Outdoor grilling is a cherished tradition, a wonderful way to bond with family and friends, and an opportunity to showcase your culinary prowess. To do that, you need the perfect gas grill by your side, one that effortlessly turns raw ingredients into mouthwatering masterpieces.
In this guide, we'll walk you through the top gas grill options for 2025, taking into account a range of needs and preferences. We'll delve into the world of cooking capacity, fuel types, build quality, and innovative features. Whether you're a seasoned grill master or a beginner, we've got you covered.
How much should you spend on a gas grill?
You can find gas grills in places like Walmart and Home Depot for under $200. And if that is absolutely your limit in how much you can spend, then you can certainly feel free to make that purchase but just know that a grill at that price is not going to last long. They're selling it at that price because the materials used to make it were cheap. Cheap materials rust and fail quickly.
For this reason, we are looking at gas grills at higher price points. After all, The Barbecue Lab exists to test outdoor cooking gear so that we can help you make a good purchase that you won't regret.
In this article will compare gas grills at different price points, starting with $400 to help you out no matter where your budget limits land.
Best Gas Grills Under $400
We purchased 3 grills under $400 from our local Lowe's. Lowe's offers free assembly and curbside pickup, so we were more than glad to let the good folks at Lowe's save us about 5+ hours putting these grills together and disposing of the boxes and packing material. If you're buying a grill at a big box store like this, I really don't know why you would want to do it any other way!
Weber Spirit E-210
Feature | Details |
|---|---|
Burners | 2 |
BTUs | 26,600 |
Cooking Space | 363 sq. in. |
Natural gas available | no |
Outdoor kitchen compatible | no |
Warranty | 10 year limited |
Additional Features | none |
Retail Price | $399 |
What we loved about the Weber Spirit E-210
What we didn't love about the Weber Spirit E-210
The Weber Spirit E-210 was our favorite gas grill at the $400 budget. Though none of the grills at this price point earned a high score in our Perfect Grill Checklist, the Weber earned the highest score among the competition. We believe that what you lose in cooking square inches you'll make up for in the longevity of this gas grill.
Monument Mesa
Feature | Details |
|---|---|
Burners | 5 |
BTUs | 50,000 |
Cooking Space | 450 sq. in. |
Natural gas available | no |
Outdoor kitchen compatible | no |
Warranty | 8-year burner, 2 year grill |
Additional Features | side burner, sear burner |
Retail Price | $399 |
What we loved about the Monument Mesa
What we didn't love about the Monument Mesa
The Monument Mesa came in 2nd place, only 6 points behind the Weber. If you need more cooking space or high temperature capabilities than what the Weber Spirit has to offer, the Monument Mesa would be a strong option to consider.
CharBroil Performance Series Silver 4 -Burner
Feature | Details |
|---|---|
Burners | 4 |
BTUs | 32,000 |
Cooking Space | 420 sq. in. |
Natural gas available | no |
Outdoor kitchen compatible | no |
Warranty | 5-year Burner, 2-year Firebox and 1-year all other parts |
Additional Features | side burner |
Retail Price | $349 |
What we loved about the CharBroil Performance
What we didn't love about the CharBroil Performance
Best Gas Grills Under $2,000
We tested 4 gas grills at or under the $2,000 price point. Each of these grills were provided to us by the manufacturers for testing and impartial review.
Grilla Grills Primate Gas Grill and Griddle
Feature | Details |
|---|---|
Burners | 4 |
BTUs | 60,000 |
Cooking Space | 663 sq. in. |
Natural gas available | yes |
Outdoor kitchen compatible | yes |
Warranty | 4 years |
Additional Features | Full griddle included, paper towel holder |
What we loved about the Grilla Primate
What we didn't love about the Grilla Primate
We have been thoroughly impressed for the Grilla Primate, especially considering the price point. If you wish you could have a grill and an outdoor griddle but feel like you have to choose between the two for the sake of space and budget, this is the no-brainer solution for you.
The Grilla Primate has proven that it isn't just a quality gas grill, but it's a true combo grill. With the full griddle coming in the box as well as the grates for a full gas grill, I was truly surprised by the value you can get for $1,099. I've even seen this grill on sale from time to time under the $1,000 price point, so you're talking about the highest BTU output grill in our test with even heat distribution across the grill grate that also functions as a full gas griddle when you want it.
I really like this grill, and my daughter Addison has claimed it as her own now that she's had a chance to work with it. When a kid says they want to keep a grill around, that really means something around here, and the Primate is a standout in this head to head.
Read our full Grilla Grills Primate review.
Napoleon Prestige 500 Gas Grill
Feature | Details |
|---|---|
Burners | 4 |
BTUs | 48,000 |
Cooking Space | 500 sq. in. |
Natural gas available | yes |
Outdoor kitchen compatible | no |
Warranty | Lifetime |
Additional Features | Infrared sear burner, rear infrared burner and rotisserie kit included |
What we loved about the Napoleon Prestige
What we didn't love about the Napoleon Prestige
The Napoleon Prestige, I think this is the grill you buy to impress your friends, neighbors and family.
The lights on the knobs are just the coolest thing to someone who hasn't seen them before. The way they're blue when off and red when lit brings guests to ask questions about the grill while you're cooking. The wavy grates are in stark comparison to straight grates you find in almost every other grill on the market, and they're a conversation starter while you're cooking and after while you're eating.
The full rotisserie included in the box with a dedicated burner and the side infrared burner for searing means this grill can do a whole lot of things right out of the box.
For the first Napoleon grill we've tested here at The Barbecue Lab, I'm impressed with the quality and add-ons included with this grill, and wouldn't hesitate to put this beauty on my patio for many years to come.
Use code: BBQLAB75 to save $75
Weber Genesis SX-335s Gas Grill
Feature | Details |
|---|---|
Burners | 3 |
BTUs | 39,000 |
Cooking Space | 513 sq. in. |
Natural gas available | yes |
Outdoor kitchen compatible | no |
Warranty | 2-12 years, depending on the part |
Additional Features | side burner, sear zone, internal temperature probe |
What we loved about the Weber Genesis SX-335s
What we didn't love about the Weber Genesis SX-335s
The Weber Genesis tested to be exactly what I thought a Weber gas grill would be. Even heat distribution across the cooking grate, new innovations that we haven't seen from things like the Weber crafted accessories, and even how the grill grate fits directly over the Weber Crafted frame without messing up the main grate. You can leave this in all the time, just take the grate off, and you're making pizza, using a griddle or searing with a wok add-on.
It doesn't come with a full griddle in the box like the Grilla, but if you want to customize your grilling setup with the accessories and features that you'll use, then this grill has a ton of options to make your cooking dreams a reality.
Use code: BBQLAB75 to save $75
Broil King Regal s490 Gas Grill
Feature | Details |
|---|---|
Burners | 4 |
BTUs | 50,000 |
Cooking Space | 500 sq. in. |
Natural gas available | yes |
Outdoor kitchen compatible | no |
Warranty | 2-10 years, depending on the part |
Additional Features | infrared side burner, rear infrared burner and rotisserie kit |
What we loved about the Broil King Regal s490
What we didn't love about the Broil King Regal s490
The Broil King Regal is a tank of a grill. From the double walled lid that helps keep the wind from messing with your heat to the extendable feet that lock your grill in place so it doesn't blow around the deck, there's a lot to love about the Regal.
If you want the heaviest grill grates at this price point, an infrared side burner to get a whole steak sear and not just grill marks, with a main cooking chamber that can handle a load of burgers night or day with the included light that shines down whenever you're cooking, don't sleep on the Broil King Regal.
Use code: BBQLAB75 to save $75
How We Tested The Best Gas Grill
Our philosophy when it comes to these big comparisons is to just collect all the data we can, as impartially as we can, and let the data speak for itself. Every consumer has different priorities when making a purchase like this so what seems like a huge selling point to one, may be a liability to another.
So now we present the categories that we assessed and the data collected:
Build Quality
Let's start by looking at the materials and build quality of these gas grills. While they all have stainless steel components included in the build, the Grilla Primate seems to be made entirely of all stainless steel, but we're not able to determine what grade of stainless they're using.
The Broil King Regal is made of stainless steel and cast aluminum, and what appears to be additional steel components in the cart.
The Weber and the Napoleon both seem to follow in the same vein as they have stainless steel lids and stainless shelves along with stainless doors on the cabinet. The rest of the cabinet is made of steel it appears, but the brand websites aren't very forthcoming with any of their build materials other than stainless.
Shelves and Storage
For shelves and storage, all of these gas grills have two side shelves that are very useful. From thermometers to trays of uncooked meat, it seems like there's never enough room when you need it while grilling, and these side shelves make grilling easier.
Side shelf dimensions:
Grilla Primate | W14 x D18.5 |
Napoleon Prestige 500 | W14.75 x D20.5 |
Broil King Regal s490 | W14.5 x D20.75 |
Weber Genesis SX-335s | W14 x D23 |
The side shelves only have 1 that folds out of the bunch, and it's the right side shelf of the Napoleon. If you have space issues when you store your gas grill, this might be important to consider.
The cabinet storage under each gas grill is quite spacious, with a half shelf increasing the usable storage on the Broil King, Grilla Primate and the Weber Genesis. The Napoleon has a support rod we assume that's for structural rigidity instead of a shelf, but there's still a cavernous opening down below.
Grill Grates
The main cooking surface size varies quite a bit among these 4 gas grills.
Gas Grill | Grate Dimensions | Grate Diameter | Upper Rack |
|---|---|---|---|
Grilla Primate | 34 x 19.5" | 8mm | no |
Napoleon | 28 x 18" | 7.5mm | yes |
Weber Genesis | 27 x 19.5" | 7mm | yes |
Broil King Regal | 25.5 x 19.25" | 9mm | yes |
The Weber upper rack is expandable, essentially doubling the amount of food you can keep on a second level of cooking. I haven't seen this in a gas grill before, but I like the idea. Keeping food warm or heating sides above the main cooking grate only multiplies the usefulness of the Weber Genesis liquid propane grill.
Capacity
To show you the real usage capacity of each gas grill, we broke out some freezer-burned and past-their-prime frozen pre-formed 1/4 pound hamburgers from Gordon's to see how many would fit on each gas grill's main cooking surface.
It's no surprise that the Grilla Primate is able to fit the most burgers out of the bunch with the widest grates in the testing group. We were able to get 4 rows of 7 burgers each for a total capacity of 28 burgers on the Grilla Primate.
The Weber, Broil King, and Napoleon were able to give us 4 rows of 6 burgers, with a max capacity of 24 burgers at a time for each of those three gas grills.
It's worth noting that on the Grilla Primate, there's room to spare even with 28 burgers at a time, while on the other 3, it's pretty tight to fit 24 at a time.
Lights
When it comes to lights on the gas grill, there are two contenders here that have the ability to light things up when it's dark.
The Broil King has a light that attaches to the main cooking chamber lid that's really helpful when you're cooking at night. You can pivot the light to shine directly on your food and turn it off and on with the power switch located underneath. The Broil King also has backlighted knobs that you can turn on and off via a switch on the front.
The Napoleon really takes things up a notch with its lighted knobs. They glow blue when the burners are turned off, but ignite the burner and the burner that was lit changes to a red color. It makes it incredibly easy to find which burners are on in the night or day. Does a gas grill need to have glowing knobs to function in today's market? I don't know, but I'm really loving lighted knobs that are burner specific and color changing, so I'm in for this.
Fuel
When it comes to fuel type, all of these gas grills come with liquid propane as the fuel of choice for standard hookup. Every one of them though, can be ordered to work with a Natural Gas line as well, so no matter what fuel is your preference, each one of these grills is ready for your setup.
Burners
At the heart of every one of these gas grills is a burner system delivering the heat.
Gas Grill | Burners | British Thermal Units |
|---|---|---|
Weber Genesis | 3 burners | 39,000 BTU's |
Napoleon Prestige 500 | 4 burners | 48,000 BTU's |
Broil King Regal s490 | 4 burners | 50,000 BTU's |
Grilla Primate | 4 burners | 60,000 BTU's |
While the factory numbers are good, I think real-use data is better. We partnered with Fireboard Labs to put their Fireboard 2 Pro to work measuring the grate temperatures of each of these gas grills. The Pro model has air temperature probes that can survive over 1,200 degrees and has excellent graphing capability to show the results, so I know you're going to enjoy this.
Temperature Range
We placed 5 probes in an X pattern across the surface of each gas grill and measured their performance. For the first test, we measured the grill from turned off to as hot as they could get with the main burners firing for 30 minutes, and here's what we saw.
The highest temperature we recorded for the Napoleon grill was 716 degrees Fahrenheit, which is 380 degrees Celsius.
The Weber gave us a high temperature of 733 degrees, which is 389 Celsius.
The Broil King saw a high temperature of 892 which is 477 Celsius.
The Grilla Primate had a high of 953 degrees, which is 511 degrees Celsius.
Time to Reach 500°
Now not every cook that we do on a liquid propane grill like this is at maximum heat, so one of the tests I wanted to run was to see how fast each gas grill was able to get all 5 zones that we measured up over 500 degrees, which is where I like to do most of my everyday grilling.
Here are the Fireboard Pro graphs for the Weber Genesis, and after starting the test at 11:59 am you can see that the last probe to reach the 500-degree mark got there at 12:07 pm for a total of 8 minutes to reach 500 degrees across the entire grate.
The Napoleon test started at 5:17 pm and the last probe to register 500 degrees got there at 5:27 pm for a total of 10 minutes on the Napoleon.
The Broil King test started at 2:57 pm and all zones were reading 500 degrees a few seconds after 3:04 pm, for a time of 7 and a half minutes for the Broil King.
The Grilla Primate rounds out the test with a start time of 2:10 pm, and all zones reading 500 degrees by 2:14 pm, for the fastest time in our test at just over 4 minutes to reach the 500-degree mark.
Temperature Evenness
Even heat distribution across the cooking surface is something that we all want to know before we purchase a grill, so let's take a look at what our probes had to say about how even the heat was on each grill.
The Weber Genesis when set to high had about 100 degrees of cooking surface temperature variation across the 5 zones in a range of 620-720 degrees.
The Napoleon Prestige had about 130 degrees of difference in temperature while set to high between 580-710 degrees.
The Broil King had just under 200 degrees of cooking surface temperature variation across the grate registering between 700-890 while set to high.
The Weber Genesis when set to high had about 100 degrees of temperature variation across the 5 zones in a range of 620-720 degrees.
And the Grilla Primate saw a range of 100 degrees across all measurement points between 850-950 degrees during our test.
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