Leaks, loud noises, sticky lids – these are just a few of the problems you can run into with your kettle. Our testing helps weed out models prone to these issues, but which kettle problems really get on your nerves?
Kettles are an everyday product that many of us take for granted, yet they certainly inspire strong opinions among Which? members.
In fact, we get more reviews posted about kettles than almost any other product we test. Those reviews give us a wealth of insight into what you do and don’t like about kettles, which we’ve then used to improve our lab testing.
Your top 5 kettle complaints
Unclear and hidden water gauges were your fifth most common complaint with kettles, while difficult lids you struggle to open came in fourth. As a result of your feedback, we’ve changed the way we assess the water gauges on kettles, so that kettles with big, clear windows on either side are rated more highly.
Kettles which stay on once the kettle’s boiled – wasting energy in the process – were your third most common bugbear. So every kettle we test now has an ‘overboil’ rating, which also feeds into our test scores.
Noisy kettles are the second most common source of irritation to many of you, so we made noise levels a more important factor in determining a kettle’s overall test score.
But by far the most common complaint we get is about kettles that leak. As this is almost always a fault that develops over time, we can’t always tell from testing alone which kettles are most likely to leak a year or two down the line. But what we can do is survey thousands of small appliance owners every year to find out how reliable the big kettle brands really are.
What’s your biggest bugbear?
Personally, what I find most annoying is not being able to see how much water is in the kettle or the kettle having a high minimum fill level. I’m a stickler for waste, so I only like to boil as much water as I need. I recently bought a Best Buy kettle that has a really clear water gauge and can boil as little as one cup at a time and it’s been worth every penny so far.
So which of the above kettle complaints annoy you the most? Are there any issues I haven’t mentioned that really get your goat?
What is your biggest kettle bugbear?
Noisy kettles (30%, 141 Votes)
Leaky kettles (20%, 92 Votes)
Kettles that continue to heat water after boiling point (16%, 75 Votes)
Difficult lids (15%, 71 Votes)
Poor or unclear water gauges (11%, 50 Votes)
Other - tell us in the comments (8%, 39 Votes)
Total Voters: 469
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