Bowl liters, motor watts, and thirty years of attachments · review
The 5-quart Artisan tilt-head mixer in blue velvet, shipping a bowl, a coated flat beater, a coated dough hook, a 6-wire whip and a pouring shield.
The net of it The only one of the five Artisan listings here that tells you what is in the box — and the only KitchenAid on this shelf whose contents include a pouring shield. And at $399.96 it is also the cheapest of the five, up to a hundred dollars under the same machine in other colors.
“Model KSM150PS includes (1) 5 Quart Stainless Steel Bowl, (1) Coated Flat Beater, (1) Coated Dough Hook, (1) 6-Wire Whip, (1) Pouring Shield”
Note that the bullet names the model as KSM150PS rather than the color — so it is describing the model rather than this variant.
The five KSM150PS listings on this shelf, priced from $399.96 to $499.95:
Contour Silver, $499.00 — one bullet, no contents, and the only page anywhere here to give a cord length: “10-speed slide control ranges from a very fast whip to a very slow stir. Cord length : 36 Inches” Almond Cream, $499.00 — four bullets, no contents Pistachio, $499.95 — five bullets, the fifth being “over 20 colors available”, no contents Black Matte, $492.06 — five bullets, the same, no contents Blue Velvet, $399.96 — five bullets, this one, with the contents
And the other two KitchenAid contents lists on this shelf do not include a shield.
The Classic at $322.99 — “(1) 4.5 Quart Stainless Steel Bowl, (1) Coated Flat Beater, (1) Coated Dough Hook, (1) 6-Wire Whip” The bowl-lift — “(1) 5.5-qt stainless steel bowl, (1) coated flat beater, (1) coated dough hook, (1) 6-wire whip”
Both four items. This one is five.
So the published evidence says the Artisan ships a pouring shield and the two cheaper KitchenAids do not — and four of the five Artisan listings leave you unable to tell.
Which is the practical reason to read this listing even if you want a different color: it is the only one that tells you what arrives.
The catalog weights confirm the five are one machine as far as weights can. 22.8 lb here and for Black Matte · 22 lb for Contour Silver and Pistachio · 24.3 lb for Almond Cream — a two-pound spread across one model, which is catalog noise. This listing and Black Matte share 22.8 lb exactly, which is what you would expect of one casting in two finishes.
What this listing omits that three of its twins publish: the color range. “Match your style with over 20 colors available. Choose from a full palette of color options” appears on Pistachio and Black Matte.
A collar that sits on the bowl rim to stop flour and liquid leaving it.
Four items on this shelf publish one.
this — a Pouring Shield, in the contents Martha Stewart, $149.99 — a “REMOVABLE SPLASH SHIELD: Helps prevent splatter while allowing easy ingredient additions through the accessible pour chute, keeping countertops cleaner” VIVOHOME, $149.99 — “Upgraded splash guard lets you pour while running” Hamilton Beach 63390, $126.95 — a “removable splatter shield that fits on top when needed”
And the half that matters is the chute.
A shield keeps flour in. A chute lets you put flour in without stopping the machine. And the moment you most want both is the same moment: starting a dry mix at low speed, which is when flour escapes and when you are adding more.
Two of the four publish a chute, and this page does not. A KitchenAid pouring shield does have an opening; the listing simply does not say so.
The other thing a shield does that nobody on this shelf mentions: it keeps things out. A collar over a bowl at speed 8 stops a tea towel, a sleeve or a hand reaching the whisk.
And the one caution worth stating about using one on a tilt-head machine: the shield has to come off before the head goes back. Which is a small friction against the design’s main virtue — “Easily add ingredients with the tilt-head design, because you will have better access to the bowl” — and the chute is precisely the answer to it.
“(1) Coated Flat Beater, (1) Coated Dough Hook, (1) 6-Wire Whip”
All three KitchenAid contents lists on this shelf specify six wires on the whip, and no other maker here states a wire count.
The Martha Stewart at $149.99 — “a stainless steel whisk” The VIVOHOME at $149.99 — “stainless whisk”, plus an aluminum hook, which is the only hook material named on this shelf The Hamilton Beach 63390 at $126.95 — “whisk” The OLIXIS — “wire whisk” The Hamilton Beach Classic at $62.95 — “2 traditional beaters, 2 dough hooks and whisk”, five pieces and no flat beater, because it is a hand mixer in a cradle
What a wire count does. A whisk aerates by dragging wires through a liquid and shearing it; more wires means more shearing surfaces per revolution, so a given volume reaches a given stiffness in fewer turns.
Six is a modest count — a professional balloon whisk has ten or twelve — and it is a sensible one for a machine that also has to knead, because a whisk on a planetary arm meets the bowl wall and a very fine wire bends.
Where it matters: egg whites and cream. Whipping cream is named in the speed bullet, and the two things that decide whether it works are the whisk and whether the whisk reaches the cream.
Which is the half nobody on this shelf mentions: a bowl too large for the job leaves the whisk turning above the mixture. Half a cup of cream in a 6-quart bowl will not whip — and the bowls here run from 4 qt (both Hamilton Beach machines) to 6.3 qt (the OLIXIS), with this at 5 quarts. So the smallest bowls are the best at small jobs, which is the one argument for the $322.99 Classic’s 4.5 quarts over this.
And the coating is never named. “Coated Flat Beater” and “Coated Dough Hook” appear on all three KitchenAid contents lists here, and none of the seven KitchenAid pages says what the coating is.
Which matters for one reason: the dishwasher. The bowl is stated dishwasher safe in bullet two, and a coated attachment is the part a dishwasher cycle works on — hot, alkaline and abrasive, a hundred times over. No page on this shelf addresses it.
What this machine does not ship is a beater that touches the bowl. Two items on this shelf do, and both cost $149.99: the VIVOHOME’s “Flex edge beater scrapes sides and bottom as it mixes; No more stopping to scrape” and the Martha Stewart’s “flat beater with silicone edge”.
KitchenAid sells a flex edge beater separately — so the $399.96 to $499.95 machine scrapes less well out of the box than the $149.99 one, and the fix is an accessory no Artisan listing on this shelf mentions.
“the durable and built-to-last metal construction, and 59 touchpoints around the mixer bowl”
The shelf, by catalog weight:
24.3 lb — the Artisan in Almond Cream at $499.00 22.8 lb — this, and Black Matte, the same model 22 lb — Contour Silver and Pistachio, the same model 22 lb — the KitchenAid Classic at $322.99 11 lb — the VIVOHOME at $149.99 10.2 lb — the Hamilton Beach 63390 at $126.95 9 lb — the Martha Stewart at $149.99 7.1 lb — the OLIXIS (currently unavailable) Not published — the bowl-lift, the Hamilton Beach Classic at $62.95
The heaviest machine here is 3.4 times the lightest, and the five KitchenAids that publish a weight are the five heaviest.
What mass does: it stops the machine walking across the countertop when the hook enters a stiff dough. A twenty-two-pound cast base absorbs the reaction; a seven-pound one does not.
Which is why the light machines publish a feature for it — the VIVOHOME’s “strong suction cups”, the Martha Stewart’s “HEAVY-DUTY BASE… minimizes movement” — and the heavy KitchenAids publish a material. A casting does not come unstuck.
And 59 touchpoints is KitchenAid’s count of the positions at which the beater passes close to the bowl wall during one cycle of the planetary arm. Because the beater’s own rotation and its orbit are not in a simple ratio, it traces a path that gradually covers the whole wall rather than retracing the same line.
The only page on this shelf that explains the mechanism instead of counting it is the Hamilton Beach 63390 at $126.95: “each stand mixer attachment rotates around the entire bowl as it spins… complete bowl coverage.”
And one machine here genuinely does not do it: the Hamilton Beach Classic at $62.95, whose “Shift and Stir lever lets you move the bowl from side-to-side.”
What 59 touchpoints does not mean is that the beater touches the bowl. It does not — which is the whole reason the flex-edge question above matters.
“to mix up 9 dozen cookies in a single batch… **Using the flat beater; 28g dough each” · “10 speeds… from mixing ingredients together on the stir speed, to whipping cream at speed 8”
9 × 12 × 28 g is 6.7 lb of dough. Which makes the claim checkable rather than impressive, and KitchenAid is the only maker on this shelf that publishes the method.
The shelf, by bowl size and claim: 6.3 qt on the OLIXIS (currently unavailable) with no claim at all · 6 qt on the VIVOHOME at $149.99 — “3 bread loaves or 2.2 lbs flour”, the only claim stated in flour · 5.5 qt on the bowl-lift — 11 dozen, 7 lbs of bread, 6 lbs of potatoes · 5.3 qt on the Martha Stewart at $149.99 — 9 dozen, undeclared · 5 qt here — 9 dozen · 4.5 qt on the Classic at $322.99 — 8 dozen · 4 qt on both Hamilton Beach machines, no figure.
The caution that matters more than the count: a bowl is not a capacity. A stand mixer’s real limit is the drive, not the volume — and no KitchenAid page on this shelf publishes a wattage or a horsepower.
The one exception is comparative, and it uses this model as its baseline. The bowl-lift: “2x the power in the bowl than Tilt-head stand mixer*; *Compared to KSM150 when measuring peak HP in the bowl; above speed 2.”
So the only quantified power statement on this shelf concludes that a different KitchenAid, the bowl-lift, has twice the torque at the beater above speed 2 — which matters on bread and mash and not at all on a cake batter.
Why “in the bowl” is the right grandeur: watts at the wall is what the motor draws, and between the motor and the beater sits a reduction gear that trades speed for torque. A 300 W motor through a deep reduction can deliver more at the beater than a 660 W one through a shallow one — which means the five watt figures on this shelf are not comparable to each other either.
On speeds, the two useful things are in the phrasing rather than the count. A stir speed below the useful mixing range, and whipping cream at speed 8 of 10 — so the top two steps are headroom.
Three pages address the slow end: this formula, the Martha Stewart’s “gently fold”, and the bowl-lift’s 1/2 speed, which is the only step below one on this shelf and the only one with a stated purpose — “gently adds delicate ingredients, like blueberries and egg whites, into recipes without overbeating.”
And nothing here says what happens under load. The Hamilton Beach 63390 at $126.95 is the only item on this shelf to claim it: “the powerful 300 watt motor… maintains constant speed.”
No pour chute, as above — on the one page here that publishes a shield in its contents.
No color range, as above — unlike three of its four twins priced from $399.96 to $499.95.
No cord length, as above — which its Contour Silver twin supplies, and which at least eleven of the sixteen items on this shelf do not publish. On a machine you will not move, three feet is the figure that decides where it lives.
No power. All seven KitchenAid machines on this shelf publish no wattage. Five items do: 660 W on the VIVOHOME at $149.99, 300 W on the Hamilton Beach 63390 at $126.95 and the OLIXIS, 290 W peak on the Hamilton Beach Classic at $62.95.
No load behavior, as above.
No attachment hub. Two items on this shelf publish one, and both are the cheaper KitchenAids: “10 plus attachments” (the Classic at $322.99) and “Over 10 stand mixer attachments available” (the bowl-lift), “to make everything from fresh pasta to burgers, veggie noodles, ice cream and more, sold separately”.* Not one of the five Artisan listings mentions it — and it is the strongest argument for buying any KitchenAid, and the place the flex-edge beater lives.
No coating name, as above.
No flex-edge beater, as above.
No noise figure. One page on this shelf mentions noise at all: the VIVOHOME at $149.99 — “Low-noise operation” — with no number.
No gear material, which no item on this shelf publishes — and it is the actual durability question, because the gear that fails on a mixer is usually a sacrificial one, designed to break before the motor does.
No tilt-back height, which nothing here publishes — the figure that decides whether the head will open under a wall cupboard, on a machine whose whole access design is a tilting head. The Martha Stewart at $149.99 is the only page to raise the subject, with “SLIM & SPACE-SAVING: Built to fit comfortably in smaller kitchens and tight spaces” and no figure. The one machine on this shelf for which the question does not arise is the bowl-lift, where the head is fixed to a column.
No warranty. Not at least one of the sixteen items on this shelf publishes a term — and “built-to-last” in bullet one is the phrase that would most want one behind it.
Read on the day this page was built: $399.96 at the American Amazon shop.
Read from Keepa on the day this page was last revised; stock and price both move without notice.
Prices quoted in this text were read on 2026-10-17. The live price is at the top of the page.
Same shelf, nearest cost — where the same money else goes.
| Contents | Bowl, coated flat beater, coated dough hook, 6-wire whip, pouring shield |
|---|---|
| Pouring shield | The only KitchenAid contents list on this shelf that includes one |
| Bowl | 5 quarts, stainless, with a comfortable handle, dishwasher safe |
| Capacity claim | 9 dozen cookies, footnoted at 28 g (1 oz) of dough each |
| Construction | Durable, built-to-last metal |
| Touchpoints | 59 around the bowl |
| Speeds | Ten, from the stir speed to whipping cream at speed 8 |
| Head lock | The head locks in place while mixing |
| Weight | 22.8 lb — identical to the Black Matte listing |
| Reference | KSM150PSVB |
| Color range | Not mentioned, unlike three of its four twins |
| Cord length | Not published; its Contour Silver twin gives 36 inches |
| Power | Not published |
| Warranty | Not published |
| Amazon reference | B07QHQ8CD3 |
| EAN | 0883049486581 |
This listing says yes, and four identical listings, priced up to a hundred dollars higher, do not say. Bullet five: "Model KSM150PS includes (1) 5 Quart Stainless Steel Bowl, (1) Coated Flat Beater, (1) Coated Dough Hook, (1) 6-Wire Whip, (1) Pouring Shield." Note that the bullet names the model as KSM150PS, not the color — so it is describing the model rather than this variant. The five KSM150PS listings on this shelf, priced from $399.96 to $499.95: Contour Silver, $499.00 — one bullet, no contents, and the only page anywhere here to give a cord length · Almond Cream, $499.00 — four bullets, no contents · Pistachio, $499.95 — five bullets, the fifth being "over 20 colors available", no contents · Black Matte, $492.06 — five bullets, the same, no contents · Blue Velvet, $399.96 — five bullets, this one, with the contents. And the other two KitchenAid contents lists on this shelf do not include a shield. The Classic at $322.99: "(1) 4.5 Quart Stainless Steel Bowl, (1) Coated Flat Beater, (1) Coated Dough Hook, (1) 6-Wire Whip." The bowl-lift: "(1) 5.5-qt stainless steel bowl, (1) coated flat beater, (1) coated dough hook, (1) 6-wire whip." Both four items; this one is five. So the published evidence says the Artisan ships a shield and the two cheaper KitchenAids do not — and four of the five Artisan listings leave you unable to tell. Which is the practical reason to read this listing even if you want a different color: it is the only one that tells you what arrives. What a pouring shield is for. A collar that sits on the bowl rim to stop flour and liquid leaving it. Four items on this shelf publish one. this · the Martha Stewart at $149.99 — a "REMOVABLE SPLASH SHIELD... allowing easy ingredient additions through the accessible pour chute" · the VIVOHOME at $149.99 — an "Upgraded splash guard lets you pour while running" · the Hamilton Beach 63390 at $126.95 — a "removable splatter shield that fits on top when needed". And the half that matters is the chute. A shield keeps flour in; a chute lets you put flour in without stopping the machine — and the moment you most want both is the same moment, starting a dry mix at low speed. Two of the four publish a chute, and this page does not. A KitchenAid pouring shield does have an opening; the listing simply does not say so.
It is the balloon whisk, and the count is a real if modest specification. Bullet five names it: "(1) 6-Wire Whip." The same wording appears in the Classic’s contents list at $322.99 and the bowl-lift’s — so all three KitchenAid contents lists on this shelf specify six wires. No other maker here states a wire count. The Martha Stewart at $149.99 says "a stainless steel whisk". The VIVOHOME at $149.99 says "stainless whisk". The Hamilton Beach 63390 at $126.95 says "whisk". The OLIXIS says "wire whisk". The Hamilton Beach Classic at $62.95 ships "2 traditional beaters, 2 dough hooks and whisk". What the count does. A whisk aerates by dragging wires through a liquid and shearing it; more wires means more shearing surfaces per revolution, so a given volume reaches a given stiffness in fewer turns. Which is why patisserie whisks have many thin wires and a general-purpose kitchen whisk has fewer, thicker ones. Six is a modest count — a professional balloon whisk has ten or twelve — and it is a sensible one for a machine that also has to knead, because a whisk on a planetary arm meets the bowl wall and a very fine wire bends. Where it matters: egg whites and cream. Whipping cream is named in the speed bullet — "whipping cream at speed 8" — and the two things that decide whether it works are the whisk and whether the whisk reaches the cream. Which is the half nobody on this shelf mentions: a bowl too large for the job leaves the whisk turning above the mixture. Half a cup of cream in a 6-quart bowl will not whip — and on this shelf the bowls run from 4 qt (both Hamilton Beach machines) to 6.3 qt (the OLIXIS), with this at 5 quarts. So the smallest bowls here are the best at small jobs, and that is the one argument for the $322.99 Classic’s 4.5 quarts over this. The other two attachments in the list are the ones the page describes least. A "Coated Flat Beater" and a "Coated Dough Hook" — and the coating is never named on any of the seven KitchenAid pages on this shelf.
It is the strongest argument for buying any KitchenAid, and not one of the five Artisan listings on this shelf mentions it. Two items here publish it, and both are the cheaper KitchenAids. The Classic at $322.99: "10 plus attachments to make more with your mixer to make everything from fresh pasta to burgers, veggie noodles, ice cream and more, sold separately." The bowl-lift: "Over 10 stand mixer attachments available*, to make everything from fresh pasta to burgers, veggie noodles, ice cream and more, ***sold separately." And the five KSM150PS listings at $399.96 to $499.95 — Contour Silver, Almond Cream, Pistachio, Black Matte and this one — do not mention it at all. What it is. A power take-off on the front of the head, driven off the same gearbox. It turns a mixer into a different machine: a meat grinder, a pasta roller and cutter, a spiralizer, an ice cream churn, a food processor attachment, a juicer. None of the other five items on this shelf has one — not the two Hamilton Beach machines, not the Martha Stewart at $149.99, the VIVOHOME at $149.99 or the OLIXIS. They mix, and that is the whole of what they do. Which is also the lock-in, and it works in your favor over time: an attachment bought for this machine fits the next KitchenAid you buy, and the hub has been physically unchanged across the line for a very long time. "Sold separately" is doing real work in those two bullets. The attachments are not cheap, and a grinder or a pasta set can cost a meaningful fraction of this machine. So the honest way to weigh it: if you will buy one attachment, the hub pays for itself against a $149.99 mixer. If you will never buy one, you are paying $250 over a $149.99 mixer for twenty-two pounds of metal, a stainless bowl, a declared capacity method, a pouring shield and a color — which are real things, and not the same thing the ecosystem is. And the hub is also where the flex-edge beater lives. Two items on this shelf scrape as they mix, and both cost $149.99: the VIVOHOME’s "FLEX EDGE BEATER scrapes sides and bottom as it mixes" and the Martha Stewart’s "flat beater with silicone edge". This machine ships a coated flat beater and KitchenAid sells the flex edge version separately — so the $399.96 to $499.95 machine scrapes less well out of the box than the $149.99 one, and the fix is an accessory this page does not mention.
Details checked on October 17, 2026.
The Artisan, bought from the one listing that tells you what arrives
Amazon reports what buyers took in the month before this page was last checked: at least 500.
The figure is a floor, rounded by Amazon, and read through Keepa — it says what buyers picked, not what a maker claims.
Specifications: the manufacturer sheet for kitchen appliances and the matching Amazon product page. Prices and availability: Keepa. Every figure on this page names its source.
1,500 W · 2 bowls, 4.5 + 5.5 L · planetary
The only stand mixer here supplied with two stainless bowls — 4.5 and 5.5 liters — behind a 1,500 W motor Arebos states is pure copper in an ABS housing. Planetary action, six speeds, a tilting head, and a set that includes beater, dough hook, whisk and splash guard.
Best for: Baking in sequence — meringue and batter in one session, without washing up in between.
1,000 W · metal body · stepless + pulse
The kMix: a 1,000 W motor in a metal housing, with stepless speed control and a pulse function rather than fixed steps. Kenwood states the range extends with over twenty dishwasher-safe attachments, and supplies a three-piece baking set — K-beater, whisk and dough hook — plus a splash guard.
Best for: A mixer bought once, for the attachment range it opens rather than for its motor.
1,800 or 2,000 W · 5 L · planetary, 8 directions
A 5-liter planetary mixer that Klarstein states moves the tool in eight directions, with six speeds and a dough hook and whisk supplied. Its power is published twice and differently: the listing title says 2,000 W, the specification text says an 1,800 W motor. We report both.
Best for: Bread and yeast doughs, from a maker that at least names what it is for.
