While juicers are great, there are tons of options available with modern, commercial-grade countertop blenders. You might love your freshly extracted green juice every morning, but maybe you also want a machine that can churn ice cream, blend soups or sauces, or crush ice for margaritas?
If this kind of versatility sounds appealing to you, we think we can help! After checking out several machines on the market, we have chosen to narrow this comparison down to two front runners – the Vitamix Professional 750 and the Blendtec Designer Series.
Each of these machines is powerful, commercial-grade blenders, capable of the paces you might put them through. So let’s take a closer look at both of them.
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| Vitamix |
| Pro 750 |
| Up to 64 oz |
| Variable Speed + Pulse |
| 1200 Watts / 2.2 HP |
| 1x Pitcher |
| 1x Blade (Dull) |
| Recipe Book |
| Hand Wash Only |
| 7 Year Warranty |
| Check Price at Amazon |
|---|
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| Blendtec |
| Designer |
| Up to 36 oz |
| 8 Speeds + Pulse |
| 1560 Watts / 3.0 HP |
| 1x Pitcher |
| 1x Blade (Dull) |
| Recipe Book |
| Dishwasher Safe |
| 7 Year Warranty |
| Check Price at Amazon |
|---|
Jugs, Blades & Lids
Each of these blenders comes with its own patented jug, which is shaped differently, but both are made of the same high quality, BPA free, polycarbonate plastic that is used to make the windows and windshields in aircraft – in other words, a big piece of ice or frozen fruit isn’t going to crack one of these pitchers.
Vitamix Professional 750
The Vitamix jug has a 64-ounce capacity and is wide from the top and narrows only slightly to the bottom, leaving plenty of room for reaching in and scraping ingredients off the side and out of the jug once blending is complete.
It has four blades at the bottom that are fairly sharp, so always use caution when arranging or removing ingredients. The handle of the Vitamix is sturdy and far enough from the side of the jug to allow for easy handling and grip. The spout of the jug is also a bit rectangular and allows for a pretty perfect pour every time.
Another very user-friendly feature of the Vitamix is its lid, and this seems to be one area in which the Vitamix vs. Blendtec comparison has to go to the Vitamix. The Vitamix lid is a 2-piece Santoprene rubber lid, which has a plug at the top that can be removed to allow you to add ingredients while the blender is in use.
The lid also features a piece on the side that fits into the lip of the pitcher, securing the lid and allowing you to turn it on and walk away without worrying that you’ll return to a kitchen covered in a banana smoothie. This feature seems to be the reason that professional kitchens sometimes choose Vitamix as their standard blender.
One common complaint we did hear about the Vitamix jug is that the measurement markings along the side are translucent, making them really difficult to read whether the jug is full or not.
Blendtec Professional Series
The Blendtec jug is a little unusual in design, primarily square, but with a fifth “wild side”. This fifth side is much narrower than the other sides and is intended to prevent cavitation while blending.
Cavitation is what happens with the rapid changes of pressure a liquid is subjected to, while blending causes a bubble or void to form in the region where the pressure is the lowest. The implosion of these bubbles can be powerful and actually a little dangerous – modern blenders with a lot of power no longer have jugs made of glass because cavitation bubbles imploding could sometimes cause glass jugs to shatter.
Fortunately, Blendtec is looking out for their customers, designing the “wild side” jug to avoid this and also to create a faster and smoother blend in general.
Another interesting detail is that the blades of the Blendtec are intentionally blunt and thick, making them strong and good for grinding hard grains as well as frozen fruits and liquid without having to switch to a different blade set. The combination of their specifically designed jug and blades make the Blendtec good for a wide range of uses for a blender, including making bread dough and batters, not things you would necessarily consider using a blender for.
The handle is comfortably designed, however as mentioned above; the lid leaves some things to be desired. Much less sturdy feeling and secure than the Vitamix, the lid has been reported to come off when the jug is overfilled before blending. This issue does seem to be avoidable by using very exact measurements as recommended in recipes, something which is made simpler by the clear, easily read measurement lines on the side of the pitcher.
Vitamix Professional Series 750 Review
The Vitamix definitely has the appearance of a more traditional blender but with some modern curves. The control panel is on the front and is more hands-on. With a knob, you can turn to the left for the preset options and to the right for more precise speed control. Two toggle switches flank the knob – one for a start and stop and the other for pulsing your ingredients. The Vitamix also features a manual kill switch on the right side of the base.
The Vitamix base also weighs more than the Blendtec, making it a much sturdier machine for the counter. Even when blending frozen fruit and ice on a high-speed setting, the Vitamix stays pretty well put, with only a slight movement of the base.
Blendtec Designer Series Review
The Blendtec is a much more modern-looking machine, with all of its controls displayed via the touch screen. The display is bright and clear and easy to use, with responsive touch capability. The manual speed setting is controlled via a slide bar on the touch screen, which seems to be pretty precise.
The smooth touch screen is also very easy to clean, lacking the nooks and crannies that manual control knobs and switches have. One surprisingly useful detail on the Blendtec was the countdown that appears on the screen when you select a preset cycle.
This is the kind of little added functionality that doesn’t sound like a selling feature on its own, but which in practice is surprisingly helpful. It’s clear that a lot of consideration was taken when designing Blendtec’s screen and choosing what options users would need most.
For that reason, it’s a bit of a mystery that more thought didn’t seem to be put into making the base of the Blendtec a little more stable when in use. Running the Blendtec on a high-speed automated cycle with frozen ingredients – for example, the ‘frozen dessert’ setting – is going to require some vigilance on your part to keep the base from bouncing across the counter, at least during the early stage of the blending.
This doesn’t mean the blender won’t achieve the desired results, but you might have to run a cycle more than once and keep a hand on the lid while you do so. The base also lacks a manual kill switch, which is especially odd for a machine featuring touch controls that could lend themselves to over-input and unresponsiveness more than a manually controlled machine would.
Stats, Accessories & Price
The Blendtec Designer Series is more powerful, with a 3 peak horsepower, direct-drive motor, and 1,560 watts. It comes with no added accessories, aside from a recipe book that touts 230 recipes, although there are a couple of different jug options that can be purchased separately.
The Vitamix Professional Series 750 is a 1,200-watt blender with 2.2 horsepower. It also comes without accessories, but many users recommend buying the Vitamix Accelerator/Tamper tool to go with it. The Vitamix holds a good star rating, with slightly more reviews total than the Blendtec has at the moment.
Both blenders are made in the United States and have a generous 7-year warranty. Vitamix will actually cover the cost of shipping both ways if your machine needs to be sent in for repairs.
Blender Base & Control Features – Style & Substance
The controls on these two blenders are similar in terms of options, but the presentation and execution of those options differ significantly from one to the other, and this actually might be the thing that draws some consumers more to one or the other on initial, aesthetic inspection.
As far as the look of these two blenders goes, they are different enough that the question of Blendtec vs. Vitamix becomes a moot point if you’re basing it on cosmetic preference, though both are good-looking machines.
Conclusion
To be honest, both of these machines are good. They are both powerful, capable, and high in quality, with enough subtle differences to make the decision one more of personal user preference than of performance.
Both machines have many dedicated fans, and recipes for either are plentiful on-line. We hope what we have done here is to share enough information about each of them with you to help you make the decision that you feel will make you happiest in the long run. Whichever machine you choose to add to your kitchen, we hope you enjoy it!
FEATURED PRODUCTS
| Vitamix Pro 750
| Check Price |
| Blendtec Designer
| Check Price |
