The 3 Best Lawn Mowers of 2025

Top pick

This self-propelled lawn mower has a battery that runs for an hour, and it easily mows down overgrown grass. It also spares you the noise, emissions, and maintenance of a typical gas mower.

For the best in convenience, battery run time, cut quality, and value, we recommend the Ego LM2156SP Power+ 21″ Select Cut XP Mower. Compared with a gas mower, it’s quieter, it doesn’t create exhaust, and it requires almost no maintenance. Among cordless models, the LM2156SP has a long run time, as its battery is good for a solid hour of mowing; it also has a short, one-hour charge time. The control interface allows you to operate the propulsion with either hand. The mower cuts with two blades, creating a finer cut and allowing for better mulching, and the motor is powerful enough to handle wildly overgrown grass. Rounding out the features are two forward-facing LED lights, an easy-to-use cutting-height adjustment, and a battery port that faces the battery gauge toward the operator. In addition, the battery is compatible with Ego’s other lawn tools, such as the company’s leaf blower, chainsaw, and string trimmer.

It has a solid run time, but that may vary depending on how, and what, you’re mowing. The LM2156SP comes with four different blades. One is the established upper blade, which always stays on the mower, and you add any of the other three—a mulching blade, a bagging blade, or an extended-run-time blade—depending on the need. Ego states a maximum run time for the mower of up to 75 minutes, which is with the extended-run-time blade cutting a light load of grass. We tested the mulching blade on tall grass and got about 40 to 45 minutes of run time, which represents the low end of the spectrum. The mower’s manual (PDF) confirms this number and states that a medium load gets about 60 minutes of run time.

The manual also includes tips on extending the run time, such as keeping a sharp blade, never cutting off more than 1.5 inches of grass, and keeping the mower at a reasonable speed. Such differences between the advertised run time and reality are not exclusive to Ego’s mowers, however: When we tested a Milwaukee mower under circumstances similar to those for this Ego model, we got about 25 minutes of run time rather than the advertised 60 minutes.

Another way to extend the run time is to purchase either an additional battery or another Ego yard tool that comes with a battery. The batteries alone are pricey: Depending on their ampere-hour rating, they currently range in price from about $130 (for a 2.5 Ah battery) to about $600 (for a 12 Ah battery). They all fit in the mower, and if you have a second one on the charger while the first one is out working in the yard, you can minimize or even eliminate downtime.

This two-bladed model offers superior power. We’ve put the mowers on some rough tufts of knotty crabgrass, knee-height rye grass, and thick stalks of weeds, and although many of the other mowers could handle the task, the LM2156SP hardly slowed down at all and left a much better cut in comparison with the competition. Other models either significantly slowed down or periodically stalled out.

The cut quality is very nice—especially compared with that of single-bladed models—and leads to a healthier lawn. With its two blades, the LM2156SP cut grass into smaller pieces than tested single-bladed mowers did. This leads to better mulching, since smaller pieces decompose more quickly, as well as more efficient bagging, since you can fit more grass into each bag.The LM2156SP’s second blade puts it into territory formerly exclusive to mowers such as those in the highly regarded dual-blade Honda HRX series. Even going through taller grass, the LM2156SP left a nice-looking lawn in our tests.

Controlling it is easy and intuitive. Like many mowers, the LM2156SP has a metal bar (called a bail) that you hold against the handle to activate the blades. To activate the self-propulsion, you press either of two buttons in the upper corners of the handle. A central dial controls the mower’s speed; you can operate that dial with your thumbs or your palm (if you’re holding the upper part of the handle).

It emits no exhaust fumes. Without the stink of gas-engine exhaust in your face, the smell of mowing the grass while using the LM2156SP is entirely different and much more pleasant. Unfortunately, the allergens are exactly the same.

It offers a number of convenience features. The headlight, something not found on gas mowers, provides some illumination as the day draws to a close. The single-adjust height control, a rarity on gas mowers, allows you to set the cutting height with a single lever. (On most gas mowers, you have to adjust the cutting height at each individual wheel.) The LM2156SP has seven cutting heights, between 1.5 to 4 inches—a wider range than on most cordless mowers, which top out around 3.5 to 3.75 inches.

It outshines gas mowers in storage convenience. Its design allows you to fold it up and prop it up on one end and then roll it like a dolly. Once folded, the whole thing is the size of a large suitcase, with multiple rails to grab. Although it weighs a little over 50 pounds, it’s quite a bit lighter than, say, our also-great gas-powered recommendation from Honda (89 pounds). We had no problem lifting the LM2156SP over large thresholds, hauling it up a couple of garage steps, or fitting it through a door.

It’s expensive up front, but it includes many features that typically come as premium options on gas mowers. At around $850, the LM2156SP represents a serious investment, but it offers a lot of convenience, including a push-button start, the ability to stop the blades but not the motor, and self-propulsion. Add in all the avoided long-term costs of gas and maintenance, as well as the LM2156SP’s two-blade system, and the value proposition starts to look a lot more even.

Once you purchase the mower and battery, you can buy other tools in Ego’s 56-volt lineup. The batteries are compatible across Ego’s line of yard-care tools, so with this mower’s included battery and charger in hand, you can purchase any of the others at a reduced price as bare tools, minus the battery and charger. Ego’s blower, chainsaw, and string trimmer have all been excellent performers in our testing. The company has also announced the release of a mini-bike (no joke), so it isn’t just making lawn tools anymore.

Flaws but not dealbreakers

The self-propelled system’s controls could use some improvement. Because the throttle buttons are so integrated with the handle, on occasion we’ve accidentally goosed the mower when we didn’t intend to. Usually this isn’t an issue, but often the moments when you’re grasping to get a better grip on the handle are the times you least want to engage the self-propulsion. For example, if you are mowing across a hill, you’ll have a brief moment during a turnaround when the mower is pointing up or down the hill. When you’re adjusting your grip to make those turns, you may inadvertently tap the throttle, destabilizing your stance or your grip on the mower.

It isn’t a true variable-speed mower. The central dial only sets the speed, and the throttle buttons on the handle activate it. As a result, you can’t really pull off a quick-reflex slowdown or acceleration. You can move the speed dial while the mower is operating, but the process is not as smooth as we would like.