Slimline 45cm dishwasher for family of 4 - 3 meals a day?

[rickyrickygrimes]

We are a family of 4.
Breakfast - only DS2 eats, but all of us have coffee / tea
Lunch - DS1 and DS2 usually home, they cook separately. DH and I are sometimes home.
Dinner - Usually all 4 of us are home.

We generally cook from scratch. We generate a lot of dishes through the day.

Until now we've managed without a dishwasher but I have just gone full-time at work and we desperately need to find ways to reduce our domestic load. We rent and our kitchen is small but we could fit a 45cm dishwasher in.

Is it worth it? The choice really is slimline or nothing!

Well it’s better than nothing, but honestly a 45cm dishwasher wouldn’t be much use to me. It’s fine for plate and mugs but
nothing else, so everything else will
need to be washed. It’s really too small for a family IMO.

Yes! Although ours is on 2-3 times a day but I wouldn't be without it.

We're a family of 3, and I'd prefer a full size but it's fine and I'd rather that than nothing. We have a toddler so still quite a lot of sippy cups and shatterproof plates, it'll be easier when we all use the same crockery and it stacks better!
You can't really get away with sticking pans in it as it fills up so much so we do those by hand generally, but again it's better than nothing.

If it's that or nothing then I'd get one. But they are WAY less good than a full size. My parents have one, and we have one at work, and stacking them is a nightmare. But they do get things clean - just not that many at once! We can go about 1.5 days on average before putting ours on (2 adults), but a slimline would definitely not do a full day - mainly things like pans/cooking paraphanelia etc. would be the issue.

It’s fine. Better than nothing.
We are family of 3, and I put full size dishwasher on probably 5 times a week. It’s daily if we have cooked more or baked, every other day possible if we had simple meal prep day.

You can always just put it on when full, you don’t have to wait. Just put on after lunch for example. Then it’s clean and empty for dinner stuff and breakfast and on after breakfast next day

I'm fully prepared to put it on at least once a day, even 3 times over 2 days if that's how it works out. And yes, train everyone to just turn it on when it's full rather than at the same time everyday.

I have a 45cm in our holiday home. It goes on almost after every meal. It's manageable in that sense and certainly better than washing up!

Family of 3 here, I was so happy to upgrade to a full size dishwasher!

However i have a friend in a family of 4 who can only fit a slimline and at the very least it takes the bulk of the washing up.

Do you have a dryer in the kitchen? If so replace with dishwasher and put the dryer elsewhere best place is upstairs on the landing if space.

No dryer either: we are very low tech 😂

It would just get all the cups / knives / small plates clutter off the worktops / out of the sink.

Just have to work out where to put all the stuff that's in the small unit currently occupying that space...

It's definitely better than nothing. With your family's routine though it will be on twice a day minimum. We're a family of 5 (3 teens) and our full size dw is on twice a day usually. I would still get one though if that's all you have space for.

Yes definitely worth it! We have a full size one for a family of 4 and it's on once a day.
I wouldn't be without one now!
A slimline is definitely better than nothing though, you could do pans by hand and everything else in the dishwasher.

Have a look at these @rickyrickygrimes

MN has this
www.mumsnet.com/swearsby/best-slimline-dishwasher

If you are able to access this new 2/9/24 Which review
www.which.co.uk/reviews/dishwashers/article/best-slimline-dishwashers