The Best Manual Citrus Juicers

This sturdy and efficient citrus juicer was comfortable to hold and easy to use. The gear assembly compresses the fruit with more mechanical advantage than a plain hinged device, providing more squeezing force for the same amount of exertion. The long arms gave us better leverage to press the fruit, and the draining slots on the bottom of the juicing bowl caught most of the seeds. The bowls comfortably accommodated limes and lemons and pressed against the fruits’ peels, extracting citrus oils and resulting in fragrant juice with notable complexity. It was easy to clean and store.

This heavy, sturdy countertop model was speedy and yielded great volumes of juice with ease. It had a solid base, which kept rocking to the minimum as we pressed the handle toward the counter to extract the juice. It was nicely constructed with a tight hinge and didn’t slam our hands when we opened it for cleaning. We liked how versatile it was, handling limes, lemons, oranges, and even grapefruits effortlessly. Because it can’t be bolted to a table or a surface, as is common with this style in commercial kitchens, we had to hold the back of the juicer to keep it stable, which required a bit of practice.

We liked the simplicity of this compact, straightforward tool, which was straightforward to use. It was lightweight but sturdy, with a grippy handle that was comfortable to hold. We liked its deep ribs and sharp edges, which bit into the flesh as we turned the reamer. The juice tasted fresh, though it was less aromatic than juice from the presses. It worked best with lemons. With small limes, the pointed tip sometimes poked through the thin peels and into our palms. Large fruits required a few more turns to get all the juice out. Using a reamer is a bit messy, but some testers were willing to accept that in exchange for having a compact, easy-to-store tool. You have to strain the juice to pick out the seeds.

This model is based on a popular vintage design that has been manufactured by various companies over the years. It processed fruits of all sizes well. Unlike other countertop presses sitting tall on the counter with metal arms extending from the top, its arm is low, which allowed us to use more muscles to press. To use, you add a piece of fruit to the spacious juicing bowl with its flesh facing the integrated strainer. Then, by bringing down the arm, the metal plate attached to it closes shut to press the fruit. The juice flows through the strainer into the catcher, and you tip the device to pour out the juice through a spout on its side. The solid base doesn’t rock. The large, heavy metal plate crushed the fruit and worked efficiently. But it was heavy to lift and move during cleanup; citrus oils also stained the interior wall of the juicing bowl. The hinge is removable for easy cleaning, but it can come off by accident and become lost.

This model worked quickly and effectively through large amounts of small and medium citrus. Like origami, it opens up during use and folds flat for easy storage; its name is a portmanteau of “flat” and “juicer.” Most presses are designed so that the arm swings down and becomes parallel to the countertop. This design is unique in that the arms swing toward each other horizontally, and using it required different muscles. There were tiny, pointy bumps on one side of the chamber that pierced the peel and released oils, resulting in especially fragrant juice. The chamber was deep but tapered toward the bottom; we had to cram our hands to reach inside the chamber to clean. There’s a seed catcher under the chamber, but some still managed to escape. It was a little messy to juice lemons, as the force could sometimes push the fruit up and slightly out of place, causing juice to spray into the air.

This lightweight model came with two reamer attachments, one for small citrus like limes and lemons and the other for medium-sized fruits such as oranges; both sizes have built-in strainers with narrow slots. The sharp ridges on the reamers made juicing easy. The plastic juice catcher was lightweight, narrow, and tall, which made the setup feel unstable. It took us a while to figure out that the strainers’ plastic cut-outs must be aligned perfectly with corresponding grooves on the model’s base, but they did have helpful tabs that made it easy to lift and remove them. When juicing a lot of fruit, the strainers’ narrow slots got blocked; we had to stop and clear them regularly.

This model’s glass juicer catcher felt very stable on the counter as we worked. The shape and size of the reamer worked most effectively on lemons but did poorly with limes. The ribs on the reamer were a bit shallow, so we had to press the fruits harder to get the juice out. The small draining slots on the strainer held back seeds, but pulp accumulated on the strainer, too, blocking juice from passing through. We had to pause to clear the pulp repeatedly, otherwise juice would overflow. We had to remove the reamer to pour out the juice, a messy and sticky task that further slowed us down. To clean, we had to unscrew the collecting bowl, which made for a total of three pieces. We preferred juicers with fewer parts to keep track of.

This elegant countertop press juicer had a stainless-steel strainer that caught most seeds, but there was a bit of a learning curve to the model. Instead of bringing down the lever in one smooth motion, you lower it to the top of the fruit, then press down again to squeeze. After the lever is lowered completely, it snaps into place with a sudden jerking motion that surprised us every time and threatened to pin our fingers behind the heavy metal arm. The hinge was so loose that the weighted lever (which was connected to the hinge) would accidentally clamp down when we opened it up for cleaning. We struggled with balancing a halved citrus on the juicing bowl because of the bowl’s pointed tip. The device also was a touch too light and rocked a lot while juicing, even with one hand holding down the juicer. The suction cups designed to prevent this didn’t work and just made it harder to lift up and move.

This model came with two reamers—a yellow one for small citrus and an orange one for larger fruits—as well as a grater. The collecting bowl was spacious enough to hold 1.5 cups of juice. Though you can pack the attachments into the bowl to store everything away, the whole model was too bulky for standard kitchen drawers. The reamers were too small to be effective; we had to grip the fruits tightly as we twisted them. After a few tries, we realized the yellow reamer intended for lemons was better suited for limes, and the orange reamer intended for oranges was better for lemons. The draining slots on the built-in strainers were too small. Pulp accumulated quickly, so we had to clear the drainage, which became a hassle.

This small and light juicer felt flimsy in our hands, and its pressing bowl was so small that it could barely fit a lemon half. The underside of the bowl has a circle of large holes that allowed lemon seeds to escape into the juice. The short arms didn’t provide as much leverage as longer-handled models when squeezing citrus, leaving the flesh unpressed and our hands tired after just a couple of lemons. It took almost 6 very frustrating minutes to process 10 limes because of how inefficient the model was to use. We also didn’t like how it splashed and sprayed, covering the counter with wasted juice and making a mess.

This handheld press felt so lightweight that we had to squeeze really hard to extract the juice. This is the only handheld press that you don’t juice directly into a vessel. The juice remains inside the press, then you tip the press to the side and direct the juice into a bowl or measuring cup via a small spout. Thanks to the drainage holes inside the press, the juice came out pulp-free every time. But we found the juicing bowl to be too small to fit a larger lime or a regular-sized lemon and the arms too short to provide enough leverage to effectively squeeze out the juice. It was messy and we lost our grip as the aluminum handle became slippery. It took 5 and a half minutes to juice 10 lemons. Not only did this juicer leave much of each citrus half unjuiced, but it was also extremely unpleasant and uncomfortable to use.