In our opinion, electric smokers are just so much more convenient than traditional meat smokers that we’d basically always choose an electric one over a charcoal one. You don’t need to supervise them. They just do their thing, and they do it amazingly well.
However, there’s a slight caveat to them that isn’t really much an issue, but it’s something that you need to be aware of. Let me start by saying, that pretty much all of the electric smokers out there have quality control issues to some degree no matter where you buy them from, due to the nature of the product. Fortunately though, you’ll pretty much know right away if there’s any issues or not.
The reason for them being like this is because there’s a lot of parts where one thing or another can go wrong. As you’d expect, eventually something inside them will stop working, but until then you should be able to enjoy a good five years of use out of one at the very least. If your electric smoker is still good after a month or two, it’ll stay strong. So, basically if you get any issues before then, make good use of Amazon’s return policy.
With all that said, our recommendations in this guide for the best electric smokers are split by the different criteria people may have for choosing one. They’re summed up in this table below. If you want to skip all the other talk and you just want to know which specific electric smokers are currently the best to go for, then they’re all right here in one place for you.
| Editor’s Award | Product |
|---|---|
| Best Electric Smoker | Masterbuilt MB20071117 Digital Electric Smoker |
| Best Large (40-Inch) Electric Smoker | Masterbuilt MB20072918 40-inch Digital Electric Smoker |
| Best Portable Electric Smoker | ASMOKE Portable Pellet Grill AS300 Electric Smoker Grill with Smart Meat Probe |
| Best Budget Option | Masterbuilt Smoke Hollow SH19079518 Digital Electric Smoker |
Click to jump straight to each topic.
- The Best Electric Smokers Reviewed
- What We Think of Some Other Electric Smokers Available
- Frequently Asked Questions
The Best Electric Smokers Reviewed
Best Electric Smoker: Masterbuilt MB20071117 Digital Electric Smoker
Best Electric Smoker
Masterbuilt MB20071117 Digital Electric Smoker
A digital panel with thermostat control, a fully insulated body to retain heat, and enough space to fit 2 turkeys, 4 pork butts, 4 racks of ribs or 6 chickens in its 721 square inches of cooking space. Sounds like a plan.
We also love the clever little loading system that allows you to add wood chips without opening the door.
What We Like:
- Masterbuilt’s Patented Side Wood Chip Loading System – Being able to add more wood chips without opening the door is a huge plus for the cook time and evenness of cooking, since you don’t get that huge temperature drop and smoke loss from, ironically, adding more wood chips to get it smoking more again. That makes a wood chip loading system like this pretty essential in our book.
Check the latest price on Amazon.
Best Large (40-Inch) Electric Smoker: Masterbuilt MB20072918 40-inch Digital Electric Smoker
Best Large (40-Inch) Electric Smoker
Masterbuilt MB20072918 40-inch Digital Electric Smoker
Masterbuilt’s best smoker, but bigger.
This one is for when you want your smoker to be able to handle large gatherings or special occasions when they come around.
This bad boy can squeeze in up to 4 turkeys, 8 pork butts, 8 racks of ribs or 16 chickens in its 975 square inches of cooking space.
What We Like:
- As Great as the 30-Inch Version, but Bigger – Everything that makes the 30-inch version so popular goes the same for this one. If you’re wondering about whether the 40″ model is worth it, then note that it’s a whole 35% more cooking space than the 30″ model. Also as you can imagine, that bigger space needs to be filled with 35% more smoke, but on the flipside your meats will cook much more evenly and you’ll achieve a consistently better result if they’re given a good amount of room for the smoke to flow around them.
Check the latest price on Amazon.
Best Portable Electric Smoker: ASMOKE Portable Pellet Grill AS300 Electric Smoker Grill with Smart Meat Probe
Best Portable Electric Smoker
ASMOKE Portable Pellet Grill AS300 Electric Smoker Grill with Smart Meat Probe
We love the design, and we’re quite convinced that the flat arrangement going on with this one actually improves its performance. There’s no unevenness or hot spots anywhere, and the build quality is consistent other than the temperature control being not quite accurate, but it certainly does the job.
The only real practical downside is the limited space, but that’s just the nature of it being a portable unit anyway. You’re trading height (and so, more cooking space) for portability here.
If that’s what you want, or even if you’re just cooking for a couple of people, this is a real quality space saver to go for.
What We Like:
- Build Quality – Unlike so many other electric smokers out there, the build quality of this one is actually up to standard for what you’d really hope for in something like this. That being said, it’s still able to pick up cosmetic damage like dings and dents on the metal sheet exterior like all of the other electric smokers out there.
Check the latest price on Amazon.
Best Budget Option: Masterbuilt Smoke Hollow SH19079518 Digital Electric Smoker
Best Budget Option
Masterbuilt Smoke Hollow SH19079518 Digital Electric Smoker
Back in 2017, Masterbuilt took over the Smoke Hollow division of Outdoor Leisure Products, Inc, bringing this affordable electric smoker under the Masterbuilt banner.
Smoke Hollow started out as a brand for entry level smokers, and it seems Masterbuilt bought them out for good reason: These are the best entry-level electric smokers available.
What We Like:
- Much Lower Price Than the Competition – It’s surprisingly reasonably priced, and not missing any features other than Masterbuilt’s side chip loading system, which makes sense because this isn’t really a Masterbuilt brand one, even though it is by name. So, the only downside is you’ll have to open the door if you need to add more wood chips, but it’s a small price to pay (pun absolutely intended).
Check the latest price on Amazon.
What We Think of Some Other Electric Smokers Available
Char-Broil 19202101 Deluxe Black Digital Electric Smoker
A far more common occurence of quality control issues on this one. You can get an impression of just how many people have gone through multiple faulty units in the Amazon reviews.
Otherwise, this product would have been pretty great for the price, and to be honest, still is if you get one which works.
It’s still not a budget piece though, so really it’s the window that makes it stand out over the masterbuilt.
Masterbuilt 30-inch Digital Electric Smoker with Window and Legs
The Masterbuilt to go for if you really want a window, but the build quality of this one just isn’t as sturdy as we’d like. Look at the legs and you’ll see what we mean. This whole unit is too easy to dent in general.
Cuisinart COS-330 Smoker, 30″ Electric
Actually pretty good, and at a decent price, but it’s not quite consistent when you want to get the temperature up.
It has some real issues with the temperature controller not staying constant, and has difficulty getting up to max temperature (with the temperature often reading something like ~50 degrees hotter than it actually is).
Put all of this together, and you can say it’s not really a contender for “the best electric smoker” unfortunately.
Masterbuilt MB20074719 Bluetooth Digital Electric Smoker, 40 inch, Stainless Steel
Good in theory, but the bluetooth barely works. That, and somehow by swapping the door design to a windowed door they’ve managed to degrade the overall quality of manufacturing.
Basically, it has many issues to recommend outright considering that it’s so much more expensive than their main model, but again, if you get one that works, it’ll be great.
It’s just another classic example of how adding features to the detriment of reliable manufacting can undermine an otherwise great product for the countless people who recieve a defective unit.
Masterbuilt MB20060321 40-inch Digital Charcoal Smoker
This newer entry from Masterbuilt is possibly the worst build quality out of any of them.
The changes in design makes there be so many potential points of failure that the manufacturing process would really need to step up its game to make this product anything more than an expensive piece of junk.
If this changes at any point, we’ll update this review, and the same goes for the others.
Frequently Asked Questions
How often do I add wood to my electric smoker?
Generally you’ll want to add two or three handfuls of wood chips to an electric smoker every 45 minutes once the previous batch has fully burned out, for the first 4-6 hours of actual smoking that you’ll be doing. If you find they’re getting used up before that, soak a batch in water for 45 minutes in the meantime.
Pro tip: Add the wood early, while the meat is still cool – and do it fast – so the last amount of heat possible escapes.
Which rack is hotter in an electric smoker?
For the vast majority of smokers, it’s hotter at the bottom, and hotter at the back.
That means:
- The hottest part is the back half of the bottom rack
- The coolest part is the front half of the top rack
And if that isn’t the case for yours, it’s more often than not just a lot more even throughout, but still hotter towards the bottom (as the hot air and smoke rises from the bottom and cools as it travels further upwards).
We hope this list of the best electric smokers has been helpful.
If there’s anything good that you think we’ve missed, or if you have any questions about anything, then let us know down in the comments below.
P.S. We couldn’t talk about smokers without constantly thinking about this classic from Zuckerberg.
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