Ninja Professional Plus Blender with Auto-iQ (BN701)

The BN701 is for the household that wants a full-size blender for smoothies, milkshakes, frozen drinks and the occasional salsa, and does not want to spend Vitamix money to get it. America's Test Kitchen names it the best less-expensive blender in its October 2025 update, and the reasons are simple: a strong motor, a big pitcher, three programs that work and a body short enough for a standard cabinet.

It is also the right pick for a family. The 72-ounce pitcher holds 64 ounces of liquid, the most of any pick on our best blenders list, so four smoothies at once is one batch rather than two. Every part that touches food goes in the dishwasher.

Who should skip it: anyone whose main jobs are nut butter, hot soup from raw vegetables or leafy-green smoothies with no flecks. Those are the three tasks where the price gap to a Vitamix shows, and they are covered honestly below.

Ice is where the Ninja is strongest. SharkNinja's stacked blade column runs up the middle of the pitcher rather than sitting at the bottom, and it pulverizes ice quickly. TechGearLab found it reduced a pitcher of ice to a uniform powder in 60 seconds and made a good margarita in two minutes, and ATK found it crushed ice effectively. For frozen cocktails, slushies and milkshakes it gives up little to the Vitamix picks; in TechGearLab's scoring only the Explorian E310 did clearly better on frozen drinks.

The programs are the second strength. Three Auto-iQ buttons, for smoothies, frozen drinks and what Ninja calls extractions, run their own pulse-and-pause patterns and stop on their own, so you can load the pitcher, press once and walk away. TechGearLab gave the controls 8.0 out of 10, the highest sub-score in its review, and praised the clear labeling. Four manual settings cover everything else. Neither the Vitamix 5200 nor the E310 has a program at all.

Size and cleanup are the third. SharkNinja lists it at 16.22 inches tall, ATK measured 17, and either way it clears an 18-inch cabinet. It weighs under 10 pounds, and the pitcher, lid and blade assembly are all dishwasher safe. The blade column lifts out, so there is no scrubbing around a fixed blade the way there is with a Vitamix container.

Texture is the first limit. ATK measured the pitcher at about 7 inches across, and a wide pitcher pulls in air; its smoothies came out a touch frothier and more fibrous than the Vitamix 5200's. TechGearLab found berry smoothies and milkshakes excellent but green smoothies grainy, with kale that never fully broke down, and scored smoothies 6.0 out of 10 against 10 for the 5200. If a green smoothie is the daily order, this is the wrong blender.

Nut butter is the second. ATK's almond butter came out gritty and the motor heated up noticeably; TechGearLab had to stop several times to push the mixture back onto the blades before it reached a usable texture. It gets there, with patience, but not cleanly.

Heat is the third. The motor does not spin fast enough to warm food by friction: TechGearLab's soup reached only 74°F, and the puree was coarser than a Vitamix produces. The BN701 will blend a cooked soup; it will not make one from raw.

Two smaller points. ATK noted that the removable blade column occasionally fell out while pouring and that the lid only seats in one orientation, which takes getting used to. And the warranty is one year, against five for the E310, seven for the 5200 and ten for the Ascent X2. In this price class that is normal, but it changes the math on a blender you hope to keep for years.

Against the Vitamix Explorian E310, the E310 is the nearest Vitamix in size and the next step up in price class. It makes smoother green smoothies, scored a perfect 10 for frozen drinks at TechGearLab and carries a 5-year full warranty, but it has no programs, no timer, a smaller 48-ounce container and a fixed blade. The Ninja wins on capacity, programs and cleanup; the E310 wins on texture and longevity.

Against the Vitamix 5200, the 5200 makes the finest smoothies ATK tested and heats soup past 150°F, but it is 20.5 inches tall, has no programs, is hard to clean by hand and sits several price classes higher. The 5200 is for people who care about texture above all; the Ninja is for people who care about the smoothie being done when they come back to the counter.

The Ninja BN701 is the honest budget answer: strong on ice and fruit, easy to run, easy to clean and short enough for any cabinet, with a one-year warranty and three real weaknesses in green smoothies, nut butter and hot soup. If those three are not on your list, it does most of what the Vitamix machines do for a fraction of the price class. If they are, spend more on the E310 or the Ascent X2.