Ninja BL480D Nutri vs NutriBullet 900-Watt Pro Side-by-Side Comparison

The Ninja Nutri is essentially a single-serve blender but refinements to its blades and motor’s power have brought it many advantages over the competition. 

You might notice the blade assembly looks like nothing else in the market. Design-wise, it is attention to detail with four sharp, sophisticated prongs. Beyonds spinning extremely speedy, the prongs are towards various sides to allow for more food contact at a time. And such combos did make our Ninja Nutri among the fastest blenders in this test, taking one minute and ten seconds to yield a serving of protein shake. Not to mention the 1000-watt motor which helped churn through ingredients like almonds, dried berries, oatmeal, with super ease. 

As efficient as it was, this blender still underperformed by a few seconds against two top competitors (the Ninja Fit and the NutriBullet), though. The texture it delivered also had room for improvement since while the oatmeal was completely broken down, small amounts of almonds and berries remained solid. Considering the price, we had wished for a chunky-free texture which was exactly similar to those we got from its counterparts. 

Overall, unless you’re really interested in its professional look and hi-tech features, there are some alternatives that can actually blend your drink better and do so at less than half the price.

The NutriBullet Pro is amazingly capable when it comes to preparing protein shakes. In this test, it was the fastest contender, mixing a silky-smooth workout drink in only 40 seconds. It blended well enough that we didn't need to shake the cup to promote contact between the food and blades. The blade spined extremely fast and together with the mighty motor, it allowed the blender to draw everything toward the blades and tear apart each at the same time without any struggle. You might notice there even wasn’t a time that food clinged to the sides of the cup.

There were also blenders that delivered the same result, such as the Ninja Fit, but they all demanded extra shaking or stirring to dislodge chunks trapped on or around the blades during the blending process. Efficiency aside, it’s apparent that your NutriBullet Pro will also outperform its rivals in terms of use ease.

The Nutri Ninja was excellent at this test. Again, its distinctly-designed blades and higher-powered motor were good things for a quick, even outcome. They allowed the blender to power through all the frozen mango, strawberries, raspberries, and blueberries to perfection in just over one minute. And we remember everything was very easy and simple here, which you will rarely experience with other weaker personal blenders. Just noting that the process was fifteen seconds slower than that of the NutriBullet, but this wasn’t a huge gap. You might be willing to wait a bit longer as long as you get good results. 

Initially, we intended to use the Auto-IQ Ultra Blend setting, but the testing trials then suggested us shifting to the regular one. When running on the Auto-IQ Ultra Blend mode, your blender will blend in short intervals in 60 seconds and there will be a unique pulsing and pausing pattern after each interval. This is meant to force all the clogged ingredients back down onto the blades to even out the blend. That being said, we don’t think this is highly necessary in making icy smoothies; frozen fruits need to blend as fast as possible, but the pausing intervals give them time to thaw and then dilute the consistency. Perhaps, the Auto-IQ technology is better for dry-grinding harder ingredients like whole ice cubes and raw nuts.

The NutriBullet completed our smoothie in less than a minute, and its results were unparalleled. Our smoothie came out exceptionally velvety. Although there were still tiny flecks of raspberry skin and strawberry seeds, this is a common occurrence when it comes to processing such ingredients. 

It’s worth noting here that no other personal blender we tested could produce such an ideal texture in the same time frame; some couldn’t even break down strawberries after a full minute. Again, this blender never demanded that we shake the cup or stir the contents, and we really couldn't be happier.

Aside from the high-speed rotation and powerful motor, we supposed the blade assembly is a factor creating this outstanding performance. Personal blenders typically feature a blade assembly with two or four prongs, but the NutriBullet is an exception. Made of first-grade stainless steel, its blade is a clear step above those of the competition, including even the pricey Ninja Nutri Pro. It isn’t super sharp, but looks thicker than most and has up to six prongs. More prongs allows for more food contact at the time so the final drink will come out faster and finer.

The blender’s ability to process leafy vegetables was above average. The final drink came out acceptably uniform but with a gritty texture. We don’t think you’ll get too many complaints if you run everything through a mesh strainer before drinking. Given its high-end price tag, however, we expected better results with fewer leafy chunks.

Liquifying high-fiber whole food like leafy veggies is always a challenging task for personal blenders, but the NutriBullet’s performance really made it stand out from the rest. 

It could break all the ingredients down into their finest state in only 20 seconds. We drained the completed drink through a mesh strainer and noticed it left behind very few leafy chunks. It could produce an even better result if we blended longer. 

Actually, we didn’t expect such good results so quickly. Most of the machines we tested turned out very coarse blends on this test, such as the Magic Bullet.

As a personal blender, this Nutri Ninja didn’t perform half bad, grinding 6 oz of whole ice cubes in just 22 seconds. None of the other blenders we tested could do the same; some took longer to entirely break up the ice while others were simply not powerful enough to churn through such a solid ingredient. (For example, the KOIOS Pro and the Oster)The crushed ice didn’t have a snow-like texture, but would be good enough for your cocktails.

The NutriBullet Pro is not only capable of crushing ice cubes, it excels at it! We tested a myriad of personal blenders, and so far haven't found a single machine that can crush ice as fluffy as this one. 

It finished the test in about 40 seconds. A couple of ice chunks still remained solid, but it didn’t look like the blades would be able to grab them. Nevertheless, this NutriBullet performed wonderfully and is very deserving of the top score.