Stainless Steel Cookware, Explained: 18/10, 18/8, 316, and the Nickel Question
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Short answer: bare stainless steel is the safest cookware you can buy, and every uncoated stainless pan on this site is a 5. The numbers on the box — 18/10, 18/8, 304, 316, 18/0 — describe how much chromium and nickel is in the alloy, and for almost everyone they don’t change the score; they change how the pan resists corrosion and whether it works on induction. The one real exception is nickel: stainless does release trace nickel into acidic food, especially when new, and if you have a nickel allergy that matters. Nickel-free stainless exists and is also a 5. Beyond that, the question isn’t which stainless, it’s how it’s built — fully clad beats a disc bottom — and whether there’s a coating hiding inside. If there is, it isn’t a stainless pan anymore.
This is the reference article the rest of the site leans on: Caraway, HexClad, the Always Pan, the bakeware and rice cooker guides all point here when they say “stainless.” It’s built from the alloy standards, the published research on metal migration, and the manufacturers’ own construction statements, which is how we score everything.
What the numbers mean
Stainless steel is iron with at least 10.5 percent chromium. The chromium forms a thin, self-healing layer of chromium oxide on the surface, and that layer is what makes the steel “stainless” — it doesn’t react with your food, and when you scratch it, it reforms. Nickel is added to make the steel tougher, brighter, and more resistant to corrosion, and to make it non-magnetic. Everything else is a variation on those two.
18/10 and 18/8 mean 18 percent chromium and 10 or 8 percent nickel. Both are the “300 series” austenitic steels — 18/8 is essentially grade 304, 18/10 is a slightly richer version — and both are the standard cooking surface in good cookware. The difference between them is marketing more than metallurgy; 18/10 sounds better, resists corrosion marginally better, and you can’t tell them apart with a fork.
316 (sometimes “marine grade” or “surgical”) adds 2 to 3 percent molybdenum, which improves resistance to chlorides — salt water, salty brines, the dishwasher. It contains slightly more nickel than 304, not less, which surprises people who assume “surgical” means “hypoallergenic.” It doesn’t. 316 is a fine cooking surface and a small upgrade in corrosion resistance; Heritage Steel’s titanium-stabilized 316Ti is the one you’ll see in cookware.
18/0, also called grade 430, is chromium with no nickel. It’s magnetic, which is why it’s the outside layer of most induction-compatible pans, and it’s what “nickel-free” cookware uses as the cooking surface. It’s a little less corrosion-resistant than 304 and can spot if you leave salty water in it, and it’s the right answer for a nickel allergy.
21/0 is a nickel-free alloy with a bit more chromium, used by a couple of nickel-free brands for the same reason.
“Surgical stainless” is not a grade. It’s a phrase. Look for the number.
Does stainless leach? The nickel question, honestly
Yes, a little, and it’s the one material fact about stainless worth knowing. A 2013 study at Ohio State cooked tomato sauce in stainless pans of several grades and measured what came out: nickel and chromium both migrated into the sauce, more from brand-new pans than from used ones, more with longer cooking, and more with higher-nickel grades. The amounts were small — tens of micrograms of nickel per serving in the worst case, a new pan simmering sauce for hours — against a normal diet that delivers a hundred to three hundred micrograms of nickel a day from chocolate, legumes, nuts, and grains. The chromium that migrates is the benign trivalent form, the one in multivitamins, not the hexavalent kind.
For most people this is a footnote: the cookware is a minor source next to the food, and the migration drops sharply after the first few uses as the surface passivates. For the roughly one in ten adults with a nickel allergy — contact dermatitis from jewelry, watch backs, jean buttons — dietary nickel can matter, and a doctor who has put you on a low-nickel diet will tell you to avoid cooking acidic food in stainless. That’s who nickel-free (18/0 or 21/0) cookware is for, and it’s a 5 like the rest.
Two habits reduce the small amount there is for everyone: season a new pan by boiling water in it a few times before you make tomato sauce in it, and don’t store acidic food in a stainless pot overnight. Neither changes the score. Stainless is still the metal we’d choose over anything coated, every time.
How the pan is built matters more than the grade
Stainless steel is a poor conductor of heat. A pan made of nothing but stainless heats unevenly and scorches in rings. Every good stainless pan solves this with aluminum or copper, and how it does so is the real difference between a great pan and a cheap one.
Fully clad (tri-ply, 5-ply) pans sandwich a layer of aluminum — or aluminum and copper — between two layers of stainless, and the sandwich runs all the way up the sides. The cooking surface is stainless, the outside is stainless (magnetic 18/0 if it’s induction-ready), and the aluminum never touches food. This is All-Clad’s design and everyone who copied it: Made In, Tramontina, Cuisinart MultiClad Pro, Caraway’s stainless line, Heritage Steel. It’s what we mean when we say “stainless pan.”
Disc-bottom pans are a stainless cup with an aluminum puck bonded to the base. Cheaper, heavier at the bottom, thinner up the sides; the sides scorch, and the disc can separate over a lifetime. Material-wise identical — still stainless touching food, still a 5. Performance-wise, the reason to spend more.
Induction needs a magnetic exterior. 18/10 isn’t magnetic; 18/0 is. So an induction-compatible clad pan is 18/10 inside, aluminum in the middle, 18/0 outside. A pan that’s 18/10 through and through — some older All-Clad, some copper-core lines — won’t work on induction. The fridge-magnet test settles it.
“Stainless” with a coating is the trap. HexClad is a stainless pan with a ceramic coating etched into its surface; several brands sell “stainless nonstick” skillets that are stainless outside and PTFE inside; Instant Pot and others sell ceramic-coated liners that look like steel. The cooking surface is what we score. A coating on stainless is the coating’s score — 3 for ceramic, 2 for PTFE — not the steel’s.
The score, and why
Bare stainless steel, any grade, any construction — 5. 18/8, 18/10, 316, 18/0, 21/0; clad or disc; Pennsylvania or Brazil. A single inert material touching the food, nothing to wear off, nothing to flake, the longest-lived thing in a kitchen. The nickel note applies to the 300-series grades and is, for most people, a footnote.
Nickel-free stainless (18/0, 21/0) — 5. Same material class, chosen for a medical reason. Slightly more prone to spotting; slightly less bright. If you have a nickel allergy, this is your stainless.
Stainless with a ceramic coating (HexClad, ceramic-coated liners) — 3. Scored on the coating; see the HexClad review.
Stainless with a PTFE interior — 2. A Teflon pan in a steel coat.
For reference, our scale: 5 is a single inert material (stainless, cast iron, carbon steel, glass); 4 is a coating we’re fine with on a metal we’re fine with; 3 is a coating with a shelf life or a transparency gap; 2 is PTFE or aluminum in contact with food; 1 is a hard no.
How stainless goes wrong, and how it doesn’t
Three things happen to stainless pans that make people think something’s wrong. Rainbow heat tint — the blue-gold sheen after high heat — is a thickened chromium oxide layer. Harmless; a little Bar Keepers Friend takes it off. White chalky spots are mineral deposits from hard water; vinegar dissolves them. Tiny pits, which are the one real failure, come from chloride: salt poured into a pan of cold water sits on the steel and etches it before it dissolves. Add salt to water that’s already boiling and pitting mostly doesn’t happen. None of these is a safety issue; a pitted pan is still a stainless pan.
The other complaint is sticking, and the fix is technique: heat the dry pan on medium until a drop of water skates across it, then add the oil, then the food, and don’t move the food until it releases on its own. That one habit is the difference between “stainless is impossible” and “why did I ever own Teflon.”
What we’d buy
All-Clad D3 12″ Fry Pan — Score 5
Why it’s here: The original clad pan: 18/10 inside, aluminum core, magnetic stainless outside, bonded in Pennsylvania. The 12-inch is the one pan most kitchens use most. Lifetime warranty that has meant it for fifty years.
All-Clad D3 10-Piece Set — Score 5
Why it’s here: If you’re replacing a whole cabinet of coated pans at once. Fry pans, saucepans, sauté, stockpot; every food-contact surface is 18/10 stainless. Expensive, and the last set you’ll buy.
Made In Stainless Clad 12″ Frying Pan — Score 5
Why it’s here: Five-ply stainless made in Italy, sold by Made In on Amazon, a bit heavier and a bit cheaper than All-Clad. The pan we point to most often for people who want the clad promise without the All-Clad price.
Tramontina Tri-Ply Clad 12″ Frying Pan — Score 5
Why it’s here: 18/10 cooking surface, aluminum core, induction base, NSF-certified, made in Brazil, and about a third of the All-Clad’s price. The restaurant supply answer.
Tramontina Tri-Ply Clad 12-Piece Set — Score 5
Why it’s here: The same construction as a full set, for what one premium fry pan costs elsewhere. Our pick for a first stainless kitchen on a budget.
Cuisinart MultiClad Pro 12-Piece Set — Score 5
Why it’s here: Tri-ply throughout, 18/10 interior, decades of reviews, and usually the cheapest fully clad set on the shelf. The lids are stainless too.
Caraway Stainless Steel Fry Pan — Score 5
Why it’s here: Five-ply, no coating, from the brand that publishes its lab reports. If you like Caraway’s look, this is the Caraway to buy — see the review.
Heritage Steel 12″ Fry Pan, 316Ti — Score 5
Why it’s here: Five-ply, made in Tennessee by the company that used to make New Era waterless cookware, with a titanium-stabilized 316 cooking surface that shrugs off salt and acid better than 304. Not nickel-free — 316 has slightly more nickel, not less — but the most corrosion-resistant surface here.
HOMICHEF Nickel-Free 3-Ply 14-Piece Set — Score 5
Why it’s here: The cookware for a nickel allergy: a nickel-free stainless cooking surface on a clad body, at a normal price. Expect it to water-spot more than 18/10 and to want a dry towel after washing. It’s the only category here where the grade is the point.
Skip: anything sold as “stainless nonstick” (that’s PTFE inside); HexClad and ceramic-on-steel if what you want is a stainless pan; “surgical stainless” as a reason to pay more; and, for nickel-allergic cooks, long-simmered tomato sauce in a brand-new 18/10 pot.
What would change our mind
Nothing is likely to move bare stainless off a 5; it’s the reference point. What would move a brand: published migration testing on its actual pans (nickel, chromium, in an acidic simulant) — Caraway does it for its ceramic line and nobody does it for stainless because nobody has to. We’d love to see it anyway.
Enameled cast iron is the other pot most stainless owners keep next to the stockpot. We scored Le Creuset, Staub, and Lodge’s enameled line — and explained what a chip means — in Is Le Creuset safe?
All-Clad is the brand most people mean when they say “stainless,” and it sells PTFE pans under the same logo. We sorted its lines, line by line, in Is All-Clad safe?
One of the quiet benefits of bare stainless: you can use metal utensils again. Our kitchen utensils guide scores wood, steel, silicone, bamboo and nylon by what they do when hot.
The same 18/8 steel is what’s inside every good water bottle; our Stanley review scores insulated bottles by the one component that isn’t stainless.
Frequently asked
Is 18/10 better than 18/8?
Marginally, for corrosion; not for safety. Both are 304-family steel and both are a 5.
Is 316 stainless safer than 304?
It resists salt and acid better. It has slightly more nickel, so it isn’t the answer for a nickel allergy. Either is a 5.
Does stainless steel leach nickel?
A little, mostly from new pans cooking acidic food for a long time. It’s a small fraction of dietary nickel for most people and worth avoiding if you’ve been diagnosed with a nickel allergy — buy 18/0 or 21/0 nickel-free.
What is surgical stainless steel?
A marketing phrase, usually meaning 316 or 304. Look for the grade number.
Does stainless cookware work on induction?
If the outside layer is magnetic (18/0). Test with a fridge magnet.
Is HexClad stainless steel?
It’s a stainless pan with a ceramic nonstick coating in its surface, and it’s scored on the coating: a 3. Bare stainless is a 5.
Why does food stick to my stainless pan?
The pan wasn’t hot enough before the oil went in. Heat it dry until water beads and skates, then oil, then food, then wait.
Is there a stainless steel blender?
Vitamix makes a 48-ounce stainless container for its Ascent machines, and a stainless immersion blender in a stainless pot is the hot-soup answer. Our blender guide scores the jars.
The bottom line
Buy a fully clad stainless pan from any maker whose construction you can read on the box, cook on it for the rest of your life, and don’t let the grade numbers sell you anything. 18/10, 18/8, and 316 are all a 5; 18/0 is a 5 and the one to choose if nickel is a medical issue for you. The only stainless pan that isn’t a 5 is the one with something else on top of it.
Scores last reviewed September 2026. How we score.
