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See why.The Best Tortilla Presses
We made more than a hundred corn tortillas to answer a pressing question: Which press is best?
By Published Aug. 19, 2021
Top Picks
What You Need To Know
A good tortilla press should do most of the work for you, cranking out consistently sized corn tortillas every time—without requiring too much elbow grease. Our winning model, the Doña Rosa x Masienda Tortilla Press, combines heft with a thoughtful design that makes it easy to apply steady, even pressure and form perfect tortillas. We also loved the less expensive Victoria 8" Tortilla Press, which offers wide plates that prevent dough from squeezing out the sides and a compact size that makes for easy storage.
What You Need to Know
People have been making corn tortillas by hand for millennia, but tortilla presses, or tortilladoras, were patented in the early 20th century to standardize and streamline tortilla making. These simple devices generally consist of two flat plates that are joined by a hinge and a handle. The plates can be made from metal, wood, or even plastic. The top plates of most presses feature a raised ridge that acts as a fulcrum when the handle is pressed down, helping distribute the weight evenly across the entire top plate. To press a tortilla, you place a ball of masa on the bottom plate and then push down on the top plate, using the handle to apply even pressure.
What makes a good tortilla press? We spoke to Lesley Téllez, a Mexican American recipe developer, journalist, and cookbook author, about what qualities she looks for in a press, and we kept an eye out for them in our testing. The most important factor she identified was weight; she recommended a press with enough weight to produce an evenly thin tortilla. She also recommended paying attention to the size of the press: Larger presses provide more sizing options when making tortillas. Bearing these tips in mind as we started testing, we soon learned that not all presses are created equal.
What to Look For
- Heavy Metal or Wood: We got the best results from the heavier presses in our lineup, which were made from cast iron, steel, or wood. You don’t need to use as much force when working with a heavier press because the weight of the top plate does the work for you.
- Wide Plates: We preferred models with plates that were at least 8 inches wide, but the wider, the better. Wider plates allowed the tortillas to spread evenly without threatening to ooze out the sides. We used the presses to make 5.5-inch corn tortillas, but we appreciated having the option to make larger tortillas. Models with wider plates also kept the dough balls in place as we pressed; on these models, the distances from the hinges to the centers of the bottom plates are longer, so the top plates approach the dough balls from the top as the pressing starts, ...
Everything We Tested
Highly Recommended
- Ease of Use: 2.5 stars out of 3.
- Performance: 3 stars out of 3.
- Durability: 3 stars out of 3.
With this reliable press’s heft, we barely had to apply pressure to create perfect tortillas. Made of smooth steel (coated in paint approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration), this press has a long handle that slides easily against the top plate’s ridge, evenly distributing the top plate’s weight and ensuring a steady pressing motion. Its sizable plates—the widest in the lineup—prevented masa from squeezing out the sides. This press is quite heavy and its large handle juts upward, making it a bit difficult to move and store, but we think its stellar performance outweighs these minor drawbacks.
Recommended
- Ease of Use: 2.5 stars out of 3.
- Performance: 2.5 stars out of 3.
- Durability: 3 stars out of 3.
Made of hefty yet smooth cast iron, this press had a heavy top plate that easily anchored dough balls in place as we pressed, and its wide plates ensured that no dough squeezed out its sides. Its relatively long handle slid easily against the ridge on its top plate, allowing for a smooth, steady pressing motion. We liked that its handle lay fairly flat, making storage easy. Still, this press wasn’t perfect every time; if we pressed too hard on the handle, we occasionally made tortillas of uneven thickness. We made more successful tortillas once we got the hang of using it.
- Ease of Use: 2 stars out of 3.
- Performance: 2.5 stars out of 3.
- Durability: 3 stars out of 3.
This press was attractive, with its alternating layers of light and dark wood, but its merits went beyond looks. Its long wooden handle slid easily against the wooden ridge on its top plate to create even pressure. Still, it wasn’t as heavy as some of the metal options, so we had to press down a bit harder to get tortillas as thin as we wanted—though they were always even. While its bulky size makes it a bit more difficult to store than more compact models, the smooth wood felt nice in our hands, and it would look great on a countertop for those with the space.
Not Recommended
- Ease of Use: 1.5 stars out of 3.
- Performance: 1.5 stars out of 3.
- Durability: 3 stars out of 3.
This press was difficult to use. Its cast-iron surface was so rough that its handle got stuck on the top plate’s ridge as we pressed, preventing us from applying even pressure. This allowed dough balls to slide around and led to tortillas of uneven thickness most of the time. However, we liked its wide plates, and its compact size made it easy to store.
- Ease of Use: 1.5 stars out of 3.
- Performance: 1 stars out of 3.
- Durability: 3 stars out of 3.
This press was simply too light to press dough evenly. Despite its wide plates, dough often slid off-center and squeezed out the press’s sides, so tortillas were almost always uneven. That said, we did like that this press’s handle lay flat for storage.
- Ease of Use: 1 stars out of 3.
- Performance: 0.5 stars out of 3.
- Durability: 3 stars out of 3.
This press's plates were close to 2 inches smaller than those of our favorite models, so dough often oozed out the sides of the press. It was also far too light, which meant that we had to exert a lot of force to press the tortillas.
- Ease of Use: 0.5 stars out of 3.
- Performance: 0 stars out of 3.
- Durability: 3 stars out of 3.
No matter how hard we tried, we couldn’t get this press to create a successful tortilla. Though its handle glided smoothly against the ridge on its top plate, the top plate simply wasn't heavy enough to create more than a 3-inch-wide tortilla, no matter how much force we exerted. These fat, doughy tortillas couldn’t cook through and would hardly support fillings for a taco.
Reviews you can trust
The mission of America’s Test Kitchen Reviews is to find the best equipment and ingredients for the home cook through rigorous, hands-on testing.
Chase Brightwell
Chase is an associate editor for ATK Reviews. He's an epidemiologist-turned-equipment tester and biscuit enthusiast.
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