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From easy-to-use electric to classic charcoal models, these expert-recommended options bring barbecue to the next level. sawdust machine
If you’re ready to bring some new flavor to your backyard barbecues this year, you may want to consider adding a barbecue smoker to your outdoor cooking arsenal. Smokers cook food slowly over low, indirect heat, imbuing barbecue staples like pulled pork, brisket and ribs with an unmistakable smoky flavor and incredible tenderness.
While purists prefer the iconic offset (or “barrel” smoker), which reflects an array of regional barbecue traditions from Texas, to Memphis, to Kansas City and the Carolinas, there’s a wider range of smokers out there. These include easy-to-use electric smokers, classic hardwood charcoal smokers, and low-maintenance wood pellet smokers. Some even have connected features that let you control their internal temperature and monitor meat thermometers via an app on your smartphone, so you don’t have to hover over them for hours.
If you’re in the market for a new smoker, we can help you pick out the right one for your home and skill level, whether you’re starting fresh or are an experienced pitmaster. Read on for the best smoker grills we recommend.
The traditional smoker design—offset or “barrel” smokers—feature two parts: a large main cooking chamber for your food, and a smaller cook box for the fuel. The wood or charcoal burns, heating the main chamber and filling it with smoke, which slowly cooks the meat with indirect heat and infuses it with smoky flavor. Offset smokers are beloved by barbecue aficionados, but are also the most challenging to use.Learning how to control the temperature in an offset smoker takes practice.
Vertical or “cabinet” smokers have a tall, closet-like design with a single door on the front and three to five racks for food inside. The heat source (usually electric) sits in the base, allowing the heat and smoke to waft upward and fill the space. Going high instead of wide makes a vertical smoker more compact, so it’s a good option if you don’t have much room on your patio. That said, the narrow profile may limit your ability to cook large pieces of meat, such as a full rack of ribs.
Like vertical smokers, the pill-shaped bullet smoker has a fuel area at the bottom with the main cooking chamber above. Vents on the bottom and top of the smoker allow you to control the temperature inside the chamber, and a water pan sits just below the cook area to keep food moist. Bullet smokers are compact, however, and some models are stacked so tightly that you may have trouble accessing the food on the middle racks mid-cook.
Most pellet smokers look more like a grill than a smoker, with a wide cook box and a clamshell lid that opens up to reveal a broad cooking surface. To generate smoke and heat, an electric auger feeds small hardwood pellets from a hopper on the back or side into a fire inside the cook box. The auger automatically adds fuel to the fire based on the temperature you dial in on the smoker’s digital thermostat, so you don’t need to babysit the smoker to maintain the proper temperature. However, they require a power source and tend to be the most expensive.
Kamado grills, like the Big Green Egg, are actually hybrid grill-smokers. These large, acorn-shaped ceramic cook boxes can maintain low temperatures for many hours, or build up scorching heat with temperatures that eclipse 800 degrees. It’s an incredibly versatile option, which has made it a gateway device for new barbecuers.
Smokers come in a variety of fuel types, including hardwood, charcoal, gas, electricity, or wood pellets. Hardwood and charcoal are the fuel of choice for smoking purists. This combination creates a high smoke output that maximizes smokey flavor. Maintaining a consistent low temperature takes time to learn, though, and it makes more of a mess.
Electric and gas smokers are convenient because they require little to no maintenance, but they don’t inherently produce smoke. Instead they rely on wood chip trays that aren’t as effective as wood, charcoal or pellets at instilling flavor into food.
Pellet smokers use wood pellets that generate real smoke for instilling flavor into food, while minimizing maintenance with automatic temperature regulation.
Smoking meat can take eight hours or more depending on the cut, so it’s important to look for a smoker with an efficient interior design that has space for everything you want to cook. The average cooking surface size for a smoker is around 550 square inches, which is enough to fit five full racks of ribs, four whole chickens, or five pork butts. That said, I’ve seen cooking surfaces range in size from around 250 square inches up to more than 800 square inches.
Some modern smokers can connect to your smartphone via Wi-Fi or Bluetooth, allowing you to track their internal temperature, change temperature settings, and monitor meat probes remotely through an app. They can also send you alerts if the smoker’s internal temperature rises or falls, the food reaches a target temperature, or if it’s low on fuel, allowing you to keep tabs on your smoker without having to hover over it.
I’ve tested dozens of grills and smokers of all different shapes and sizes over the years, and currently use a Masterbuilt charcoal-fed gravity smoker and a Weber Smokey Joe at home. I pulled from my experience with smokers along with external research to make my recommendations. Since the world of smokers is so vast, I wanted to include a variety of options spanning different fuel types and prices for both experienced pitmasters and people just starting to dip their toe into the craft of smoking.
I supplemented my own experience and criteria for smokers with hours of research into the different types and offerings available. I compared specifications of various smokers and consulted user reviews to find trends or stand-out issues (both positive and negative) that might be of concern to buyers. The final picks in this article span a range of design and price points, and each offers strong performance, durable build quality, and great value.
Traeger is regarded as the gold standard for pellet grills and smokers, and the Pro 575 makes it easy to see why. Its digital controller can maintain precise temperatures automatically, so you can truly set it and forget it. Just load it with pellets, dial in the temperature on the digital thermostat, and let the smoker cook. You don’t even need to be nearby: It can connect to your home Wi-Fi network through Traeger’s “WiFire” technology, allowing you to monitor and control the internal temperature remotely on your smartphone.
The Pro 575 is compact enough that it won’t hog space on your deck or patio like other smokers, but still offers enough cooking surface to handle five full racks of ribs or four whole chickens. Add to that its excellent build quality, and the Traeger Pro 575 is indeed one of the best all-around smokers out there.
Adding a smoker to your outdoor kitchen doesn’t have to set you back thousands of dollars. You can get into the game on the cheap with this Royal Gourmet offset smoker. It offers similar capacity to more expensive smokers with its 811 square inches of total cooking surface, giving you plenty of space to experiment with different meats. It's also equipped with cool-touch handles and vent controls on the firebox for regulating temperature.
The front table provides prep space and a lower shelf for storage. While it lacks the sturdy construction of our other picks, this is a solid entry-level option if you want to try cooking traditional barbecue, but don’t want a big investment.
Traeger’s top-of-the-line smoker has a huge 885 square-inch cooking surface—enough to fit 10 whole chickens, nine pork butts, or seven racks of ribs. With its digital thermostat and 20-pound pellet hopper, the Ironwood 885 can smoke for a full day without the need for a refill. Add in the ability to monitor both the grill’s internal temperature and food temperatures using your phone, and you have a smoker that won’t tie you down for hours.
Other notable features include a “super smoke” mode that cranks up smoke output for extra flavor, a sensor that alerts you when the hopper is low on fuel, and double-walled insulation that helps the smoker maintain consistent temperatures. The Traeger Ironwood 885 is expensive, but it’s a serious smoker for those looking to feed a crowd. If you want the best of the best and are willing to splurge for it, I’d say it’s worth it.
Masterbuilt’s Gravity Series 800 allows you to get that unique flavor from hardwood charcoal smoke into your barbecue without dealing with all the fuss of micromanaging your smoker. It pairs a large gravity-fed hopper for hardwood charcoal with a digital thermostat that controls the internal temperature. The hopper keeps your cooking fire fed, while an internal fan system regulates temperature to maintain consistency. Just load it up, light it, and let it cook for hours with minimal maintenance.
As with our top pick, the Gravity Series 800 features wireless-enabled smart controls, which allow you to monitor the temperature from your phone. It also includes a digital meat probe (plus ports for up to four probes), allowing you to track multiple items at once.
With 800 square inches of cooking surface, you’re getting a lot of space here. There’s plenty of room for ribs, whole chickens, and pork butts. But at nearly six feet wide, the Masterbuilt 800 is a big boy. Possibly too big for some decks and patios. That said, it also functions as a standard charcoal grill and a flat top griddle, so you could ditch your standard grill to make space for it.
This small electric smoker from GE lets you take your smoking indoors. It uses two heat sources—one to cook food and the other to burn pellets—then uses a filtration device to prevent the smoke from filling your kitchen. Its modest 293 square inches of cooking surface is enough to smoke two half racks of ribs or a small pork butt.
A bevy of controls allow you to set smoke levels and adjust temperatures. There are also preset food settings for commonly smoked foods, including brisket, ribs, pork butt, and chicken wings. Built-in probes and Wi-Fi connectivity allow you to monitor meat temperatures remotely from a smartphone, and this smoker is compatible with voice controls via Amazon Alexa and Google Home.
This smoker combines an offset smoker design with a tower shape, giving it excellent capacity and professional-quality smoking. The main cooking chamber has 1,890 square inches of cooking surface spread over six adjustable cooking grates. But thanks to its tower design, the Dyna-Glo model takes up a smaller footprint than most offset smokers, which is good since its lack of wheels means it requires a permanent spot on your deck or patio. Flanking the cooking chamber is a large charcoal cook box with a grate that slides out for easy access and a removable ash pan for easy clean up. There are also dampers on the side and top that allow you to control air flow to adjust heat.
A user-friendly design makes the East Oak Electric Smoker an ideal choice for newbies to the world of smoking food. Its digital control makes it easy to maintain specific temperatures, and the side wood chip loader and glass door allow you to monitor food and add wood chips without opening the door, which can cause fluctuations in the cooking temperatures.. Its 725 square inches of cooking surface is enough for experimenting with various types of food in a single smoking session, and it’s reasonably priced for people still gauging interest in smoking. . Plus, it measures just 19 inches wide and 18 inches deep, so it won't take up a lot of space on a deck or patio.
This gas smoker offers ample smoking capacity and simple temperature controls in a tower design. It uses a 20,000 BTU burner and a dial, so you can set temperatures ranging from 160 to 350 degrees. There are also three damper valves for additional temperature control. Its 690 square inches of cooking surface is broken up into four racks, so you can cook multiple types of foods in one session, and the large wood chip tray is perfect for adding smoky flavor to food. While this smoker requires a permanent spot in your outdoor living space since it doesn’t sit on wheels, it won’t take up much space as it measures just two feet wide by 15 inches deep.
What’s the best temperature for smoking meat?
With a smoker, you want to keep the temperature low and cook for a long time. Depending on what you’re cooking, I’d recommend maintaining your heat between 190 and 225 degrees. In that range, you will cook your meat slowly enough to make it incredibly tender and infuse it with smoky flavor.
How long does it take to smoke meat?
It depends on what you’re cooking. Smoking a rack of ribs typically takes between four to five hours, but a pork butt may need eight to 10 hours. Brisket is well-known for needing an especially long smoke–around 12 to 18 hours.
Can I use my gas grill as a smoker?
Technically yes. You can add a smoker box to a gas grill, which holds wood chips to generate smoke. So long as you keep the top of the grill closed, that’s a smoker. Make sure to set up the grill so that the food is not sitting directly above the heat source, and set the burners so that the grill only heats to a max of 225 degrees with the lid closed.
That said, it’s far from ideal. It’s more difficult to maintain the consistent low temperatures needed for smoking with a gas grill than it is with a dedicated smoker. On top of that, flames from a gas grill will not impart the same distinctive taste as a proper smoker burning charcoal or hardwood. (Purists don’t even like gas as a fuel for dedicated smokers.)
Tony Carrick is a full-time freelance writer who specializes in technology, home improvement, DIY, home security, and outdoor recreation. He’s tested and written about everything from home security systems to power tools to gas grills. His product guides, how-to articles, and feature stories can be found in such publications as Bob Vila, Angi, U.S. News and World Report, Field & Stream, Futurism, and Switchful. When Tony isn’t writing, he can be found working on his latest home improvement effort at his home in North Carolina.
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