The Hamilton Beach Wave Crusher Blender is a budget-friendly blender with a sturdy-feeling 40oz glass jar. The 2-part lid allows for hot blending and adding ingredients mid-blend. However, despite its eight buttons and advertised 14 blending functions, it lacks automatic blending programs and only has two blending speeds: low and high. Aside from its jar, it doesn't feel well-built.
Our Verdict
The Hamilton Beach Wave Crusher Multi-Function Blender is decent for multi-purpose use. It's good for pureeing fibrous ingredients for recipes like smoothies, sauces, and soups, whether you're working with a small batch or filling the jar to full capacity. You can use it to hot blend, although the manufacturer says not to add over 25oz of hot liquids at once, while the jar's full capacity is 40oz, so you might have to blend soup recipes in a couple of batches. It's not very versatile otherwise. It struggles to crush ice cubes and process thicker recipes like nut butter and hummus. Also, aside from the glass jar, it feels plasticky and not very sturdy.
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Good at blending fibrous ingredients.
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Hot blends.
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Quiet for a blender.
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Struggles to crush ice.
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Sub-par build quality.
The Hamilton Beach Wave Crusher Blender is satisfactory for single-serve smoothies. It only comes with a 40oz jar, but does a good job of blending smaller batches of fibrous ingredients like fruit or kale. However, it leaves some unprocessed bits behind and takes several minutes of blending to get the best results.
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Good at blending fibrous ingredients.
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Quiet for a blender.
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Struggles to crush ice.
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Sub-par build quality.
The Hamilton Beach Wave Crusher Blender is adequate for multiple servings of smoothies. Its 40oz jar is on the small side for a full-size blender but can hold enough for a couple of smoothies. It does a good job of blending common smoothie ingredients like kale and fruit, although it won't make a completely smooth blend. It also takes several minutes of blending to get the best results.
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Good at blending fibrous ingredients.
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Quiet for a blender.
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Struggles to crush ice.
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Sub-par build quality.
The Hamilton Beach Wave Crusher Blender is a bad ice crusher. It makes slushy, chunky crushed ice with lots of unprocessed ice cubes left over. It's not a very sturdy blender, either.
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Quiet for a blender.
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Struggles to crush ice.
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Sub-par build quality.
The Hamilton Beach Wave Crusher Blender is great for soups. It can hot blend, so you can add hot ingredients like cooked vegetables directly from the pot or pan. It does a good job of blending fibrous ingredients like broccoli or leafy greens. However, the jar's maximum capacity is 25oz for hot ingredients versus 40oz for room temperature or cold ingredients, so it might not fit a full recipe in one batch.
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Good at blending fibrous ingredients.
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Hot blends.
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Quiet for a blender.
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25oz capacity for hot ingredients.
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Sub-par build quality.
The Hamilton Beach Wave Crusher is mediocre for professional use. Aside from the glass jar, it's made of cheap-feeling plastic, including the gears on the base and jar. It's good for liquid recipes like smoothies and soups, but it can't handle more difficult blends like nut butter very well.
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Good at blending fibrous ingredients.
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Hot blends.
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Quiet for a blender.
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Struggles to crush ice.
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Difficult to use for thick recipes.
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Sub-par build quality.
- 7.0 Multi-Purpose
- 7.3 Smoothies (Single Serving)
- 6.7 Smoothies (Multiple Servings)
- 4.6 Ice Crushing
- 8.0 Soups
- 6.0 Professional Use
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Updated Oct 21, 2024:
We've updated the results to more accurately reflect the blender's performance. Because of the blending time, the score for Fibrous Ingredients (Small Batches) processing changed from 7.5 to 7.0, and the score for Fibrous Ingredients (Full Capacity) processing changed from 7.5 to 6.5.
- Updated Aug 09, 2024: Compared its build quality to the Beautiful High Performance Blender with Touch-Activated Display's.
- Updated Jan 11, 2024: Review published.
- Updated Jan 08, 2024: Early access published.
- Updated Jan 04, 2024: Our testers have started testing this product.
- Updated Nov 29, 2023: The product has arrived in our lab, and our testers will start evaluating it soon.
- Updated Nov 13, 2023: We've purchased the product and are waiting for it to arrive in our lab.
Differences Between Sizes And Variants
The Hamilton Beach Wave Crusher Multi-Function comes in 'Black' and 'Stainless Steel' variants. We tested it in 'Black'; you can see the unit's label here.
If you come across another variant, let us know in the forums, and we'll update our review.
Compared To Other Blenders
The Hamilton Beach Wave Crusher Multi-Function Blender is a budget-friendly blender with a glass jar. It's not as well-built and doesn't perform as well as similar models like the Black+Decker Quiet Blender with Cyclone Glass Jar and Oster Pro 1200. It's best at blending liquidy recipes like soups and smoothies since it does a good job of blending fibrous ingredients but struggles with crushing ice and thick recipes like nut butter. However, the Hamilton Beach Power Elite Multi-Function makes a smoother blend with fibrous elements like leafy greens, so it's a better option if you want an inexpensive blender for things like smoothies.
If you're still looking for a recommendation, check out our recommendations for the best blenders, the best blenders for smoothies, and the best blenders for crushing ice.
The Ninja Professional Blender 1000 is better than the Hamilton Beach Wave Crusher Multi-Function for most purposes. The Ninja is sturdier, much better for crushing ice, and easier to use for recipes like nut butter or hummus. However, the Hamilton Beach comes with a glass jar, which you might prefer. It can hot blend and make a smoother blend with fibrous ingredients, which is important for well-blended soups and smoothies. However, it has a sub-par build quality.
The Oster Pro 1200 is better than the Hamilton Beach Wave Crusher Multi-Function. It performs better for most uses, including smoothly blending fibrous ingredients, crushing ice cubes, and blending thick recipes like nut butter. It comes with a 24oz personal jar in addition to its 48oz main jar. However, the less powerful Hamilton Beach is significantly quieter.
The Calphalon ActiveSense is better than the Hamilton Beach Wave Crusher Multi-Function. The Calphalon has a better build quality and a larger capacity in its main jar. It makes a smoother blend with fibrous ingredients like fruit and kale, which is important for well-blended smoothies. It's also much better for crushing ice. It has automatic blending programs, which you might find more convenient. On the other hand, the Hamilton Beach has a glass jar, and its removable blade assembly makes it much easier to clean.
The Black+Decker Quiet Blender with Cyclone Glass Jar is better than the Hamilton Beach Wave Crusher Multi-Function. It has a sturdier build and a better performance for most uses. It makes a smoother blend with fibrous ingredients for recipes like soups and smoothies and does a better job of crushing ice and processing thicker recipes like nut butter. It also comes with a 24oz personal jar for making single-serve recipes like smoothies and protein shakes.
The Hamilton Beach Wave Crusher Multi-Function is better than the Brentwood 12-Speed Pulse Blender with Glass Jar. The Hamilton Beach makes a smoother blend with fibrous ingredients, and you can use it to crush ice or make nut butter, although it's not very good for that. You can also use it to hot blend. The Brentwood is quieter when it's running, though.
The Oster Master Series Blender with Texture Select Settings is better than the Hamilton Beach Wave Crusher Multi-Function for most purposes. The Oster is sturdier and more versatile since it does a much better job of tougher blending tasks like crushing ice and making nut butter. It also comes with a 24oz personal jar intended for single-serves. On the other hand, the Hamilton Beach can make a smoother blend with fibrous ingredients in less time.
The Magic Bullet Combo Blender is better than the Hamilton Beach Wave Crusher Multi-Function for most purposes. The Magic Bullet is much sturdier and comes with a 15oz personal jar as well as a 48oz main jar. It's better for processing small batches of fibrous ingredients. The Hamilton Beach is more versatile since it can crush ice and process dry ingredients, but it's not good for more difficult blends like ice or nut butter.
The Beautiful High Performance Blender with Touch-Activated Display is better than the Hamilton Beach Wave Crusher Multi-Function. It has a much better build quality, makes a smoother blend with fibrous ingredients, makes snow-like crushed ice, and does a better job with recipes like nut butter. That said, the Hamilton Beach is much quieter and has removable blades that make it easier to clean by hand.
Test Results
It's somewhat bulky, so you'll probably want to store it on a counter versus in a cupboard or on a shelf. However, it's not that heavy for a full-size blender.
It has a sub-par build quality. The entire blender is made of ordinary plastic, including the gears on the motor body and jar. The control buttons feel flimsy and shake when the blender runs, as you can see in a video here. Other components, including the jar collar and lid, don't feel high-quality, and the rubber feet under the motor base don't suction onto the counter to help keep the blender still. Aside from the glass jar, it doesn't feel well-made. If you want a blender in the same price range with a better build quality, you might prefer the Beautiful High Performance Blender with Touch-Activated Display, although it doesn't come with a glass jar.
The glass jar has a 40oz capacity. However, if you're blending hot liquids, the manufacturer says not to fill it beyond 750mL, or about 25oz.
The jar is made of glass, which is less prone to scratching and discoloration than plastic. You can put it on the top rack of the dishwasher.
The blade assembly is removable from the jar, which helps make the blender easier to clean. It can go in the dishwasher, but the manual says not to use the sanitize setting on it.
The lid seals with friction, and you need to properly align it and apply pressure to seal it on the jar. It also takes a bit of effort to pry it off again. Unlike some blenders, like the KitchenAid K150, which have vented lids you don't need to open and close, you have to manually open the steam vent on the lid when hot blending.
There's a small hole in the bottom of the motor base, which the power cable retracts into.
- Hamilton Beach Wave Crusher motor base
- 40oz glass jar
- 'Cutting' blade assembly
- Blade assembly collar
- 2-part lid
- User manual
It's very good for small batches of fibrous ingredients. It leaves some tiny bits of kale behind but still makes a uniform blend. However, it takes several minutes to get these results. The manufacturer says to blend a minimum of one cup of liquid at a time for the best results. Our recipe involves 1/2 cup of liquid. When we repeated the test with a full cup, the results were not as good, with more and bigger specks of kale leftover. You can see a picture of the results with one cup of liquid here.
It's good at processing fibrous ingredients at full capacity. After several minutes of blending, there are still many small unprocessed bits of kale left over, but they aren't very big, and the puree has a uniform texture.
It's a poor ice crusher. Using pulse mode, it makes slushy, wet ice and leaves behind many unprocessed chunks.
It's sub-par for nut butter. You have to blend for over 15 minutes and stop the machine to remove the lid to stir several times during the process. Ultimately, it doesn't manage to process the nuts smoothly, so the result is crunchy nut butter. However, it doesn't leave any big chunks behind.
It's not particularly loud for a full-size blender. All blenders make noise, but it's quieter than many models we've tested, including the Oster Pro 1200.
It doesn't have a wide range of speed settings. The lowest setting is quite fast, which is helpful for purees but less convenient for thicker recipes, which you might want to start at a lower speed to avoid the ingredients flinging to the sides of the jar.
It's advertised to have a 700-watt motor, which refers to the peak power. If you calculate the motor power using the amperage and voltage indicated on the blender (3.5A * 120V), the result is 420 watts.
The manufacturer advertises that it has '14 blending functions'. However, the different buttons don't run the blender for different lengths of time. Instead, the following buttons run at the same lower speed: Dice, Stir/Easy Clean, Milkshake/Mix, and Chop/Salsa. The following buttons run the blender at the same high speed: Puree/Whip, Smoothie/Grate, Grind/Icy Drink. There are only four functions: low pulse, low regular blending, high regular blending, and high pulse. Aside from both pulse buttons, every button starts a continuous blending cycle, and you have to stop the blender manually.