The 7 Best Kids Lunch Boxes of 2025
Insulated lunch bags
The Bentgo Kids Insulated Lunch Tote is meant to be paired with the Bentgo Kids Lunch Box, which is our favorite bento box for younger kids. It’s too small for the Bentgo Fresh, though, so we think you’re better off with the L.L.Bean Lunch Box, which can fit a variety of bento boxes, and costs about the same as the Bentgo Kids Tote.
The affordable Go Green Lunch Box Set comes with an insulated fabric bag, a bento box, and a water bottle, but the bag and box were too big, and they felt cheaply made.
Unlike the smaller Mackenzie Classic, the Mackenzie Cold Pack can fit both of our plastic Bentgo picks, but only if you remove the cold pack (which is small and ineffective, anyway). Plus it’s got a bunchy nylon lining instead of the Mackenzie Classic’s sturdy molded foam, so it’s harder to clean.
Like the Pottery Barn Kids Mackenzie Classic Lunch Box, the insulated fabric Lands’ End Insulated EZ Wipe Printed Lunch Box we tested has a molded foam interior that gives it a firmer shape in comparison with the L.L.Bean Lunch Box. With use, however, the separate lining started blistering in the corners, and we found the box too large for a kid’s lunch.
The L.L.Bean Flip-Top Lunch Box is larger than our pick, the L.L.Bean Lunch Box, but it has a similarly rugged outer shell and an easy-to-wipe inner lining. It’s more structured, and it doesn’t fit as neatly into backpacks or totes.
The PackIt Freezable Lunch Bag has decent reviews on Amazon, but we’ve read customer complaints stating that the inside becomes covered in condensation and gets food wet. One of our editors used this lunch bag and said it was difficult to clean.
The insulated fabric Wildkin Lunch Box inner lining has a lot of seams, which trap crumbs and make cleaning difficult. In our tests, tomato sauce heavily stained the interior.
Bento-style lunch boxes
We noticed Sistema Bento Food Containers being praised on several online forums as an affordable alternative to bento boxes, but when we tried them, they immediately warped in the dishwasher.
The plastic and metal Monbento MB Wonder is fairly leakproof, but it’s even bigger than our metal bento box picks, so it doesn’t fit in any of our insulated lunch box picks. And none of its five compartments can fit even half a sandwich.
The Bentgo Kids Snap and Go holds a generous amount of food, but you can’t fit a sandwich in any of the compartments. Also, with its removable top and four latching sides, it’s a bit more work for kids to open and close.
The Bentgo Pop holds just as much food as the Bentgo Fresh, about five cups, but we’re wary of its single latch. Bentgo’s plastic latches tend to fail after about a year, but with the Bentgo Fresh, which has two latches, it was still operable when one of them broke (though slightly less leak-proof).
The Bentgo Chill Kids comes with an ice pack insert, but because it’s not insulated, the food we placed in it was completely room temperature after four hours. Plus it’s petite, and only holds enough food for the youngest kids.
In 2025, Bentgo introduced the Bentgo Chill Max, which fits the same amount of food as the Bentgo Fresh and is basically a bigger version of the Chill Kids. It has a single latch, and feels clunky and cumbersome. Plus, it only opens to 90 degrees, whereas the Bentgo Fresh opens flat—This made storage awkward on my dish drying rack.
The B.box Lunch Box also includes a small ice pack that integrates into one of its compartments. But, like the Bentgo Kids Chill, this box didn’t keep the food cool for a meaningful period of time.
The plastic Bentgo Classic Lunch Box was a pain to use. We had trouble fitting the lids onto the containers, and the plastic cutlery was a nuisance.
The plastic Bentoheaven Premium Lunch Box has only two large compartments and flimsy, toylike utensils.
For young kids, the Ecolunchbox Three-in-One Classic is a nice, compact stainless steel option, but we ruled it out because it’s not leakproof. And it’s more than a cup smaller than some of our other picks, so it’s too small for older kids.
The stainless steel LunchBots Large Cinco Bento Box comes in many sizes, configurations, and layouts, with a variety of lidded bowls that can fit inside. But it felt flimsier than our other stainless steel bento box picks, and the unattached lid could get lost more easily.
The Pottery Barn Kids All-in-One Bento Box can be purchased as a bundle with our Mackenzie Classic pick, but the plastic felt very cheap, and it’s an awkward size. We did not test the metal Pottery Barn Kids Spencer Stainless Bento Box because its compartments are small and limiting. And the box’s thin plastic lid looked less durable than the material on our bento picks.
Similar in design to the plastic Bentgo Kids, the Yumbox Panino is too small for many kindergarteners and older kids, and the plastic was less rugged than we’d like.
The Zojirushi Mr. Bento Stainless Lunch Jar is a next-level insulated bento box with multiple locking containers. But it’s too large for school use and too complicated for younger kids because it needs to be packed in a specific way to close securely.
