Best Gas Ranges for $1,000 or Less

At retail, you’ll find dozens—if not hundreds—of gas ranges to choose from. Some of these gas ranges come with fancier features than others, like continuous grates, griddle burners, and ovens that can air fry. But what’s most important is a range’s ability to perform some very basic tasks really really well, day in and day out, which many models do, without breaking the $1,000 threshold. That’s why we only recommend gas ranges that meet the following criteria:

• They heat water fast. The best gas ranges in our tests are quick to bring a large pot of water to a near-boil.
• They simmer steadily. That means having a low-heat burner that’s capable of maintaining a small and steady flame when simmering liquids, so you don’t need to stir constantly to avoid scorching, say, tomato sauce or melting chocolate.
• They bake and broil evenly. Gas ranges don’t always bake as well as the best electric offerings, so we look for cakes and cookies that emerge uniformly baked from multiple racks. And the broilers of the best gas options heat evenly while still getting hot enough to sear.
• They offer plenty of space. Many manufacturers inflate oven sizes by counting the space where you can’t cook, like the bottom of the oven. We measure and score usable capacity from the lowest rack position.
• They’re reliable. We survey thousands of CR members each year about the reliability of their gas ranges and tabulate scores based on those responses.

To put a gas range through its paces, our experts use a combination of calibrated time and temperature measurements that size up how evenly an oven distributes heat and how quickly a cooktop heats water.

We also test simmer functions with tomato sauce and chocolate. Over the course of a year, our test engineers bake more than 2,400 cookies and 400 cakes to test ovens for even baking, and record thousands of temperature measurements to see whether gas broilers heat evenly, while still getting hot enough to sear.

CR members can read on for full reviews of the best gas ranges for $1,000 or less.