You might not think you need an electric wine opener, but hear me out: If you frequently host and open multiple bottles to share, an electric wine opener makes perfect sense. The best electric wine openers remove a cork in seconds, providing a more efficient way to open and present bottles. We have a list of simple corkscrews we’d recommend for opening the occasional bottle of wine. However, some corkscrews can be finicky to position, uncomfortable to grip, or unstable, requiring a deft hand to remove the cork without damaging it. An electric wine opener streamlines the process by safely and quickly removing the cork without damaging it.
We tested 10 electric wine openers to determine which models we liked the most. After testing the openers with more than 20 bottles over a month, a few clear winners emerged. Our tests found that the best electric wine openers are sturdy, easy to position, and look natural next to our wine glasses and other essential wine tools. Below are the best electric wine openers to get the most out of every bottle chilling in your wine fridge.
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Upon unboxing, this sleek, cylindrical electric wine opener earned points for its gorgeous presentation. It arrived as a matching set with a compact stainless steel recharging base and foil cutter, making this a great host gift for a wine lover. This wine opener uncorks automatically when firmly placed over a bottle. Once the opener is compressed, that downward force activates the corkscrew. It stops automatically once the cork is ejected. Pressing the top button on the opener ejects the cork from the corkscrew. This was the quietest electric wine opener we tested, producing a faint whirring hum that was much less audible than other electric models.
This wine opener is very easy and intuitive to use. Since this opener is sturdy, balanced, and slightly heavier than other models, we found its construction made it easier to position the cork for removal. There was little to no repositioning required to open the bottles we tested, and we noticed little to no wiggling during uncorking. We would note that this wine opener requires some downward force to initiate the uncorking process, but it was overall a very automatic process. The cork was easy to eject from the corkscrew with the push of the top button.
Overall, this wine opener is much easier to use than a manual corkscrew, as it requires less specific positioning and leverage. It does the uncorking for you as long as the opener is centered, a downward force is applied, and the opener is firmly positioned above the cork. We felt the foil cutter was a bit underwhelming due to its plastic casing, but it still worked well to cleanly slice and remove the foil from our bottles. This wine opener took a little under 10 seconds to fully remove the cork from our bottles of wine, and we did not encounter any broken corks.
Material: Stainless steel, acrylic | Dimensions: 2 x 2 x 8 inches | Cork Removal: Under 10 seconds Bottles opened per single charge: 80
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Most wine openers we tested were fairly bulky and came with a charging station, but this wine opener is small, short, and incredibly compact. It has a sleek stainless steel frame with the bottom third made of clear plastic to expose the internal corkscrew. This wine opener has two buttons on the front of the body to remove and eject the cork, and the bottom plastic part of the opener is illuminated in blue LED light when in use, making it easy to see what you’re doing. During our tests, we liked its compact footprint and its lightweight yet sturdy and modern construction.
One thing we’d note is that this opener is not fully automatic and does not have an automatic start. We actually preferred the manual button mechanism over some of the fancier fully automatic models that were more difficult to properly align and position. This wine opener is charged via a USB cable and does not include any other accessories. It removed our cooks in only five seconds, making this the fastest model we tested. If you’re looking for something compact on a budget, we recommend the Ozeri.
Material: Stainless steel, plastic | Dimensions: 10.7 x 4.2 x 2.9 inches | Cork Removal: Five seconds | Bottles opened per single charge: 80
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Another sleek and compact wine opener that doesn’t have a huge footprint, the Zwilling Enfinigy Electric Wine Opener looked great displayed on our bar cart. It doesn’t come with a charging stand like the others, so it takes less room to store. Its body is made from matte black BPA-free plastic with a stainless steel corkscrew and foil cutter, so it felt sturdy and and modern. We liked a few specific design features on this opener: We liked the blue LED light that illuminates the interior of the opener when in use. We also liked the included foil cutter, which clips into the body of the wine opener, so you’ll never lose it.
This is another semi-automatic electric wine opener that requires the push of a button to operate. One button controls cork removal and ejection, simplifying the process. It was on the quieter end of the openers we tested, producing a pleasantly low hum. We would point out that the foil cutter had some minor design flaws and required some serious force (and a few passes) to cleanly remove the foil from a bottleneck. One of our corks got stuck in the chamber when removing it, but we had success with the other bottles we tested.
Overall, this wine opener did its job well: It removed the cork from the white bottle easily and quickly. There was very little jolting, and the overall experience was smooth.
Material: | Dimensions: 3.43 x 3.43 x 9.37 inches | Cork Removal: 20 seconds | Bottles opened per single charge: 50
Our Favorite Electric Wine Opener
We tested 10 electric wine openers, but our top pick is the Peugeot Elis Touch Electric Corkscrew. Sleek, slightly heavier, and intuitive, the Peugeot removed the cork from our bottles in less than 10 seconds with zero wobbling. We liked its clean stainless steel design and appreciated the compact charging station and foil cutter. We also liked its pressure-activated automatic start feature, which never caused any false starts.
Food & Wine / Danielle St. Pierre
How We Tested Electric Wine Openers
We tested 10 electric wine openers through a month-long testing period. We used the same two bottles of still wine to test each wine opener: One white (a bottle of Grillo or a Muscadet) and one red (a bottle of Nero d’Avola or a Portuguese Vinho Tinto).
Food & Wine / Danielle St. Pierre
We evaluated each electric wine opener by using the below testing methodology:
- Design: We unboxed each wine opener and evaluated its general design and construction. We noted if it was a sleek, attractive product we would happily display on our bar cart or if it felt bulky, heavy, or outdated. We also evaluated if the materials felt sturdy or cheaply constructed and noted any helpful design features like built-in foil cutters, included accessories, buttons, and LED light displays.
- Speed: Each time we used the electric wine opener to open a bottle, we timed how long it took to remove the cork. We also noted the downward force required to initiate the cork removal and ejection and the force required to remove the foil from a bottle if a foil cutter was included.
- Stability: We noted any wobbling or instability encountered during uncorking and if any corks got stuck in the chamber during ejection.
- Noise: We observed the noise produced by each opener, noting if it was distracting.
- Manual Start: We paid close attention to models with automatic starts, evaluating if they helped or hindered the cork removal process. In most cases, we preferred manual starts with the push of a button since this gave us more control.
Food & Wine / Dana Fouchia
What We Looked For
Ease of Use
The best electric wine openers make it easy to quickly and safely remove a cork from a bottle of wine, so we paid close attention to how user-friendly the models were in our tests. Any models that proved to be wobbly, felt unstable, damaged the cork, or led to corks getting lodged in the chamber were not included in our list of winners.
Included Accessories
Most electric wine openers will include a USB cord and wall charging unit, but pricier electric wine openers usually also include a matching charging stand and foil cutter. If you’re gifting a wine lover or looking for a comprehensive set, we recommend the Peugeot Elis Touch Electric Corkscrew since it comes boxed with these accessories in a nice giftable box.
Manual vs Automatic Starts
We tested several openers with an automatic start and actually found most to be more difficult to use than those with a manual start or a simple push-button. For some pressure-activated automatic corkscrews we tested, the corkscrew falsely started before making contact with the cork, and in some cases, before it was even placed on top of the bottle. With the exception of the Peugeot Elis, we’d recommend electric wine openers with a manual start and, ideally, a simple push-button.
Size
Sure, you’ll be using your wine openers a lot — but there are certainly instances where you might want to keep them out of sight, too. When testing the best electric openers, we looked for sleek designs that were not unnecessarily bulky and could easily be stored, like the travel-sized Ozeri, or the compact Zwilling. The exception to this rule is the Peugeot, which comes with a compact charging doc that you’ll likely want to keep displayed on your bar cart anyways.
Other Electric Wine Openers We Tested
Food & Wine / Danielle St. Pierre
After testing 10 electric wine openers, we recommend only the three picks on our list above. The below models fell short in two or more major testing categories, which prevented them from making our best list. Here’s where they could have done better:
Cuisinart EvolutionX Cordless 4-in-1 Wine Opener ($70 at Amazon)
This wine opener felt cheaply constructed due to its plastic frame, and we felt its rectangular shape was too awkward to snugly place onto a bottle of wine. It took us a few attempts to make even contact with the cork to properly remove the cork using this opener. We had to tilt the wine opener over and look at exactly where the corkscrew was located before lowering it straight on top of each cork, so there was an extra step involved to properly align this opener every time. The included foil cutter also felt flimsy and almost dangerously sharp.
Cuisinart Vacuum Sealer Cordless Wine Opener ($40 at Amazon)
This wine opener has two buttons and was not as intuitive to use as we had hoped. We found we had to hold the base of the wine pretty firmly to prevent the bottle from spinning and moving around on the countertop. While it removed the white wine’s cork very easily, we had trouble with the bottle of red’s cork. It ended up completely bending, almost in half.
Food & Wine / Dana Fouchia
Oster Electric Wine Opener ($25 at Amazon)
The design of this wine opener felt excessively bulky, too tall, and a bit outdated. During our tests, cork remnants fell into our bottle, and the extractors felt jilty, stopping and going along the way. While we liked the included foil cutter, we did not like the clunky charging station. Ultimately, this wine opener took upwards of 30 seconds to open a bottle of wine.
Food & Wine / Dana Fouchia
Rabbit Automatic Electric Corkscrew ($52 at Amazon)
We thought this wine opener was going to be the easiest to use since there are no buttons and it’s automatic. However, we quickly realized that it was very difficult to get the timing down correctly to properly uncork. Since this corkscrew automatically starts at any detection of pressure, the cork extraction process started automatically (and prematurely) several times during our tests.
The whole cycle ran automatically for the uncorking and extrusion, and there was no way to stop it. So if we misaligned the corkscrew or nudged the bottle at all before we were ready to uncork, we had to wait for the full 20-ish second cycle to end before we could open a bottle. There were no buttons or features that let us control the action or stop the cycle, so this wine opener was not very easy to use whatsoever. It made opening a bottle more difficult than it should be.
Rabbit Electric Wine Opener Set ($50 at Amazon)
The actual extraction process was relatively smooth and fast with this corkscrew, but we felt it came with far too many subpar accessories. This set comes with an electric corkscrew, a charging base, a foil cutter, an aerator/pourer, and two wine stoppers. While it comes with lots of accessories, there are so many pieces that we found the whole setup to be a bit overwhelming. More importantly: The foil cutter did not work.
Food & Wine / Dana Fouchia
Secura Electric Wine Opener ($23 at Amazon)
While this wine opener semi-successfully opened our bottle of red wine, the Secura Electric Wine Opener completely broke the neck of our white wine, causing glass shards to enter the wine and posing a potential safety hazard. We chalk this up partially to user error, but we also noted that this wine opener felt wobbly and stable when it did successfully open our red.
Food & Wine / Dana Fouchia
Wine Enthusiast 2-in-1 Electric Blue Automatic Wine Bottle Opener ($60 at Amazon)
We thought the automatic feature would make this wine opener very easy to use, but we had difficulty positioning the corkscrew correctly over the cork once the automatic uncorking process had already begun. We also had to use a very secure grip and a fair amount of downward pressure to stabilize the wine opener, which would be limiting for anyone with joint issues or lacking upper body or arm strength.
We would have preferred a button to hold once we correctly positioned this wine opener over the cork to initiate the uncorking process manually. The automatic uncorking proved to be more problematic than helpful. The button-operated extrusion process, however, worked just fine.
Our Expertise
- Danielle St. Pierre is a senior commerce editor for Food & Wine. She has a WSET Level 1 Award in Wine and professional bartending experience tasting, serving, and pairing wines. She has opinions on Aperol Spritzes, where to find the best stemless wine glasses, and why everyone should have a reliable wine stopper on standby. She’d like to thank her former local wine shop, Drink PLG, in Brooklyn, New York for allowing her to shoot these wine stoppers in their backyard.
- Dana Fouchia is a senior commerce editor for Food & Wine. In addition to testing several electric wine openers for this piece, she’s also reviewed the Rocco wine fridge and will happily guide you where to find the best drinking glasses.