The Breville 3x Bluicer Pro has a somewhat silly—but nonetheless accurate—name; it’s a combination of a blender and a juicer. It uses a single motorized base to power separate, interchangeable blender and juicer attachments. Breville says that the appliance can perform both functions with ease, churning out fresh juice that you can then blend into smoothies or frozen cocktails with the simple switch of an attachment. But at about $400, the Bluicer costs more than our winning centrifugal juicer (the Breville Juice Fountain Cold) and our winning midpriced blender (the Breville Fresh & Furious) combined. Intrigued, we tested it against both these winners in a Breville battle to see if it could truly replace both appliances. We also compared it with our winning high-end blender (the Vitamix 5200) as the ultimate test of performance. During testing, we evaluated the Bluicer’s ease of use and cleanup, juice and food quality, and overall performance.
After juicing carrots (left), kale, and grapes (right) with the Bluicer, we measured how much of each juice we produced and evaluated their flavors and textures.
Juicing With The Bluicer
When juicing, the Bluicer acts as a centrifugal juicer—it shreds produce into pulp and then relies on centrifugal force to fling the pulp against a filter basket to separate the juice from the solids. Cleverly, the blender jar doubles as a juice carafe. Like the Juice Fountain Cold, the Bluicer has a wide, 3-inch feed tube, which means that minimal food prep is required. We could insert multiple carrots or handfuls of kale in one go. We’ve found that centrifugal juicers aren’t very good at juicing kale (the lightweight leaves aren’t flung against the filter basket with sufficient force), and that was the case with the Bluicer. It did effectively juice both carrots and grapes, but the carrot juice was initially slightly foamier and the grape juice was a bit pulpier than the juices we made with our favorite centrifugal juicer. These differences were subtle, and both machines generally produced quality juice. And though all juicers are a bit of a pain to clean, both the Bluicer and the Juice Fountain Cold were relatively easy to clean and reassemble.
To see exactly what you get for your money, we compared the blending abilities of the Bluicer (right) to that of our favorite midpriced model (left) and our favorite high-end blender (middle).
Blending With The Bluicer
When it came to blending, the Bluicer and our winning midpriced blender, the Fresh & Furious, performed almost identically. That’s because they’re almost identical in design. The bases of their jars are both fairly narrow (about 4.5 inches across), allowing them to create tight vortices and blend food effectively. The machines have similar presets, including “smoothie” and “frozen drink” buttons that make short work of frozen fruits, ice, and leafy kale alike. The Bluicer’s serrated blades were powerful enough to blend toasted almonds into almond butter, albeit with a couple pauses to stir and scrape down the jar. And the Bluicer has a dial to adjust the speed—including a low setting that was ideal for emulsifying mayonnaise. One quibble: Like the Fresh & Furious, the Bluicer automatically pauses blending after 1 minute, which means that you can’t just set it and forget it during long blends. Still, from well-blended smoothies and snowy crushed ice to creamy mayonnaise and smooth almond butter, the Bluicer kept up with the Fresh & Furious at every turn.
A good blender should be able to make smooth, cohesive drinks (such as the kale-pineapple smoothie on the left) and handle tougher tasks (such as turning almonds into almond butter, right).
Could it match the consistently stellar results of the Vitamix 5200? The answer: not quite. The Vitamix’s tapered jar, which is about an inch narrower at its base than the Bluicer’s jar, created a powerfully compact vortex that kept food contained at the bottom. As a result, it worked more quickly and produced silkier, smoother results. We didn't have to pause and scrape down the sides of the Vitamix as often as we did with the Bluicer, and its included tamper was useful in nudging food toward the blades. The Vitamix’s top was also easier to remove. However, scraping out and cleaning the Vitamix’s tall, narrowly tapered jar was more difficult than cleaning the Bluicer.
Do You Need A Bluicer?
Throughout testing, the Breville 3x Bluicer Pro performed almost as well as our winning centrifugal juicer, the Breville Juice Fountain Cold, and just as well as our winning midpriced blender, the Breville Fresh & Furious. However, it costs more than both these models combined, so most people are better off buying our two winners separately. The Bluicer does offer the advantage of a more compact footprint and streamlined design, so if you are an avid juicer who frequently blends and wants to save kitchen space, it may be worth your while. And if you have upwards of $400 to spend and are mainly interested in an incredible blender, we recommend our winning high-end blender, the Vitamix 5200.
Using Juicer Attachment:
- Time how long it takes to juice 1 pound of carrots
- Evaluate the carrot juice for temperature change, flavor, and consistency
- Juice 1 pound each of kale and red grapes, evaluating the juice for flavor and consistency
- Refrigerate 1 cup of carrot juice and check the flavor and consistency each day for four days
- Juice an additional 5 pounds of carrots to test durability
- Clean the juicer after every test by hand or in the dishwasher, noting the ease of cleanup
Using Blender Attachment:
- Blend kale, pineapple, and orange juice smoothies for 1 minute
- Blend kale, pineapple, and orange juice smoothies using the “smoothie” setting
- Make mayonnaise
- Make almond butter
- Crush ice
- Clean the blender after every test by hand or in the dishwasher, noting the ease of cleanup
