By Bryan Wall
Product Test Journalist | Kaipūrongo Whakamātautau Hautaonga
A dishwasher can save you time and money, using less water than washing dishes by hand and leaving you free to watch The Chase.
But if you buy a poor-performing model, you’ll waste more time and money rewashing half-done dishes and risk missing that favourite telly show.
Here are three of the worst performing dishwashers in our test, and one we think you should consider instead.
Dishwashers to avoid
Our favourite affordable dishwasher
How we test dishwashers
In the test lab, we assess how well a dishwasher removes food like oats, spinach, egg yolk, baby cereal, butter, tomato juice and tea stains.
We leave all the food to dry on the plates, cups and cutlery overnight, and don’t rinse them first. This test gives us a washing score.
We then check how dry the dishes are 30 minutes after the cycle has finished and use the results to calculate a drying score.
We combine the two scores to reach a performance score.
We also calculate an energy efficiency score, based on the amount of energy used per place setting washed.
