Curious about which portable grills were worth buying, we tested seven popular models from trusted brands. Cuisinart is better known for kitchen appliances than grills, so it makes sense this petite model is designed with an eye toward food prep, not just grilling. It packs up neatly, with a wooden lid that doubles as a cutting board.
First, assembly is a non-issue, as it consists of lining up the grates after taking the grill out of the box, and it took longer to unpack than to make it ready to cook. The cast aluminum body, top, and cast iron grates are built to last, and the included weber charcoal grill Flipkit turns the two-piece top and bottom into two hibachi grills that double your cooking area. The Q 1200’s design caused the fewest flare-ups of any model we tried, thanks to built-in channels in the porcelain-coated cast-iron grill grates.
The stand is easy to operate, with clear indicators for raising and lowering it. Since the base is included, you won’t need to hunt for a safe cooking surface or crouch down to flip burgers, but it requires a little more storage space and room in your trunk. If you’re looking for a bigger portable grill, the Weber Q weber bbq 2200 Gas Grill has the same features, performance, and build as our pick, but with almost 50% more grilling capacity. It can fit up to 10 large burger patties, two cut-up chickens, or 16 large bratwurst links at a time. They’re commonly constructed from thin porcelainized steel with thin wire-rod grilling grates.
Even though the Jumbo Joe isn’t the smallest or most compact charcoal grill we tested, it is lightweight (about 18 pounds) and easy to carry. A swiveling metal arm holds the grill together for transport and doubles as a lid holder while you’re grilling. The comfortable plastic handle allows you to lift the grill with one hand, while a heat shield keeps it cool to the touch during grilling. The Weber Q 1200 Gas Grill is the best of the portable propane models we’ve tested.
We rated the grills on ease of cleaning, including dumping any ash and unused charcoal for applicable models. After rating the grills’ overall performances in these areas, we looked at those scores and weighed them against their retail prices. Rating each area on a scale of one to five, we averaged the category weber bbq scores to arrive at the final score for each grill. Porcelain-enameled, cast-iron cooking grates provide even heat distribution across the entire grilling surface and superior heat retention. Char-Broil covers the Grill2Go X200’s lid, firebox, and burner for five years and everything else for one year.
Another tabletop option, this portable gas grill from Weber was a standout for our testers, who named it the winner of the group, and even noted its performance rivaled standard-size grills. “This thing could be priced even higher and I would buy it,” a tester noted, although at under $300, it’s attractively priced as-is. We conducted two sets of tests for scoring, depending on whether the grill was gas-fueled or charcoal. The first step for each was to assemble the grill, rating it on the clarity of instructions and how easy it was to accomplish the task. Next, we judged the grills’ portability, such as how easy they were to move and if lids or grates fell off easily. For those with carts, this included how easy or difficult they were to move, pop up, and collapse.
A temperature dial lets you control the heat as easily and quickly as on a kitchen range. However, this 40-pound grill isn’t lightweight by any stretch of the imagination. And heating the larger grill surface will burn through propane faster. This propane grill is sturdy, easy to use, and big enough to grill burgers for a small crowd. It’s on the heavy side, but it has comfortable handles for transport. Those items included the main body of the grill, 2 cooking racks, 2 wheels with installation hardware, and a grease pan with an aluminum liner.
Naturally, the hot dogs and beef hamburgers were done before the turkey burgers. This is where having multiple burners would have been a nice feature. It would have allowed me to keep the food warm while the turkey burgers cooked at a higher temp.