The Best Creamy Peanut Butter

This pick is one of only two peanut butters that got a unanimous thumbs-up from every member of our tasting panel. Teddie peanut butter checks all the boxes: It has good, spreadable body, great salt content, a pleasant grainy texture, and fresh-roasted peanut flavor. Our tasters liked how the nuttiness burst on the palate and that the consistency was somehow simultaneously loose yet thick enough to hold shape on a spoon. Out of all of the peanut butters we tried, Teddie made my favorite PB&J. Its assertive salted peanut flavor complements jams and jellies, and it holds its form atop sliced bread without oozing out the sides. Since it’s a natural peanut butter, you need to incorporate the oil that has separated from the solids before using it. (We found a handy tool for that very task.)

Texture: Grainy and loose but not drippy
Ingredients: Dry-roasted peanuts, salt
NYT Cooking recommends: Peanut butter cookies, peanut butter-glazed salmon and green beans, ginger chicken with sesame-peanut sauce

Of all the “regular” peanut butters we tried (oil added, super-creamy, and homogenous), Skippy was a standout favorite. It tied for first place with Teddie, winning a unanimous thumbs up from our tasters. Skippy’s robust peanut flavor lingers on the palate longer than that of other regular peanut butters, such as Jif and Peter Pan, and it has a pleasant texture that doesn’t feel waxy like some of the other oil-added peanut butters we tried, including Reese’s and Target’s Good & Gather. Our panel of tasters described Skippy as candy-like but not cloying, because it has enough salt to balance the sweetness. Surprisingly, we found that Skippy’s salted peanut flavor becomes even more pronounced when paired with jam and bread (in a good way).

Texture: Supersmooth and thick
Ingredients: Roasted peanuts, sugar, hydrogenated vegetable oil (cottonseed, soybean, and rapeseed oil), salt
NYT Cooking recommends: Chocolate peanut butter pie, chocolate peanut butter swirl cookies, cold noodle salad with spicy peanut sauce

Our panelists praised this ubiquitous peanut butter for its pronounced and robust peanuttiness. To me, Jif tasted like Skippy with slightly less sugar. (That may be why it has a faint bitterness that Skippy lacks.) One taster appreciated Jif’s “unimpeachably smooth” texture. Another mused that it “tasted like the spoonfuls of peanut butter I grew up with as a kid.” Jif is a classic choice for PB&J. As another panelist noted, “This is a good supermarket-style peanut butter, in that the synergy with the jam and bread hits the spot—sweet, salty, creamy.”

Texture: Supersmooth and thick
Ingredients: Roasted peanuts, sugar, molasses, fully hydrogenated vegetable oils (rapeseed and soybean), mono and diglycerides, salt
NYT Cooking recommends: Chocolate peanut butter pie, chocolate peanut butter swirl cookies, cold noodle salad with spicy peanut sauce

Santa Cruz Organic’s smooth peanut butter comes in light- and dark-roasted options. We tried both and found that the light-roasted peanut butter showcased the sweetness and complexity of the peanut more than its toastier sibling. Santa Cruz Organic’s Light Roasted Peanut Butter is similar to Teddie’s All Natural Smooth Peanut Butter in texture, body, and flavor, except that it has noticeably less salt. In fact, when I tasted this peanut butter sprinkled with a couple flakes of Diamond Crystal salt, it was strikingly similar to a dollop of Teddie peanut butter straight out of the jar. Santa Cruz’s powerful peanut flavor also stands out in a PB&J. If you’re looking for an organic, low-sodium, fresh-tasting peanut butter, this is it.

Texture: Grainy and loose
Ingredients: Organic roasted peanuts, salt
NYT Cooking recommends: Peanut butter cookies, peanut butter-glazed salmon and green beans, ginger chicken with sesame-peanut sauce

If you want a dark-roasted peanut butter with just a hint of salt: Like its light-roasted sibling, Santa Cruz Organic’s Creamy Dark Roasted Peanut Butter (about $6.50 for 16 ounces at the time of publication) delivers a similar texture and assertive peanutty flavor to Teddie peanut butter, but with 60% less sodium. Compared with Teddie, Santa Cruz Organic’s dark-roasted peanut butter didn’t taste as balanced, delivering deep-roasted flavor and little else. But a tiny sprinkle of salt rounds out the flavor. And unlike many other natural peanut butters we tried, Santa Cruz Organic peanut butter tastes like fresh-roasted peanuts, not dusty old ones.

If you like salty peanut butter: Trader Joe’s Creamy Salted Peanut Butter (about $2 for 16 ounces at the time of publication) is an affordable, natural peanut butter that many of our panelists loved. It’s supersmooth and generously salted, with an almost pourable viscosity. Some tasters thought it was too salty and sticky when eaten plain, but on a PB&J, the peanut butter balanced the jam’s sweetness with its saltiness and assertive roasted-peanut flavor. One tester said they’d like to try using it to make sesame noodles. It’s very finely ground, resulting in an almost silt-like texture, a plus for folks who don’t like any crunchy bits.

If you want organic peanut butter in bulk: Kirkland Signature Organic Peanut Butter (about $14 for two 28-ounce jars at the time of publication) is an excellent value. It’s finely ground and similar in texture and dark-roasted flavor to Trader Joe’s Creamy Salted Peanut Butter, but it has less salt. Panelists liked the Kirkland peanut butter’s spreadability and smooth texture in their PB&Js, though a couple of folks thought the jam overpowered it somewhat. One warning: It was a giant pain in the neck to mix the oil with the peanut paste in the bottom of the jar. Our peanut butter mixer, which worked beautifully on every other natural peanut butter we tested, got stuck. Stirring with a peanut butter knife left us with an oily, lumpy mixture. A spin in the food processor finally did the trick to make this peanut butter homogenous, something most people might be reluctant to do at home.

Many panelists agreed that Peter Pan Creamy Peanut Butter (about $4 for 16.3 ounces at the time of publication) was overly sugary, so much so that it subdued the peanut flavor. However, a couple of us loved its candy-like sweetness.

Greasy, thin, and too salty was the general consensus on the body and taste of Whole Foods 365 Creamy Peanut Butter (about $3 for 16 ounces at the time of publication). Some panelists also thought that the peanut flavor came across as raw and stale.

Target Good & Gather Creamy Peanut Butter (about $2 for 16 ounces at the time of publication) has a muted peanut flavor that’s most pronounced in the aftertaste. Our panelists were also put off by its waxy texture.

Smucker’s Natural Creamy Peanut Butter (about $4 for 16 ounces at the time of publication) has long been a favorite of a few of our tasters because it’s widely available and has a good amount of salt. But we all agreed that compared with the competition, it has a flat, almost stale, peanut flavor.

Trader Joe’s Organic Creamy Salted Valencia Peanut Butter (about $4.50 for 16 ounces at the time of publication) has a robust roasted-peanut flavor and a thin, sticky texture. Many panelists found that it tasted stale.

Our panelists thought that Woodstock Organic Smooth Easy Spread Peanut Butter (about $8 for 16 ounces at the time of publication) tasted slightly bitter and under roasted.

Walmart Great Value Creamy Peanut Butter (about $4 for 16 ounces at the time of publication) has difficult-to-identify, off flavors that our panelists struggled with. The spectrum of descriptions included: “artificial citrus-extract flavor,” “acrid,” and “[tastes] kind of like the peanut butter in Uncrustables.”

As a lover of peanut butter cups, I was very excited to try Reese’s Creamy Peanut Butter (about $4 for 16 ounces at the time of publication). But it didn’t live up to its name. Even though it had a punchy peanut flavor, the mouthfeel was overwhelmingly waxy.

For this guide, we only tasted jars labeled “peanut butter,” which is a legal designation. According to the USDA, peanut butter must contain at least 90% peanuts, blanched or unblanched. If any oil is added, it must be a fully hydrogenated plant-seed oil. Anything else must be labeled “peanut butter spread,” which includes brands that list palm oil as an ingredient.

To reflect what people are most likely to buy and to narrow down our pool of contenders, we excluded chunky-style peanut butter. Surveys such as this large one (subscription required) from 2014 or this smaller one from 2019 suggest that more people choose creamy than crunchy. However, we have good news for any chunky fans reading this guide: Almost all of our picks are available in chunky style as well.

We tested the natural style (the kind that usually requires some stirring) and what we refer to as the “regular” style (silky-smooth and homogenous). Natural peanut butters are generally just peanuts ground to a paste, maybe with some added salt, though the term natural doesn’t carry any regulatory weight. Regular peanut butter, which includes fully hydrogenated vegetable fats to keep it homogenized, is the stuff that many of us in the US grew up with, like Jif and Skippy. Regular peanut butter also typically contains sugar, whereas none of the natural peanut butters we tested do. Additionally, the regular kind is what’s often recommended in baking recipes that call for peanut butter. Both styles of peanut butter are good, and it truly just depends on your personal preferences and what you’ll use it for.

We also did our best to test peanut butters that folks can buy in major grocery stores. To help us gain a clearer picture of what’s available in different regions and narrow down our list, we asked 22 Wirecutter staffers from all over the country to send us photos of the peanut butters available at the markets they frequent, focusing on national supermarket chains and big-box stores.

To prepare the peanut butters for tasting, we covered the labels so that our panelists could taste without the bias of their nostalgia. We then incorporated the oils and solids in the natural peanut butters with these handy Witmer Peanut Butter Mixers, which homogenize natural peanut butter without splashing oil all over the kitchen and your clothes. (If you buy one, make sure you get the correct size for the peanut butter jars you have. A PDF on Witmer’s website helps you choose the best model for your needs.) The peanut butter mixer allowed us to fully incorporate a 16-ounce jar of natural peanut butter in about a minute.

Our panel included six tasters: Wirecutter kitchen editors Marilyn Ong and Gabriella Gershenson, and Wirecutter writers Mace Dent Johnson, Ciara Murray Jordan, Rachel Wharton, and myself. We first tried each peanut butter solo from a spoon, tasting them for freshness, peanuttiness, saltiness, sweetness, and any peculiar, off flavors. We then ruled out the definite nos and made PB&Js from the remaining favorites, noting the brands we liked best. When we finished tasting, we discussed our thoughts on each peanut butter and came to a consensus on the best of the bunch.

This article was edited by Gabriella Gershenson and Marguerite Preston.