The Weber Kettle Smart Ring is a $279.99 fan and Wi-Fi controller that drops into a 22-inch kettle and holds a temperature the way a thermostat holds a room. I said in my Weber kettle review that this one was staying in the box until I had earned the dampers first, and it has now come out. It works exactly the way Weber says it does. What I did not expect is that the best reason to buy it has almost nothing to do with temperature control.
The Weber Kettle Smart Ring is $279.99 direct from Weber as model 3400660, and it is not sold on Amazon. It fits 22-inch Weber kettles and excludes the Jumbo Joe Premium along with any kettle that has a hinged lid, so look at your lid before you order. If you do not own the grill yet, the Weber Original Kettle Premium it sits inside is $249 on Amazon.com.
The Smart Ring is sold on temperature control, and that turned out to be the least interesting thing it does.
- The fan makes convection, not just heat - moving air browns and crisps food in a way a still kettle never has.
- Rapidfire Assist lights your coals - the fan stokes the charcoal up to cooking temperature instead of leaving you to wait it out.
- It raises the grate about 4 inches - food sits further off the fire, which I think is why my cook ran less sooty than charcoal sometimes does.
- Overnight cooks stop being a fantasy - a temperature held for hours is the whole difference between a kettle and a smoker.
- Your phone becomes the thermometer - Weber Connect sends food alerts, fuel alerts, and a nudge when it is time to flip.
- The Kettle Has Not Needed Help Since 1952
- What You Get And How It Drops In
- The First Cook Was Coppa Pork Steaks And A Bourbon Peach Cobbler
- The Joy of Charcoal Convection Cooking Is The Part Weber Buries
- Weber Connect App Works Really Well - Among The Best Wireless Apps For Grilling That I've Tried
- Two Things Weber Needs To Fix In Version Two
- So, Who's The Kettle Smart Ring Right For?
Weber sent the Smart Ring along with the Weber Original Kettle Premium this summer, and I left it in the box on purpose. I wanted the dampers and the patience first. Now that I have them, the ring has changed my mind about what a kettle can do without quite changing my mind about whether I want one bolted into mine.
The Kettle Has Not Needed Help Since 1952
A Weber kettle is the last analogue thing in most backyards. The design has barely changed since 1952, the dampers already give you real control over airflow, and the appeal is that there is nothing to plug in and nothing to update. Fathers, sons, and grandfathers have all cooked on the same grill, which is not something you can say about much else on the patio.
That simplicity is also the honest limitation. Charcoal is difficult to hold at a constant temperature, and it is hardest at the low end. You can smoke a rack of ribs on a kettle, but an offset smoker or a pellet grill is the right tool for that job, and anyone who has run both knows it.
So the Smart Ring solves something real. It also almost feels like cheating. For me the kettle meant not plugging anything in and not worrying about anything except taking a moment to slow down on a summer afternoon, and this changes that equation whether I want it to or not. I am still not certain I want it on the grill all the time.
What You Get And How It Drops In
The Smart Ring is a band that drops in between the bowl and the lid of a 22-inch kettle, with a digital fan on one side and an LCD Wi-Fi controller clipped to the outside. There is no drilling, no cutting, and nothing permanent about the installation, which matters on a grill people keep for a decade.
It raises the cooking grate by about 4 inches. That reads like spec-sheet trivia right up until you cook on it.
One thing to sort out before it arrives: it has to stay connected to power for the entire cook. The port is USB-C, which is the good news, but Weber's product page never mentions how the unit is powered at all, so you find that out when you open the box. Work out where the cord is going before you are standing in the yard with hot coals and nowhere to plug in.
The First Cook Was Coppa Pork Steaks And A Bourbon Peach Cobbler
The first cook was real food with people waiting on it. Coppa pork steaks over the coals, and a bourbon peach cobbler in cast iron skillets from Smithey alongside them.
The method was a hard sear directly over the charcoal followed by a slow smoke at a held temperature, which is exactly the sequence a kettle normally makes you fight for by hand. Those were some of the best pork steaks I have ever tasted. My father-in-law Jim told his friends about them, and he told Heather's grandma, which is a tougher review board than anything I write.
The only real note of frustration here was that no matter how innovative the Kettle Smart Ring is, you can't overcome physics - getting a ripping hot sear can't magically drop from 800 degrees to 300 instantly and 300 can't stay 300 infinitely, so you still have to tend the fire. The only real solution to this problem would be for Weber to bring out a "Gravity Fed" grill that adds charcoal to the fire based on need to maintain temperature.
The Joy of Charcoal Convection Cooking Is The Part Weber Buries
Here is the part I wasn't expecting - and honestly it brought me over the edge from "ok it's another grilling gadget" to, "Yeah this one's staying with me". The same fan that blows air at the coals to bring them up also sets up a convection current of hot air inside the kettle, and that current is what got the skin on those pork steaks properly crisp. I was expecting a thermostat. What I got behaves more like a convection oven with a fire at the bottom.
Weber does say this. "Air circulates around the food for even browning and crisping" sits right there on the product page, one line below the temperature control that gets all the marketing. It reads like a footnote, and it is the actual reason to spend the money.
One note here is that the instructions specifically advise using briquettes not lump because it is easier to control the temperature and lump tends to burn faster. We discussed some of these differences in our briquettes vs lump charcoal article earlier this month as well.
The raised grate feeds into the same result. With the food about 4 inches further off the coals, I think that is why my cook came out less sooty than charcoal sometimes gets. I have not run wings for a guys night or a rotisserie chicken on it yet, and both are next, because moving air plus distance from the fire is exactly what those two want.
However, if you look around at other reviews - most of the guys that are talking about it focus on low and slow - briskets and pork shoulders ... turning the grill into a smoker when in effect it's now an awesome charcoal-fired convection oven! I'm almost thinking that a pizza stone would make it a pretty awesome candidate for doing charcoal fired pizzas with a crispy foundation and still getting the top nice and brown too.
Weber Connect App Works Really Well - Among The Best Wireless Apps For Grilling That I've Tried
The controller pairs with Weber Connect over Wi-Fi, and the phone provides grill modes, probe setup, a timer, and direct control of the fan. Real-time food temperature alerts, fuel alerts, and a flip-and-serve notification all come through the same app. This is the same app that Weber uses for its wireless temperature probes and with its other grills and it's clear that they've invested a lot of time in making it actually work right, not just a tool to enable you to monitor temperature.
The app is also your gateway to Rapidfire Assist, the mode that stokes the coals to preheat, and shortens the time normally spent with the chimney and saves you some mess with sparks flying when you dump the coals in your kettle and try to move them around into the perfect configuration. Now you can just set it up as a sloppy snake or whatever your preference, add some Weber charcoal starter (or whatever your preference is) and Rapidfire Assist starts the blower so it directs the starter flame right onto the charcoal and keeps it burning throughout your cook.
Two Things Weber Needs To Fix In Version Two
The first is power, and what makes it frustrating is how close Weber came to solving it. I understand that the fan needs electricity. The port is USB-C, so the fix is a commodity part that costs a few dollars, and Weber shipped neither a battery nor a single word about the connector on the product page. Instead, the unit is tethered to an outlet for the length of the cook unless you work the answer out yourself. I am going to run mine off a UGREEN battery pack and see how long a cook it will carry.
The second is the probes. There are two probe ports on the back of the controller and exactly one probe in the box. I know why, and they would like to sell me the second one. If I am buying another probe it is going to be a wireless one, because a wire running out of the grill undercuts the entire idea of a smart ring. The MeatStick V Duo I reviewed this spring already runs two probes without a single wire.
So, Who's The Kettle Smart Ring Right For?
This is the question I kept asking myself the entire time I was sitting there drinking some of my bourbon while waiting for the pork and peach cobblers to be ready to eat ... on one side this is a wonderful accessory that takes the best core grilling experience on the market into the 21st century with smart features ... but because of the limitations of physics it is unable to complete the journey the way a gravity-fed charcoal grill tries to and at the same time it takes away the exact thing that I love about cooking on fire - back to basics simplicity and a chance to connect with my ancestors through a shared experience of grilling over a fire.
However, ultimately I'm pretty excited about this entrant into the market since it clearly fills a niche - charcoal convection. At under $300 it's a great gift idea for Father's Day or a Christmas gift for a guy in your life that wants something new that most other guys don't have already. For me, the charcoal convection angle is something I'm very excited to continue exploring over the back half of this season and in 2027 as well.
One more thing to price at the same time: Weber lists the Smart Ring as compatible with its charcoal rotisserie, sold separately. Moving air plus a rotating bird is the cook I want most out of this thing. For current pricing and availability, check weber.com.