Juice vs Smoothie

A juice is the liquid with the fiber removed; a smoothie is the whole fruit or vegetable broken down and kept. That is the entire difference, and every other difference follows from it. Juice is thinner, faster to drink, lower in volume per pound of produce and quicker to go off. A smoothie is thicker, more filling, more forgiving of soft fruit and keeps a little better. Neither is a healthier version of the other in any way this site has standing to claim, and the appliances are not interchangeable.

The difference in one table

What juice is actually better at

Three things, and they are specific rather than general:

1. 1.Vegetables you would never drink whole. A pound of celery or a bag of kale is pleasant as juice and genuinely unpleasant as a smoothie -- the stems stay stringy no matter how long a blender runs. This is the single strongest case for owning a juicer, and it is why this site exists.
2. 2.Volume of greens without volume of drink. A juice concentrates a lot of produce into a glass you can finish. The same produce blended is a quart of thick green liquid most people do not finish.
3. 3.Drinking before food. A juice is thin and goes down in minutes, which suits a morning routine. A smoothie is a meal, and treating it as a drink is how people accidentally double their breakfast.

What a smoothie is better at

1. 1.Soft fruit. Berries and bananas are poor in a juicer -- berry skins and seeds blind the screen and a banana produces almost nothing. In a blender they are the best ingredients there are. Our best juicers for berries page is honest about this rather than pretending otherwise.
2. 2.Keeping you full. The fiber is what makes a smoothie filling, and removing it is exactly what a juicer does. If the purpose of the drink is to replace a meal, blend it.
3. 3.Cleanup, by a wide margin. A blender is a jug and a blade. A juicer is a screen, a bowl, an auger, a pusher and a pulp bin. This is the main reason smoothies survive in busy households and juice habits sometimes do not -- see easiest juicers to clean for how much the machine choice can narrow that gap.
4. 4.Not wasting produce. A juicer discards the pulp. A blender discards nothing. If food waste bothers you, that is a real point, and what to do with juicer pulp is the mitigation rather than the answer.

You cannot make one with the other machine

This is the practical question behind most of these searches, and the answer is no in both directions -- but the two failures are not symmetrical.

• A blender cannot make juice. It can make a purée you then strain through a nut-milk bag, and the result is closer to juice than to a smoothie. It is also slow, messy and lower-yielding than a juicer, and on fibrous produce like celery the bag does most of the work. People do it, and it works, and nobody does it twice a day for a year.
• A juicer cannot make a smoothie. There is no version of this. A juicer's entire function is removing the thing that makes a smoothie a smoothie. Some masticating machines extrude frozen fruit into a sorbet -- Tribest states a mincing attachment on the Slowstar and Dash includes a frozen-dessert attachment -- but that is a dessert, not a smoothie.

If you are deciding which single appliance to buy rather than which drink to make, that is a different question and juicer vs blender is the page for it. Juicer vs Vitamix covers the specific case where the blender in question is a high-powered one.

Storage: the practical difference

Juice separates and degrades faster than a smoothie, and the reason is mechanical rather than mysterious -- there is no fiber holding the liquid together, so the solids settle and the surface is fully exposed to air. A smoothie separates too, but shaking it re-mixes it in a way that does not work for juice.

The practical rules are the same either way: fill the container to the brim so there is minimal air above the drink, cap it immediately, and refrigerate at once. How long does fresh juice last sets out what is genuinely known about juice storage and what is folklore, and juice oxidation explained does the same for the oxidation claims that get attached to this comparison.

The honest answer: most people end up with both

Not as a cop-out, but because the two drinks do genuinely different jobs and the produce that suits each barely overlaps. The household pattern we would expect is a blender for breakfast smoothies with bananas, berries and yoghurt, and a juicer for a green or celery juice -- which is produce a blender handles badly at any price.

If budget forces a choice, the deciding question is what you will actually put in it. Soft fruit and meal replacement: buy the blender and do not buy a juicer. Celery, kale and hard vegetables: buy the juicer, because no blender makes that drinkable. How to choose your first juicer walks through the rest of the decision, and is a juicer worth it covers the case for not buying one at all.

If the question underneath this one is about fiber, do juicers remove fiber answers it mechanically: which fiber leaves with the pulp, which stays in the glass, and how to put some back.

If the conclusion is that you want both drinks, juicers and blenders covers owning both appliances: which to buy first, what it costs on a counter, and why a combo machine compromises the juicing side.

The picks in full

1. Best juicer if you want both drinks

Omega NC900HDC

Omega NC900HDC · $200–400 · Our score 7.9/10

If you are going to make juice as well as smoothies, this is the machine that does the juice side with the most control: Omega states five adjustable end-cap pressure settings and two juicing screens at 80 RPM and 150 W, with a 15-year limited warranty. The reason it suits a both-drinks household specifically is that it also extrudes -- Omega sells it as a nutrition system, and it handles nut butters and sorbets, which covers some of what people buy a second appliance for. The trade is honest: it is 19.22 in wide with more parts to wash than any vertical here. Skip it if counter depth is tight.

Yield

Omega markets high juice yield and five pressure settings; no numeric yield figure is publishedManufacturer claim: Omega Juicers · checked 2026-10-02

Pulp

Five adjustable pressure settings and two juicing screens, per OmegaManufacturer claim: Omega Juicers · checked 2026-10-02

Cleanup time

Not available - no published cleanup time in minutesNot sourced

Speed

Omega states 80 RPM and 150 W outputManufacturer claim: Omega Juicers · checked 2026-10-02

What works

• Five pressure settings give real control over pulp and extraction
• Handles wheatgrass, which most verticals do poorly
• 15-year warranty on a design that has been iterated for years

What does not

• 19.22 in wide, which is a counter-depth problem in small kitchens
• More parts to wash than any vertical here
• 18.7 lb, so it lives out on the counter whether you like it or not

Skip this if: Your counter is shallow, or cleanup is what will make you quit. It is over 19 in wide and there are more parts to wash than on any vertical here.

Representative photo. We have no manufacturer image library, so this is a licensed stock photo of the category, not a photo of this unit.

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• Yield9/10
• Pulp9/10
• Cleanup6/10
• Value8/10
• Quiet8/10

Read the full Omega NC900HDC review

2. Best juicer for a smoothie-first kitchen

Ninja NeverClog JC151

Ninja JC151 · $100–200 · Our score 7.9/10

If smoothies are the main habit and juice is the occasional thing, buy the juicer that is least annoying to own: Ninja states two pulp filters, one for less pulp and one for more, 150 W, and that the removable parts are dishwasher safe. The more-pulp filter is genuinely useful here, because it makes juice closer to the texture a smoothie drinker expects. Ninja publishes no RPM at all, which is a real gap, and the US warranty is 1 year. Skip it if a long warranty is the point of the purchase.

Yield

Not availableNot sourced

Pulp

Ninja states two pulp filters, for less pulp or more pulpManufacturer claim: Ninja · checked 2026-10-02

Cleanup time

Ninja states the removable parts are dishwasher safe; no cleanup time publishedManufacturer claim: Ninja · checked 2026-10-02

Speed

Ninja states 150 W; no RPM publishedManufacturer claim: Ninja · checked 2026-10-02

What works

• Genuine pulp choice: two filters, not a marketing claim
• Dishwasher-safe removable parts
• Widely stocked at the big retailers, so it is easy to find and easy to return

What does not

• 1-year US warranty
• Ninja publishes no RPM, so it cannot be compared on speed
• 24-30 oz jug means emptying on bigger batches

Skip this if: You want a long warranty. Ninja covers this for one year in the US, against 15 on the premium verticals.

Representative photo. We have no manufacturer image library, so this is a licensed stock photo of the category, not a photo of this unit.

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#ad How we are funded

• Yield7/10
• Pulp9/10
• Cleanup8/10
• Value8/10
• Quiet7/10

Read the full Ninja NeverClog JC151 review

3. Best low-cost way to add juice to the routine

Nutribullet Slow Juicer

Nutribullet NBJ50300 · $100–200 · Our score 7.4/10

The cheapest genuine cold press on this site, which makes it the sensible buy for someone who already owns a blender and wants to find out whether juice earns a place next to it. Nutribullet states 65 RPM, 150 W and a reverse function, with a footprint of 17 in tall and 6.25 in wide -- small enough to share a counter with a blender, which is the real constraint in a both-drinks kitchen. The 24 oz catch cup is one glass, and the warranty is 1 year limited. Skip it if you make juice for more than one person.

Yield

Not availableNot sourced

Pulp

Not availableNot sourced

Cleanup time

Not available - no published cleanup time in minutesNot sourced

Speed

Nutribullet states 65 RPM, 150 W, with a reverse functionManufacturer claim: Nutribullet · checked 2026-10-02

What works

• Cold press mechanics at a centrifugal-adjacent price
• Reverse function, which is how you clear a celery jam
• Small footprint at 17 in tall and 6.25 in wide

What does not

• 1-year warranty against 15 years on the premium verticals
• 24 oz catch cup forces breaks on bigger batches
• No published yield, pulp or cleanup figures

Skip this if: You juice for more than one person. A 24 oz container means stopping and emptying mid-session.

Representative photo. We have no manufacturer image library, so this is a licensed stock photo of the category, not a photo of this unit.

Check price on Amazon

#ad How we are funded

• Yield7/10
• Pulp7/10
• Cleanup7/10
• Value9/10
• Quiet8/10

Read the full Nutribullet Slow Juicer review