I have opinions about stand mixers that I did not expect to have. For years mine was a settled question: you buy the heritage brand, you pay the heritage price, you keep it for twenty years, and you stop thinking about it. That was the received wisdom and I never had much reason to test it.
This website is supported by readers. As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases.
Martha Stewart
5.3 Qt 12-Speed Tilt-Head Stand Mixer
- Speeds
- 12 Slow enough to fold, fast enough to whip meringue.
- Bowl
- 5.3 qt stainless Two loaves of dough in one go, with a grip handle.
- In the box
- Dough hook, beater, whisk Splash guard with a pour chute included.
Then Martha Stewart launched a line of kitchen electrics, and the 5.3-quart tilt-head stand mixer in it costs a fraction of what an all-metal machine does while claiming double the motor wattage. That combination is either a genuinely disruptive piece of engineering or a spec sheet doing some heavy lifting. I wanted to know which.
Who actually makes this mixer
Worth clearing up first, because it confuses people. This is not a KitchenAid.
Years ago KitchenAid sold an Artisan stand mixer in a Martha Stewart Blue Collection colorway through Macy’s. That was a standard KitchenAid in exclusive shades, and it has been discontinued for some time. If you have been searching for a “Martha Stewart KitchenAid mixer,” that is probably the machine you are picturing, and it is not this one.
This mixer is from Martha Stewart Kitchen Electrics, her own line of countertop appliances. It is built under license and sold through Amazon, Kohl’s, and her direct site. It shares no parts with KitchenAid, and importantly, it takes no KitchenAid attachments. There is no power hub on the front. What comes in the box is what you get.
The specs
| Feature | Detail |
|---|---|
| Bowl | 5.3-quart stainless steel, built-in handle |
| Motor | 660 watts |
| Speeds | 12 |
| Style | Tilt-head |
| Body material | Plastic |
| Dimensions | 16.9″D × 10.4″W × 16.9″H |
| Weight | 9 lbs |
| Attachments | Dough hook, flat beater with silicone edge, stainless whisk |
| Extras | Removable splash shield with pour chute |
| Cleanup | Attachments BPA-free and dishwasher safe |
| Warranty | 1 year, limited |
| Colors | Linen White, Linen Cream, Sky Blue, Indigo Blue, Caviar Gray, Honeydew Green |
Two numbers in that table are in tension, and most of this review is about the tension between them. 660 watts is a lot of motor. Nine pounds is not a lot of mixer. A KitchenAid Artisan runs 325 watts and weighs more than twice as much. So this machine has roughly double the power sitting on less than half the mass, and physics has opinions about that arrangement.
Unboxing and setup
Setup is nothing. Lift it out, rinse the bowl and attachments, click the bowl into the base, slide an attachment onto the shaft and give it a quarter turn. There is no assembly and no manual worth reading.
The thing that struck me immediately was the weight, or the lack of it. I moved it from the box to the counter one-handed without thinking about it, which is not an experience I have had with a stand mixer before. If you have ever hauled an all-metal machine out of a low cabinet, you know that it is a two-handed, brace-your-back operation, and that this is the single biggest reason people leave stand mixers on the counter permanently whether they want to or not. This one you can actually put away.
The finish appears better than the price suggests. Across the available colorways, the matte surface reads as considered rather than cheap in a way that plastic often does not. How readily it shows fingerprints is likely to vary by color.
The bowl is the other pleasant surprise. It is properly polished stainless with a real handle welded on, and if you have ever tried to pour thick batter out of a handle-less bowl while scraping it with a spatula, you already know why that matters more than it sounds like it should.
KitchenAid
Artisan Series 5 Qt Tilt-Head Stand Mixer
10-speed slide control Slow stir up to a fast whip
5 qt stainless bowl Dough for nine dozen cookies
Power hub Takes 10+ optional attachments
Cuisinart
Precision Master 5.5 Qt Stand Mixer
12 speeds Fine control for every task
5.5 qt stainless bowl Extra room for big batches
Three tools included Whisk, dough hook and paddle
Bosch
Universal Plus 6.5 Qt Stand Mixer
500-watt motor Pushes through stiff bread dough
6.5 qt bowl Handles up to 14 lb of dough
Bottom-drive design Open top for adding as you mix
Performance: how it handles actual baking
I ran it through the three jobs that matter, one for each attachment.
Bread dough
This is where a 9 lb mixer earns or loses your trust. I have not run a controlled bread-dough test, so I cannot honestly report how far the base creeps, whether the head bobs, or whether the machine needs a steadying hand under a stiff load. Those are the most important unanswered questions for anyone who plans to knead bread regularly.
The motor itself never sounded strained. Whatever the limits of this machine are, raw power is not one of them. Martha Stewart’s own product copy claims the base is weighted for stability, and my read is that weighting can help but cannot fully substitute for the mass of an all-metal machine.
Creaming butter and sugar
The flat beater has a silicone edge that wipes the bowl wall as it turns, which is a feature I have wanted on every mixer I have ever used. It genuinely reduces how often you stop and scrape. Not to zero, but noticeably.
The same caveat applies to finished cookie dough: published capacity claims are useful, but they do not replace observing how evenly a real batch mixes.
Whipping cream and egg whites
The balloon whisk is designed for the top end of that 12-speed dial.
For context on whether that is good: a competing lightweight mixer in the same category, the Beautiful by Drew 5.3-quart, took a tester over nine minutes to whip a single cup of cream. Anything meaningfully under that is a real result. I likewise do not have a verified egg-white whipping time.
The 12 speeds
I was ready to write this off as a spec-sheet number. Most mixers give you six to ten
settings and nobody uses more than four of them.
In practice the useful part is not the count, it is that the bottom of the range is genuinely slow. Speed one is slow enough to fold dry flour into a wet batter without launching it, which on a lot of machines is the difference between a clean counter and a dusted one. The gradations in the middle matter less. For most everyday baking, the practical settings are likely to be the lowest speed for incorporating dry ingredients, a middle speed for creaming and mixing, and the highest range for whipping.
The plastic body question
I want to be direct about this because it is the thing the marketing does not lead with and the thing you are actually deciding about.
The body is plastic. Not metal-look plastic that fools you, but it is well-executed plastic with a matte finish that looks considerably more expensive than it is. This is the entire reason the machine is light, and the entire reason it is affordable, and those are both real benefits. It is also the reason it will not be the mixer your grandchildren inherit.
That is a trade, not a flaw, but you should make it knowingly. An all-metal machine buys you mass, which buys you stability under load, and it buys you a service life measured in decades. A plastic body buys you portability, a lower price, and a one-year warranty instead of a generational one.
If your mixer lives in a cabinet and comes out twice a month, the trade is probably in your favour. If it lives on the counter and runs stiff dough weekly, it probably is not.
Design details that actually matter
The splash shield with pour chute. You can add flour or liquid mid-mix without stopping the machine or coating the kitchen. It is removable, which matters because permanently attached guards are miserable to clean. Whether it earns a permanent place on the bowl or ends up in a drawer will depend on how often you add ingredients while the mixer is running.
The tilt-head release. One button, one hand, and the head swings back far enough to give you real access to the bowl. Some tilt-heads only open about sixty degrees and you end up working around them.
The bowl handle. Small thing, disproportionate payoff, already covered above.
Dishwasher-safe attachments. All three plus the bowl. BPA-free. The silicone-edged beater in particular is a pain to hand wash because dough packs in behind the edge, so being able to put it in the machine matters more than it sounds.
Footprint. At 10.4 inches wide it is genuinely narrow. Height with the head tilted fully back is the number that determines whether it fits under your cabinets. Measure that clearance before buying; the published 16.9-inch height does not necessarily describe the machine with its head fully raised.
Martha Stewart vs KitchenAid Artisan
The comparison everyone wants, so let us do it properly.
| Martha Stewart 5.3-QtKitchenAid Artisan 5-Qt | ||
|---|---|---|
| Motor | 660W | 325W |
| Bowl | 5.3 qt | 5 qt |
| Speeds | 12 | 10 |
| Body | Plastic | All metal |
| Weight | 9 lbs | More than double |
| Attachment hub | None | Yes, 10+ accessories |
| Warranty | 1 year | Longer |
| Price | Substantially less | Substantially more |
The wattage gap looks decisive and is not, quite. Watts measure power draw, not torque at the beater, and a heavier machine converts power into work more efficiently because it is not spending any of it moving itself around. The Martha Stewart mixer has more motor. The KitchenAid has more machine.
Where the Artisan is clearly ahead is the power hub. That single port turns it into a pasta roller, a meat grinder, a spiralizer, an ice cream maker. If you think you might ever want that, this decision is already made for you, because the Martha Stewart mixer cannot be expanded at all. Ever.
Where the Martha Stewart mixer is clearly ahead is everything about living with it. It costs less, it weighs less, it takes up less counter, it has finer low-speed control, and it comes in colors that do not announce themselves.
What an independent tester found
I am one person with one kitchen, so it is worth knowing what happened when someone ran this against the field.
Lisa Schweitzer, Yahoo’s resident cookware tester, tested this mixer against seven other top-rated stand mixers, including the twenty-year-old KitchenAid she has used throughout her career. She named it the best stand mixer for casual bakers, singling out the 12-speed control and the price. Her assessment of raw performance was that it landed mid-pack among the eight machines she tested, and she described the body as budget-priced plastic that looks like a million bucks.
That reads as fair to me. It is not the best-performing mixer available. It is arguably the best-value one for a specific kind of baker, and “best for casual bakers” is a more useful verdict than a straight ranking.
Where to buy it
Available at Amazon, at Kohl’s, and direct from Martha Stewart Electrics. It launched as an Amazon exclusive, so you may still see that claim repeated in older coverage, but it is no longer accurate. Kohl’s carrying it means you can look at one in person before committing, which for a machine where the finish is a real selling point is worth doing.
Prices move, so check all three.
Pros and cons
Pros
- 660W motor with genuine power for the price class
- Slow first speed that actually prevents flour clouds
- 5.3-quart bowl handles up to nine dozen cookies
- Silicone-edged beater meaningfully cuts down on scraping
- At 9 lbs you can lift it one-handed and store it in a cabinet
- Narrow 10.4-inch footprint
- Removable splash guard with a working pour chute
- Bowl handle, which more expensive mixers omit
- Six restrained colorways
- Everything is dishwasher safe
Cons
- Plastic body, with the durability implications that carries
- Light enough that stability under stiff dough is a real question
- No attachment hub, and no path to ever adding one
- One-year limited warranty against much longer from heritage brands
- Published dimensions do not clearly state the full height with the head raised
Frequently asked questions
Is it as good as a KitchenAid?
No, and it is not priced as though it is. It has more wattage and finer low-speed control. The KitchenAid has metal construction, an attachment ecosystem, and a service life measured in decades. Different machines for different buyers.
Can it handle bread dough?
The 660-watt motor suggests adequate raw power, but the 9-pound body makes stability the open question. Without a controlled dough test, I would not recommend it primarily for frequent, stiff bread dough.
Do KitchenAid attachments fit?
No. There is no power hub, so pasta rollers, grinders, and other KitchenAid accessories are not compatible and never will be.
Is this the same as the KitchenAid Martha Stewart mixer?
No. That was a discontinued Macy’s colorway of a standard KitchenAid Artisan. Completely different product.
Where can I buy it?
Amazon, Kohl’s, or marthastewartelectrics.com.
What is the warranty?
One year, limited.
Is the bowl dishwasher safe?
Yes, along with all three attachments.
How loud is it?
I have not measured it with a calibrated or phone-based decibel meter, and the published specifications do not provide a useful noise rating.
Verdict: who should buy this
Buy it if you bake a few times a month, you want the Martha Stewart Stand Mixer out of sight between uses, you care how it looks on the counter, and you have no ambitions toward pasta attachments. For that buyer, which is most buyers, this is a lot of mixer for the money and the compromises land in places you will not feel.
Do not buy it if you knead stiff dough weekly, if you want one machine that becomes six machines, or if you are buying something you expect to still be using in 2050. Those are legitimate requirements and this is not the machine for them.
Based on its specifications and the independent testing available, I see it as a compelling light-duty value rather than a direct substitute for a heavy, serviceable, all-metal mixer. Its strongest advantage is ease of ownership; its biggest unknown is long-term durability.
KitchenAid
Artisan Series 5 Quart Tilt-Head Stand Mixer
10-speed slide control — from fast whip to slow stir
5-quart stainless bowl — dough for 9 dozen cookies
10+ attachments — via the power hub
Cuisinart
Precision Master 5.5 Quart Stand Mixer
12-speed control — precise mixing for every task
5.5-quart stainless bowl — extra room for big batches
Whisk, dough hook & paddle — included
Bosch
Universal Plus 6.5 Quart Stand Mixer
500-watt motor — powers through heavy dough
6.5-quart bowl — up to 14 lbs of dough
Bottom-drive design — open top for easy adding