The Best Dutch Ovens for Breads, Braises, and Beyond

An enameled cast-iron Dutch oven is an essential piece of cookware for every home cook, and the best Dutch ovens—Staub and Le Creuset—will last a lifetime (or longer) if you care for them properly. Deciding between the two is more a matter of selecting for preference than for quality, and we’ll get into that shortly. But you don’t have to spend upward of $300 to get a high-quality Dutch oven. We’ve been testing these versatile cooking pots since 2018, and after using more than 20 popular and top-rated brands in our own kitchens, we’ve also been very impressed by a few really good Dutch ovens that you can use for pretty much everything: baking bread, simmering soups and stews, frying chicken, and cooking all manner of one-pot meals.

• The best Dutch oven overall: Staub 5.5-Quart Round Cocotte
• An equally-great Dutch oven: Le Creuset 5.5-Quart Dutch Oven
• The best Dutch oven under $100: Amazon Basics 6-Quart Dutch Oven

Deciding between Staub and Le Creuset

Staub-heads please don't @ us, but we think that the image of a Dutch oven most people have is of a Le Creuset. The French-made enameled cast-iron pots enjoy a sterling reputation for quality and longevity—and have the price tag to match. We’ve taken the Le Creuset to task for more than five years, and it has remained the standard-bearer for what a Dutch oven should be. But Dutch “cocottes,” which is what Le Creuset's primary rival, Staub calls their enameled pots, are made just as well (also in France), come in a variety of appealing colors, and are similarly priced.

The main difference between Staub and Le Creuset is the interior enamel. Le Creuset's Dutch ovens have a smooth, sand-colored interior while Staub's is a slightly-textured black interior enamel—which somewhat resembles well-seasoned raw cast iron out of the box. Both protect the cast iron underneath and both provide a not-quite-nonstick surface that will easily release food with enough butter or oil. But these surfaces do perform a little differently when you're cooking—and even our testers have differing opinions on which is better.

Le Creuset's super-smooth, light enamel makes it easier to monitor browning as you're cooking, and this can be especially helpful for beginners. However, Staub's dark enamel actually browned meat and veggies a little better because the slight texture allowed for a tiny amount of fat to move between the food and the surface—which also made foods release somewhat more easily. The dark enamel also won't show stains over time like a light enamel will.

All of that said, the best Dutch oven for you really comes down to personal preference. If you have your heart set on an iconic Le Creuset Dutch oven, you won't be disappointed, but it's worth considering a Staub too.

Below, find a detailed review of both along with our recommendation for a good Dutch oven under $100. Keep reading to learn more about how we tested, what we looked for, and what we think of the other Dutch ovens we've tested.

What we love: Staub is Le Creuset’s primary rival, and our testing has repeatedly demonstrated that Staub Dutch ovens offer even surface heating, durability, moisture retention and an overall quality in cooking experience on par with Le Creuset. The textured interior enamel allows for a tiny bit of butter, oil, or other cooking fat to move between the food and the cooking surface, which means meat and veggies brown beautifully, and release a little easier than they would from a smoother enamel too.

The top of the lid has the brand's iconic outer ridge and interior convex basting divots, which pretty much every Dutch oven, except Le Creuset, features these days. Theoretically, basting or braising divots distribute condensation across the cooking surface rather than down the sides of the pot during cooking. It would be a great idea, if we—or pretty much any other cooking gear review site, really—were able to observe an impact this design has on anything we’ve cooked. So far we haven’t.

That said, Staub's Dutch oven lid is heavier than Le Creuset's, and it's the only lid (of our top picks) that didn't let any water sputter out with the steam when we had it going at a rolling boil.

Concerns and considerations: The 5.5-quart size Dutch oven, which we recommend for most home cooks, has a suggested retail price of around $400, which can be prohibitively expensive for some. And as mentioned above, Staub's dark matte interior may be less user-friendly for novice cooks because it's somewhat more difficult to visually monitor cooking and watch out for burning and doneness. For those who have honed their cooking instincts, this isn’t a huge deal, and there are also many people out there who prefer a dark interior because it won’t look scuffed and ruddy after extended use like light enameled interiors inevitably do. Finally, because the interior enamel has a slight texture, certain dish-drying towels may catch and leave a little lint behind, so it's best to dry this Dutch oven with a lint-free kitchen towel.

What we love: Le Creuset's Dutch ovens have repeatedly passed every cooking test we put them through, producing well-crusted seared meat and evenly caramelized vegetables with nary a cold spot to be found. The lid fits well, providing an effective moisture seal, is easily set ajar, and offers consistent control over the evaporation level going on in the pot. Our stew came out of the oven with the ideal amount of evaporation, and the ragù, with the lid set slightly ajar, cooked down to a perfect saucy thickness.

But how well the Le Creuset cooks isn’t what truly distinguishes it as a winner—most of the competitors we’ve tested are capable of delivering comparable results. It’s really the Le Creuset’s shape and design that set it apart. It is the easiest cast-iron Dutch oven to handle and move around, and it's a little lighter than the Staub. In fact, relative to their size, Le Creusets are among the lightest enameled cast-iron pots we’ve tried; the 5.5-quart size weighs 11.35 pounds (only recently did Vermicular’s beat it by a few ounces). The wide loop handles are big and easy to hold with oven mitts or dishcloths without risk of burning your knuckles. Handle design is such an easy thing to replicate, yet so many other brands opt to make them smaller at the expense of comfortable handling.

Testing has also demonstrated the quality of Le Creuset’s enamel, which resists chipping both inside and out. The light-colored enameled cooking surface made it easy to see the level of browning as we cooked, which is especially helpful for novice cooks. The interior enamel does grow dull over time, but that’s merely a cosmetic issue, and the careworn Le Creuset pots in the test kitchen still cook like they did fresh from the box. If you follow the care instructions, you’ll have a chip-free Dutch oven you can pass down to your children some day. Another nice nod toward durability: Le Creuset has phased out its phenolic plastic knob and now a stainless-steel knob comes standard on all new Dutch ovens. The change is important for high-heat baking projects which require a lid, like bread. The plastic knob can melt after prolonged exposure to temps above 450℉.

Concerns and considerations: The only real drawback of the Le Cresuet is its price. The 5.5-quart is currently $420. While they frequently go on sale, we know this price is prohibitive for a lot of people, even when taking the pot's longevity into consideration. Many of the other contenders we tested will serve you well at the fraction of the price if you learn to accept them for their varied flaws (which we detail down below). The Le Creuset Dutch oven might technically be one of the two best Dutch ovens, but you don’t need the best Dutch oven to make succulent braises, hearty stews, and no-knead bread. If you love cooking, know you’ll use it often, and can afford one, we say the Le Creuset is worth the splurge. It’ll last a lifetime and look good doing it.

Amazon Basics’s kitchen gear is all over the place in terms of quality and performance, but the Dutch oven is a great value. Over the last few years, it’s performed well in all of our testing, the enamel has yet to chip (for us, anyway), and it’s available in three sizes and ten colors.

If you’re looking for a versatile cooking pot that will allow you to simmer, stew, sauté, bake, braise, or deep-fry, and you don’t want to spend more than $100, this is the best option we've found. Like the Le Creuest Dutch oven, it has a smooth, light interior. And like the Staub Cocotte, the inside of the lid has braising divots (though, again, we’ve not seen any real impact on cooking from this particular feature). The knob is stainless steel and the whole thing is oven safe up to 500ºF.

No, this isn’t heirloom-quality cookware like Staub and Le Creuset. But if you’re building out your cookware collection on a budget or you simply don’t want to spend hundreds of dollars on a single piece, you will likely be very happy cooking in this budget-friendly Dutch oven for a few years, at least.

Concerns and considerations: For something so affordable (just over $50 at the time of publishing) we don't expect the enamel on this Dutch oven to last forever. While we have yet to experience any chipping, enough customer reviews have reported chipped enamel that we'd expect it at some point. Amazon does offer a one-year limited warranty on this product to try to ease some of these concerns though.

We tested Dutch ovens in the 6-quart range (except the Misen, which only comes as a 7-quart). Depending on the brand, sizes range from 3 quarts to 9 quarts, but most offer one in the 5.5-to-6-quart range, which we find to be the most useful for everyday cooking. Enameled cast-iron Dutch ovens made up a bulk of the models we tested. For our tests in 2018 and 2019, we made a beef stew that requires a stint on the stovetop as well as in the oven; for the 2020 update, because we began cutting back on the amount of beef we cook, we went with a slow-cooked pork ragù instead. Both were designed to show a model’s searing and braising prowess. We also took special note of how easy or challenging it was to clean the Dutch ovens and how they were to move around the stovetop and into the oven. Over the last several years we've repeated our searing and braising tests on a bigger batch of newcomers alongside the classics. We also added a steam test to observe how well the lids contained moisture when fully closed.

We seared meat and caramelized vegetables in each of the Dutch ovens to test their heat retention capabilities and the relative effectiveness of their cooking surfaces. We looked for a crisp, browned edge on each piece of meat, as well as even caramelization on the vegetables. Because they should be capable of high heat tasks like bread baking, we limited our test to oven-safe models, which meant no coated nonstick Dutch ovens to judge on how well the ingredients released. There isn’t really a good case for a nonstick Dutch oven anyway, but we want to note the reason for their absence.

We wanted to see how meat braised in the Dutch ovens. We were looking for even cooking, tender meat, and moisture retention, which included condensation on the lids and the amount of liquid left in the pot.

Shape is a big variable when it comes to Dutch ovens. Some pots, like the Le Creuset, have relatively straight sides, while others, like the Lodge and the Dansk discussed below, are more rounded in the corners. Rounded pots make stirring easier and keep food from sticking in the corners, but also provide less flat surface area at the bottom for searing. Every pot we tested was circular except for the Ikea and Great Jones models, which are only available in oval shapes; we were curious how this would affect heat distribution and cooking.

We looked for large, grippable handles that made the pot easy to maneuver on the stovetop as well as into and out of the oven. We also wanted a sturdy, snug-fitting lid—ideally with a knob that made it simple to remove.

The pots had varying levels of scorching and residue on the bottom. Ideally, the pot should be easy to clean and have minimal scorching. It’s best to stick to handwashing Dutch ovens to ensure proper treatment of the enamel, but being dishwasher-safe certainly doesn’t hurt.

A previous budget pick, the Milo by Kana Dutch oven is inspired by Le Creuset, but designed in California and manufactured in China. It has a light enameled interior and a 10-inch diameter cooking surface that imparts an even sear on meat and vegetables. In terms of performance, the differences in the final sears and braises between the Milo and the Le Creuset were not drastic, and the Milo is available for $145—not cheap but a fraction of what a Le Creuset goes for. The Milo’s handles are slightly smaller than the Le Creuset’s, and it is a pound lighter despite the same capacity, but these aren’t damning flaws. While some people have complained online about the Milo chipping, it didn’t happen to us and doesn’t occur at near the frequency and extent that the Lodge Essential (another former budget pick) has become known for.

In our testing, we found Made In’s enameled cast iron skillet to be on par with Le Creuset’s, and the Dutch oven seems to be too—both in terms of quality and design. It also happens to cost about $100 less than the same size Dutch oven from Le Creuset and we actually prefer the design of the Made In handles. A bit more flat surface area makes it easy to lift a full pot by the side handles even when wearing oven mitts, and the knob is easy to grab with bare hands or mitts. The size and color options are somewhat limited, but if you’re looking for a high-quality alternative to Le Creuset at a significantly lower price, this Dutch oven is definitely worth considering.

We were kind of surprised to discover this 6-quart Dutch oven from Zulay Kitchen—which makes the popular, inexpensive, handheld milk frother—but it was a pleasant surprise. It’s only $60 and comes with a manufacturer's lifetime warranty (better than Amazon Basics’s limited one-year warranty). It looks a lot like a Le Creuset Dutch oven, and the cast iron is thick and heavy. In our testing, it performed well and heated evenly too. The lid is heavy, with a stainless steel knob and braising divots, and when we had water going at a rolling boil, it let out a steady amount of steam but didn’t rattle or allow any water to sputter out. We haven’t used it long enough to crown it a budget pick just yet, but we’ll continue to test it and update this review with our findings.

DTC cookware brand Caraway expanded their offerings in 2024 to include a durable enameled cast iron, and like their nonstick cookware, it’s available by the set or by the piece. Overall, we liked cooking in the Caraway round Dutch oven—which is currently only available in a 6.5-quart size (there’s also an 8.5-quart oval Dutch oven). It was deeper than comparable models we tested, and the dark, textured interior enamel made it great for sautéing and browning veggies and meat. However, the shallow side handles have an odd design and we worried more than once we’d get our fingers stuck in the small space between the pot and the handle. The 6.5-quart size is also a little big for most home cooks’ everyday needs.

This Smithey Dutch oven is unlike any other on the list, because it is not enameled. It is made of polished cast iron, and it’s a beaut. However, compared to an enameled Dutch oven, it is undeniably a pain in the ass to clean. Because it is not enamel-coated, its cooking surface requires more care. Now, Smithey says that this Dutch oven is easy to care for—that you don’t have to baby it, that you can cook acidic food in it, use soap, whatever. The seasoning will just develop over time and get better with age. But in order for that to happen you need to use it a lot. While we generally agree with the “just cook with it” attitude toward cast iron, it’s harder to pull off with a huge Dutch oven. It’s easy to cook with a skillet on a daily basis to develop a nice seasoning, but with a Dutch oven it takes a more concerted effort. Typically we use Dutch ovens to make stews, soups, and braises, which aren’t the best cooking methods for developing seasoning—depending on how acidic they are, they can actually have the opposite effect. As a result, the Smithey Dutch oven, despite having it for a couple of years, has a pretty underdeveloped seasoning that’s prone to the occasional rust spot. Does it still work and do the job? Yes, but the enamel Dutch ovens in our test over this one will consistently be ready to go.

While this Lodge enameled cast-iron Dutch oven performed well in initial cooking tests, it failed the durability test. The Dutch oven has developed a reputation for chipping over time, and unlike the other cheap models we tested, we did experience chipping with the Lodge. There also seem to be some issues with manufacturing consistency, as cold spots are a common complaint. Until very recently, Lodge didn’t make any enameled cast-iron products at its Tennessee foundry. Instead, it worked with independent manufacturers in China to offer the product at the budget price point consumers expect from the brand. Some consumers have pointed out that the Lodge Dutch oven and the Amazon Basics Dutch oven look suspiciously similar, and they might point to this product being an inexpensive generic model produced by manufacturers for any brand or retailer to license and sell as their own.

We point this out merely to bring attention to the halo effect the Lodge name might impart on its budget Dutch oven. We don’t love recommending things that don’t last, and thus wouldn’t recommend this product.

The American-made Lodge USA Enamel Dutch Oven is a clear step up in quality compared to the overseas-manufactured Lodge essentials Dutch oven above. This made-in-the-USA model has precisely applied enamel layers, stainless-steel hardware, and nice, easy-to-grip handles. During testing, it demonstrated an even cooking surface without significant cold or hot spots and produced a satisfactory braise. As far as moisture retention goes, the lid doesn’t create an entirely tight seal, and the curve of the lid leads to quite a bit of condensation leaking out the seams rather than cycling through the pot. This is only really an issue, though, if you’re cooking with the lid covered on full boil, which you almost certainly won’t. It’s heavier than a Le Creuset by a couple pounds, which knocks it out from being a winner, but it’s a good Dutch oven. One of my colleagues has lived with this pot for over a year and she’s yet to notice any surface chipping of the enamel—a problem that plagues the Lodge essentials Dutch oven. If you like the idea of making your short ribs or sourdough in an American-made product, then you’ll like this Lodge Dutch oven. If you're searching for it online though, just keep in mind this is the more expensive pot of the two you will find.

The Emile Henry Dutch oven is made of clay ceramic, and though we liked its look and feel, it cooks quite differently than a cast-iron Dutch oven. It was difficult to get a good sear on the pieces of meat we cooked in it, and the stew hadn’t evaporated enough by the end of the recommended cook time. If you opt to use this for recipes intended for a cast-iron Dutch oven, expect the cooking experience to be a little different. It also is not compatible with induction cooktops.

The Dansk Casserole—made of enamel-coated carbon steel rather than cast iron—is also considerably lighter, weighing just 6 pounds. However, this pan had a scorched bottom by the end of our cooking process, and it was the most difficult to clean. Though heavy, cast iron is just a superior material for a Dutch oven.

Cuisinart's enameled cast iron cookware isn't all bad; the skillet is our budget pick in that category! Unfortunately, the brand's affordable Cuisinart Dutch oven produced lackluster results in the searing category, as the cooking surface had several cold spots, resulting in unevenly cooked pork.

The Great Jones Dutchess was the heaviest pan in the bunch, coming in at a whopping 15 pounds, and the only oval Dutch oven we tested. In comparison to round Dutch ovens, the ovular shape provided a lot of space for searing, but it stuck out a bit on either side over a round burner. It is, though, one of the best-looking options—the kind of cookware you want to leave out on the stove all the time. The Dutchess makes for a sturdy mid-price option.

We really liked the Misen Dutch oven when we first tested it, but we’ve seen some truly baffling choices by the company. For some reason, at one point, it stopped selling this Dutch oven with the regular center-knob lid, instead only offering a grill pan and a silicone lid, both of which have their uses, but do not satisfy as a substitute for a normal lid. When using the grill pan as a lid, it is very difficult to quickly check on the contents of the pot when inside a hot oven. To do so you have to get both arms in there, which is uncomfortable and feels hazardous. The silicone lid can provide a tight moisture seal, but it does not absorb/radiate heat like cast iron, and thus is incapable of creating the same cooking environment that many Dutch oven recipes rely on. We're happy to report that as of 2025, the regular lid is back! So here's why we loved it in the first place:

This Dutch oven was the deepest we’ve tested. This is largely due it only being available with a 7-quart capacity, a full quart more than many of the other brands, whose offerings top out in the 5.5–6-quart range. Regardless, we found this to be an asset for deep-frying, as it accommodated a lot of oil with a couple inches to spare, or as a sturdier stockpot. For comparison, a 7-quart Le Creuset has wider and shallower dimensions, which is better for searing big batches of meat. The Misen did a splendid job browning up pork shoulder with even heat distribution throughout.

That said, long-term testing has revealed that the enamel coating is not quite as durable as claimed, with a couple chips developing on the edges of the lid. Also, while the Misen Dutch oven comes with a lifetime warranty, a lifetime warranty is only good if the company has the ability to honor it, and some recent issues we’ve had with product sourcing and drastic changes to the company’s product lineup has left us with a few questions on that front.

Denby is a well-known English pottery company is best known for dinner and serveware, but it also has a modest collection of enameled cast-iron cookware, including this Dutch oven. Our main gripe with this one was with its handles. They are the smallest out of all the ovens we tested, meaning they have less space for you to grab, and they heat up quite a bit. If that won’t bother you, it’s a satisfactory Dutch oven available at a mid-range price point.

Vermicular products are beautiful and thoughtfully designed—senior writer Emily Farris is a die-hard fan of its lightweight enameled cast-iron skillet. The Vermicular Oven Pot is a spin off of the brand's flagship musui komodo, but in function it is a classic enameled cast-iron pot. At 10.8 pounds, it is also the lightest Dutch oven available in this size range. While the Vermicular has many idiosyncratic design features, none of them resulted in any observable difference during testing. The rim—left unfinished for a “precision seal,” and therefore more susceptible to rust—was not observably better at sealing in moisture than the Le Creuset and Staub, which do have an enamel coating to prevent rusting. The ridged cooking surface made no significant impact when searing and braising pork shoulder. The side handles on the lid were the most significant shortcoming. They were basically irrelevant for any stovetop cooking and were more of a hindrance when removing the Dutch oven from the oven. We really wanted to like this one, but ultimately the unique design just didn’t pay off.

If you thought the Misen or Great Jones Dutch ovens were heavy, this fella has them beat by 5 pounds. Yes, this 6-quart Dutch oven weighs 20 pounds, and that’s before there’s any food in it. Weirdly, a lot of the weight is in the lid. If you’ve ever wondered what it would be like to cook stew in a hollowed-out boulder, this is the pot for you. One could argue that the thicker walls means this pot can retain more thermal energy—this is true—but we’re slow-cooking dinner here, not smelting gold. That said, it is a really pretty pot, and everybody loved the pistachio color.

As another sub-$100 contender, we really rooted for the Tramontina Dutch oven. It looked like a good alternative to the Le Creuset, but had a notably different shape that created some trade-offs. It has taller sides, which make it great for deep-frying, but at the expense of a slightly smaller cooking surface. It’s also pretty light at around 11 pounds. Unfortunately, the sear test revealed a cold spot that persisted regardless of its position on the flame, which resulted in some sticking and uneven cooking. In the grand scheme of things, a cold spot is a small nuisance that any cook can adapt to—but it’s the sort of thing that distinguishes adequate cookware from the top tier.

The enameled cast-iron version of the Our Place Perfect Pot is certainly an upgrade in terms of longevity and performance compared to the original ceramic nonstick design. We’ve been lukewarm about Our Place products in the past—mostly due to their premium prices for ceramic nonstick cookware that last only a couple years—but this pot held its own against the competition, and at $175, is relatively affordable. It seared meat evenly and retained moisture well, producing luscious and tender pulled pork. It had a few issues, though. Many on staff weren’t crazy about how tall and bulbous the lid was and felt that might hinder storage, (the lid does sit comfortably inverted in the pot, but if you’re the type who likes to display your cookware, you may not want to do that). Like the Staub, it has a dark enamel interior, which hides scuffs and discoloration, but makes it harder to see fond development or burning spots. Also, the model we received did have two chips in the enamel fresh out of the box. Since Our Place offers a warranty that covers this, we gave the brand the benefit of the doubt, but it leaves us questioning production oversight and the veracity of its proclaimed “heirloom” quality. In our mind, Perfectly Fine Pot is a more apt moniker.

Italic’s whole business is based on the idea of offering direct-to-consumer pricing on products sourced from manufacturers that produce goods for recognizable, high-end brands. But here’s something worth knowing about commercial manufacturing: Factories produce products that vary widely in quality in order to target different sectors of the market. So, just because a manufacturer makes high-quality goods, doesn’t mean that everything it makes is of equal quality.

Which brings us to the Italic Blackstone Dutch oven. According to the product page, its Dutch oven is made by a manufacturer that previously worked with Staub and Zwilling. On what exactly? Softly implying that its Dutch oven is of equal quality to a Staub, Italic goes so far as to put the $420 price tag of a Staub Dutch oven next to the $120 price of its own, illustrating how much money you're saving by getting its product instead.

So is the Italic Blackstone Dutch Oven on par with the Staub? Well, based on the design and overall performance, it is not. Let’s start positive. It has a light enamel interior—something Staub Dutch ovens famously do not have. That’s a good thing since we generally prefer light enamel interiors, but it speaks to the arbitrary nature of the comparison they draw. Beyond that, though, the performance of the Dutch oven itself was disappointing. The thin lid did a poor job maintaining moisture, releasing more steam while completely closed compared to every other Dutch oven we tested. It didn’t even fit neatly on the pot. Despite this thin lid, it still managed to be heavier than the same sized pot from Staub by roughly a pound.

While it’s still a serviceable piece of cookware, we think Italic vastly overstating the value of the product it is selling, and that left a bad taste in our mouths.

Additional testing and reporting by Emily Johnson and Kendra Vaculin.

We’re home cooks just like you—and we bring a home cook’s perspective to all of our rigorous testing. But unlike you, we have an extra 10 hours a day to spend geeking out over kitchen tools because it is literally our job. We don’t only use our recommended products in controlled settings, we bring the best ones into our own kitchens to help us put dinner on the table on a Wednesday night for our families, or to throw a dinner party for 12. When we recommend a product, you should trust that we’ve used it—a lot—just like you will. Read more about our testing process and philosophy here.