Cordless Phones Reviews

Consumer Reports magazine earns our highest reviewer rating with its test of 26 cordless phones, with and without answering systems. Editors also discuss new trends in cordless technology that promote the integration of cordless phones with home networks, the Internet and cell phones. The previous Consumer Reports article on cordless phones, completed in 2006, is older but still useful since it covers nearly 50 cordless phones, most of which are not re-tested for the 2007 report. Additionally, Good Housekeeping magazine and Wired magazine evaluate a handful of cordless phones with less formal testing.

Those professional reviewers almost never test and recommend the same cordless phones. However, many recommended phones differ only in terms of the number of included handsets or whether there's an answering machine or speakerphone. In that way, we did find commonalities. We also checked the top picks at Consumer Reports, Good Housekeeping and Wired magazine against owner-written reviews at Amazon.com, CNet.com and Target.com (which has become a surprisingly good source for consumer reviews).

We did not find any cordless phones that receive unqualified great reviews from owners. We found at least some mixed reviews regardless of price or functionality. The sporadic but universal complaints about sound quality and range might have something to do with the complex network of electronics that now exists in our homes. Everything from cell phones to microwave ovens can affect cordless phones, and we still found user complaints about static and poor voice quality. The best advice we can give might be to keep the packaging, so you can return a phone that doesn't work well for you.

Our Consensus Report shows how many times products are top-ranked by reviewers included in our
All The Reviews Reviewed chart.

In this case, our consensus chart is a little hard to decipher, mainly because few reviewers seem to recommend the same model twice. That doesn't quite tell the whole story, however, since many of the recommended models are very similar, differing by small features, or perhaps how many handsets are included. We also cross-referenced the top-rated phones in professional reviews with owner-written reviews found at Amazon.com, CNet.com, Epinions and Target.com. The Panasonic KX-TG1032S and VTech 6032 are both DECT phones/answering machines. User ratings for the Panasonic cordless phone are much better than for this particular VTech model. If you aren't worried about interference, we find good reviews for the basic VTech ia5824, which doesn't have an answering machine.