Best garlic presses

A garlic press is an efficient way of prepping your garlic for cooking and it's much quicker and easier than finely chopping cloves of garlic with a knife. But if your garlic press is poorly designed, a nightmare to clean and more effort than it's worth, then it will take just as long as using a knife.

In October 2021, five researchers tested out nine garlic presses from Ikea, Jamie Oliver, Oxo, Joseph Joseph and more, ranging in price from £3 up to £40.

We assessed each garlic press for comfort, performance, mess and ease of cleaning, and put all of them through their paces by pressing a huge amount of garlic cloves with skin on and skin off.  

Prices and availability last checked as of 1 November 2021.

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The best garlic presses

Only logged-in Which? members can view the garlic press reviews below. If you're not yet a member, you'll see an alphabetically ordered list of the garlic presses we tested.

Join Which? now to get instant access to our test scores and Best Buy recommendation below.

Ikea Koncis Garlic Press

Cheapest price: £3, available at Ikea, also available at Amazon

Weigh: 200g

This garlic press from Ikea is the cheapest we tested. It's made of stainless steel and is dishwasher-safe.  

Find out whether it's worth paying more for a garlic press.

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Key features: Dishwasher-safe

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Jamie Oliver Garlic Slice and Press

Cheapest price: £13.69, available at Amazon

Weight: 400g

If you want a device that will slice your garlic and dice it, this garlic press from Jamie Oliver might be an option for you. 

Find out whether we felt this press was gimmicky or the pick of the bunch.

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Key features: Dishwasher-safe

John Lewis Stainless Steel Garlic Press

Cheapest price: £8, available at John Lewis

Weight: 250g

This press from John Lewis features rubber-coated handles that supposedly help with grip. 

Did we find this was the case?

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Key features: Dishwasher-safe, five-year guarantee 

Joseph Joseph Rocker Garlic Crusher

Cheapest price: £10.39, available at Amazon, John Lewis, Lakeland, also available at Dunelm, Marks and Spencer

Weight: 50g

To use this garlic crusher you have to press down and rock it back and forth. 

We found significant differences in this approach, but did this crusher prove any better than the basic basket design?

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Key features: Dishwasher-safe, three-year guarantee if bought from Lakeland 

Kuhn Rikon Epicurean Steel Garlic Press

Cheapest price: £39.96, available at Amazon, also available at Harts of Stur

Weight: 300g

This stainless steel garlic press is the most expensive in our test.

It helped us to gain some interesting insights into how much you need to be spending on a garlic press.

To see if it's worth investing in, log in or join Which?.

Key features: Dishwasher-safe but hand-washing is recommended

Lakeland Garlic Slice and Dice

Cheapest price: £9.99, available at Lakeland

Weight: 120g

Looking for an alternative to the classic garlic press design? Lakeland has designed a self-contained device that has a removable tray for minimal mess. 

But did our researchers find this garlic press easy to use?

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Key features: Dishwasher-safe, Lakeland three-year guarantee

Le Creuset Garlic Press

Cheapest price: £32, available at Harts of Stur, Le Creuset

Weight: 330g

If mess is a concern for you then investing in a garlic press with a built-in cleaning device like this Le Creuset might be appealing. 

Find out whether it actually worked at removing excess garlic.

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Key features: Dishwasher-safe

Oxo Good Grips Garlic Press

Cheapest price: £10, available at Amazon, John Lewis, M&S, also available at, Lakeland, Robert Dyas

Weight: 360g

This chunky garlic press from Oxo has rubber-coated handles and a rubber cleaning surface. 

We've also tested a number of Oxo Good Grips products, including the Oxo digital kitchen scales. 

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Key features: Dishwasher-safe

Zyliss Susi Garlic Pres

Cheapest price: £10.99, available at Ocado, also available at Amazon, Dunelm, Harts of Stur, Lakeland

Weight: 130g

This garlic press comes with a detachable rubber brush for cleaning.

Did this extra tool prove useful in our cleaning test?

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Key features: Dishwasher safe, five-year manufacturer's guarantee

What's the best way to peel a garlic clove?

Peeling garlic is a tedious cooking task. We tried out a few techniques to see if we could find the best method.

• Soaking in warm water - we left a garlic clove soaking in warm water for five minutes and afterwards the skin slipped right off.
• The jar trick - You can use two bowls fitted on top of each other for this or a jar. We threw some unpeeled garlic into a large jar, closed it shut and shook it vigorously for 30 seconds. To our surprise, the garlic came out peeled and ready to go.
• Knife - Less of a trick and more of a standard procedure that's quicker than the above two methods, but it is more fiddly.

Should you crush garlic with the skin on or skin off?

Many chefs, most notably Jamie Oliver, stand by their choice not to bother peeling garlic. It's a time-saver and avoids the unnecessary cleaning of another knife. 

As it's become popular to press both peeled and unpeeled garlic, we made sure we tested each garlic press with both types. Our results showed that it's very rare to find a garlic press that can do both. Only two presses we tested were capable, one of which was our Best Buy. 

How to get garlic off your hands

The whiff of garlic coming from your skin and under your nails is rarely enjoyable. If washing your hands isn't working, try one of these methods to remedy that garlic smell:  

1. Salt and baking soda - rub one part salt to two parts baking soda into your hands with a bit of water until you have a paste. Then rub together for 30 seconds and wash off. 
2. Mouthwash - pour a capful of mouthwash onto your hands and wash them along with some soap and water. 
3. Stainless steel - supposedly, if you run your hands under cold water while touching something made of stainless steel, the sulphur molecules from the garlic will transfer onto the steel surface. 
4. Salt and lemon - wash your hands in a little salt and a squeeze of lemon. The citric acid from the lemon and the exfoliation from the salt should get rid of the smell. 

How we tested garlic presses

We chose nine popular garlic presses available at major retailers and put them through their paces. As always, Which? paid for all of the products we tested, so you can be sure we're giving you our honest, unbiased opinion.

Ease of use

Five researchers spent an afternoon pressing and crushing lots of peeled and unpeeled garlic cloves. During this time, the team rated each garlic press for comfort, performance and mess. 

Cleaning 

After all the garlic presses had been used and left out to sit for a while they were then washed by hand in hot soapy water.