I'm ditching my KitchenAid for the Ooni Halo Stand Mixer — here's why

Ooni is best known for making some of the best pizza ovens, but as any home chef will know, your pizza is only as good as the dough you use. Which is why the brand created its Ooni Halo Pro Spiral Stand Mixer, which uses a dual-kneading spiral design which develops stronger gluten networks for "pizzeria quality dough." Sign me up.

I've always made my pizza dough from scratch, and while I still think my KitchenAid is an amazing stand mixer for whisking up cakes and meringues, I'll confess that it lurches around my countertops if I dare to throw more than a loaf's worth of bread dough in there to knead. So I was first in line to try the Halo Pro mixer, and I even threw a pizza party to put it to the ultimate test.

My verdict? While it's expensive, Ooni doesn't rest on its reputation with the Halo Pro. This mixer is well-made, durable, and powerful, and its claim of restaurant-quality dough definitely stood up to rigorous taste-testing.

Here's my full verdict.

Ooni Halo Pro Spiral review: Price and availability

The Pro Halo is $799, and comes in white and grey. You can buy it at the likes of Ooni, Best Buy, and Williams Sonoma.

In the U.K., where Ooni originates, you can buy the Halo for £699 direct at Ooni.

Included, you'll get a work bowl, splashguard lid with spout, dough hook, power whisk, breaker bar, and silicone-edge beater.

Ooni Halo Pro Spiral review: Design

I had to apologize to the postman who delivered this mixer. At 32 pounds, it's seriously heavy. But once I'd managed to slug it onto my kitchen counter, this no longer felt like a downside. All that heft surely helps keep it in place while it throws around up to 11 pounds of dough, right?

This mixer is a tilt-head, which surprised me. Typically, I associate tilt-head mixers to be less durable and stable than bowl-lift models, such as KitchenAid's more premium line. But the tilt-head is locked firmly into place with two levers, one either side, which you need to press in order to lift and lower your mixing attachments.

The Halo Pro comes with very premium-feeling attachments. The dough hook and breaker bar are both made of sturdy, heavy stainless steel. Fitting attachments is intuitive, and there's a removable shield that slots onto the tilt-head to protect you from splashes while mixing.

Fitting the splash guard is a little finicky. You need to do it while the tilt head is lifted, as it won't slot in if it's lowered. It's a good guard, though. The front lifts up to allow you to pour in ingredients, and there's also a dripper slot which can help to slowly drizzle in oils or other liquids while mixing.

Ooni Halo Pro Spiral review: Performance

Cake

I used the flat beater to combine my cake ingredients in the Halo Pro. The generous bowl is ideal to make large batches, but I was concerned that my loaf cake ingredients would spread around the bowl too much, making the beater less effective.

With a lot of mixers, I need to go in and scrape the excess off the side of the bowl, but because the Halo has a flex edge beater, it softly removes any stuck-on ingredients as it moves around the bowl and re-integrates it into the cake batter.

(Image credit: Tom's Guide / Millie Fender)

(Image credit: Tom's Guide / Millie Fender)

(Image credit: Tom's Guide / Millie Fender)

You can see in the video below how fast the mixer works when cranked up to 100% power. It's super noisy. I hit 75dB on top speed, which would be a bit overwhelming if you ran it at top speed for a long time. I was only mixing for a few minutes though, and it did an excellent job of creaming together soft butter and sugar to create a light texture. After adding the rest of my ingredients, I was left with a smooth and buttery batter that was ready to scrape into my loaf tin.

My finished cake was tasty, but a little dense. I've had better luck when making larger layer cakes in this mixer, so be warned that if you're making smaller servings, you might not end up with the fluffiest texture.

Whisking

Usually I test stand mixers by making whipped cream or beating egg whites into meringue, but I decided to take it one step further for the halo, and make butter from scratch.

This was my first time making butter, and the Halo made it very easy. I added 600ml / 20fl. oz. to my bowl and then turned the whisk up gradually to its maximum speed of 345 rpm.

I set the timer for 10 minutes, and slotted the splash guard into place to prevent any messes.

It took around two minutes of mixing for my cream to reach stiff peaks, and then another two for it to start reaching a grainy texture that, in past experiences, has indicated that I've taken my whipped cream too fast.

I left the Halo to keep mixing, and it slowly started to separate the fat solids from the buttermilk, which immediately began to splash all over my guard.

The mixer was quite noisy at top speed, hitting 73dB, and the whiny sound was more akin to the noises made by a KitchenAid.

It took around eight minutes of mixing before I decided the butter was finished. I found that I had to pause the mixer to check on the butter; otherwise, I'd have been immediately splashed by buttermilk when peeking under the lift-up section of the guard.

From there, I simply strained the butter from the buttermilk (I'm keeping this aside to tenderize some chicken) and rinsed my butter under cold water to remove any remaining buttermilk.

(Image credit: Tom's Guide)

(Image credit: Tom's Guide)

I was left with 300g / 10.5oz. of butter, which I combined with some flaky Maldon salt to make my own homemade butter. After rolling it in some baking parchment and letting it set in the refrigerator, I was able to spread it (perhaps a bit liberally!) on a slice of toast, and it tasted fantastic.

This is more of an endurance task for most stand mixers, but the Halo didn't break a sweat when making quite a large volume of butter. I was also impressed that the cream didn't end up stuck against the side of the mixing bowl, despite how relatively empty it looked.

Bread dough

Bread kneading is where the Halo comes into its own. The first loaf I made in this mixer was a simple white bread, and I used the classic basic bread recipe that I always turn to.

I've made this recipe in my KitchenAid Artisan before, and while it did a capable job, I did worry that it moved around my countertop as it kneaded. I definitely wouldn't risk a larger quantity of dough in the KitchenAid, whereas I had no concerns that the Ooni couldn't handle this simple recipe.

After 10 minutes of mixing at 20% speed, I was super impressed with the gluten development I was able to achieve with this mixer.

The kneading mechanism of the Ooni reminds me a lot of the famous Ankarsrum mixer, which is also ideally designed to knead bread dough and uses a rotating bowl to create the mixing mechanism.

According to Ooni, the spiral mixing technology is usually found in professional kitchens. But in these professional mixers, the breaker bar is non-removable, meaning they can only be used to make dough.

Fitting the removable breaker bar is easy enough. You simply need to slot it into place and screw down a cover, and it's firmly locked in.

(Image credit: Tom's Guide / Millie Fender)

(Image credit: Tom's Guide / Millie Fender)

I was super happy with my white sandwich loaf, which rose massively when I left it to prove for an hour, before knocking it back and folding into a loaf tin for further proving.

Once out of the oven, it had a springy texture and excellent flavor. I enjoyed it with some more homemade butter, feeling like one of those TikTok chefs who make everything from scratch.

One thing that struck me when making this recipe is that I'd have enjoyed the addition of an in-built scale with this mixer. It's a premium feature that you'll find in the likes of Kenwood and Bosch mixers, but then, this is a premium product.

Pizza dough

After how easily the mixer kneaded my bread loaf, I decided it was time for it to hit the home straight: pizza dough. Let's not forget, the Halo was created by Ooni, maker of some seriously good pizza ovens, so it would've felt wrong not to make a few pies.

I followed a recipe for New York-style pizza dough, which I left to ferment for 24 hours in a cold refrigerator. I made enough for eight pizzas, using over 1kg / 2lbs of flour alone with a mix of 00, bread and plain flour.

(Image credit: Tom's Guide)

(Image credit: Tom's Guide)

(Image credit: Tom's Guide)

I left the dough to knead for 10 minutes, slowly integrating more and more of my warm, yeasted water as the flour combined. I was left with a huge, sticky mess of 65% hydration dough ready for cold proving, and the gluten development was outstanding.

I was also impressed to see that the shield became a little steamy when I left my dough to prove, which is a sign of just how much yeast activity the mixer had stimulated.

I threw a pizza party to enjoy the fruits of my (and the Ooni Halo's) labor, and there were a lot of comments on how well the dough held up. You'll have to forgive my sub-par shaping in my demo pizza, which is not my finest work!

It had a good chew and great flavor, and the crusts puffed up perfectly while the base proved sturdy and ideal for holding up some over-zealous toppings.

Ooni Halo Pro Spiral review: Verdict

There's no question that the Ooni Halo is the most capable stand mixer I've ever tested. It combines the convenience of a tilt-head mixer with the rigor of a professional product.

But unless you love cooking large volumes of bread, or you're really passionate about pizza, you might be able to find a mixer that's capable of meeting your day-to-day needs for less.

That's not a failing of the Ooni Halo Pro Spiral. This is the heftiest, brashest stand mixer I've ever used. But it's super expensive, and its cake-mixing ability was sub-par thanks to the large and flat-based mixing bowl.

I made some big bakes in this thing: a huge batch of butter, dough for eight pizzas, three-layered cakes, and I never once felt like the machine was straining. If you're looking for a genuine workhorse, and don't mind paying for premium quality, you should look no further than the Ooni Halo Pro Spiral stand mixer.