Paper towels

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Paper towels

What's behind our paper towel Ratings?

Experts at our National Testing and Research Center tested 23 models in paper towels to see which ones perform best.

We look for:

Overall score
Overall score is based on a towels ability to absorb water, to withstood scrubbing along a rough surface and force needed to tear while wet.
Absorbency
Absorbency is based on how much water a 5-inch square piece of towel could hold.
Scrubbing
Scrubbing is based on the number of times a towel could be rubbed along a rough surface before the sheet tore.
Wet strength
Wet strength is based on how much weight a wet sheet of paper towel could hold before it tore.
Sheet
The length and width of each sheet in inches.
Sq. ft. per roll
The number of square feet of paper towel contained in each roll.

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Recommended paper towels

Recommended paper towels are standout choices with high scores. They include CR Best Buys, which offer exceptional value. When narrowing your choices, weigh features, price, and attributes that matter to you.

Paper towel buying guide

To find the paper towel that is right for you, read our expert advice on which features to consider and how to find the best value.

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If you're looking for information about paper towels, Consumer Reports is your best resource. Consumer Reports’ paper towel reviews will give you honest buying advice that you can trust. Use our paper towel buying guide to discover which features are most important to consider. We also provide unbiased Ratings and paper towel reviews to help you choose the best paper towel for your needs.

Ratings & recommended paper towels

Paper towels (23)

The Ratings rank paper towels by overall performance.

Paper towel buying guide

When it comes to slurping up spills, some paper towels really do "bring it," which is Bounty's challenge to the messy among us. Among the nearly two dozen products we tested, two Bounty products were best, but a third version absorbed less than its brand mates.

We test for absorbency (measuring how much water weight a towel can suck up), scrubbing strength (the number of strokes it takes to tear a wet towel when rubbed across an abrasive surface), and wet strength (the force it takes to pull apart a wet towel that has been clamped into a tensile-strength-testing machine). The best at scrubbing survived five to 10 times as many scrubbing strokes as those that tore most easily.

Do green claims make a difference? There are currently few or no governmental regulations for many of the "green" claims on paper towels. But "recycled" claims do have some merit, so it's a good idea to look for a high percentage of post-consumer recycled content.

Prices ranged widely, from less than two dollars to more than five per 100 square feet, but you needn't pay top dollar. One brand from a big-box store cost less than two dollars per 100 square feet and was very good; the most expensive paper towel was lowest rated of all.

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