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It retains heat very well. It looks beautiful and fits easily in most hands. My two nitpicks are that it currently measures no smaller than 16 ounces, which is odd since its Hydro Flask cousin has a 12 ounce size. It feels like Oxo is still figuring out the colors. The color indicator on the web page is almost a pale blue, while the cup in the picture is a deep ocean blue, but the color I received for testing was a darker, softer shade of the latter. “Bright Red” is almost a happy orange in the photo, but looks more like “Campbell’s Tomato” in real life.
I also did a temperature test in my 70°F kitchen, filling each cup with freshly boiled water, putting the lid on, and coming back four hours later to measure the temperature. I have to keep in mind that the containers are different sizes because a lot of water keeps them warm for longer, but there are few surprises. 14-once Yeti, wide mouth thin lid, 125 degrees on the bottom alone; warm but no longer hot. The 16-ounce Contigo takes up a big chunk in the middle and is unremarkable in size at a 140-degree angle; the $144 Hydro Flask (not bad for a 12-ounce mug); then three in the sweet spot, the 17-ounce Takeya, and Oxos in 16 and 20 ounces, were at 153, 154 and 157 degrees, respectively. Zojirushis easily takes top honors for thermal insulation, 173 degrees for the little guy and 180 degrees for the big guy.
Oddly, this is where it gets a little tricky. Do you want something this hot? My mouth doesn’t like drinking 180 degree hot water at all. Most people will need to open a container of liquid at that temperature and let it cool for a while before drinking.Also, anything below 140 degrees is danger zone A place where bacteria can thrive.
With that in mind, 6.5 hours later, I checked again and it turned out that only Zojirushis was (well) above 140 at 156 and 165 degrees, although the 20 oz Oxo didn’t get much below the 137 mark. Zojirushis is your safest bet if you need your drink to stay hot in the cup for a long time.
A pleasant surprise happened at the end of the test when I filled the Big Oxo halfway with water, turned it upside down and put it in a plastic bucket. I fully expected to see the bottom of the tub slowly fill with water, but it didn’t! I surrounded it with Contigo, Hydro Flask, two Zojirushis, and Takeya, all filled with water, upside down and stuffed into their own tub overnight. Elizabeth discovered my countertop Tupperware party this morning. She would love to know more about me getting up after she went to bed, and I’m happy to report that the six of them didn’t leak a drop of water overnight.
“It’s impressive,” she said. “Engineers work on solving the world’s pressing problems!”
Later, I took the Oxo and Hydro Flask three-quarters full of water to my little rooftop patio and did a crazy dance with one hand in each hand until my arm hurt, trying to keep them in the midst of closing the lid. Case leak location. Impressively, they didn’t.
While “not leaking” isn’t an unexpected outcome for Zojirushi and Takeya, the unexpected stability of “less secure” competition is sure to eat away at their market. In fact, it pretty much upended my classification system for adventurous commutes.
The new Oxo may not be the absolute best mug for everyone, but it does a lot of things very well – especially how it’s used in the dishwasher – and overall it’s clearly the best travel mug.
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