I finally found my perfect blender…
TLDR: this blender is comparable to a Vitamix E310 in terms of blend quality, and is in some ways easier to use. Read below for my smoothie journey and how I settled on this being my preferred blender.I’ve used a couple of different blenders over the last couple years, including a Vitamix E310, a magic bullet and a nutribullet. The Vitamix was great, but just too big for my needs. I normally make single serve smoothies/bowls for just myself, and don’t require a super large container to make multiple smoothies. The magic bullet was undoubtedly the worst blender, with only a 250 watt motor It really struggles to make anything using frozen fruit or ice. The nutribullet was better, but it required some babysitting as you had to shake the container to distribute the fruit when it gets stuck at the top.So now I’m here, I haven’t tried ninja blenders before and I did quite a bit of research before settling on this one specifically. Ninja does have more expensive blenders that come with a larger container as an added bonus, however during my research I have found that the larger containers for this brand seem to perform worse than the smaller single use containers. The reason comes down to the blades, the larger one uses 3 separate blades that “chop” everything up, where as the smaller containers use a more traditional blender blade system that blends things nicely. I was also intrigued by the bowl attachment, as it is similar to how Vitamix uses the tamp to distribute items more evenly.So I bought it, and it works fantastic. I’ve attached a short video where you can see a bowl I created with the bowl attachment, and 2 smoothies blending. The video really shows how well the blender is able to mix frozen items without supervision. It just does it, no babysitting required. The smoothie bowl attachment does require you to twist it, but only for 30 seconds (which I think is doable considering how great the consistency is)Also somewhat surprisingly, it blends leafy greens like kale or spinach perfectly without leaving clumps. Only the Vitamix was ever able to do this for me, so I’m happy to have found a blender that is able to do this in single serve fashion. For this to work well you need to use the extract button.At the time of writing this review it’s $69, and I’m pretty sure this is the best blender you can get for that price. Even at its normal selling price I’d still buy it considering how well it works.The only potential downsides to this blender include:1) it’s pretty light, and it can just hop around the counter if the suction feet aren’t attached properly. Try to get the feet a little wet and clean the counter before setting it down to avoid this.2) it’s a ninja, I don’t think this brand is exactly known for product longevity but I guess I’ll have to see how it holds up. Build quality is overall good but not up to Vitamix standards of course.3) It’s loud, like I’m pretty sure you will wake up everyone within a 500 ft radius if you are blending at 6 am. Don’t be that person.That’s about it for this long review, I’m not sure why I spent the time writing this out but I think it’s good for a product like this to get the recognition It deserves. 5 stars, just buy it.