The best rice cookers for perfect results, tried and tested in a real kitchen

Cooking rice may seem like an easy task, but getting it just right can be a skill. The Nutribullet everygrain cooker takes away all the guesswork. It has five presets, so whether you’re cooking brown rice, white rice, oats, quinoa, or grains, it’s got you covered.

The results were super consistent each time during testing. I didn’t just test rice in it, either – I also used the appliance to cook quinoa and oats, and the preset programs worked well. When it came to cooking rice, the appliance cooked white rice perfectly evenly (no burnt bottoms here), resulting in fluffy grains.

One thing I did notice was if you’re cooking a smaller portion of rice, for example, you can’t rely on the timer, as your rice will be done a lot quicker. The pot actually sets two cups of rice as the minimum for the guide lines within the pot but there was nothing in the instructions saying this was the minimum you cook at a time.

I was also impressed with how the appliance handled brown rice, as it didn’t take too much longer than the white rice (if you’ve ever cooked brown rice, you know it usually takes forever). The Nutribullet took about 25 minutes to cook white rice, while brown rice was done in about 45 minutes.

The appliance also has plenty of features, which helped it secure the top spot in this list. The keep-warm function held the temperature of the rice without drying it out. And the delay start function is perfect if you have a slow cooker and like to prepare your meals before you start work in the morning. The delay start function also works really well if you like starting your morning off with a bowl of porridge. It’s really easy to use, and the buttons are well labelled.

Plus, the size of this rice cooker is ideal – it’s big enough that you can cook for a family, but does sit neatly on the worktop without taking up too much space. The only thing I really didn’t like was the cleaning process. The inner lid can just be wiped clean, but the lid was a bit more difficult to tackle. However, it’s still my favourite of the rice cookers tested.

The Morphy Richards eight-cup rice cooker offers a great balance of simplicity and capacity. With a generous eight-cup capacity, it’s ideal for larger households, and it performs well when cooking both white and brown rice (white rice takes 25 minutes, while brown rice takes about 45 minutes). However, it did need more water than the instructions said, as a couple of test batches left me with patches of dried, burnt rice when I followed the guidelines.

It’s really easy to use, with just one switch to the front that has to be turned on when you’re ready to start cooking. It does have a keep-warm function and it will automatically switch to this once cooking has finished. However, I found that the rice dried out a little when using this feature, so if you do use it, don’t leave it too long before tucking in.

The design is fairly compact, so it won’t take up loads of room on your counter top, but you do need to be aware of the mess that it makes. During testing, water splashed all over the counter top during cooking. It does warn you of this in the instruction manual, but it’s still an extra bit of cleaning up you may not want to have to deal with.

When it comes to cleaning the machine itself, the dishwasher-friendly lid made this fairly straightforward. The bowl should be washed in warm, soapy water. Overall, it’s a great appliance for the price point.

It may be super basic and very compact, but this Lakeland mini electric rice cooker does a superb job. It’s ideal for one or two portions, with white rice taking a little less than 20 minutes to cook, before coming out fluffy, moist, and with nothing stuck to the bottom of the pot. Brown rice also cooked quickly, being ready in just 30 minutes, and it came out at the ideal consistency.

There’s nothing complicated about this rice cooker, but it does have a delay time function, so you can set it to start working whenever is best for you. It has a keep-warm function, which is automatic and will keep your rice warm for up to 12 hours. This worked really well during testing – I left one batch on the keep-warm setting for three hours, and it was as hot as it would’ve been just after it finished cooking. There’s an LED light that lets you know when your rice has just six minutes left of cooking, so you can get the rest of your food out of the oven and onto the plates.

The inner pan of the rice cooker is removable, making it easy to clean and to dish up. This is a fantastic choice for smaller households.

If you’re looking for an appliance that will whip up more than just rice, this Cosori rice cooker has presets for two types of rice, three types of grains and it can also slow-cook, steam and sauté. The inner pot is made from a non-stick ceramic, which ensures even cooking, resulting in some of the fluffiest rice I sampled during testing.

The device has a quick rice feature, which, to be honest, wasn’t that quick. While using this function, white rice cooked for a little over 35 minutes, and brown rice took nearly an hour. However, it does have a very good keep-warm function, which didn’t dry out the rice. This does make it easier to cook in advance, meaning that the longer cook times don’t really matter.

When testing the additional functions, such as the slow cooker setting, I found they worked really well, so this space-saving, multifunctional device definitely deserves a spot in your kitchen. Plus, despite having a 10-cup capacity, which is ideal for medium to large families, the machine is pretty compact. It’s one of the easiest rice cookers to use, too – the button layout makes sense, and you can change settings mid-cycle. Clean-up was also super easy, thanks to that ceramic-coated inner pot.

This Staub cocotte rice cooker may not be electric, but don’t let that put you off. During testing, this little dish produced some of the fluffiest rice I’ve ever tasted. This is partly down to the lid featuring the special chistera drip structure, which provides constant condensation, keeping the rice moist.

The pot has been made using cast iron and works with all hob types, including induction. It heats up incredibly fast, so you won’t be waiting long for your rice – white rice takes just 12 minutes to cook, making it the fastest rice cooker on test.

When it comes to ease of use, it couldn’t be simpler. You just add your water, add your rice, and turn on the hob. You do have to monitor it while it’s cooking, so it doesn’t have the same ease of use as a set-and-forget version but, for the results, it’s well worth it. It has a really generous 1.5l capacity, so it’s ideal whether you’re cooking for one or a family. It’s also nice and compact, storing away in the smallest of spaces. As it’s for use on the hob, it doesn’t take up any counter space, either.

It doesn’t have any extra features, but you can do quite a bit with this little pot – including steaming veg, making a little casserole, or baking a loaf of bread. It is also surprisingly easy to clean – you can just wash it with warm water once it’s cooled down. Unlike some other cast iron pans, there’s no need to season it once it’s been cleaned.

If you’re cooking rice for a large family, this nifty Ninja device is an ideal solution. It has a 6l capacity, so it can handle large volumes of rice without turning the bottom into mush. It did take a little longer than some of the other rice cookers tested, but it still cooked white rice within 35 minutes and brown rice in about 55 minutes, and everything cooked well and evenly throughout.

The Ninja foodi rice cooker also acts as a multi-cooker – it can steam, sauté, slow-cook and cook pasta (possibly one of my favourite functions). I was really impressed by its slow-cooking abilities. It managed to make meat super tender while keeping the flavour of the sauce. The pasta function was also great – pop your dried pasta in the pot, select the preset and within 12 minutes you’ll have the perfect pasta ready to serve.

The foodi has a keep-warm function, which will keep anything you cook in the device nice and warm for up to 12 hours. The keep-warm function also works automatically, so you don’t have to remember to set it before you start cooking.

The appliance is easy to clean, too – the inner pan is non-stick and removable, so you can just clean it out by hand or pop it in the dishwasher. This is a brilliant choice if you’re cooking for a lot of people or you like to prepare your meals in advance.