Weber Original Kettle Charcoal Grill, 22-Inch, Black – Classic Outdoor BBQ Grill with One‑Touch™ Cleaning System & Precise Temperature Control Dampers

The grill is big, easy to set up, and very sturdy. It cooks food quickly with great flavor, whether for a small group or a big party. Cleaning is simple thanks to the ash system. Even though it's an entry-level model, the cooking surface is just like more expensive grills, making it a great value.

Excellent grill. It is a nice size for just two people. Big enough for most anything and not so large as to be cumbersome. Is easy to move and set up.

Great grill quality and heat distribution.

this is my second webber grill and i love them but i got a cover this time to help it last longer. best charcoal grill !!

At 57 years old, I've had a lifelong obsession with outdoor grilling, and I have used dozens of different grills of all design types and fuel sources. I can afford the most expensive grills on the market, and what do I use today, when cooking for my small family? This Weber 22 inch grill, which blows every other grill of any type away for real life every day grilling, for these reasons: 1. Performance- the grill is highly adjustable, and easy to control heat levels with the upper and lower vent. Food can either be placed over the coals for high heat, or away from them for more gradual indirect cooking. 2. Versatility- the grill is air tight with both vents closed, so can be used as a very effective indirect heat smoker. If you want to control the location of the charcoal more precisely than piling it up on one side, use the Weber Charcoal Rails, available on Amazon for $7-8, which enable you to precisely contain coals on opposite sides of the grill, and add more through the hinged grate when necessary, for longer smoking jobs. I find the rails to be superior to the baskets, since they vent air better and provide for more positional flexibility. If you're on a budget, use bricks for this purpose instead of rails, which have the added benefit of heat retention. 3. Efficiency/Economy- good charcoal is not cheap, and it can be used multiple times if you completely close the vents when you are done cooking. The airtight nature of this grill that allows for this charcoal recycling is nearly impossible to find on other (non-Weber) grills, in my experience. If you have found one that seals up tighter than this model, I'd love to hear from you and know what other models compete in this area. 4. Taste- I will only use a gas grill if I am in a big hurry, with no time to wait for the charcoal heating period. I have found that when I am in such a hurry, I should likely not be grilling at all. Cooking over wood/charcoal gives food a superior smoky flavor versus any gas grill, in my opinion. Happy grilling, and I hope this review was helpful.

I bought myself this grill for Christmas when nobody else got it for me, and now I've had it almost three months and have used it quite a few times. I bought it based on the Amazon recommendations, and the recommendation of FoodTV host Alton Brown in his book, GEAR FOR THE KITCHEN. Also, in perusing the internet, I found the "Blue's BBQ" web site from Australia. One reader asks, "How did the Weber become the icon for the Australian BBQ?" Blue had to disappoint the reader by informing her that the Weber is actually American. But if it has that kind of reputation in Australia, is must be good. Judging from the reviews here, I'll have to wait 20 years to see how it holds up. It does live on my back porch, but with the Weber cover. It is fairly easy to assemble, and in my humble engineering opinion, seems well-made and designed with few exceptions. The Silver model has an ash catch-pan hung between the legs. The pan sits on top of spring clips clipped to the leg. After how well everything else went together, this seemed really cheesy to me. If you're a prefectionist, you'll go nuts trying to level the pan. I guess that the "one touch cleaning" feature is the vanes on the bottom that also act to adjust the temperature in the grill by adjusting the airflow. If you swish them back and forth, opened and closed, it'll push some ash through the vent in the bottom. The problem is that the vanes themselves are wide and flat, and half of the ash just rides back and forth on them. I think Weber overstates this "one touch cleaning" feature. The vanes closely fit the bottom shape of the grill when assembled, but after a couple of uses, one warped. I don't know if this is from heat, or something I lodged under it. I had to disassemble the vanes, and bend the offending blade a bit, and it's been perfect since. I am a bit disappointed in some of the accessories, like the tool rack and little side table. They hang on the edge of the grill, and compromise the otherwise pretty good seal between the lid and grill. They also sell a lid rack, but note that the lid does comes with a hook in it so you can hang it on the edge of the grill, although it is certainly not as easy as using the optional rack. Based on recommendations here, I got the 22" (larger) model. I can't disagree with that. Unless you just don't have the extra 4" of storage space or REALLY need a good grill, but just don't have the money, get the bigger one. It doesn't use that much more charcoal. The other thing I scratched my head over was whether to get the Silver or Gold model. The differences were not completely clear to me until I actually got the grill. First, the Gold model adds a catch can that fits closely to the bottom of the grill instead of the pan I complained about. That would be nice. Maybe when you're grilling, hot specks of charcoal won't fall out the bottom and burn your legs, and if you grill somewhere where you don't want a lot of ash, this might be worthwhile. But the Gold is almost twice the price of the Silver, and I had a hard time justifying the additional cost. The other feature added by the Gold is a grate with folding sides to allow you to add more charcoal when doing a long roast. A handy feature for sure, if you're cooking includes that, but I found those replacement Weber grates locally for twelve dollars, so wouldn't pay for the Gold model to get them. And I guess that's another advantage of the Webers in general: They're so popular, replacement parts are easily found locally. Sometimes, I long for the built-in side table of the Platinum, but that's a lot of money. The grill came with a small cookbook that has proved useful. I don't know getting burgers and steaks done right has been such a hit or miss, trial and error, proposition that most people make it out to be. You look up in the little book, "Beef, 1-1/2 in thick, well-done (I know, Alton Brown wouldn't like me), 10 minutes first side, 9 minutes second side" and they come out perfectly. DEFINITELY pick up a Weber charcoal chimney if you don't have one yet. It's the best way by far to start the grill - no kabooms, no fumes, no smell, no dangerous fluids stored in your house, and a good use for Florida Today newspaper. If you want to try something different, pick up the book AMERICAN PIE by Peter Reinhert and try the grilled pizza.

This is the fourth Weber Grill I’ve owned over 40 years. You can cook just about anything with this grill. The basic model is what you need. Get some long steel tongs to move food around and the Lodge’s Dutch oven lid lifter to move the coals and hot grill grate around. There is enough room on grill to cook for a family of five. I use this Weber about two or three times a week. Example: I’ll cook potatoes which take an hour and then cook some sausage for 15 minutes and then grill stakes and eat as soon as I take them off grill. If we have a lot of people over I’ll cook lots of appetizers so we eat constantly over three hours. Like when Coals are ready, I’ll cook some mushroom stuffed with cheese and then I’ll close up the grill and cook smoked chicken wings for an hour and then after that I might even do a dessert of grilled pineapple served with ice cream. I also have a small ash bucket I empty every month. I use Kingsford Original Charcoal Briquettes but cheap’ole Cowboy Charcoal from W*mart works great too. Don’t use lighter fluid, use a basic chimney starter with some paper to light ur coals, which takes about 15min before they r ready. There are more expensive webers but I think this is the only one you need. Save money and get accessories instead. Also, I take my grill camping too, it’s easy to take apart and smoked chicken thighs cook in less than two hours and are amazing (can smoke about 8 thighs in this Weber at once). Oh and grilled Big Portabella mushrooms are so good in this thing. Also the bottom vents r easy to adjust using ur tongs. Included picture of what my 10 year old Weber looks like. Still works great just not shiny and bottom vents r gone.

The name Weber speaks for itself. I owned one back in the day but left it behind during a move. I’ve had cheaper grills that rusted through in a few seasons. You don’t get any better than Weber, and I prefer charcoal grills too — you just can’t get that flavor with gas. This 22-inch grill is HUGE! I had the 18-inch one previously, and boy do those 4-inches make a big difference. I barbecued 10lbs of chicken quarters (8 quarters in all) with room to spare! HUGE! Now, about assembly, sheesh! The wordless instructions were deceiving at best, and incorrect at worst. The instructions tell you to install the main leg first — no problem — and then the right leg (with the kettle upside down and handle facing you - although deducing this wasn’t easy as the drawings inexplicably change the orientation of the kettle from the initial drawing); they indicate that after you install the right leg that you can easily attach the triangular shaped tray that sits at the bottom of the grill assembly. The problem is, once the leg is in place it is impossible to thread the end of the triangle tray through the hole of the leg once it is “pinned” to the main leg first by way of a hook. After several attempts to do it the way they instructed (slightly damaging the primary leg as I tried to position the tray to fit - the hook that you feed into that hole barely fits, and turning it extends and bends the metal around that hole), I finally decided to take the right leg off, thread the end of the tray through the hole on the leg, and then install the leg, sort of like how they instruct you to do for the third leg. The third leg was difficult to install because of an incorrect instruction as to which hole to use for the clip; you have to use the opposite one they indicate to accommodate the third end of the tray. Even the instructions for the installation of the handle wasn’t as straightforward as they should have been. Weber needs to grab ten people and watch them individually try to assemble this grill using these instructions so they can modify the drawings to make more sense. But, once it is assembled, what a grill! One issue I have is with the metal tray/cup that is suspended below the bottom of the kettle to catch the ashes when they fall during cooking and cleaning; those clips just do not keep the tray attached securely. It keeps falling off. The other issue is with the metal fan-like device that is supposed to help scrape the ashes out of the kettle and send them through the gaps into the unsteady tray/cup below; because it only moves a few inches back and forth instead of all the way around the bottom of the kettle, you can’t adequately clean the ashes from the kettle they way the design intended. I’m super pleased that I finally have a Weber grill again, the Cadillac of barbecue grills!