Breville The Smart Scoop Ice Cream Maker Review 2023

In my wider tested review of ice cream makers, the Breville The Smart Scoop Ice Cream Maker impressed me as the best high-end model on the market. Ahead, learn more about this next-level ice cream maker and why I loved it so much.

Homemade ice cream is a treat, full stop. But after testing seven different ice cream makers over the course of 10 days, I found that Breville The Smart Scoop Ice Cream Maker churned out ice cream that rivaled the best scoops I have eaten in my favorite ice cream shops around the country.

Breville The Smart Scoop Ice Cream Maker is a compressor-style option with a built-in motor that ... [+] simultaneously chills and churns liquid bases into ice cream, sorbet, gelato or frozen yogurt.

The Breville is a compressor-style ice cream maker, which means that it has a built-in motor that simultaneously chills and churns liquid bases into ice cream, sorbet, gelato or frozen yogurt. In comparison, the Cuisinart Frozen Yogurt, Ice Cream and Sorbet Maker (the model I selected as the best ice cream maker overall) is a canister-style ice cream maker that requires the mixing bowl to be frozen for 16 to 24 hours before it can be used. I appreciated that the Breville is ready to go whenever the ice cream craving strikes.

Thanks to the built-in compressor, Breville The Smart Scoop Ice Cream Maker is on the larger side, commanding a significant amount of counter and storage space. It is also, like all of the compressor-style ice cream makers I tried, on the expensive side, at just under $500. But it is a great match for anyone who wants to upgrade their ice cream–making experience and has a bit of room to spare in the kitchen. Ahead, find my full Breville ice cream maker review, with details on the features I found to be most exciting and impressive.

Amazon

Dimensions: 7.2 x 16.2 x 10.7 inches | Weight: 30 pounds | Capacity: 1.1 quarts | Dishwasher-safe: No | Includes: Cleaning brush, bowl, paddle, motor

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Whenever I am testing a new appliance, I like to go in with an open mind. I do my research, of course, but I try not to have preconceived notions about how a particular product will perform. In the case of Breville The Smart Scoop Ice Cream Maker, that meant ignoring the rave customer reviews on Amazon and also its inclusion on other "best of" lists. In the end, however, the Breville didn't need any advance hype.

In batch after batch, it consistently turned out 1.1 quarts (just over 2 pints) of next-level ice cream. Right out of the machine, both the vanilla and cookies and cream recipes I tested were rich and luscious—the texture of dense soft serve. Even the vegan ice cream, made with oat milk and coconut cream, was thick and custardy. The ice cream maker's paddle churned the bases evenly, so there were no icy spots or not-quite-mixed sections. And after transferring the ice cream containers and letting them chill a bit more in the freezer, they became as close to textbook-perfect as any scoops I have tried—ever.

Breville The Smart Scoop Ice Cream Maker churned out scoop shop–worthy ice cream every single time I ... [+] put it to the test.

Breville The Smart Scoop is a compressor-style ice cream maker, which means it has a built-in motor that chills the ice cream base while it churns. Unlike a canister-style ice cream maker, which requires up to 24 hours of pre-freezing, I just poured in my ice cream base and the machine did the rest. But I still found it to be uniquely user-friendly. Unlike the Lello 4080 Musso Lussino, another high-end, compressor-style ice cream maker I tested, the mixing bowl was removable, which made transferring the ice cream to bowls (and also clean up) much easier.

Breville The Smart Scoop was also the only ice cream maker I tried that gave any indication about when the ice cream was done churning. (The batches I tried were ready in 30 to 45 minutes.) With the other models, it was a bit of a guessing game—when the ice cream looked thick, I turned off the motor. But the Breville gave a little ding to indicate when it was time to incorporate any mix-ins, and another when the ice cream reached its optimal consistency. As an ice cream–making beginner, I found those dings very reassuring. For more-experienced ice cream makers, a knob on the control panel lets you customize your desired ice cream texture, from a softer consistency for frozen yogurt to a harder and more scoopable ice cream.

Two things to consider before buying a Breville The Smart Scoop Ice Cream Maker are the price and size—both are formidable. At nearly $500, it is significantly more expensive than the Cuisinart Frozen Yogurt, Ice Cream and Sorbet Maker, which was the other ice cream maker that topped the best ice cream makers list. And thanks to the built-in compressor motor, the Breville is also quite a bit larger and weighs a hefty 30 pounds.

For home cooks who do not plan to make ice cream very often, and people working out of small kitchens with limited storage space, Breville The Smart Scoop might be more ice cream maker than they need. But for ice cream connoisseurs or anyone hoping to bring their homemade ice cream game to the next level, it is absolutely worth both the price and the counterspace.

Of the seven ice cream makers I tested in search of the very best, three of them were compressor-style machines that have built-in motors to freeze the liquid ice cream base as it churns. The Breville stood out almost immediately as the best of those three. The Whynter Upright Automatic Ice Cream Maker was smaller and less expensive than the Breville, but the ice cream it produced was disappointingly airy in one batch and icy in another.

The Lello 4080 Musso Lussino, which was both the most expensive and largest compressor-style ice cream maker I tried, turned out ice cream that was on par with the Breville The Smart Scoop in quality. But there were drawbacks, including that it worked almost too efficiently! I waited a minute too long to add mix-ins to my batch of cookies and cream, only to find that the ice cream was so cold and thick, the paddle could no longer spin through it to incorporate the chopped cookies. The Breville, meanwhile, indicated exactly when to add mix-ins. The Lello's mixing bowl was also not removable, which made scooping out the finished ice cream and cleanup more difficult. While I loved the ice cream from both models, the Breville was the clear winner in my tests.

It took a lot of ice cream to determine which of the seven ice cream makers I tested were the best. In all, I tested 21 batches of dairy and vegan ice creams, going through a whopping 5 quarts of milk, 7 quarts of heavy cream, 3.5 quarts of oat milk and almost 3 dozen eggs. Each machine churned out a batch of American-style vanilla ice cream (made with a milk and cream base), a French-style cookies and cream ice cream (made with a cream and tempered egg yolk base, and threaded through with chopped sandwich cookies) and a vegan chocolate ice cream (made with an oat milk and coconut cream base). The ice cream makers that topped my list were user-friendly, with removable mixing bowls and straightforward control panels. In test after test, Breville The Smart Scoop was a delight to use, and the ice creams coming out of it ranked on top.

I am a lifelong ice cream obsessive who would choose a hot fudge–topped sundae or a double-decker cone over just about any other dessert. In addition to my personal love of ice cream, I am a food writer whose writing and recipes have appeared in Food & Wine, Bon Appétit, the Washington Post, New York Magazine and Food52. I am also the author of seven cookbooks—none of which specifically focus on ice cream, but there's always the next book! For Forbes Vetted, I regularly review and test home appliances including rice cookers, toaster ovens and cold-press juicers.