New KING of Wireless Meat Thermometers (Sorry, Meater Block 😬)

Byamazingfoodstv


I tested the top wireless meat thermometers head-to-head for accuracy, range & speed to see which is BEST between Meater Pro, ThermoWorks RFX, Combustion Inc Gen 2 & the Fireboard Pulse. Thanks @SelkirkSport for sponsoring today’s video, checkout Selkirk after today’s video –

Probe Links
👉🏼 Meater –
👉🏼 FireBoard –
👉🏼 RFX –
👉🏼 Combustion –
👉🏼 ChefsTemp –

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Chapters
00:00 – Meater Block Dethroned
00:45 – Marketing Hype-busting Tests
01:33 – Who’s In & Who’s Out
04:29 – The Best On Paper (Specs Comparison)
11:21 – Overnight Brisket Stress Test
16:43 – Selkirk Ad
18:55 – Brisket Test Results
26:36 – High Heat Sear Test
33:30 – Dropped Signals, Connection test
37:49 – Final Ranking Best Wireless Probes

#meatthermometer #meater #smokingdadbbq

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30 Comments

  3. Oh hell no, Smoking Dad is smoking crack!
    – Three Meater probe failures including 2nd gen product
    – Terrible customer service
    – Never charged when i need it
    – Consistent disconnects.
    – Wife threw the remaining probe and block in the trash out of anger when it quit mid cook on her.
    My Thermoworks RFX reigns KING, it never drops or misses a beat. Always charged and ready to go. <– this is what is important.
    There is not a snowball's chance in hell I would ever buy another Meater. Dude you lost your reputation with me on this paid review.

  4. I call this video horse pucky. It's an advertisement disguised as a review. I know as I bought and have lived with the Meater 2 and the RFX. I cannot recommend either.
    My Meater does nothing but drop connection with the base less than a foot away. Customer support? What's that? I'll leave it their. Never buy a Meater product.
    The RFX is still to Beta, does drop connection despite the claims and it's a hardware design issue they don't want to acknowledge, and then there's the app. That app needs to be scrapped entirely.

    If you've read this far, simply buy a wired unit and instant read thermometer.

  7. Did you use the expert mode on the combustion showing all 8 sensor readings? Where the ones actually at the core any closer? I can deal with ambient being off, but core being of that luch would seriously worry me.

  9. My Meater block Pro XL works flawlessly every time. I bought it based on reviews from this very channel ! I don't know what happened to James since switching back to green egg but it seems like he's getting some cash from companies to glaze certain products while putting others down. I wish he was more transparent ! I've learned allot from watching his videos but I'm not watching as much anymore since he seems to have lost his impartiality. Too bad….

  11. I own three Combustion Inc probes, and after watching this review I was concerned that maybe mine weren’t reading accurately. So I ran my own test — all three probes were placed in hot water, and each showed exactly 100°F, with only a fraction of a degree difference, which is completely negligible.

    I also cross-checked with a mercury thermometer, and the readings matched perfectly. This suggests the probes are highly accurate when tested correctly.

    Frankly, inserting probes into a piece of meat is not a reliable way to test temperature accuracy. The meat’s density, fat content, and uneven internal temperature will inevitably affect readings, so expecting identical results across all sensors simply isn’t realistic.

    While I haven’t compared other brands, I do think the conclusions in this review are misleading and unfair to the manufacturer, who has clearly invested heavily in developing a very precise piece of technology.

  12. I have the original Meater Block, 2 Meater 2 Plus individual probes and now I have an RFX Gateway with 8 probes. I will not use another Meater product and cannot recommend any of their products. The RFX Wireless is fantastic and can't recommend it enough.

    I heavily used my Meater Block probes and after about a year and a half they started falling apart, conveniently beyond my warranty.

    My 2 Meater 2 Plus probes constantly had connection issues. For context I have a LSG Pellet grill with thick walls as well as a Workhorse 1975 3/8" thick steel offset, LSG Insulated Vertical cabinet smoker, double walled Hestan 42" gas grill etc. So not the easiest things for signals to get through… but I was very disappointed with all my Meaters connections and inconsistencies through this.

    In particular DO NOT GET the NON BLOCK Meater products. Their connections from my experience are significantly worse. Even the second gen ones with the better bluetooth was very poor, during almost every cook for a year one or both of my probes would disconnect multiple times. One particularly annoying issue (that the older Gen 1 Block didn't have) was they would lose connection with the App and wouldn't reconnect until I restarted the app. This completely defeats the purpose of alarms since I could never tell when it lost connection unless I'm checking it manually all the time and hard restarting the app.

    So with the meaters one fell apart and had spotty connection, one stayed together but had even worse connection.

    I contacted support about the meater 2 probes (I had tested for about 10 months to see if I could figure a way around it, so was still in warranty) took like an hour to convince them that I had spent 10 months and many cooks testing and all their simple steps I had already tried. They sent me two new probes. I wasn't convinced they were damaged or anything since they both behaved with the same inconsistent connection issues. No difference with two new probes. I tried to get them to give me a refund, told them repeatedly I just want a refund, no go.

    So yeah about $550 of mostly wasted money on Meater probes. I have high heat food safe sealant to try on the old Meater probes since they are coming apart, maybe I'll do that and give them away to family for free… the original block works moderately connection wise as long as it's close, just they fall apart. Other than that a waste of money.

    So then I got the RFX Gateway with 4 probes and expanded by adding 4 more for a total of 8 probes.

    It's like night and day. 99% of the time I have no connection issues with one tip. Just ensure you don't put the probes too deep, the thick band representing the outer limit of dept I always ensure is fully exposed. I had some issues at first since I was inserting them too deep (which is easier to do since it doesn't get wide for an ambient sensor on the end). Once I figured that I almost never have any connection issues. Even on my Workhorse 1975 with 3/8" thick steel. This is with the gateway inside my house! Though if I need to put it close it's small, very easy to clean, magnetic so can stick to the side of anything metal etc.

    To me the RFX system is perfect. I never used the ambient portion of the probes anyways. If I'm using a pellet smoker it already has an ambient probe so I don't really care, more thorough tests out there have shown they aren't the most accurate anyways depending on what you're cooking at what heat and when in the cook. Also the only time I need to add my own ambient probe is when I run something other than my pellet grill that doesn't have one built in like my offset or IVS, but in that case the ambient probe on the meat probe is pointless anyways since I want a static one to monitor the temps before I put the meat on. So I have to add a static one anyways so with this I can put the gateway out there and get a built in static one rather than need a separate system for that (which is even more cost effective since the ones with ambient probes built in don't give you a static one like the RFX).

    Even better since they don't put those ambient probes in the per probe price is much cheaper than the competitors. For most other ones they are $120-$150 each vs the RFX probes are $95, not on sale. Plus the system is expandable unlike the Meater Blocks… I got a 4 pack + Gateway and then just bought 4 extra probes to tack on to the same singular system and can keep going with more if I want. 8 probes has been very useful when cooking different meats, a lot of meats, or even multiple probes in the same meat which has been educational in understanding what parts of the meat get what temps etc, also better coverage. Also I can cycle some for cleaning and still have some to cook.

    Further Meater has a really bad web app (at least when I was using it a year or so ago) where you could only look at one probe data at a time. I was spoiled with using Fireboard and their excellent web app where I can keep it up on a second monitor while doing things and just look over and see all my probes. The RFX web apps is FAR better than the Meater (if not quite as good as Fireboard).

    So yeah, can't recommend RFX enough. I almost went with Pulse but the price per probe and the lack of sustained high temp support was a no go (though I love my Fireboard 2 and their software is the best). The RFX is essentially the perfectly designed system IMHO, no useless ambient probes, don't have to pay for that if you expand the system either, high temp support and it just works and stays connected.

    Maybe the Meater 2 Block solves all the problems I had but I refuse to spend more than the $550 for mostly paper weights I have now, including that poor support experience.

  13. Thanks for the video, i have the new Meater and the RFX, glad to seeI havve made the correct purchases, although personally i would reverse the ranking of the two. Thank y9u for sharing all your knowledge, i have a grilla grills kong kamado and use your double indirect set up and it is great.

  15. I wonder if there is something wrong with my Meater probes and or base because the probes will lose connection to the base if i use my offset smoker or barrel smoker or even my traeger 885, and those have a super thin metal lid. Its so useless that i have stopped using them which sucks because they were like 300 dollars.

  16. James, another great video and evaluation. Two questions for you: when you tested internal temperatures with a quick read external probe, did you just test the brisket overall, or did you probe next to each wireless probe to validate individual accuracy as a large piece of meat will vary through during the cook? Second, when using multiple probes from a Meater duo or XL in full brisket, or multiple briskets how do you keep them organized for proper brisket A vs B temp differentiation. Like the color probe idea from the other vendor.

  17. Really big fan of Fireboard products with my Drive 2 being well used (with wired probes of course). I was hoping the wireless probe would be a contender as the app and connectivity are exceptional in my circumstances. Any plans to re-test after it is fixed / replaced? I’d love to be able to use it with my rotisserie that I’m starting to enjoy using.

  20. Love the channel, but this review is a miss. ChefIQ probe is WiFi enabled (in addition to Bluetooth) and is a complete game changer in terms of range. It also matches the top specs of other probes at a very aggressive price point. The app is soso but it outclasses all of the other probes.

  21. Half the ones you say weren't out like MeatStick V have been available for almost a year. When did you film this, January?

    Think the big thing is doing a test on how long these probes last after normal or extreme usage.

  22. Meater is absolute garbage. I’ve owned two separate meaters, my father in law has had two as well. They all failed after one cook. They’re nearly impossible to get to connect in the first place, the Bluetooth range is about 3 feet, then they are one time use and fail. Garbage.

  25. Great comparison. Now a question – How long does it take for the ambient temperature to stabilize? Does it stabilise any faster than 1-10 hours into the cook? Because for doing low and slow 1/2lb beef patties I can't imagine the ambient temperature being anywhere near the actual ambient temperature no?

  29. Regardless of who sponsored this particular video, have you ever accepted sponsorship money or received financial or free products from meater? Ethically, you should disclose the answer to that either way. It’d go a long way to making people feel like you’re not shilling for a product.

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