TechGearLab

The Cuisinart CTG-00-SSAS was surprisingly impressive, given its small size. Though it is smaller than many other choices in this review, it removed water and dirt well. One nice feature, which only one other appliance in our round-up has, is a hole in the top of the lid. The hole allows you to add more water during operation; once the lid is secure, you don't need to take it off until the greens are fully cleaned. Additionally, the crank arm is ergonomic. The colander securely fit within the bowl, and the non-slip pads on the bottom stabilized the bowl during high-speed spinning. The clip to secure the colander onto the bowl does take an extra second or two, but it fastens easily. All of these factors make fast-spinning easier.
The main limitation of this model is braking performance. At times, the salad spinner was harder to hold securely after high-speed spinning due to the smaller lid. It's best to avoid spinning the colander at the highest speed to prevent this issue. However, by no means is this problem a dealbreaker. This model won't disappoint, especially if you want a compact spinner that leaves room for other appliances in your kitchen.

The Cuisinart CTG-00-SSAS salad spinner was impressive, given its small size. Though it is smaller than many other choices in this review, it removed water and dirt well. One nice feature, which only one other appliance in our round-up has, is a hole in the top of the lid. The hole allows you to add more water during operation; once the lid is secure, you don't need to take it off until the greens are fully cleaned. Additionally, the crank arm is ergonomic. The colander securely fit within the bowl, and the non-slip pads on the bottom stabilized the bowl during high-speed spinning. The clip to secure the colander onto the bowl does take an extra second or two, but it fastens easily. All of these factors make fast-spinning easier.
The main limitation of this model is braking performance. At times, the salad spinner was harder to hold securely after high-speed spinning due to the smaller lid. It's best to avoid spinning the colander at the highest speed to prevent this issue. However, by no means is this problem a dealbreaker. This model won't disappoint, especially if you want a compact spinner that leaves room for other appliances in your kitchen.

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Wirecutter

The pump on the OXO makes it the easiest to use of all of the salad spinners we tested. It also stores better than similarly sized spinners.

America's Test Kitchen

Built like a cocktail shaker, this container was just the right size, easily emulsifying both small and large volumes of dressing. The wide mouth of the canister facilitates filling, whisking, and cleaning; the top screws on easily, creating a tight seal. Best of all, its pour spout dispenses vinaigrette with a nice even flow. And after we put it through 10 dishwasher cycles and disassembled and reassembled it 50 times, the shaker was still as good as new.

The newly updated model of our former favorite now has a much-improved brake and a rounder bowl shape. It worked easily—with just one hand—and was the most effective of our lineup at removing water from a variety of greens, with good clearance under the basket to collect runoff. Its lid is simple to pull apart (and click back together) for easy cleaning and drying, and it's dishwasher-safe. Our only quibble: A central stem protrudes from the lid into the middle of the basket by 2 inches, which slightly bruised baby spinach we'd heaped in, although the greens pressed against the outer walls as soon as we started spinning.

After years of spinning and pumping, we are still completely satisfied with the quality of this salad spinner, which has an easy-to-use hand pump in the center.

Our redesigned favorite is better than ever. Its patented pump mechanism was the easiest to use among the models we tested, and its performance remained superb, holding plenty of greens and getting them drier than rival models. The new, wider base provides more stability, the smaller pump increases the spinner’s capacity, and the flat lid (which comes apart for cleaning) makes the spinner easier to store.

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Its pull-out handle isn’t as operator friendly as the pump on the Good Grips, but this model cleans and dries greens well, and its brake is as easy to use as our winner’s.

The Mueller 5-Liter Vegetable Washer performed well in the battery of tests that we threw at it. Though pricier than many spinners we tested, its unique benefits outweigh the added expense. The unit was a breeze to get up to a high spin rate, which allowed for an impressive amount of water removal. After two consecutive five-second spins, it averaged 96.5% water removal across the four types of plants tested. We especially appreciated the ability of this model with freshly rinsed kale and blackberries. The lid fits securely on the bowl while offering trouble-free clean-up. Although its braking button was small, it still easily stopped after a fast-spinning operation.
Not everything was perfect, though. Perhaps this unit could benefit from a redesign on the colander. In both the dirt test and its ability to be cleaned, the colander created issues that caused it to lose points. Despite this, this product more than made up for lower scores after receiving perfect scores in the water removal, ease of spinning, and ease of braking tests. If you're after an excellent spinner, this might be the answer. 

Has the best spinning mechanism and comes with an attractive stainless-steel bowl that’s great for serving.

This has a nearly identical spin mechanism as the Good Grips, but comes with a more attractive stainless steel bowl that’s great for serving. But we think it’s only worth the extra money if you don’t already have a good salad bowl (or if you prefer the look of stainless steel).

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This compact version of our top-rated salad spinner is a great choice for smaller households or for when you don’t want to use the full-size version for smaller quantities of greens or herbs. Its basket holds about 2.4 quarts compared to nearly 5 quarts in the larger model, but it performed on par with the full-size version, effectively and easily cleaning produce and spinning it dry, removing nearly all the water from salad greens. Because the basket is positioned on a small spike, holding it well above the bottom of the bowl, we were able to pour a full cup of water into the bowl before any reached the basket of greens, keeping runoff from rewetting food once the basket stopped spinning—unlike other spinners we’ve tested. We also found it easy to clean and dry this spinner, but a few small pieces of the lid broke and cracked after we deliberately dropped it from the kitchen counter to the floor as an abuse test. The damage was cosmetic, however, and it still operated as new.   More on this test

Salad Spinner Comparison