By hour four, the Corkcicle was the first to have its contents fully liquified, and the Coleman was on the verge. That may seem overly dramatic, but after seeing other, straighter designs, our testers tended to set the Zoku aside. In 2022, we compared the new versions of our top two picks with the old versions to make sure they lived up to their predecessors.

A wider profile makes the stainless steel Yeti feel at home on a farm, at a construction site, or at camp. The standard lid has a medium-size opening at one side of the mouthpiece designed to restrict flow from hot drinks yet allow cool beverages to pass with fluidity. The 20-ounce version we originally tested was in the exact same group of finalists in our cold tests as the Hydro Flask, though it didn’t do as well at keeping heat; after 2.However, the new slider lid’s drink opening is large enough to accommodate a straw; the previous version’s was not. The current (mid-2022) equivalent of the Hydro Flask tumbler we tested—it now holds 20 ounces, not 22—is about an inch shorter than the original and slightly bigger in girth.

This slim, powder-coated stainless steel tumbler fits easily in hands and cup holders, and that’s why we love it.

The lid still nestles down into the cup, leaving the edge of the steel tumbler exposed; we didn’t notice any metallic taste, but if you don’t like drinking from metal tumblers, this might be a dealbreaker. We pulled our fast-to-heat-up-inside black sedan into the parking lot in front of the 7-Eleven in downtown Salt Lake City. I come home from work on Friday evening and find that the ice in the cup is still ice on Monday mornings. Klean Kanteen has discontinued our runner-up pick (though you may still be able to find it for sale in places), and replaced it with the 16 oz Rise Tumbler. Can it meet an entire day’s worth of needs as a singular vessel: sunrise coffee, mid-morning smoothie, ice water with lunch, afternoon lemonade with the same ice, sunset beer, evening cocktail, nighty-night tea?

If you get any of the four colored tumblers, the coating feels more tactile than the Hydro Flask’s, like it’s been rubberized.

Our control Slurpee in the standard 7-Eleven plastic cup lasted about an hour, while the insulated counterparts were continuing to hold form at approximately 50% of the original density into hour three. As the tumbler is the ultimate car-travel vessel, either during commutes or on road trips, we concluded that three hours of retention for heat and four for cold was plenty. All 15 sat in the front seat of the sedan on the roof of a downtown parking garage, where the internal temperature topped out at 112 °F.

At the time, the Hydro Flask had the slimmest, most covetable shape of all the tumblers we looked at and came in eight pleasing powder coats. This bottle comes in three sizes, 17 oz, 25 oz, and 34 oz, and is made from a combination of high-quality 304 stainless steel and BPA-free plastics, and features a copper lining for extra insulation to keep your beverages at the perfect temperature. With the closest watering hole slightly out of range for a quick dip, we opted for a tried-and-true American classic instead: the 7-Eleven Slurpee. It was a design that solved all sorts of issues—splashing, straw access—yet some testers said they hated flipping lids.

CamelBak KickBak Tumbler: The hot and cold retention was really good, but the two-sided flip lid on the CamelBak was polarizing. In temperatures reaching as high as 112 °F, all the tumblers we tested had an effective insulating value, so they can all keep your drink hot or cold for a few hours.