- Ice cube trays produce ice cubes of different sizes, shapes, and flavors and are made in a wide variety of materials.
- The best everyday ice cube tray for most people is the OXO Good Grips Ice Cube Tray, which is affordable, easy to use, and produces attractive half-moon shaped ice cubes.
Baby, it’s hot out there. But there’s a simple way to beat the heat: Enjoy a cold drink over ice. While many of us have refrigerators with built-in ice makers, others don’t, or simply need to make additional ice cubes, too.
There are hundreds of different styles of ice cube trays that will transform water into ice of different sizes and shapes. Novelty or gimmick ice cube trays have become increasingly popular, and are a relatively inexpensive way to add a blast of fun to a special occasion.
For the purpose of making “regular” ice cubes at home, there are several things to consider. Look for a tray that allows you to extract the ice easily (unlike those awful hard plastic ones from your youth) and one that doesn’t impart distasteful odors – or freezer-burn – to the cubes.
These are the best ice cube trays you can buy to keep your drinks cold.
Here are the best ice cube trays:
- OXO Good Grips Ice Cube Tray
- Peaks Ice Works Everyday Ice Tray
- Tovolo Perfect Cube Ice Trays
- Onyx 18/8 Stainless Steel Slot Ice Cube Tray
- Zoku Ice-Ball Ice Sphere Mold
The best overall
The OXO Good Grips Ice Cube Tray is affordable, easy to use, and produces attractive half-moon shaped ice cubes.
One of OXO’s guiding philosophies is to use “universal design” to create products that are usable by as many people as possible. OXO has succeeded in spades with these easy-to-use ice trays.
The dishwasher-safe tray produces 14 attractive half-moon-shaped ice cubes that pop out of the mold easily without any prying. You can also release one of the ice cubes without impacting the other cubes. The unique patented cover not only helps you easily stack the trays in your freezer, but it reduces odors, resulting in fresher cubes.
They're also affordably priced, so you can easily buy more than one to stock up.
Pros: Elegantly-shaped cubes, easy extraction, sturdy plastic construction, lids make for easy stacking and fewer odors
Cons: Lids can be difficult to maneuver
The best with a lid
The Peak Ice Works Everyday Ice Tray is a stylish silicone tray with a convenient lid that lets you easily extract one ice cube at a time.
The Peak Ice Works Everyday Tray is our second favorite tray, and it's almost as great as our top pick from OXO. Available in three colors - charcoal, peak blue, and white - this stylish ice cube tray makes 12 ice cubes and comes with a protective lid that prevents freezer burn while allowing for easy stacking in your freezer.
It is simple to push individual ice cubes out of the flexible silicone tray while leaving the others intact. Peak also makes trays that produce oversized ice cubes, as well as trays for crushed ice. The price is fairly reasonable, too.
Pros: Stylish, convenient lid, easy to extract individual ice cube, sturdy silicone construction
Cons: Cubes are not perfectly formed, some users complain of a bad taste
The best silicone tray
The Tovolo Perfect Cube Ice Tray produces oversized ice cubes that are perfect for cooling down drinks without diluting them too quickly.
The Tovolo Perfect Cube Ice Trays come in nine bright colors including fuchsia, ice blue, and vivid violet. These fun BPA-free silicone trays produce 15 perfectly uniform one-inch ice cubes that can make your cocktail look like it was made by a professional mixologist. You can pop the ice cubes out easily; there is no twisting required. Simply push from behind with your finger. Each tray measures 7 x 4.5 x 1.5 inches.
Guides editor Malarie Gokey has two of these Tovolo ice cube trays in her freezer, and after about five years of use, they're still going strong. After struggling with hard plastic ice cube trays for her entire life, using silicone trays was a game changer, and she reports it's incredibly easy to remove these cubes from the trays.
Pros: Creates uniform ice cubes, easy to extract cubes, colorful and fun, easy to clean, ideal for freezing broth and baby food
Cons: Some claim the trays leave a rubbery taste in the cubes
The best stainless steel tray
The Onyx Stainless Steel Ice Cube Tray has a fun vintage look and freezes water quickly.
If you are of a certain age, you may remember the old steel ice cube trays that showed up on the American scene in the 1950s. When you mention them to anyone, you'll likely hear some variation of, "My grandmother had those!" The most distinguishing characteristic of these trays was the lever you had to pull to crack the ice into cubes.
Now, Onyx, a manufacturer of non-plastic storage containers, has recreated this old-style stainless steel tray that makes 18 "slanted" cubes by pulling the easy-release handle. The steel material is sturdy and long-lasting, and also means you'll cut back on plastic products.
Pros: Retro appeal, sturdy stainless-steel construction, freezes ice cubes quickly, no plastic or aluminum
Cons: Hard to extract ice, expensive
The best ice ball mold
The Zoku Ice Sphere Mold easily makes large ice balls to enhance your cocktails and keep them cold for hours.
If you want to take your cocktail party game to the next level, it may be time to invest in an ice ball mold. The appeal is obvious: The giant sphere in your glass in downright intriguing.
But there's more to it than that. Ice balls last longer and stay colder than regular ice cubes, so it helps cocktails stay cool - with less dilution - all night long.
The Zoku Ice Ball Mold comes with two units that create 2.5-inch balls. The silicone units are easy to use. To release the ice balls after freezing simply pull the halves apart, flip over the mold, and push on the bottom of it. The ice balls should snap right out. The units are designed to stack in your freezer, but the bright red design is attractive enough to display on your bar.
Pros: Easy to use, stylish, inexpensive compared to other ice ball molds
Cons: Some users report a weird taste
Check out our other buying guides
The best drinking glasses
High-quality drinking glasses can handle hot and cold liquids, are resistant to breaking when dropped, and don't spill easily.
The best frozen dessert makers
When the summer weather heats things up, the best way to keep your cool is with ice-cold sweets. Dessert makers can produce delicious frozen treats using simple ingredients.
The best ice cream makers
If you love ice cream so much that you want to make your own from scratch, you need a good ice cream maker. If you're looking for a fun option to add to your dessert repertoire, check out these ice cream makers.