In today’s world, many technologies are invented in every field that we can’t even imagine, and one of those technologies is the infamous instant pot. Everyone in this fast-paced life is running toward something in their life, and no one has the time to sit and wait around for things, and even the kitchen appliances have advanced themselves with the need of time. The activities that used to take hours for completion are now only done in minutes with the help of modern equipment. Here are we going to test Best 3 Quart Instant Pot.
Instant pot is one of the few brands which have retained their state of the art technology and are working each day to update themselves according to our fast-paced needs.
Instant pot produces multicookers of every kind, which are able to replace multiple appliances and vessels in our kitchen.
Even if the name indicates them as being pressure cookers, they work amazingly well as slow cookers too.
Instant pots are eco-friendly, time and energy-efficient as well, and work as a single solution for all your kitchen needs.
The instant pot always ensures the safety of their customers by providing safety and security measures in their cookers, reducing your cooking time to such an extent that you might have never imagined.
Now the question arises which size of instant pot serves the best functions, and why is the 3 Quart pot the best of them all?
It can be difficult to determine the best size for your kitchen, and the answer solely depends on how many people you need to cook for.
As for me, I only cook for myself as I live alone, and the 3-quart pot serves the best function for me.
Or even if you don’t have that much space in your kitchen, a small compact instant pot works best.
A 3-quart instant pot is definitely a power pack of features, and with every upgrade, it just gets better.
Being a small equipment, the 3-quart pot also helps steam to build quickly and generates more pressure than the big sizes.
As they’re smaller so they are also very affordable, and I’m sure they will fit within your price range.
Below, I compiled a brief list of the best 3-quart pots produced by the manufacturers of Instant pot, and if you have any kinds of confusion or indecisiveness about what pot to buy, I’m sure you will find this very helpful.
- Lightweight and portable so you can carry it while traveling
- Easy to use with numerous functions
- Time consumption is reduced, that means it also is power efficient
- Dishwasher safe
Our Top Picks:
| Image | Product | View on |
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Instant Pot Duo 7-in-1 Electric Pressure Cooker | |
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Instant Pot Duo Plus 9-in-1 3 Quart Electric Pressure Cooker | |
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Instant Pot Star Wars 3-Qt Pressure Cooker | |
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Instant Pot Ultra 10-in-1 Multi-Use 3 Qt Programmable Pressure Cooker | |
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Instant Pot Lux Mini 6-in-1 3 Qt Electric Pressure Cooker | |
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Instant Pot Duo Nova 7-in-1 3 Qt Electric Pressure Cooker |
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Instant Pot Duo 7-in-1 Electric Pressure Cooker:
Pros
- Lightweight and portable so you can carry it while traveling.
- Easy to use with numerous functions.
- Time consumption is reduced, that means it also is power efficient.
- Dishwasher safe.
Cons
- You might need to buy some extra pots as some recipes require pot in pot cooking.
The instant pot duo is the cheapest pot amongst them all because it is one of the oldest and the best functioning pressure cookers in the UP line.
Instant pot is the one brand that promises amazing performances and quality no matter what size pot you’re using, and whatever you make in a bigger size pot, you will easily be able to make in the smaller pot.
I tried all the three sizes of instant pot duo, and just with little altercations in the recipe, what I made in the 6-quart pot was exactly the same as the 3-quart pot.
The 3-quart instant pot duo is ideal if you live in a dorm or a hostel and you don’t have access to a stove or burners and don’t have space to keep the big bulky pots.
I gifted my sister the instant pot duo mini as she is going to live in her college dorm, and she loves this pot in terms of functionality, durability, and performance.
As a person living alone, I think this pot is also ideal for me as it is very easy to use and gives me the functions of up to 7 appliances in just one multipurpose pot.
Along with pressure cooking, I can slow cook, steam, cook rice, make yogurt, sauté and brown my food in this cooker.
To test its functionality, I tried to make rice in this cooker.
Believe me, getting the right proportions of water to rice is a very tricky thing, but as you get an instructions manual with the pot, you will not experience those problems.
According to the pamphlet, I put 1 cup of rice in the pot and 1 cup of water, set the timer on the interface for 15 minutes, and selected the preset for making rice.
The presets definitely make your life easier as you don’t have to stand there guessing the right pressure and time limit for your food to cook.
I just selected the preset for rice cooking, and the cooker automatically knew what it had to do.
The timer started for 15 minutes, and all I had to do in the meantime was relax. After 15 minutes, my home smelled of freshly cooked rice.
The rice was cooked perfectly, and they were not mushy or sticky; instead, they were aromatic and fluffy. I think that this pot is definitely ideal for doing all sorts of cooking.
And its lightweight and small size make it perfect for being portable, and you can carry it with you when you’re traveling.
You can carry it around in your RV or just place it in your hotel room for quick and cheap ready-to-go meals.
Specification:
| Dimensions | DxWxH 11.2 x 11.4 x 10 Inches |
|---|---|
| Weight | 8.65 Pounds |
| Capacity | 3 Quarts |
| Material | Stainless steel |
| Color | Stainless Steel/Black |
You can read the full review of Instant Pot Duo 7-in-1.
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Instant Pot Duo Plus 9-in-1 3 Quart Electric Pressure Cooker:
Pros
- Stainless steel body which makes It durable for the long run.
- Minimalist design with easy-to-use LED panels and 15 one-touch presets.
- Automatic sealing and pressure venting are also automatic.
Cons
- You might not be able to use the Saute or sear function fully, as this pot has some height and will get in the way.
Just like the instant pot duo, the duo plus is the updated version and thus carries even better functions than its predecessor.
If the duo pot has 7-in-1 features, then the duo plus gives you a 9-in-1 function, and if it were for me, I would prefer more features in one pot.
The duo plus mini is a perfect little pot for your individual cooking.
If you like cooking on a daily basis and do not make weekly batches of food, then you will live in this unique multipurpose pot.
Even if you have a bigger pot for the main dishes, the mini pot works excellently for cooking side dishes as well.
Whatever party or cookout you’re going to, just pop in some veggies to be steamed in your pot, and voila, you will have amazingly steamed veggies in just 10 minutes.
This pot gives you the facilitation of replacing 9 appliances in your kitchen with just one multicooker.
It has more functions than the previous model, and sous vide is one of them, where you can cook your food by sealing it in a plastic bag and cooking it in a water bath.
The first major difference I noticed between the duo and duo plus is that the manufacturers even modernized the lid and included safety features such as automatic sealing.
I noticed that the pressure vent is farther away from the handle so that you don’t burn yourself.
I really wanted to cook a little portion of beans in this pot as they’ve always been a favorite and usually the first thing I cook when I get a new pot.
Pressure cooking beans is a very easy and quick process and doesn’t require any prep or effort.
I like to cook kidney beans with lots of spices, and they are a zero prep, hearty meal.
I just have to soak the beans for 10 minutes, pop them in the pot with enough water and seasonings, and then let them cook for 35 minutes at high pressure.
If you like your beans a bit hard and crunchy, then 35 minutes is ideal, but if you want them to be a bit mushier, I suggest adding another 10 minutes to the cooking time.
These dry beans work amazing for salads, pasta, or tacos, and the instant pot duo lets you cook them amazingly in no time.
And in this way, I was able to pressure cook my beans perfectly, and I can swear by the other functions of this pot.
And if you’re looking for a pot that can be stored perfectly in your little kitchen, which is also very affordable, then you should definitely get your hands on this pot.
Specification:
| Dimensions | DxWxH 10.2 x 11.5 x 11 Inches |
|---|---|
| Weight | 8.8 Pounds |
| Capacity | 3 Quarts |
| Material | Stainless steel |
| Color | Stainless Steel/Black |
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Instant Pot Star Wars 3-Qt Pressure Cooker:
Pros
- The size and the beautiful designs are a seamless fit for any kitchen, and you can choose from six other designs in the star wars collection.
- Durable stainless steel pot.
- Delay cooking + keep warm option.
Cons
- It doesn’t feature a touch panel, and an advanced LED display.
Let’s travel in the far multiverse with these limited edition Star Wars by Instant Pot.
If you’re a huge fan of the legendary series, this pot is definitely for you.
Apart from its excellent design, it promises the best quality and working performance.
The Instant Pot came up with six different limited edition designs to pay tribute to the huge fan following of the legendary Star Wars series, and these six designs represent each of the characters present in the series.
These pots are very beautiful and stylish to look at, also being highly productive and efficient.
Recently, I got my hands on one of the famous designs, the little bounty design.
It comes in two colors, black and silver, and has Yoda printed on the exterior. It is extremely cute to look at.
Now all that remains is to see if it lives up to the high standards set by the other Instant Pots.
It also comes in 3 different sizes, but the smallest one suits me the best, so I got the 3-quart one, and it arrived super quickly.
The body looked strong and sturdy, and the insert is made up of nonstick material, while the external body is made up of stainless steel.
It also has 7 different presets with which I can make 100s of different recipes.
In this pot, I decided to cook my lentil soup which usually takes hours to simmer and needs a lot of supervision to see if the lentils are not stuck to the bottom or too mushy.
Lentil soup is definitely a difficult recipe to master, but with the help of certain online recipes and the instructions manual, I ended up cooking amazing soup in under one hour.
And it tasted even better than some soups I have had at restaurants.
Its working is almost similar to the other Instant Pots and is very easy to operate and accessible.
As per the small size of this pot, you can still make all of the dishes you want in this pot, and this will work amazingly for any difficult or simple recipe for one person.
Specification:
| Dimensions | DxWxH 12.01 x 12.01 x 12.13 Inches |
|---|---|
| Weight | 10.73 Pounds |
| Capacity | 3 Quarts |
| Material | Stainless steel |
| Color | White |
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Instant Pot Ultra 10-in-1 Multi-Use 3 Qt Programmable Pressure Cooker:
Pros
- The settings are highly customizable, which allows me to cook in my own personal style.
- You can even make desserts like cake in this cooker, not just the savory options.
- It displays the pressure and tying settings on the interface.
- The dial knob on the interface is a new and useful addition.
Cons
- It might take extra 10-15 mins to build pressure.
- It might present a learning curve.
If you have fallen in love with the amazing features of the Instant Pot and are looking for an upgrade to better fit your style, the Instant Pot Ultra is the most updated and trendy Instant Pot, and is definitely the most tech-savvy as well.
It enables you to create and cook an unlimited number of healthy and delicious dishes in the comforts of your own home.
It is able to do all the functions that the other Instant Pots can do, but there are so many new added features that you will get only with the Ultra pot.
It is specifically designed for people who live a very contemporary modern life and love cooking for themselves in a modern, tech way.
Instead of the regular plus-minus buttons, this pot displays a knob that allows you to regulate the temperature according to the function you want to use.
In addition to the amazing 10-in-1 features, you can customize your cooking needs by selecting the Ultra option on the pot.
I even discovered that I could make any kind of cake in this pot by selecting the steaming option and placing the container on the steaming rack.
In the same way, I made eggs as well, and I got a fluffy pan of eggs that were so good to eat, and in just 20 minutes, my cake was made, and the eggs took even lesser time.
But the main thing I made in this pot to try out its functions was beef chili.
As beef chili is a complicated dish with different ingredients and all those ingredients require a different level of cooking temperature.
So we will see that with all its modern features, this pot will be able to cook the perfect chili.
And as I live alone, this pot is only 3 quarts and is ideal for a person living alone and cooking individual portions.
The bigger pots are efficient in cooking, but let’s see if the smaller pot is the same productive or not.
I started by sautéing my beef in the pot and slowly added all my ingredients in the pot, like beans and vegetables, onions, and beef broth, to act as the liquid for our cooking and steam production.
According to the recipe pamphlet, the chili should be cooked for only 20 minutes under high pressure, and I wasn’t sure that it would be done in just 20 minutes.
Because usually, chili takes about 2 hours to cook.
But believing the manufacturers, I followed the recipe and secured the lid, and it sealed automatically.
For selecting the preset, I just had to rotate the knob till it landed on the beans/chili option.
The timer and pressure limits were already set, and I let the cooker work its magic.
After 20 minutes, the pressure went off, and after the contents cooled down, I checked to see if the food was cooked perfectly, and to my disbelief, the chili was cooked to perfection.
There is no raw beef sticking out or hard beans in there, just pure homogenous and delicious chili.
In my opinion, just to conclude this, there are no other electric cookers in the market that even come close to the functionality of this pot.
After you’re done cooking, you can just select the keep warm option to keep it warm for up to 12 hours.
Specification:
| Dimensions | DxWxH 10.2 x 11.5 x 11 Inches |
|---|---|
| Weight | 9Pounds |
| Capacity | 3 Quarts |
| Material | Stainless steel |
| Color | Stainless steel/Black |
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Instant Pot Lux Mini 6-in-1 3 Qt Electric Pressure Cooker:
Pros
- Budget-friendly.
- This cooker can replace up to 6 appliances in your kitchen for a small pot.
- Stainless steel insert pot which is durable for the long run.
Cons
- Manual pressure release.
Apart from being a trustworthy and amazing brand, Instant Pot upholds the quality of their products, so you know that what you expect is what you’ll get.
I’ve used several pots, pressure cookers, and canners in the past, and not all of them were of the best quality.
Each product displays different quality and poses differences in their cooking time, steam release valve, heat distribution, accessories, and display panels.
But one pot that I found which is amazing and a perfect cooker regardless of all the other products available in the market is the Instant Pot Lux Mini cooker.
It’s an affordable and lightweight model, so it was very tempting for me to pick this one up and start cooking in it.
When you’re getting the work of 6 pots in 1, then who needs a backup rice cooker, steamer, slow cooker, and whatnot.
In the package, I received multiple accessories as well, for example, a steaming rack with handles, condensation collector cup, instructions guide, measuring cup, rice paddle, and soup spoon.
After all these accessories come within the pot, it cuts the cost of buying accessories separately.
Hence it becomes even more cost-cutting.
The Lux includes 6 options for cooking different dishes, and this one might not be the most advanced pot, but believe me, this can still do all the other functions that other Instant Pots can do.
Even with the absence of a yogurt-making preset, I made my own yogurt by customizing the temperature, pressure, and timing.
To test it out thoroughly, I decided to try out Italian chicken in the pot, which is a super simple recipe and is also very easy to make with zero prep and not many ingredients.
Because of the small size, I wasn’t able to fit one whole chicken in the pot, so I just had to take frozen chicken and add it to the pot with cream veggies and seasoning.
According to an online recipe, this procedure should take only 25 minutes on low pressure.
Setting the cooker to low pressure and customized pressure was not something very difficult, and maneuvering its settings was pretty easy.
It’s user-friendly; I definitely have to say this.
There were no gas leaks during the process, and the pressure was built super quickly.
After the cooking timer was up, I released the pressure, and there was a pin on the lid to detect the level of pressure inside the pot.
After the pressure was reduced, this 3-quart pot produced one of the softest and juiciest chickens I had ever made in an instant pot.
Even though this pot’s size is smaller, its functions are better and easier to use than the other products.
After cooking, you can pop the inner pot in the dishwasher for cleaning, and because of its small size, it can be tucked in any corner of your pantry without taking up a lot of space.
Specification:
| Dimensions | DxWxH 10.51 x 11.5 x 10.51 Inches |
|---|---|
| Weight | 8.5 Pounds |
| Capacity | 3 Quarts |
| Material | Stainless steel |
| Color | Stainless steel/Black |
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Instant Pot Duo Nova 7-in-1 3 Qt Electric Pressure Cooker:
Pros
- Clean and simple design, which is very easy to use.
- Separate quick and natural release options for your ease.
- Delay cooking + keep warm setting.
Cons
- It doesn’t have handles on its sides.
Another amazing and spectacular small-size pot from Instant Pot is the Duo Nova Pressure Cooker, which is marketed as a 7-in-1 electric cooker, and it’s proclaimed to have 7 different cooking options for you.
For example, it can slow cook, pressure cook, steam, sauté, make rice, keep your food warm, and make yogurt.
It also includes a number of presets; with one touch, you can cook any kind of food you want, from porridge to soup, from rice to meat.
And even with all these presets, you can choose your customized function and set your personalized timing and pressure settings.
This pot is even cheaper than the rest of the Instant Pots in this list, and for this price, all the features you’re getting are definitely a steal.
Look at all the things you will be able to cook for yourself, and you don’t even have to worry about storing this pot as it is very small and will fit into any corner of your kitchen.
It also has a reasonably sized LED panel on the interface, which helps immensely with controlling the settings.
To test out this pot, I decided to cook a little bit of porridge in this as I had been craving it for many days.
Sweet oat porridge is always my go-to for cooking in the Instant Pot, so for the Lux, I also opted for the same thing.
I put 1 cup of oats in the pot along with 2 cups of oat milk as it is a healthier alternative to whole milk.
Along, I added a little cinnamon stick, agave syrup, apple, and nuts for the earthy taste.
The lid sealed automatically, and I selected the manual setting and started the timer for 20 minutes at a high temperature.
The cooker did take some time to build the pressure, but after the timer started, it was done in exactly 20 minutes, and the result was astonishing.
The oats were cooked to perfection.
They were sweet with the crunch of the nuts. I added a few almonds as garnish and devoured the whole cup in no time.
Another thing noticeable is that this 3-quart pot made up to 3 servings of cooked oats, and I’m even surprised by the quantity it cooked as I wasn’t expecting.
Again, a very easy-to-use pot with no complicated buttons or settings to confuse with an easy cleaning process.
And with the steaming process, you can even reheat your leftover food by popping it in the cooker for just 5 minutes.
This reduced my food waste and energy plus time consumption.
Specification:
| Dimensions | DxWxH 11.42 x 10.04 x 11.22 Inches |
|---|---|
| Weight | 3.99 Kilograms |
| Capacity | 3 Quarts |
| Material | Stainless steel, Plastic |
| Color | Stainless Steel/Black |
Frequently Asked Questions
What to Consider When Buy Instant Pot?
Before heading out to the market to get your instant pot, you might need to consider a lot of factors so that you make the right decision and get the right pot to satisfy all your kitchen needs. Most people think that an instant pot is just a pressure cooker, but they don’t know that it is a multi-cooker. It can replace many of your kitchen pots and pans, and within the budget of one cooker, you get a bundle package.
- SIZE: The first thing you need to consider is the number of people you have to cook what, and that will determine the size you will buy. Also, consider the storage space you have in your home because some pots might be bigger in size, and you won’t have the space to keep them.
- SAFETY FEATURES: The second important thing is how many safety mechanisms this instant pot has. It should have heat-resistant handles, automatic pressure release, lid locking mechanisms, and certain other safety features to be considered the perfect cooker.
- EASY TO USE: Always go for a pot you think you can handle and which will be easy for you to work with. So many buttons might look nicer but if you’re not an avid cook, then consider buying a simpler option.
- DISHWASHER SAFE: the pot should be easy to clean and shouldn’t give you a very hard time while cleaning it. The inner pot should be dishwasher safe.
- EXTERIOR BODY: the exterior and insert pot should be of good quality stainless steel because that shows the sturdiness and durability of the pot.
- WARRANTY: Whatever product you buy from the Instant pot range should always have a warranty of 1 year so that if anything goes wrong with your pot, you should be able to replace the faulty parts.
What can you cook in a 3 quart instant pot?
In a 3-quart Instant Pot, you can cook a variety of dishes, including soups, stews, rice, pasta, steamed vegetables, small cuts of meat, poultry, fish, and even some desserts. The smaller size is ideal for single servings or smaller meals.
