Ninja Professional Plus BN701 Review

If you asked us to name the one blender that suits the most households, this would be it — not because it is the best blender, but because it does the job most people actually want done, at a price that does not require justifying. This review is about what that job is, and the two places where the machine stops.

Standard disclosure: a specification and running-cost review from Ninja's published listing for the exact unit we link to, not a lab test. Method on how we review.

The specification

About that 1,400 watts

Ninja quotes peak watts — the momentary spike the motor can draw under load, not a continuous rating. Every brand measures peak differently, and there is no industry standard, so the number is not comparable across manufacturers. A 1,400-peak-watt Ninja is not more powerful than a 2 HP Vitamix, and you will see budget blenders claiming 1,800 and 2,000 peak watts that perform worse than this one.

What we can say is that within Ninja's own range this motor is a step up from the original Professional, and that it is plainly sufficient for the job it is sold for. Judge it on the jar and the blades, which is where the real engineering is.

Stacked blades: the good and the cost

The Total Crushingassembly is a spindle with cutting edges at multiple heights running up the middle of the pitcher. This is Ninja's answer to cavitation — the problem where a frozen load rides up the jar walls and leaves the blade spinning in an air pocket — and it is a genuinely effective one. There is always a cutting edge at every level, which is exactly why Ninja owns the crushed-ice and frozen-drink category despite being the cheaper brand.

The cost is cleanup, and it is a daily cost. You lift a multi-blade spindle out of a sticky pitcher and wash it as a separate component, every time. It is dishwasher-safe on the top rack, but it is still a sharp multi-part object you handle after every smoothie. Compare that with a fixed-blade Vitamix jar that self-cleans in under a minute with no disassembly.

This is the criterion we would weight most heavily if you blend every morning before work, and it is discussed properly in how to clean a blender.

Read the pitcher capacity carefully

The pitcher is 72 ounces, and Ninja states a 64-ounce maximum liquid capacity. The difference is headroom for foam and ice, and it matters when you are comparing on paper: against a Vitamix 5200's 64-ounce jar this is a tie, not a 50% advantage.

Sixty-four ounces of liquid is comfortably two large smoothies with room to spare, or a family batch of frozen drinks. It is genuinely a family-size pitcher.

Auto-iQ: convenience, not capability

Three preset programs that run timed pulse-blend-pause patterns. Press one, walk away, come back to a finished smoothie.

Being straight about this: presets are a convenience, not a capability. The pulse-and-run pattern they automate is one you could drive manually with the same result — the cheaper Ninja BL610 makes the same smoothie with one more button press and a 20-second wait. Whether that is worth the price gap is a personal call, and if the BL610 is on sale it is frequently the better buy. Both appear in best blenders under $100.

Where presets do earn their place is with people who will not otherwise learn the machine — a household member who wants a smoothie without a tutorial.

The hot-liquid restriction is a hard line

This is the most important thing on this page. Ninja's owner's guide for the BN700 series states not to blend hot liquids, because sealing hot contents in the pitcher can build pressure and steam.

That is a safety instruction, not a performance preference, and it rules the machine out for a whole category of cooking. No blended soup, no warm sauces, no hot nut butters. If any of that is on your list, this is the wrong blender and you want a Vitamix or an immersion blender — both covered in best blenders for hot soup, with the handheld machines ranked in best immersion blenders.

If everything you blend is cold — smoothies, shakes, frozen drinks, cold dressings — the restriction never comes up, and you should not pay a premium for a capability you will not use.

What it is genuinely excellent at

Worth being specific, because "good value" is a lazy summary and this machine has real strengths.

Crushed ice and frozen drinks. This is the category Ninja owns, and the stacked blade is why. Frozen margaritas, slushies and thick frozen-fruit smoothies come out properly textured rather than as a lumpy slurry with a puddle at the bottom.

Large batches of cold drinks. Sixty-four ounces of liquid is genuinely enough for a family or a party round, and the machine does not labor at full load the way smaller motors do.

Cold sauces and dressings. Vinaigrettes, salsa, chimichurri and pesto all work well, and the pulse control gives you enough texture command to stop before things become sauce.

Where it is merely adequate rather than good: fibrous greens. A kale-heavy green smoothie comes out smooth-ish with visible green threads suspended in it, which a Vitamix eliminates. If green smoothies are a daily habit, that is the one job where paying more genuinely buys you something — we lay the field out in best blenders for smoothies.

Footprint and build

At 9 inches wide and 6.75 deep this has a genuinely small counter footprint — narrower front-to-back than most full-size blenders — and at 17.5 inches tall it clears a standard 18-inch cabinet gap, unlike the Vitamix 5200. At 8.1 lb it is light enough to move easily.

The build is plastic where premium machines use metal, and the one-year limited warranty reflects the tier. That is the honest trade for the price, and for a machine used a few times a week it is a perfectly reasonable one.

The honest cons

No hot blending — the hard limit described above. Stacked blade cleanup every single use. No self-cleaning, unlike a fixed-blade jar. Plastic build against premium machines. One-year limited warranty, where Vitamix offers five to seven. Peak-watt marketing that tells you nothing useful.

One more worth naming: it is loud. Not unusually so for the class, but a 1,400-peak-watt motor driving stacked blades through ice at 7am is a household event. No blender at this price is quiet, and any that claims to be is not publishing a decibel figure to back it up.

Where it sits in Ninja's own range

Ninja sells several machines that look similar, and the differences are easy to miss.

The BL610 is the same 72-ounce Total Crushing pitcher on a simpler 1,000-watt base with three speeds and pulse — no Auto-iQ. It is the value pick, and if it is discounted it is frequently the smarter buy.

The BN701, reviewed here, adds the Auto-iQ presets and a higher stated peak wattage.

The BN801 Kitchen Systemis the BN701's motor base with a kitchen attached: the same 72-ounce pitcher plus a 64-ounce food processor bowl, two 24-ounce to-go cups, and five programs including a dough setting rated for up to 2 lb in about 30 seconds. If you want a blender and a processor from one base and have the cupboard space for the parts, that is the one — we work through that trade in blender vs. food processor.

All three share the no-hot-liquids restriction and the stacked-blade cleanup, so those decisions carry across the whole line.

Verdict

Buy the BN701 if your blending is cold — daily smoothies, frozen fruit, ice, shakes — and you want one machine that handles a family-sized batch without thinking about it. On those terms it is excellent value and the presets are a genuine convenience.

Buy the BL610 if you want the same 72-ounce capability for less and can live without presets. Buy the BN801 Kitchen System if you also want a food processor bowl and to-go cups on the same base. And buy a Vitamix 5200 if hot soup, nut butters or a decade of daily use are the actual requirement — the full comparison is in Vitamix vs. Ninja.