makes this type of cookware so expensive does provide even heat distribution throughout the entire pot—not just at the base, like budget stock pots do. It also features what All-Clad calls a “starburst finish,” which helps keep food from sticking and makes it easy to clean.
The downside to this stock pot? It is not cheap. But according to reviewers (and the members of Team Epi who have this and other All-Clad tri-ply products in their own kitchens), the lifetime warranty is worth the money; you’ll have this pot for a very long time, and it will serve you incredibly well. And while we always advise using oven mitts if you need to touch any part of a hot stock pot, in side-by-side tests we found its smaller, shorter handle got hotter than others, just in case you’re the type to make an errant, mitt-free grab.
Best budget stockpot: Cuisinart Chef’s Classic Stainless-Steel Stock Pot
If you’re looking to spend on a still-high-quality stock pot, the Cuisinart Chef’s Classic is the best bet. Middle of the pack height- and width-wise, it’s a great Goldilocks pot that doesn’t take up too much stove space. The mirror-stain finish is shiny and good looking, and the “Cool Grip” handles stay relatively cool on the stovetop, particularly compared to our top pick. It has an aluminum-core base that conducts well and provides even heating at the base and makes it induction friendly.
We also found the measurement line inside the pot, with both metric and Imperial volumes, came in handy. We wouldn’t necessarily use the post as a measuring cup, but it’s a handy reference if you need to keep track of how much liquid is in there in order to know if you’ve reduced it enough or need to add more water or stock to something.
One highlight specific to the Cuisinart stock pot: It has a superlative lid. It’s the tightest fitting lid we tested, which the brand calls a “Flavor Lock” thanks to a neat design that doubles as a dripless pouring rim. While all of the stainless-steel models we tried featured a flared lip at the top of the pot, Cuisinart’s was the flattest and thinnest, which made for a great seal for the lid and easy, spill-free pouring.
This is a taller style of stock pot, and its shape isn’t nearly as versatile for using in the oven. Like all stainless-steel cookware, it’s still oven-safe, but you’d need to seriously rearrange the racks if you want to use it for an oven braise. It’s also about 2 pounds lighter than the All-Clad, which could be a plus if you’re in search of a lightweight stock pot that’s easy to move, but does raise some concerns about its durability and whether or not it’ll warp. That said, Cuisinart offers a lifetime warranty, which doesn’t necessarily mean that it’ll last a lifetime, but you can get it replaced if it ever gets damaged.
How we tested
This should not come as a surprise to you: To test these stock pots, we made a bunch of stock, following a very basic chicken stock recipe that relied on collagen-heavy wings. We made a double batch in each pot, yielding about four quarts.
Then we tested heat conduction by boiling water and cooking 24 ounces of lasagna noodles in each pot. We tracked how long it took to bring the water to temperature and how easy it was to drain the noodles after they’d reached an al dente texture.
We also cooked 1 pound of beans in each pot, as a test of how easy they were for using slightly smaller volumes of food, and what it felt like to have to reach inside the pot while it’s hot.
Lastly, we moved the pans in and out of the oven while hot and full, to test their maneuverability and oven-friendliness.
In addition to the cooking tests, we took note of the general features of each pot: their heights, widths, weights, handle shapes, lid material and fit. Things we considered
What we looked for
How big of a stock pot do you really need? We think you need a large stockpot, but not too large. We believe that for the average home, eight quarts is the perfect size. Go smaller and you teeter into normal pot territory, only able to make a small amount of broth. Go larger, like a 12-quart stock pot and storage and maneuverability become real issues. Eight-quart stock pots can boil a few pounds of pasta, yield more than four quarts of stock, and cook a large batch of long-simmering Sunday sauce, all while stacking and stowing easily when not in use. You definitely need one big pot in your kitchen, and eight quarts is exactly how big.
Even after controlling for capacity, the shape and height of the stock pots we tested varied greatly. Finding the perfect pot on the spectrum from short and wide to tall and narrow has a lot to do with personal preference, but there are some universal factors to consider. Shorter and wider pots stacked more easily with the others we own, which made them easier to store after use, easier to reach into for stirring and flipping foods, and also more versatile for using in the oven. The narrower pots, however, took up less space on our stove, which made it easier to do other cooking tasks while our stock simmered away on a back burner.
Pot thickness and handle size and shape are important with larger stock pots, specifically; moving a full pot from the sink to the stove or the stove to the oven with oven mitts on is a challenge if your cookware is super heavy or difficult to grasp. We lugged each pot, full of boiling water, around the kitchen a bit to make sure it was easy to maneuver.
Almost every stock pot we tested was stainless steel, with a matching stainless-steel lid. For even cooking, lifelong durability, cooktop compatibility (induction or gas), and dishwasher friendliness, it’s really the only choice, which is why our top and budget picks were both made from this material. Two models (the RSVP and Cook N Home), though stainless steel themselves, came with a glass lid. It was nice to be able to see through the lid to check if our water was boiling we suppose, but the lids were harder to clean and weren’t nearly as durable. The one outlier was the Le Creuset, which is enamel-coated carbon steel. We stayed away from nonstick stock pots because, as with all nonstick cookware, the coatings only last a few years, can’t be used over high heat, and it won’t come handy for most stock pot projects. While we concede that nonstick frying pan can be useful there’s no reason to have a nonstick stock pot (if you’re looking for our best nonstick skillets, click here). Similarly we stayed away from all aluminum stock pots because we thought they wouldn’t be as durable.
Other pots we tested
The Cooks Standard 8-quart Stainless Steel stock pot is a solid budget pick and has a 10-year warranty. It’s very similar to the Cuisinart, but just a tad taller, apparently due to a thicker aluminum-core plate at the bottom. Its looping handles are easy to grip and stay cooler than smaller ones while over the heat. But we prefer the flatter handle shape of the handles on the Cuisinart and the All-Clad—they’re just as roomy, but a little thicker, and their flatness provides better support when moving the pots around when full and heavy. Finally, the extra inch-or-so of height on the Cooks Standard limits its versatility.
The Made-In Stainless Clad stock pot is another wide and short option, second in width only to the winning All-Clad model. We appreciated the wide, flat handles on this pot, which made it easy to move even while wearing bulky oven mitts, and the five-ply construction, which makes it oven-safe up to a whopping 800°F. The price point knocked this pot out of the running for the budget category, and as a brand, Made-In is just too new to be able to claim the kind of long term durability of All-Clad. But we really like this pot and with extended use could easily see it claiming the top spot in the future.
The Le Creuset Enamel-on-Steel 8-Quart stock pot with Lid is, like most other products from this iconic brand, a total looker. The color choices are fun and playful, but online reviewers warn that the coating chips over time and bemoan the fact that it isn’t dishwasher-safe. The tall, skinny shape took up little space on our stove, heated quickly, and featured a “stay cool” knob on the lid, but we preferred the stainless-steel models we tested for durability.
The RSVP International Endurance 8-Quart stock pot was the tallest, narrowest, and lightest weight stock pot we tested. We liked the large loop handles, which were comfortable to hold, and the glass lid with a steam vent, which makes it easy to see when water is boiling or keep an eye on your sauce. While it’s unlikely you’d need to go much hotter for anything in this pot, the lid is oven-safe only to 450°F. Also, the pot felt a little flimsier than the others we tested.
The Cook N Home Stainless-Steel 8-Quart stock pot made our testing list because of its thousands of five-star reviews on Amazon. It’s very inexpensive, easy to clean, and features an encapsulated aluminum disc in the base for even heating. But despite the fact that it weighs the same as the All-Clad (five pounds) , it felt thinner in our hands. Similar to the RSVP model, we liked the tempered glass lid for peeking in on our cooking projects, but the silicone handles and topper preclude the pot from being oven-safe in a useful way.
The takeaway
The best eight-quart stock pot on the market today is the All-Clad Tri-Ply Stainless-Steel Stock Pot: It’s sturdy but not overly heavy, well-proportioned for easy storage and use, and built to last a lifetime. If you’d like to spend less than on a pot that is slightly taller, narrower, and lighter but similarly effective, the Cuisinart Chef’s Classic Stainless-Steel Stock Pot is the move.
