The Absolute Best Saucepans You Can Buy Right Now

As a professional kitchen gear tester, writer, and editor, I have covered a lot of cookware: Dutch ovens, nonstick and cast iron skillets, you name it. And while I love covering all those types of pots and pans, there’s one in particular I use at least daily that doesn’t get much air time: the saucepan.

For some reason, people don’t talk or ask about saucepans often, but let’s change that! Saucepans are ideal for cooking grains, boiling a serving or two of pasta, blanching veggies, making a batch of barbecue sauce, reheating chili or soups … the list goes on.

There are as many saucepans as there are uses for them, so to find the best ones, I tested models from top brands — stirring, whisking, and pouring again and again. Let’s get to it.

For more details on the best saucepans, including our testing methodology, shopping tips and deals, and maintenance, keep reading or just hit the links below.

Tramontina’s 4-quart saucepan offers fantastic performance at a budget-friendly price (high-end saucepans, like our top splurge pick, easily go for $200-plus when not on sale). It’s usually about $75 at full price, but it’s currently on sale for less than $70, making it an even more valuable purchase. It has tall, straight sides, a spacious cooking surface, a sturdy main handle, and a helper handle. The Tramontina is made from stainless steel, which cooks evenly and allows you to easily monitor browning.

I also liked this saucepan from Zwilling, which is a solid pot with a grippy, cup-shaped handle. The main handle is a tad short and doesn’t have a helper handle, but it’s another great option if you have a slightly larger budget.

Who it’s best for: Anyone who wants a great stainless steel saucepan, but doesn’t want to spend more than $100.
Good to know: This saucepan comes in several different sizes, including 1.5, 2, and 3 quarts.

If you’re looking to invest in your cookware, there’s no better pick than All-Clad’s (the brand’s stainless steel sauté pan is a Kitchn favorite). This saucepan heats beautifully; cooks evenly; has tall, straight sides; has a helper handle; and has a stainless steel interior (which makes monitoring browning easy). The pan’s cupped handle provides a non-slip grip and stays cool on the stovetop.

Who it’s best for: Anyone looking to invest in a stainless steel saucepan.
Good to know: All-Clad makes some of the best cookware out there — and the saucepans are no exception. When I say you can’t go wrong with any of them, I mean it. This saucepan also comes in a 1.5-, 2-, and 3-quart version (which is currently on sale!).

This nonstick 4-quart saucepan from Zwilling (also currently on sale) offers impressive performance at a reasonable price point. Nothing stuck during testing and the food cooked evenly. I love its helper handle; pour spouts; tall, straight sides; perforations in the lid for draining water; and its cup-shaped handle that felt super grippy and stayed cool on the stovetop.

The dark interior makes it more difficult to monitor browning, and it’s the heaviest of all the saucepans I tested. I was still able to pour from the saucepan using one hand, but this might be too heavy for some people. Overall, this a great nonstick saucepan and is incredibly easy to clean, too.

Who it’s best for: Anyone who is looking for a nonstick saucepan that’s easy to clean and cooks well.
Good to know: This pan comes in three smaller sizes — 1 quart, 2 quart, and 3 quart.

To rate each saucepan, I performed the following tests:

I judged all of the saucepans on the following criteria based on a scale of 1 to 5 (1 being the worst and 5 being the best):

Saucepans come in many sizes, but I find that a 4-quart pot is best. You can always cook less in a larger saucepan, but you can’t cook more in a smaller one. I think it’s helpful to have both a large and small saucepan, but if you’re only going to get one, go for the 4-quart version. For this testing, I focused on 4-quart saucepans, but included some 3-quart models if that was the largest size the pan came in.

You want it hefty enough to heat food evenly (thin pans tend to have more hotspots and can scorch food), but light enough so it’s still easy to pour from even with one hand. During testing, I found that saucepans weighing less than 3 1/2 pounds without their lids were the sweet spot.

With this weight, I got the cooking results I wanted and could still comfortably tilt the saucepan to pour out boiling water, swirl it around while browning butter, and easily pour pastry cream into a fine mesh strainer.

The best saucepans have tall walls and straight sides, which don’t cut down on the saucepan’s usable cooking area. Saucepans with light interiors are also preferable to ones with dark interiors, as this helps for monitoring, like if you’re making browned butter or if you’re sautéing aromatics for risotto.

If I can’t firmly and securely grip a pan’s handle, I can’t lift it well — which means I also can’t swirl or pour with ease. The handle shouldn’t be too skinny or too rounded, both of which are tougher to hold and tend to slip from your hand as you pour.

I prefer handles that are cupped, meaning they have indentations at the top to ensure a non-slip grip. The best handles were also at least 7.25 inches long because that length will help keep your hands comfortably away from the heat source.

This brings me to my next handle-centered point: Does the saucepan’s handle stay cool while cooking? If it doesn’t, I don’t want it. And, finally, saucepans that have a helper handle opposite the regular handle are, well, the most helpful. A helper handle is useful for moving the saucepan around the stovetop and if you need extra leverage when pouring. It’s not a must-have, but it is very nice.

This mirrors that of a nonstick skillet: For things that are super gooey, a nonstick saucepan means easier cooking and cleanup. This includes making sauces or reheating macaroni and cheese. And to no one’s surprise, cleaning pastry cream off of the nonstick saucepans was much easier than the stainless steel models.

However, with stainless steel saucepans, you get longevity. Nonstick cookware has a finite lifespan, but a great stainless steel saucepan will last for years. Because of this, I recommend buying a stainless steel saucepan first and a nonstick saucepan to complement it.

With all of the saucepans, I made sure their interiors didn’t dull or become splotchy after cleanup. While you could put a saucepan in the dishwasher, I don’t recommend it — I’d definitely suggest hand-washing any cookware you want to last. The heat and detergent from the dishwasher can tarnish stainless steel cookware and cause nonstick cookware to lose its, well, nonstick-iness faster, so they’re items you shouldn’t put in the dishwasher.

I’m a professional kitchen equipment tester and was the former tools editor here at Kitchn. I previously worked at America’s Test Kitchen and my reviews on topics like stand mixers, induction burners, toaster ovens, and multicookers have been published in Cook’s Illustrated, Cook’s Country, and on the America’s Test Kitchen website. My work has also been featured on America’s Test Kitchen’s and Cook’s Country’s television programs. And again, I use my saucepan at least once a day.

We will do our homework, going wildly in depth with our testing. But we’ll condense the info into easy, breezy summaries, so that you can see what we picked and why, and then move on with your life. Because we know you’re busy!

Do you have a question about saucepans? Leave it in the comments below!