The Best Small Cutting Boards

We love our full-size cutting boards for most tasks. But sometimes we want a more compact board for small jobs or when cooking in cramped spaces. We wanted to find the best small cutting board—one that would be durable and sit securely on the counter but also be easy to maneuver and clean. So we bought nine models priced from $9.49 to $38.95 and made from a few different materials. Each measured about 11 by 14 inches, roughly half the size of our favorite full-size boards. We then put the boards to work, chopping onions, mincing parsley, pounding chicken cutlets, and mincing pungent garlic and stain-inducing chipotle chiles in adobo on them. To see whether any board dulled knives faster than others, we made 500 cuts on each one with a newly sharpened knife, testing the knife periodically by slicing through copy paper. We washed the boards by hand or ran them through the dishwasher 25 times, according to the manufacturers’ instructions, and dropped each off the counter three times, simulating the kind of abuse a board might endure.

Which Material Is Best?

Material mattered. Some testers liked cutting on the softer, slightly textured surfaces of wood and bamboo boards. But these boards weren’t necessarily gentler on knives than the boards made from other materials, nor were they were more durable. After 500 strokes, knives used on the plastic and composite boards were just as sharp as those used on the wood and bamboo ones. And boards of every type sustained a fair amount of wear and tear without becoming gouged, scuffed, or scarred beyond use.

In our testing, though, both wood and bamboo boards stained and retained odors longer than other boards. And wood and bamboo boards require more careful cleanup and maintenance; they must be seasoned with oil before use, washed and dried by hand after each subsequent use, and oiled periodically to keep them from absorbing water and then splitting or warping. We preferred the plastic and composite boards, which didn’t stain or retain odors, are maintenance-free, and can be thrown in the dishwasher when you’re done with them, making them even more convenient and easy to use for quick jobs.

Pitting Portability Against Stability

Plastic and composite boards have an additional advantage: They’re more portable, as they are usually thinner (¼ to ½ inch thick) and lighter than other boards, with most weighing less than 2 pounds. But that user-friendliness sometimes came at a cost. Regardless of material, the thinner and lighter the board, the less securely it sat on the counter and the more likely it was to slip or spin in action, making for unstable and slightly dangerous mincing, chopping, or ... read more