Pin Down Your Portion Sizes With These Food Scales, Hand-Picked by RDs

The Greater Goods High-Capacity Digital Food Scale has a weight capacity of 22 lbs. That’s significantly more than most home-kitchen scales, which have a capacity of 8 to 11 lbs. This makes it an excellent choice for people who are weighing ingredients for full family meals or baked goods in large pots or bowls.

This scale is also very easy to use, and it feels well-made and very high-quality. It's sleek-looking and compact. I can easily store it in a drawer because it has such a small footprint and slim profile.

One of the only complaints I have about this food scale is that it's so small that weighing food in larger pots or bowls made it very difficult to read the screen. And while the surface wipes clean easily, the lip under the nonremovable plate is difficult to fully clean.

Coming in under $15, the Amazon Basics Digital Scale is an affordable option with some features that still make it a standout pick.

First, it has a larger surface area for weighing than many more-expensive food scales. So, you can easily weigh larger plates, bowls, or pans and still see the display. The plate is also a cinch to clean, with no grooves where food may get stuck. Plus, it weighs up to 11 lbs of food and is small enough that you could find a home for it in even the most cramped kitchens.

While I appreciate how easy this food scale is to use, I noticed some accuracy issues when measuring small amounts. I added salt a little bit at a time until the scale read 2 grams (g), but when I reweighed the entire amount at once, it was actually 8 g — which I verified with two other scales. Also, the LCD display is not backlit and can be difficult to see, because the numbers appear very light as well.

The Smeg Digital Kitchen Scale is unique, featuring a removable bowl that allows you to prep ingredients and weigh them in the same container. Smeg products also are known for their distinct look. “If you're buying a Smeg appliance, then you already know the price point is a reflection of the look,” says health and nutrition writer Tori Martinet, RD.

But this scale's bowl style limits its functionality, Martinet says. The scale can't be used to measure food on plates, in pots, or in other bowls. “It's a nice-looking product and I can see using it for certain tasks,” she says, “but I don't think it will replace my current, much more basic–looking but more-precise scale.” Another drawback is that this scale costs over $150, which is significantly more expensive than most other food scales.

For baking projects that often require the use of large mixing bowls, having a scale display that's easy to read is key. This Oxo Good Grips scale features a pull-out display, allowing you to easily read the weights even when using a larger container to measure ingredients in.

“I love the pull-out feature on this scale,” says editor Katie Tuttle. “It's easy for a bowl to obscure your measurements when you're mixing dough, and Oxo handles that quite neatly.”

She also appreciates the scale's slim profile and its easy-to-clean, stainless-steel surface. However, she says the scale can only weigh down to one-tenth of an ounce, so it may not accurately measure very small quantities. She also says there can be a delay when the scale calculates weights.

The Greater Goods Food Scale With Nutrition Calculator is a unique tool for people tracking their food intake, be it calories, macronutrients, or both.

While our team didn’t test this scale, I personally tried another Greater Goods food scale and was very impressed with the product quality, sleek design, and affordable price. However, it's unlikely that this scale will include all of the foods that you eat inside its database. It doesn't connect to any common food-logging apps, either. It also requires you to enter a code from a codebook to relay to the scale what food you’re weighing. This can be time-consuming.

If you’d like to avoid having to change batteries, a USB-rechargeable scale like this one from Letron is a good choice. It's versatile in that it can use battery power, or you can charge it with the included USB cable.

This food scale also has a very generous weight capacity of 33 lbs and a built-in timer. This makes it particularly useful for people who bake large amounts of bread at once, because bread-making often involves proofing and rising times.

However, according to our research, this product feels inexpensive and doesn't seem durable. It’s also prone to shutting off or resetting mid-use. And with such a high weight capacity but a small surface area for weighing, I imagine the display's visibility when using a large mixing bowl would also be an issue.

I've had my Ozeri Pronto kitchen scale for five years, and the reason it's been a mainstay is that it's so easy to use.

It uses physical, tactile buttons that respond every time, even with wet hands — a nice contrast to the finicky touch controls on many glass-display models. The Ozeri display is a non-backlit LCD, but the numbers are dark enough that they’re easily visible. The weight plate is also removable and easy to clean.

This kitchen scale weighs up to 11.24 lbs of food. But I don't know that I’d pay nearly $30 for this scale; it was around $15 when I purchased it. And when I bought mine, there were several color options available; now it appears to only be available in silver.

What’s more, the scale is plastic. While it's performed well for me, I've also tested scales in that price range that seem much sturdier. But based on my experience with this kitchen scale, I would trust any of the scales from Ozeri. 

For a food scale that's very easy to clean, look no further than this KitchenAid scale. It features a completely flat surface with digital buttons, and it's fully waterproof. It's easy to wipe down the entire scale without damaging the digital or electrical components. It can also be safely rinsed under running water.

The bright LED display ensures that the numbers are easy to read even in the shadow of a mixing bowl. Plus, the scale is very slim, making it easy to store in nearly any kitchen. The glass surface is also stain-resistant, so it can stay nice-looking enough to display on your counter if you desire.

During our research, however, we noted that this scale may be less accurate when measuring smaller amounts of food. The completely flat digital buttons also may not respond properly if your hands are wet or dirty.