Best Pasta Maker for Home in 2025

Fresh homemade pasta bears little resemblance to the dried pasta in boxes. The texture is silky, the flavor richer, and the cooking time drops to 2-3 minutes. A quality pasta maker enables restaurant-quality pasta at home for a fraction of the cost. Here are the best pasta makers for home cooks.

Fresh Pasta vs Dried Pasta

Fresh Pasta: Made with eggs and soft wheat flour. Silky, tender texture. Cooks in 2-3 minutes. Best for rich sauces — butter, cream, carbonara. Shorter shelf life (1-2 days refrigerated, 3 months frozen).

Dried Pasta: Made with semolina (hard wheat) and water. Firm, chewy texture. Cooks in 8-12 minutes. Better for olive oil-based and lighter sauces. Long shelf life. More economical.

For special occasions and richer sauces, fresh pasta is unmatched. Dried pasta handles everyday weeknight cooking.

Types of Pasta Makers

Manual Hand-Crank: Traditional roller machine — feed dough through rollers, adjust thickness, cut with included cutters. Most affordable. More hands-on.

Electric Motor Attachment: Adds a motor to a manual machine for one-handed operation. Popular with KitchenAid stand mixer owners — the pasta attachment uses the mixer's motor.

Pasta Extruder: Forces dough through die plates to create shaped pasta (rigatoni, penne, fusilli). Different product than roller-made pasta. Philips Pasta Maker is the most popular home extruder.

Top Picks

Best Overall: Marcato Atlas 150 Pasta Machine

The Marcato Atlas 150 is the classic Italian pasta machine found in home kitchens and restaurant prep areas for decades. The chrome-plated steel rollers produce pasta from 0.6mm to 4.8mm in 9 thickness settings. Includes spaghetti and fettuccine cutting attachments. Made in Italy since 1930. Virtually indestructible.

Pros: 9 thickness settings (0.6mm-4.8mm), made in Italy, virtually indestructible, wide 150mm rollers, additional cutter attachments available, clamps to any countertop. Cons: Hand-crank requires second person or prop to assist, no motor (manual only), attachments sold separately for additional pasta types.

Price: Around $75. Check price on Amazon

Best KitchenAid Attachment: KitchenAid 3-Piece Pasta Roller Set

For KitchenAid stand mixer owners, this official attachment set uses the mixer's motor for hands-free pasta rolling. Feed dough with both hands while the mixer drives the rollers — a dramatic workflow improvement over hand-cranking. Includes roller, spaghetti cutter, and fettuccine cutter. Makes pasta quickly once the technique is established.

Pros: Motor-driven (hands-free rolling), official KitchenAid quality, three attachments included, fast production once dialed in, stores with other KitchenAid attachments. Cons: Expensive, requires KitchenAid stand mixer, roller is smaller (6 inches) than standalone machines.

Price: Around $200. Check price on Amazon

Best Extruder: Philips Premium Pasta and Noodle Maker

Philips' pasta extruder mixes and extrudes shaped pasta automatically — add flour and eggs, press start, receive pasta in 15 minutes. Makes 150+ different shapes with optional die attachments. The extruded pasta texture differs from roller-made pasta (more rustic) but the automation is remarkable. Dishwasher-safe parts.

Pros: Fully automatic (mix + extrude), 150+ shapes with attachments, dishwasher safe, makes shaped pasta not possible with roller machines, minimal skill required. Cons: Very expensive, extruded texture different from rolled, requires specific flour types, cleaning is more complex than marketing suggests.

Price: Around $250. Check price on Amazon

Basic Fresh Pasta Dough

Ingredients (serves 4): 300g 00 flour (or all-purpose), 3 large eggs, 1 tsp olive oil, pinch of salt.

Method: Make well in flour, add eggs and oil, incorporate gradually. Knead 8-10 minutes until smooth and elastic. Rest 30 minutes covered.

Rolling: Start at widest setting, fold and repeat 3-4 times. Progress through thinner settings to desired thickness.

Final Recommendation

Most home pasta makers should start with Marcato Atlas 150 — Italian craftsmanship, decades of proven performance, and extensible with additional cutters. KitchenAid stand mixer owners should add the KitchenAid Pasta Roller Set for motor-driven convenience. Those who want automation and shaped pasta should invest in Philips Premium Pasta Maker.