Instant Pot Duo Nova, 10-Quart Having said that, the stainless-steel finish gives it a reassuringly robust look. Richmond Howard started Meal Prepify in 2019 and has helped over a million people learn how to meal prep, get better at meal planning, and create a kitchen they love to use. He’s an avid home chef and loves to bbq, grill out, and make awesome food for family and friends. It got hot enough to easily brown eve hearty veggies like carrots and made quick work of diced onions. We believe this ability is crucial; to effectively saute right in the pot vastly increases the number of meals you can make with only one dish to clean at the end. For the most part, we found the differences in cooking abilities to be minor between the models in our fleet. That being said, we thoroughly enjoyed the food made by the DUO Nova, with it earning superlatives in most of our cooking tests. The stainless-steel cooking pot doesn’t have handles for easy lifting, if you’d prefer handles consider another model such as the Instant Pot Pro or the Instant Pot Evo Plus. Fast, versatile, and convenient, with its bright, upgraded display and lid, the Instant Pot® Duo™ Nova is a rising star in the bestselling Duo™ family. This is especially true if you’re cooking for a family and need something that is going to be big enough for all the hungry mouths in your house. Conversely, there’s no point buying a more expensive, larger capacity pressure cooker if it’s just for one or two people. If you’re looking for the Cake Setting or egg program, neither of these models have that feature at any quart size. Don’t worry as you can still make hard-boiled eggs using the steam button and cakes using the pressure cook button. All you need to do is adjust the time based on the recipe you’re following. If you’re trying to decide between the Instant Pot Duo vs Duo Nova here is a side by side comparison of the key differences between the two electric pressure cooker models. Just like the Duo, the Duo Nova is incredibly easy to use once you get the hang of it. Meals can be prepared in a matter of minutes – all there is to do is chop up your ingredients and select the cooking process that you want to use. Of course, paying more for the Duo Nova does bring some extra features, which could be pretty useful to the right person. Instant Pot DuoInstant Pot Duo Nova3 QuartsYesYes6 QuartsYesYes8 QuartsYesYes10 QuartsYesIf you’re looking for a larger Instant Pot, the Duo Nova 10 quart might be an option for your kitchen. Before we get into our comparison, it’s probably best to take a look at what Instant Pot actually is. Although the term “instant pot” is often used in place of products such as “slow cooker” or “pressure cooker”, Instant Pot is also the name of one of the most popular worktop cooker brands. The Instant Pot Duo is one of the electric pressure cooker models made by Instant Brands. The chili wasn’t thickened to our liking but by switching back to saute it was easy to reduce it to the perfect consistency. During slow cooking the handles and sides all stayed cool, the lid reached 113 F/ 45 C which isn’t too warm to touch. The Instant Pot Duo Nova has 15 one touch preset programs covering off the main foods you’re likely to cook in the multi-cooker, as well as various manual settings for the different functions. But it has far fewer preset programs than you’ll see on some other Instant Pots such as the more expensive Instant Pot Duo Evo Plus, which has 48 customizable presets. One cool thing that the Instant Pot Duo Nova has is an auto-sealing lid. Additionally, we found many meat-based pressure cooker recipes suggest significantly longer cooking times than Instant Pot suggests for the same cut of meat. In those situations, we generally found Instant Pot's recommendations to be more on point, with the longer cook times bringing about slightly drier and tougher results. The pressure release button makes depressurizing the cooking chamber feel much easier and less stressful. Helen is a freelance writer who specializes in kitchen appliances and has written for some of the biggest home-related titles around. From a price perspective, the cost of each model is generally similar when you look at each quart-size side by side. Be sure to keep an eye out for deals and flash sales to save money on your purchase. As the number-one selling electric multi-cooker in the US, Instant Pot is a brand that stands out in this area for its intuitive design and versatile offering. If you type multi-cooker into Google however, you’ll find a host of well-respected brands who are also adding stylish pressure and multi-cookers to their collections. We also had great luck prepping various grains, including rice and quinoa, in the DUO Nova. As a result, it’s fair to say that the manual seals on the Instant Pot Duo are a bit of a drawback. However, The Instant Pot Duo Nova also comes in an extra special 10 liquid quartz size. This huge Instant Pot is absolutely ideal if you’re cooking for a large family or need to cater for a party. You’ll struggle to find another high-quality pressure cooker with such a large capacity. Instant Pot is the most recognizable brand name in the pressure cooker space for a reason, and the DUO Nova delivers on that pedigree by offering exceptional performance at a reasonable price. There are very few situations where the DUO Nova wouldn't be our top pressure cooker recommendation. The first is for those that mainly want to cook meat, as we've found some other cookers that can retain just a bit more tenderness in specific cuts than this machine. It sets the standard for pressure cookers, offering a versatile list of cooking functions, well-designed controls, and convenient touches like a pressure release button. In the world of pressure cookers, the DUO Nova sells for a relatively reasonable price but leads the pack in terms of performance.