Consumer Reports Just Picked a $90 NutriBullet Over the $630 Vitamix, and Owners Disagree

Consumer Reports' refreshed 2026 full-size blender ratings placed the nutribullet NBF50500, listed at $111.99 on CR's own product page, above the $579.99 Vitamix Propel 750 in the lab. That is a $468 gap, and for the household that wants smoothies, crushed ice and the occasional puree, the honest recommendation is the cheap one.

The gap does not buy better blending. On the evidence published so far, it buys a seven-year warranty instead of a one-year warranty, roughly one noise tier of quiet, and the ability to make hot soup in the jar from friction alone. Those are real things. They are also things a specific minority of kitchens needs and most do not.

One caveat on sourcing, because it shapes everything below. CR's numeric scores, ranks and reliability standings sit behind its membership paywall. The finding that the NBF50500 took the top spot among 23 tested full-size blenders comes from The Daily Meal's report on those ratings, which also notes the NutriBullet earned top marks for ice crushing, pureeing and smoothies while scoring lower than both runners-up on brand reliability and owner satisfaction. CR's own openly readable best blenders roundup, updated August 25, 2026, leads instead with the Breville Fresh & Furious, the Ninja BN801 and the Chefman Obliterator, and does not mention the NBF50500 at all. Both things can be true, and the discrepancy is worth holding in mind.

The reported result is the whole story: highest possible marks from CR's testers for crushing ice, pureeing and making smoothies, from the weakest motor of the three at 1200 watts and the lightest body at 7 pounds. Blade geometry and jar shape evidently matter more than wattage, which is why the 1400W machines did not walk away with it.

Price depends on where the shopper looks. CR's page lists it starting at $111.99; The Daily Meal cites roughly $89.99 at retail, more than $400 below the Vitamix and about $80 below the Ninja.

Owner sentiment is good but not uniformly so. The Daily Meal reports 4.5 stars across more than 10,600 Amazon reviews and 4.1 stars on NutriBullet's own site, with recurring praise for power relative to price and for texture, one owner flatly noting "no more chunky smoothies." The critical minority clusters on durability after heavy use and on noise, the latter matching CR's lab classification exactly: Very Loud, 90 to 109 dBA, which CR likens to a subway train. Pitcher leaking appears in some reviews, though it is reported as uncommon on this 1200W full-size unit compared with NutriBullet's 600W and 900W personal-cup lines.

For a household blending smoothies most mornings and ice drinks on weekends, this is the machine, and the money saved is not a consolation prize.

CR content describes the Propel 750 as "the top-rated blender we test," and credits the friction from its fast-spinning blades with heating soup to serving temperature inside the jar. No other machine here does that. It also offers ten speeds plus pulse against the NutriBullet's three, which matters more than it sounds: CR engineer Elias Arias, who oversees blender testing, advises shoppers to "take note of the number or type of speed-control settings that allow you to customize the blending process for different ingredients."

Then there is the warranty. Seven years against one is not a rounding difference, it is a different theory of ownership, and it is the single clearest reason the Propel commands $579.99.

Two marks against it, both concrete. At 10 pounds it is the heaviest of the three, and there is no personal-cup attachment, so anyone wanting a to-go smoothie decants it. Vitamix's recall history concerns other product lines: CPSC records a 2013 recall of 64-oz Low-Profile containers used with the older 7500 and Professional Series 300 and 750 blenders, prompted by 18 blade-breakage reports with no injuries, and a 2018 recall of Ascent and Venturist containers for laceration hazard. Neither touches the current Propel 750, which carries no CPSC recall as of September 17, 2026.

Buy it if the kitchen makes hot soup and nut butters as routine work rather than novelties, or if a seven-year service life is worth paying for up front.

The BN801 is the machine CR's open roundup actually features, calling it a "top performer all-around" that "excels in icy-drinks tests and is excellent at puréeing." It brings the largest jar at 9 cups, a 1400W motor matching the Vitamix, five speeds plus pulse, and the only removable blade of the three, which is the difference between rinsing a jar and working around a fixed hub.

It is also the only one of the three that is not merely a blender. The box includes a food chopper bowl, a dough blade and two 24-oz cups with lids, at $199.99 and up on CR's listing, about $80 above the NutriBullet by The Daily Meal's accounting. The warranty is one year, the same as the NutriBullet's.

This is the pick for a kitchen trying to retire a blender, a mini chopper and a dough hook in one purchase, and for anyone who wants near-top blending without the NutriBullet's noise.

Three things separate these machines, and blending performance is not one of them. On the reported 2026 results all three landed at or near the top of a 23-model field that spans $30 to $600, which was CR's stated point in publishing it: "You don't have to spend a fortune to get a great blender."

The first real difference is coverage. One year against seven is the Vitamix's actual product. A household that replaced the NBF50500 twice at $111.99 would still be $356 short of one Propel 750, so the warranty argument only pays off if the Vitamix genuinely runs past year seven and the NutriBullet does not reach year three. Nothing in the published data settles that; CR's reliability and satisfaction figures, drawn from 26,481 blender owner responses collected between 2015 and 2023, are members-only, and the openly reported summary says only that NutriBullet ranked below its two rivals.

The second is noise, and it is measured. CR puts the NBF50500 at 90 to 109 dBA, a category it compares to a subway or a shouted conversation, against 70 to 89 dBA for both the Vitamix and the Ninja. In a house with a sleeping baby or an open-plan kitchen adjoining a home office, that tier is a daily fact, not a spec.

The third is range. Ten speeds and in-jar hot soup are the Vitamix's answer to a cook who blends more than frozen fruit; a chopper bowl and dough blade are the Ninja's answer to the same question at a third of the price. The NutriBullet answers it with three speeds and a pulse button, which is exactly enough for what it was bought to do.

The strongest objection to picking the cheapest machine deserves its own hearing. CR's survey data, gathered from tens of thousands of owners over eight years, is a measurement of what happens after the lab bench, and it went against NutriBullet. Amazon's critical reviews point the same way, citing degraded performance after extended heavy use. That is two independent signals pointing at service life, and it is the reason the verdict below is not unconditional. It does not change the answer for most buyers, because the price gap is large enough to absorb a shorter life and the lab result for the actual job is unambiguous.

Buy the nutribullet NBF50500 at $111.99, or less if the $89.99 retail price The Daily Meal cites is available. It won CR's 2026 full-size ratings on the three tests that describe what most American kitchens ask a blender to do, and the saving against the Vitamix is not marginal.

Two groups should not. A household that makes hot soup in the jar, wants ten speeds, or intends to buy one blender for the next decade should pay $579.99 for the Vitamix Propel 750 and treat the seven-year warranty as the thing being purchased. A household sensitive to noise, or one hoping to replace a chopper and a dough hook at the same time, should take the Ninja BN801 at $199.99 and up, which CR's own roundup ranks among its best picks and which runs a full noise tier quieter than the NutriBullet.

What the published evidence cannot yet answer is how long the NutriBullet lasts under daily use, since CR's reliability standings are paywalled and its survey window closes in 2023. Until that is public, the sensible framing is that the NBF50500 is a three-year machine priced like one, and the Propel 750 is a seven-year machine priced like five of them.