Taylor Compact 9877FDA Pen-Style Thermometer

What the maker puts in writing

• “Instant Temperature Read: Delivers fast, reliable results with a responsive stainless steel probe & wide -40 to 450°F range, ideal for grilling, roasting, candy making & everyday kitchen cooking tasks.”
• “Waterproof Construction: Built for busy kitchens, this waterproof food thermometer withstands splashes & quick rinses”
• “Large LCD Display: Clear digital screen provides easy-to-read temperatures at a glance, while the integrated HOLD function locks readings for safer viewing away from heat sources.”
• “Smart Auto Shut-Off: Equipped with a 10-minute auto shut-off feature, this compact kitchen thermometer conserves battery life”
• “Compact Pen Design: Slim pen-style thermometer fits neatly in drawers & apron pockets, while the probe cover snaps onto the back to form a practical handle for improved grip & control.”
• Reference 9877FDA · Catalog: 31 g (1.1 oz), 27 × 18 × 210 mm (1.06 × 0.71 × 8.27 in)

The cover becomes the handle, which no other item here does

“the probe cover snaps onto the back to form a practical handle for improved grip & control”

A pen-style thermometer is a thin tube, and the body is the handle — so your fingers sit as close to the food as the geometry allows.

Snapping the cover on the back extends the body, moving your hand further from the heat and giving you something thicker to hold.

Two problems solved by a piece of plastic that would otherwise be loose in a drawer.

The shelf addresses storage five other ways, and none of them helps in the hand:

A magnet — eight of the fourteen items sold on Amazon.com, including both ONFIKY units, the ANDAXIN, the LONICERA and two TempPro models. It decides where the tool lives, which matters, and it does nothing while you cook. A hang hole — the TempPro TP-02S at $9.99, the ANDAXIN at $9.99, the TempTrack at $19.99 A folding probe — the TempPro TP03A at $9.99 and TP03H at $9.98, which tuck the tip into the body A tabletop stand — only the TempTrack, which is the one item here with three storage modes A loose probe cover — the TempPro TP-02S, which protects the tip and then has to go somewhere

The caution the page does not give: a cover that snaps on is a cover that can snap off, and the piece protecting the tip is now the piece you put down on a countertop. A blunted or bent tip is the commonest way a thermometer goes out of true.

At 31 grams and 210 × 27 × 18 mm this is the second lightest item on the shelf, behind the 23 g TempPro TP-02S — and the pen format is what buys that. For comparison: the LONICERA at 40 g, the TempPro folders at 48 g and 51 g, the Alpha Grillers at 68 g, the TempTrack base at 96 g and the Etekcity gun at 113 g.

A HOLD function, which is the feature that justifies a pen

“the integrated HOLD function locks readings for safer viewing away from heat sources”

Five items on this shelf publish one: this, the ANDAXIN at $9.99, the LONICERA at $12.99, the ThermoMonster at $16.99, and both leave-in units by their nature.

Why it matters most on a pen. A pen is read along its own axis, so with the probe in a roast the display points wherever the probe does — at the oven roof, at the floor, or away from you. Without a lock you lean in and squint.

With one you insert, wait, press, withdraw and read standing up. The only time your hand is near the heat is the measuring time — which on this page is unstated, since no reading speed is published.

The expensive alternative to a lock appears twice on this shelf. The KitchenAid at $11.99 has an “Oversized, pivoting backlit display” readable “from any angle”; the ThermoMonster at $16.99 has an “auto flip large LCD… perfect for both left and right hand users” — the only mention of handedness anywhere here.

A hold button makes the angle irrelevant, which is the cheaper answer to the same problem.

And the ten-minute shutoff is the other practical bullet. “10-minute auto shut-off… conserves battery life” — matched only by the TempPro TP-02S at $9.99. Three items do better with motion sensing: both ONFIKY units, which claim “4000+ Hour Battery Life”, and the ThermoMonster, where the tool “wakes up instantly when you pick it up and auto-sleeps after seconds”.

Motion sensing beats a timer, because a timer still runs ten minutes after every use and still has to be switched on by hand. Nine items on this shelf publish no power management at all.

What the page does not say is which battery. Only one item here makes an argument of it — the TempPro TP03A at $9.99: “1 AAA battery instead of a button cell… lasts twice as long”. A CR2032 holds about 220 milliamp hours against roughly 1000 for a AAA, and a AAA is in every drawer in the house.

No accuracy figure and no speed, at nineteen dollars

The page says “fast, reliable results with a responsive stainless steel probe” and publishes no number for either.

Seven of the fourteen items sold on Amazon.com publish a tolerance:

±0.5 °F — the ThermoMonster at $16.99, a thermocouple, NIST cited ±0.9 °F — the TempPro TP-02S at $9.99, the TP03A at $9.99 ±1 °F — the ANDAXIN at $9.99, both ONFIKY units at $9.97 and $9.98, the LONICERA at $12.99 ±1.8 °F / 1 °C — the TempPro TempTrack at $19.99

And ten publish a reading speed: 0.5 s once, 1 s three times, 1–2 s four times, 3 s once, and under 6 s on the KitchenAid at $11.99 — which is also one of only two pages among the items sold on Amazon.com to name its sensor, a “Digital thermistor”, against the ThermoMonster’s thermocouple.

This publishes neither figure.

Why it matters. The only function of a thermometer is to be right, and the two questions are how right and how fast. Chicken is safe at 165 °F. Beef runs through rare to medium in 5 °F bands. Pork is safe at 145 °F with a rest. A custard splits within a few degrees of setting. ±1 °F sits inside all of those and ±5 °F does not — and an unstated figure could be either.

The honest comparison at this exact price. The Etekcity infrared gun is also $18.99 and measures something no probe can: surfaces, to 842 °F, in under half a second — though it cannot read the inside of food at all. A dollar more buys the ThermoMonster’s ±0.5 °F in 0.5 seconds with a NIST reference. And $9.99 buys ±0.9 °F in 1 second with a measured 5.3 inch probe.

Minus forty to four hundred and fifty, which covers candy and not much more

The shelf, by range:

−58 to 842 °F — the Etekcity at $18.99, the widest −58 to 572 °F — six items, from $9.99 −40 to 482 °F — the KitchenAid at $11.99 −40 to 450 °F — this 32 to 572 °F — the TempTrack at $19.99, with probe and wire rated to 716 °F 32 to 392 °F — the Taylor at $24.24, from the same maker: the narrowest range on the shelf, on the most expensive item No range — the ThermoMonster, the Alpha Grillers, the TempPro TP03H

450 °F covers the uses the page names. Candy making is the demanding one: hard crack is about 300 to 310 °F, caramel 340 to 350 °F, and deep frying runs 325 to 375 °F. Food itself does not exceed 212 °F in moist cooking.

So the top end is adequate and it is 122 degrees short of what ten dollars buys. Whether that matters depends entirely on whether you make caramel — and above 450 °F nothing in a domestic kitchen is a food temperature anyway.

The bottom end is the better half. −40 °F is below any domestic freezer, so the useful checks are that a freezer holds 0 °F and a fridge stays below 40 °F — a food-safety job no other feature on this shelf performs.

And the reference 9877FDA is worth a word. FDA in a Taylor part number denotes their food-service line, which is consistent with the pen format: a pen in an apron pocket is a commercial-kitchen habit, where line cooks carry one and check temperatures as they plate.

Which makes one omission sharper. A commercial kitchen keeps food-safety records against checked instruments, and no calibration function is published here — where five items on this shelf have one, including the Alpha Grillers at $14.97, which also says it “comes pre-calibrated”.

Waterproof, with no code, and the page says what it means

“this waterproof food thermometer withstands splashes & quick rinses”

“Splashes and quick rinses” is the candid part — it tells you the thing is not immersible without pretending otherwise.

But it is not a tested rating, and this shelf sells four of those:

IP67 — both ONFIKY units at $9.97 and $9.98, the Alpha Grillers at $14.97: dust-tight and thirty minutes submerged under a meter IP65 — the ANDAXIN at $9.99: dust-tight, low-pressure jets only IPX6 — the TempPro TP03H at $9.98, the LONICERA at $12.99: high-pressure jets, dust not rated Unrated claims — this, and the ThermoMonster at $16.99 (“100% waterproof”) Nothing — six items, including the KitchenAid, both leave-in units and the Etekcity

Why it matters on a thermometer. The probe goes into raw chicken, and the part needing a wash is not the probe — smooth stainless wipes clean in a second — but the seam where the probe enters the housing, a crevice no cloth reaches.

The practical rule here: rinse it, dry it, and do not leave it in the sink.

And the failure it prevents is the quiet one. A damp board reads wrong for weeks before it stops reading at all, which on a thermometer is worse than a clean death.

What is not published

No accuracy figure and no reading speed, as above.

No probe length. Only four of the fourteen items sold on Amazon.com publish one — 6.5 in (TempTrack), 5.3 in (TempPro TP-02S), 5 in (LONICERA), 4 in (ThermoMonster). On a pen, where the body is the handle, reach is the specification that decides how close your knuckles get to the oven shelf — and the catalog total of 210 mm includes both probe and body.

No backlight. Nine of the fourteen items sold on Amazon.com publish one, and this page sells “grilling… & outdoor BBQ sessions”. A barbecue is read at dusk.

No calibration function, as above, on a part number from a food-service line.

No IP code, as above.

No battery type, as above.

No sensor type, which only two pages among the items sold on Amazon.com name — and they are the two extremes of speed.

No warranty. Three items on this shelf publish one: the LONICERA at $12.99 — 18 months plus a 60-day money-back guarantee, the longest here — the ANDAXIN at $9.99 (one year, with CE and RoHS) and the maker’s own Taylor at $24.24 (one year limited). Eleven publish none, and this one is among them while its stablemate publishes a year.

No warning against leaving it in the food, which only the KitchenAid publishes: “Digital thermometers are not meant to be left in food during cooking. The plastic and electronic components could be damaged with excessive heat.” It applies here in full — and the maker’s own $24.24 unit is the one on this shelf built to do it instead.

No country of manufacture, which no item on this shelf publishes.

Availability

Read on the day this page was built: $19 at the American Amazon shop.

Read from Keepa on the day this page was last revised; stock and price both move without notice.