Peanut Butter Brands Ranked Worst To Best

The luxury of peanut butter isn't guaranteed, as anyone who's tried more than one brand can attest. Every producer believes it has the magic formula for cranking out a spread that's second-to-none. But if you've ever tried making your own peanut butter at home, you know how the simplest blend is usually the best; peanuts, salt, a little oil, and some sweetener, if you're so inclined. Which is why looking at the peanut butter aisle at any given grocery store can make the process of picking a proper peanut butter positively perplexing.

As long as I have a butter knife and taste buds to spare, this sort of consumer confusion can't be allowed. I need to quell my curiosity regarding the best and worst of branded peanut butter. So I grabbed a goodly number of the most readily-available jars — 14 of them, to be precise — and cracked the lids to find out which ones are worth sticking around for and which ones are more likely to leave you stuck. This hierarchy reveals the untold truth about peanut butter and how these pantry staples stack up against each other. To keep things even, I used only smooth selections without add-ins; crunchy, honey-sweetened, jelly-infused and all the other doo-dads only complicate matters. I'll explain more about the methodology at the end, but for now, read on to discover how these peanut butter brands compare.

If you're going to pay top dollar for a jar of peanut butter, that jar best deliver something special. But MaraNatha is a premium-priced peanut butter that goes in several different head scratching directions that make me wonder why it costs so much. It's proudly organic with no sugar or salt added and proclaims that it's a creamier version of natural peanut butter. Yet when you twist off the lid and peel back the label, you find a gooey mess that's almost as thin as water and requires the knife to go down to the bottom of the jar to pick up the peanut butter solids. And the flavor is just as unimpressive.

This combination of organic dry roasted peanuts and organic palm oil may seem like a hoity-toity high-end purchase but in the peanut butter universe, it's a qualified mess. Do yourself a favor and don't get stuck with this jar.

Smart Way is Kroger's extra affordable house brand, offering items and labels that hearken back to the white package with black lettering generic brands of yore. It's yet one more avenue for the grocery giant to provide products at prices that bests the big names and many of the competing store labels as well. Having another jar of peanut butter cluttering shelves may seem like overkill, and I was convinced before buying a jar that it would be one of the bottom-most picks. But the under-$2.00 price was too good to pass up, even if the butter in the jar might be a miss.

And what a miss it is. It's not just the label that's generic; this peanut butter is as basic as you can get, with the four different types of oil on the ingredient label potentially sitting on top of any notable peanut flavor. This would be emergency food for the most dire of circumstances, something you'd keep on hand in the event of an apocalypse but not to enjoy as part of your regular diet. It may be cheap, but it also doesn't taste very good. If quality is what you're looking for, you might need to shell out more. 

Naming a peanut butter for a beloved literary and film character is tricky business, but Peter Pan locked it in, becoming the first branded peanut butter in the U.S. But what passed for great peanut butter in 1928 and even through the ensuing years doesn't necessarily hold up as great peanut butter in the 21st century. Even so, it's a must in a round-up of creamy spreads, though it shouldn't be a must in your kitchen cabinet.

It's fascinating how the same ingredients combined by different companies can produce entirely different tasting results. The label on the Peter Pan jar may say roasted peanuts, sugar, oil, and salt, but the flavor is so much less peanutty than the others that it's hard to fathom they came from the same ancestral recipe. After spending so long on the prepared food circuit, maybe Peter Pan has just lost its magic. But this is one selection that I would not consider buying a second time, even if I had a hungry household to feed.

If you can't count on the top name in peanut butter to deliver a top-rate product even more than 90 years after launching, what can you count on? Skippy is a nostalgic name that we peanut butter lovers associate with the spread as much as mac and cheese fans connect their beloved pasta with Kraft's moody blue box. Even if long-term dependability almost a century deep goes a long way with grocery shoppers, that doesn't necessarily dictate the quality of the product.

It's been a long time since I've had Skippy peanut butter, and I can safely say that this is formulated for a younger palate. It's smooth and creamy, but it also comes with a much sweeter essence than I remember. My personal preference is a more savory peanut butter, which means even if Skippy is on sale, I won't be making the purchase. Even the boast of seven grams of protein blasted on the labels is unseemly, since the other peanut butters on the list have about the same amount. 

This stir-and-spread version of Kroger's more additive-heavy peanut butter is my preference these days. The fewer ingredients on the label, the better off I and my fellow peanut butter aficionados are nutrition-wise. Kroger Natural omits all the extra stuff from its natural peanut butter, which should be a plus, but somehow this ends up working against the product in both texture and flavor. I've purchased this jar many times in the past but this is the first time I've noticed how cloudy and murky the separation is, which ended up having an impact on my appetite.

Despite first impressions, I dug deep and tried it, surprised to find out how flavorless it truly is. I used to live on this sort of peanut butter instead of the usual formula, trying to take a healthier path and realizing that if I poured most of the oil out, I would be in much better shape. It took me a minute to remember why — and after I took a sample of what was left, I couldn't remember why I ever thought this was a tasty purchase. Live and learn.

I'm a fan of many Kroger products, both for the pricing and quality. I've enjoyed this peanut butter for much of my adult life, preparing lunches for my kids with a bargain spread that let me stock my pantry deep and wide when the store offered special pricing. Inflation has driven the once-lower price up past the $2.00 mark, which is still a great deal comparatively, though I long wistfully for the days when it was closer to $1.00 a jar.

Kroger was my go-to peanut butter when I was feeding my children during their grade school years, largely because it was on sale frequently and made an affordable option for my family budget. Tasting it again now as an empty nester, all I picked up was the sugar in the jar; it was like eating a spoonful of peanut butter fudge. It may say roasted peanuts and molasses are included in there as well, but darn if I could detect them even after two bites. This subpar peanut paste that may do great in a pinch, but shouldn't top your shopping list if you're particular about your peanut butter preference

Pricing both of its natural and, erm, non-natural peanut butters within a nickel of each other give Great Value a sneaky trap to snare customers looking for a healthier alternative. But why wouldn't Walmart's key in-house label simply make the natural version and call it "peanut butter" instead of doing double-duty? Clearly, some consumers prefer the taste and texture of a traditional peanut butter, while the more modern eater is more likely to go for a thoughtful redux that offers less sugar and added oils.

Great Value bucks the trend of having an actual natural peanut butter by including sugar and oil in the recipe, resulting in a no-stir version that makes for a very tasty peanut butter. Believing I would be getting something a little more mindful before finding out it's just peanut butter is a big disappointment. If I bought this while shopping for a more nutritious product, I would feel pretty duped finding out that a green label emblazoned with the word "natural" means nothing in the world of Great Value peanut butter.

One of the major players in the peanut butter game for the better part of our collective sandwich-eating existence, Jif hit the market in the mid-1950s and has been a prime mover and shaker ever since. With its "Choosy Mothers Choose Jif" slogan from the 1960s to the brand's purchase by Procter & Gamble in 2001, it's been on the hearts and minds of peanut butter lovers for more than 60 years. Age doesn't automatically mean it can stand jar-to-jar with competitors, especially with so many decades of other brands playing catch-up. But the untold truth of Jif is that it's kept its edge regardless of the crowd on the shelf.

The flavor slides pretty close to the peanutty end of the spectrum, offering a no-nonsense take on what old-fashioned peanut butter can be. I wouldn't say it's a flat flavor; more that it's a great choice if you're creating a peanut sauce for Thai satay, maybe, or looking for a less-sweet ingredient for dipped candies. A company that's been around as long as this knows what it's doing without having to think about it, so while there's no razzle-dazzle, there's also nothing disappointing here at all.

Justin's takes the daring leap into the high-end nut butter realm with its peanut butter, a partner product to its alternative butters like cashew and almond. This premium brand justifies its dedication to naturally delicious peanut butter by offering nothing but dry roasted peanuts and palm oil in its creation. 

The austere flavor reflects that there's not a scrap of sugar to sweeten the situation, an element that leaps out immediately when comparing these peanut butter selection side-by-side. This taste like something you would make it home if you were devoted to a healthier way of enjoying peanut butter. While the jar gets extra points for not adding sugar or an excessive oil, it's also likely to be an acquired taste especially by kids who expect something a little more exciting with the bread and jelly in their lunch bags

Target gets its Good & Gather gang in on the peanut butter with its own creamy offering. It's sticky territory for a store label that's elbowed its way into just about every store section in the grocery store. Having sampled other items from the line-up, I was optimistic about giving this one a first-time try. I'm always game to add a new low-price item to my radar, especially when it expands my panoply of peanut butter possibilities.

This less-expensive creation avails itself admirably against the others, offering a smooth-as-silk texture with a delightfully balanced flavor that puts peanuts first, sugar second, and tosses in a little molasses to enrich the recipe. This is one I could see using expressly for peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, especially with grape jelly, since the reduced sweetness of this butter would make a great dance partner for something as sweet as Welch's signature flavor. If you're a more daring shopper, you can certainly explore other interesting ways to use peanut butter, beyond my recommended purist pursuits.

The country's largest grocer isn't going to miss out on a chance to capture the hearts and dollars of the peanut butter crowd, which is how Signature Select from Albertsons and Safeway makes its way onto the shopping list for this taste test. The price is admirable, keeping in line with the other in-house labels I shopped for. If it could keep up flavor-wise, it might be a big winner.

I'm happy to report that Signature Select has cracked the peanut butter code. Albertsons surprises with a highly pleasant creamy peanut butter that emphasizes the roast of the peanuts. This was one of the few jars in which I could see prominent speckling from the peanuts, a visual trick that helped sell this as old-fashioned peanut butter. This one is a straight out of the jar people pleaser, a peanut butter that I would scoop out and sprinkle a few chocolate chips in whenever I needed something sweet to nosh on. I might even combine it with mashed potatoes for a daring sweet treat if I'm feeling adventurous. We peanut butter eaters are a wild bunch.

Smucker's may be best-known these days for syrupy ice cream toppings, but there was a day when the name was a top pick in the jelly and jam aisle. So it's a logical move that this old-timey food maker would come up with a peanut butter to corner the whole PB&J market. That sort of strategic planning is worthy of some kind of food producer marketing award, if there is such a thing.

True to its old-fashioned reputation, Smucker's presents a nostalgic jar that does know more or less than it should. It offers humble peanut butter flavor, and a texture that requires stirring because it's a natural version, while being made of nothing at all but peanuts and salt. Maybe it's the mere association I have with Smucker's as an ice cream topping, but this feels like the type of peanut butter that I would use to decorate a scoop of vanilla if I was looking for something lightly decadent to add flavor to my dessert.

Touting itself as an all-natural peanut butter creator, Crazy Richard's takes out all the questionable bits and leaves in just the peanuts blitzed to mush. It's a most single-minded peanut butter, with an ingredient list that says nothing at all but peanuts; there's no added sugar, no extra oils; nothing to thin down what's naturally in the peanuts used and nothing to impart any extra flavors. The result is a pleasantly passable peanut butter that doesn't need anything more than what it has — even if it does have the separation problem of oil rising to the top that requires stirring and refrigeration. But these are easily worked around by doing what the instructions say after you've opened the jar, similar to other natural peanut butters.

As a cautious eater this is one that I would invest in for an enjoyable healthy peanut butter experience, even if it cost a little more than the other brands. And because it's such a stripped-down take on the recipe, I would happily use it in every cooking category where peanut butter is welcome. I might even make up a few new ones.

Come on, now — the candy company known for its delicious peanut butter-filled creations removing the chocolate shell and jarring the creamy center stuff? Amazing. I had no reason to believe Reese's wouldn't come through in a clutch to deliver a first-rate sandwich spread that would taste just as delicious in a PB&J as it does as the core of a cup. Of course, the candy bar is bound to have more sugary additives to make it enticing. At least, that was my assumption going in. This company wouldn't just serve candy in a jar, would it?

Well, kind of. The aroma is as intoxicating as anything a jar of peanut butter can release when the label is peeled back. A single taste is enough to remind me of just how dominant Reese's is in the peanut butter game, whether it's covered in chocolate or not. The even balance of sweet and savory may be helped by the inclusion of molasses in the recipe. And after a taste using one of my pretzel dippers, I knew I would be using this one to make peanut butter cookies with chocolate chips at some point soon. Consider Reese's one of the top jarred peanut butter pics of the pack, even with the sugar added.

I restricted my choices to smooth peanut butter only to level the playing field, then shopped for both big-name brands and lesser-known store signature labels, hoping for a few hidden gems on the market. I opted for a two-bite testing process, one bite straight from the spoon, the other using a pretzel as a dipper, since flavor can be influenced by choice of vehicle. I stopped short of spreading my test products on toast or bread, since that would have been the start of an eating situation I wouldn't be able to get myself out of. Have I mentioned how much of a peanut butter fan I am?

Flavor is the most obvious criterion for a test like this; not surprisingly, when laid side-by-side, there's a clear distinction between jars, likely due in part to the roasting process of the peanuts preferred by each producer. Texture was the next most-critical aspect, especially in a smooth peanut butter. I was able to determine which were a more putty-like consistency and which were truly smooth, an aspect that sometimes overrode the flavor factor. Finally, the ingredient list came into play; for a foodstuff that can be made out of nothing but peanuts, finding such far-reaching elements as high fructose corn syrup and hydrogenated oils on the label pushed certain selections lower in the ranking.