We Tried 18 Butters — And the “Delicious” French Winner Is What We’ll Spread on Toast Forever

Butter! Oh, butter. Let me count the ways that I apply you: spread onto crispy bread, baked into cookies, or basted on steak. A little (or a lot) of butter is key to adding creamy richness to almost anything.

It shouldn’t surprise you to hear that there are a lot of butter brands lining our grocery shelves. Of course, not all butter is made equally: Some contain a higher fat-to-water ratio than others, not to mention the obvious differences between unsalted and salted. We spent an entire afternoon smearing and tasting a staggering 18 different blocks of butter to find which ones are the best.

• Best Salted: Isigny Ste Mare Salted Butter
• Runner-Up: Kerrygold Salted Butter
• Best Budget: Breakstone’s Salted Butter
• Best Unsalted: Vital Farms Unsalted Butter
• Runner-Up: Cabot Cabot Unsalted Butter
• Best Budget: Aldi Countryside Creamery Unsalted Butter Sticks

For this test, we focused on unsalted and salted butters. We sourced a variety of name- and store-brand options based on availability, popularity, and price. The butters ranged in price from $3 all the way up to $10, although most were around $5 at the time of this tasting. We also requested input from our editorial team to round out the list of 18 competitors (six unsalted, 12 salted). 

To appropriately test each type of butter, Ola, our culinary assistant, baked six batches of classic shortbread cookies using the unsalted butters (all other ingredients were consistent). The salted brands were sampled with sliced sourdough bread. After a long (but delicious) hour of tasting, one butter from each category stood out for its distinct and “decadent” flavor and texture. 

With just pasteurized cow’s milk, salt, and lactic starters, Isigny Ste Mère Beurre d’Isigny won high praise from virtually every single one of our tasters, including Mara, our senior groceries editor. Mara described it as “ultra-creamy and slightly sweet.” (She actually wrote about this butter last year after discovering it on TikTok, and was just as impressed with it now as she was then.)

Made in the Normandy region in France, this butter is actually a Protected Designation of Origin [POD] butter, which means that it must be made in a specific location using traditional methods and ingredients. It’s as fancy as butter can be, which is why we weren’t too surprised to see it take the top spot in our test. “It just can’t be topped,” said Ali, our associate groceries editor. 

At nearly $10 for the equivalent of two sticks, this butter is a splurge. If you’re hosting or want to treat yourself, it’s absolutely worth adding it to your cart. 

What’s So Great

• “Can’t be topped”
• Ultra-creamy

Good to Know

• $$$, but worth the splurge

Buy: Isigny Ste Mère Salted Butter, $9.39 for 8.8 ounces at Instacart

Kerrygold is iconic in the butter world — and our office. So we weren’t too surprised to see Kerrygold Salted Butter up top once the brands were revealed. Yes, even without its shiny gold label, it proved to be “fabulously smooth and rich,” says Mara. “Whatever brand this is, this is what I know and love butter to be,” added Brian, our director of people operations.

We sampled 12 salted butters and not a single of them was bad, so it all came down to the tiny (or, in this case, granular) details. A few tasters, like Ali, thought it was a bit too salty compared to the winner. It’s still a very golden runner-up.

What’s So Great

• Smooth & rich
• Great with bread

Good to Know

• A bit too salty, for some
• $$

Buy: Kerrygold Salted Butter, $6.49 for 8 ounces at Instacart

Terri, our executive editor at Apartment Therapy, summed up her love for this butter in just two words: “It’s perfect.” She went on (and on), describing it as “gorgeous” and “the perfect shape and color.” Its “subtle creaminess” earned it a spot as one of her top three butters. Mara agreed, writing, “When people say ‘like butter,’ this is what they mean.”

While other tasters weren’t as sold, they still thought it was a solid choice for “for cooking or bread-eating.” The largely glowing reviews, coupled with a lower price tag (for double the quantity) earned it a shoutout as our best budget pick. 

What’s So Great

• Thick & creamy
• Great for cooking

Good to Know

• Most budget-friendly

Buy: Breakstone’s Salted Butter, $6.49 for 16 ounces at Instacart

If you’re Team Unsalted for baking, then Vital Farms Unsalted Butter is the butter for you. These sticks absolutely shined in the freshly baked shortbread cookies, creating a “flavor explosion of buttery goodness,” said Sam and a crumbly texture that practically “melts in the mouth,” added Alex. (It also gave the cookies a delicious buttery smell.) Basically, it checked all the boxes we’d want in a high-quality ingredient.

What’s So Great

• Super flavorful
• Makes tender shortbread

Good to Know

• $$

Buy: Vital Farms Unsalted Butter, $4.89 (on sale!) for 8 ounces at Instacart

Compared to the winner, Cabot Unsalted Butter’s shortbread was “slightly more moist,” wrote Ali and not as crumbly, according to Sam. Mara also first noticed the “height” that Cabot Cabot Unsalted Butter gave the shortbread. Meanwhile Terri, who ranked this one as her favorite, went all in on its “rich and buttery taste.” 

This could be because it may have a higher water-to-fat content compared to the other butters (although with a bit of online research it seems to be on par with, if not higher than, other butter varieties at 83 percent fat), but it still imparted a great buttery flavor. 

What’s So Great

• Rich & buttery shortbread

Good to Know

• Makes slightly moist shortbread

Buy: Cabot Cabot Unsalted Butter, $4.99 for 16 ounces at Instacart

Despite following the same exact recipe, the shortbread made with Aldi Countryside Creamery Unsalted Butter Sticks had an extra, underlying sweetness — more so than any other” batch, according to Sam. When it comes to baking, that’s an especially positive thing, notes Ali, adding that this butter also yields an incredibly “flaky” cookie. (Conversely, Mara found it had a “cake-like texture,” which was still delicious — just not what she looks for in a shortbread cookie.) 

Overall, the team of tasters had plenty of positive things to say about this butter, and even more so after discovering it had the most budget-friendly price tag. It’s less than $4 for four sticks. How on-brand for Aldi.

What’s So Great

• Buttery & flaky shortbread
• Less than $4 for a pound

Good to Know

• Slightly sweeter shortbread 

Buy: Aldi Countryside Creamery Unsalted Butter Sticks, $3.85 for 16 ounces at Instacart 

We recruited eight staff members to randomly taste 18 different butters, including salted and unsalted sticks, sold at national grocery retailers. Ahead of the tasting Maya, our studio assistant, set the unwrapped salted butters out to allow them to come to room temperature. She assigned each one a letter — A through L — to conceal the brands’ identities. We also had crusty sourdough bread and water as palate cleansers (and enhancers) on hand during the tasting.

We really wanted to test how unsalted butter holds up in a recipe, which is why we chose these classic shortbread cookies that contain just four ingredients: butter, salt, flour, and sugar. Ola, our culinary assistant, baked all six batches using a different butter for each and kept the rest of the ingredients consistent. Once baked and cooled, she randomly assigned each shortbread a letter — A through F — ahead of the tasting. 

Tasters were encouraged to sample the butters and shortbread in random order (to avoid giving any particular brand an advantage) before writing down their thoughts. Our team then rated each butter on a scale of one to five (1 = No, thanks; 2 = Meh; 3 = Pretty good; 4 = Really like; 5 = Yes, Please!) across four criteria — look, smell, texture, and flavor — and included any specific observations, tasting notes, and general opinions worth mentioning. They were also asked to answer, arguably, the most important question of all: Would you buy this butter?

To decide which butters are worth buying, we recruited eight volunteer testers who work at Apartment Therapy Media (our parent company) to evaluate 18 different salted and unsalted butters based on texture, look, smell, desire to repurchase, and, of course, flavor. 

Tasters were unaware of the brands involved and sampled each one randomly. Each taster independently filled out a score sheet, scoring and ranking each creamer without larger discussion or influence from the group throughout the entirety of the test. It was only after all evaluations were completed that we tallied the scores to determine the winners.

Did your favorite butter brand make the list? Tell us about it in the comments below.