Thermometers built into the lid of a grill aren’t fully reliable. They’re usually positioned several inches above the cooking grate, and as a result they don’t accurately report its temperature. Consider getting an inexpensive infrared thermometer to gauge the temperature of your cooking surface. The Weber Spirit II E-310 excelled at every test, producing the best hamburgers—deeply seared, evenly cooked—among all the grills we tested. And it outdid or equaled the competition in grilling barbecue chicken and whole roasted chickens with crispy golden skin. Inside the grill, your grate material is also very important.
Depending on the grill size, that means turning one or two burners off completely. To determine the best gas grill and get a feel for how these grills perform in a variety of cooking scenarios, we perform three tests. Based on different meats, methods and heat settings, these tests show us how efficiently and evenly a grill does (or doesn’t) cook.
One thing I was happy to discover was that the built-in thermometer on the lid, often useless on other grills, was surprisingly accurate at telling the air temperature at grate level. In fact, for most cooking it worked well enough that there was little point in using the air probe to monitor the air temperature inside the grill. The Genesis E-325s is the only one of our picks that we haven’t physically tested, but we did test its predecessor, the Genesis II E-310. We also checked out the new Genesis model in person at a few different stores.
Mom prefers having seafood cooked outside “so it doesn’t stink up the kitchen,” so Dad and my sister used the side burner to boil lobsters one night and steam clams another. Having that burner there was great for steaming corn on the cob while grilling something else. It being summer, I appreciated more ability to cook outside instead of making an already-sweltering kitchen even hotter. Look for grills in the $400 to $900 range with a cast-aluminum firebox, which holds heat well and won’t rust.
In addition to the gas barbecue models above, here are the other gas grills we’ve tested. This list doesn’t include the many models we’ve tested over the years that are no longer available for purchase. No one ever said you have to spend hundreds of dollars to be happy with your barbecue grill. This model brings 40,800 BTU of power over a generous 438 square inches of cooking space, not counting a 12,000-BTU side burner. So if you’re on the hunt for a quality gas grill, you’re in luck.
She’s written close to a dozen pieces on all styles of grills and done firsthand testing of smokers and grills featured in her articles. Ariane Resnick, who also updated this article, is a special diet chef, certified nutritionist, and bestselling author. She has more than 20 years experience in the food and writing spaces and believes in a joy-filled approach to health and wellness.
Goldwyn suggests 225 or (less often) 325 degrees Fahrenheit for the indirect zone. Using the zones instead of cooking over a flame the whole time brings your chances of success way up. We’ve determined that a three-burner grill is large enough for most needs, with plenty weber portable grill of space to cook for a family dinner or a backyard barbecue. Grills with more burners are usually overkill, and two-burner grills can feel cramped. Weber added two new models to its Spirit line of gas grills in 2020, but we ultimately chose not to test them.