When it comes to trying to interpret and understand exactly what oven ratings mean, it can often be helpful to first determine who has given an oven a certain rating. There are a number of different companies and organizations devoted to rating appliances and various products, and different groups can use different ratings systems and standards. Once you establish who has rated an oven a certain way, you can then look for more detailed information about how that company establishes a rating and thereby better understand what the rating means. You should also be sure to use the same type of oven ratings when comparing ovens.
Oven ratings are typically a system established and used to indicate the value of an oven, often dealing with specific criteria. As you are trying to interpret what these ratings mean, you should usually begin by determining who has given an oven a certain rating. It is possible that a “five star rating” was given to an oven by the manufacturer of the oven simply as a marketing ploy. This would mean that such a rating really does not tell you anything more about the oven than that the manufacturer considers it of high value, which should be a given.
Any literature or similar documentation that indicates oven ratings should also indicate who has awarded an oven a certain rating. Though there are a number of different ratings groups, two of the most common are JD Power™ and Consumer Reports™. There are other legitimate rating groups as well, though you should be cautious when considering ratings from a group you have never heard of before. Once you establish where ratings come from, then you can determine how that oven was rated by the group.
For example, JD Power™ has strictly established criteria regarding how a product rating is determined. Oven ratings from JD Power™ are based on factors such as overall customer satisfaction, ease of use, performance and reliability, and the warranty offered by the manufacturer. These criteria are scored based on surveys and other information-gathering methods to determine how customers would rate a product. This means you can find oven ratings regarding these individual aspects, as well as the overall rating for a product.
You should be sure that you compare like oven ratings, however, since doing otherwise could lead you to fallacious results. For example, if you use a JD Power™ rating to evaluate one oven, do not compare that to a Consumer Reports™ rating on another oven. Different organizations can use different rating scales and systems, and it is usually more accurate to compare similar systems.