Instant Pot Pro 8-Quart Multi-Use Pressure Cooker and Slow Cooker: A Full Review

My old six-quart pressure cooker finally died after five years of heavy chili and bone broth duty, forcing me to figure out which model to replace it with. I cook for a family of four and usually want leftovers, so I bumped up to the eight-quart size with the Instant Pot Pro. The sheer size of this thing is the first thing you notice—it demands a lot of countertop real estate and barely clears my upper cabinets. But that extra capacity makes a massive difference for batch cooking and meal prep on Sundays.

I've spent the last month running it through the standard rotation: rice, pulled pork, yogurt, and even trying out the sous vide function on some steaks. The standout upgrade here isn't the 28 smart programs, since I mostly ignore those and manually set the time anyway. It's the pressure release switch. Instead of nervously nudging a hot valve with a wooden spoon, there is a dedicated, gentle release switch with a diffusing cover that keeps the steam from blasting your ceiling. It also preheats noticeably faster than older models, which cuts down the total time you spend waiting for dinner.

At around two hundred bucks, it is definitely on the pricier end of countertop appliances. If you just want to make rice and occasional soup, it is overkill. But if you rely heavily on hands-off cooking to feed a crowd, this might just be the best instant pot in the current lineup. The upgraded inner pot with silicone handles is a massive quality-of-life improvement, letting you lift out a heavy, hot batch of stew without oven mitts slipping into your food.