Myth or fact

Avocado oil is the best oil for high heat

Short answerSort of

By GyroscopeUpdated November 14, 20263 sources

Sort of. Avocado oil is a good oil, built a lot like olive oil, mostly monounsaturated and low in saturated fat. But in one lab test the avocado oil bottle smoked at 386 °F (197 °C), before the extra virgin olive oil did. Smoke point depends on the bottle.

Avocado oil has a reputation as the oil for searing and roasting at high heat. The reputation rests on smoke point, and on the idea that a higher smoke point means a safer oil in a hot pan. Neither part holds up as well as people think.

How similar are the two oils?

They’re very close. Here’s a tablespoon of each from the USDA’s tables, with canola for comparison.

• Saturated
• Monounsaturated
• Polyunsaturated

For your LDL the two are nearly the same, both far better than butter at 7.2 g of saturated fat or coconut oil at 11.2 g. In the 2018 heat test, the avocado oil’s main fat was oleic acid, about two thirds of it, the same fat that makes up about three quarters of the extra virgin olive oil.

What did the heat test find?

A lab in Australia, run by an olive oil company, bought ten common oils from the supermarket and measured their smoke points, the temperature where a steady blue smoke appears.

The second column is the one that surprises people. Oxidative stability is how long an oil resists breaking down when it’s heated with air blowing through it, and the authors found it was a better guide to how an oil behaves in heat than smoke point was. That bottle of avocado oil lasted about 10 hours, a third as long as the extra virgin olive oil.

The lab also heated each oil in a deep fryer for 6 hours and in a pan up to 464 °F (240 °C), and measured the breakdown products. Averaged over both tests, the avocado oil reached 11.6%, in the middle of the ten. Extra virgin olive oil had the least, 8.5%, and canola the most, 22.4%.

Why do people say avocado oil handles more heat?

Smoke points for refined oils can be high, and avocado oil is sold both refined and unrefined. The authors say differences between oils “could be related to the method of extraction, their level of refining” and their fatty acids, so two bottles with the same name can smoke at very different temperatures. The test also found that an oil’s smoke point drops as it’s used.

The bigger mistake is treating smoke point as the safety number. In the same test, the oils that smoked latest, refined sunflower, canola and grapeseed, made the most breakdown products over 6 hours at 356 °F (180 °C). The authors’ conclusion was that “smoke point does not predict oil performance when heated.”

What are the limits here?

It was one lab, one bottle of each oil from an Australian supermarket, and an olive oil company running the test. No food was cooked, and water from real food changes the chemistry. A different avocado oil, especially a refined one, could smoke later than this one did. What the test shows is that the avocado oil it measured wasn’t the heat champion, and that the heat ranking people repeat comes from a number that doesn’t predict much.

Which oil for searing a steak?

For a short, very hot sear, smoke point is the useful number, since it decides whether your kitchen fills with smoke. If your pan smokes with extra virgin olive oil, the high oleic peanut oil in the test smoked at 439 °F and still made among the fewest breakdown compounds, and a refined avocado oil may do the job too. Canola smoked even later, but it broke down the most in both heat tests, so we’d keep it for baking. For everyday cooking, roasting and pan frying, extra virgin olive oil is the one with the most evidence behind it. Avocado oil or olive oil? puts the two side by side, and the oil compare does it for any pair.