Side by Side Comparison of: Nesco vs Excalibur

I have ordered three others of these, they are my favorite dehydrators.. I got rid of all the other brand name ones I had and only use these nesco ones, they are fast without over heating the fruits, vegetables or other foods I put in them. We grow big gardens and I love to dehydrate a lot of it so we have it during times when we aren't growing any. These are perfect. :)

Very happy with this purchase. Only complaint is there is no way to keep everything "latched" together for storage. It's easy to get all the trays bumped and it all falls to pieces in the cabinets. If you've got tons of cabinet space this won't be a problem for you. The jerky gun worked better than I expected too. It made perfect little strips consistently. We've definitely got our money's worth with this one. Would absolutely buy again.

I bought this for my partner for Father's Day over a year ago because we had made some jerky in the oven and everyone in the family loved it. This dehydrator makes the process much simpler and faster, and the jerky is great. As soon as we got it, we tried just about everything we could think of we had on hand. I had some cans of pineapple chunks and mandarin oranges in the cabinet, and both of those dried up great, really sweet and chewy without all of the extra sugar you sometimes get in packaged dried fruit. Bananas and apples were not as popular, but I think that just our family. Last year we had an enormous amount of cherry tomatoes and we dried those and got a delicious product that's like sweet tomato raisins! I will say those took a very very long time. We have found, however, that our jerky takes much less time than is called for in recipes, so it is important to keep watching every few hours. The racks are a bit hard to clean, but I have found that if you flip the beef strips over 1.5-2hours in, you have less sticking, and slightly easier clean up. The gun for ground beef is great, and if you use the spices with it, you will end up with something that resembles a slim Jim or other packaged jerky, which is super tasty, but the seasonings do have some chemicals that are easy to avoid in strip jerky. I haven't found an alternative recipe for ground beef that I like as much yet though. All components of this kit are easy to use. If I had one wish for an additional feature it would be a timer so that when it gets late and I decide the jerky needs a couple more hours, I could go to bed '... A longer cord wouldn't hurt either. Overall, I would recommend this product to anyone wanting to dehydrate and/or make jerky on a regular basis.

While changing my eating habits, I came to realize that I would need a dehydrator. While looking through Amazon for the right one I came across the Nesco American Harvest FD-61 Food Dehydrator. This one was just what I was looking for and a perk was that it came with a jerky gun. When I first opened the box I was very surprised that they had included jerky seasoning to help me get started. The jerky gun is super easy to use and easy to clean as well. The dehydrator is also easy to assemble and easy to use. There is a guide that provides you with how to clean and care for the items and also giving helpful tips and drying times of certain foods. This is a great product especially if you are a first timer like myself.

the noise is very minimal, sounds like a bathroom fanfits about 1.5lb of jerky on all supplied trays (using ground meat and gun) . My timings were waaaaaaay off from what the instructions and reviews say. Id be able to throw 1.5 lbs in and have it done in 3 hours tops. The product is great, ive used venison, beef, turkey, pork and bison. the best combo ive done so far is Berkshire ground pork, Nesco original seasoning, red pepper flakes to taste, and a couple shots of pure Grade B maple Syrup. its insanity, you gotta try it....maybe one day ill try dehydrating something healther. but till then, thank you Nesco Meat Jerky Machine.

It took me a long time to figure out what dehydrator I wanted and where to purchase it from by I am very happy that I bought this dehydrator. It comes with pretty much everything you need to get started. The jerky gun worked great and made even strips of jerky with minimal effort. The original flavor jerky seasoning this came with tasted great. I have yet to use the other accessories but i am looking forward to trying some dried fruit and making some fruit roll ups.For reference purposes I bought 2 extra trays for mine to make 7 trays total, i was able to just barely fit 4 pounds of jerky meat give or take on all the trays. I used it a week ago to make 8 pounds of venison jerky that came out amazing in about 4 and a half hours per batch. I am impressed by how good this Nesco dehydrator warms up and how quickly my jerky was ready. The taste was great and everyone loved it.Important notice: I have done some research and found that the tray designs have been changed. They used to have notches in the center ring and from what i have read, the trays would slant upward. Now its one solid ring of plastic in the center of the tray and they slant downwards. My new dehydrator came with the new design and the 2 pack of tray expansions also had the new design.So basically, anyone purchasing a new dehydrator should be just fine with their trays and any expansions they want to add to it. The new design add a trays come with a note saying that the new ones should work just fine with the old design, for anyone who has had their dehydrator for a couple years but I have yet to have the chance to find out if this is true.Overall a great dehydrator that I would recommend to anyone looking to make some tasty jerky.

Love the raw settings on this. Been using it a lot.

This dehydrator has been fantastic. I work on an organic farm and, as with any business that sells food, there is a lot of waste. Between canning and dehydrating I've been able to save some of that waste for winter use. I've dehydrated apples, onions, carrots, peppers, eggplant, tomatoes, bananas, jerky, fresh herbs and a huge variety of other veggies. It's never taken more than 12 hours, even with a full load and over filled a little. It's easy to keep clean and doesn't seem to make any impact on our power bill. Overall, I'm very pleased with this purchase.

LOVING this machine since we got it! SO much better than the smaller machines I've had in the past. The circulation is excellent, cleanup couldn't be easier (I put the black trays in the dishwasher). I can actually buy produce from Costco now without wasting anything! Pears, pineapple, mango, and apples have turned out the best. If you want to try something really delicious as a "candy"--I had a box of mandarin orange cups from Costco (you know, the kind with the peel top that you throw in a lunch box) and I opened a few and drained the fluid and placed them on the dehydrator just to see what those would turn out to be like--SO delicious! SO sweet! I bought some fresh mandarins and they were such a hassle to peel or slice for one tiny wedge of fruit--they didn't turn out nearly as good as those from the cups! Definitely more pricey, but we really weren't eating them fast enough, so I decided to get some use out of them. Yum! I've been using the greens from everything we buy that I would normally throw away (beet tops, leek tops etc) and dehydrating them and grinding them to a powder making my own "super food" mix and putting them in everything I cook (stews, soup, quiche, eggs etc) as well as my husband's daily "shake". Nothing is going to waste in this household! I need all 9 trays to make it worth my while! If I'm going to have to do as much chopping and prepping as it takes, I want to do it all in one sitting if I can. The smaller machines are much more of a chore because you can't fit much in them. This is amazing! What an upgrade! Worth every penny! :)

use it all the time only wish I had the one with the timer maybe in a few years :)

Excalibur, the "Cadillac" of food dehydrators! I love it. Dries efficiently and thoroughly with the rear fan and variable temperature dial. So much better than my old one-temperature blow-from-the-bottom-thru-the-plastic-trays version.

I got the Excalibur 9 Tray dehydrator to replace my old worn out round dehydrator. The old one just couldn't handle the volume of jerky family and friends demanded LOL So far I am very pleased! I mixed up a 5lb batch of ground deer mixed with NESCO Jerky Works Original seasoning mix. I could have easily put in 7-8lbs of ground deer in the Excalibur. I really like the removable trays and mesh. It should make for easy clean up.

Love the machine, simple and does it's job well, 5 stars for the machine. Personal opinion on the jerky shooter, but it makes too thick a strip for me. It works fine, however. I give it 4 stars, you may have a different view?

So much better than my ronco. I love that it actually circulates the air and that it has different temperatures (the low worked wonderful for drying flower petals. They always ended up brown with my ronco). Only thing that is a real hassle is having to unplug every time I'm done using it. I have it set up on a "dresser" in my back room, and needing to reach behind the dresser to unplug is a major pain.

Only had this for a day. Seems like a decent product for the price. However, I couldn't agree more with one reviewer who said it needs two things, both of which seem very basic. There is no switch to turn it on or off. Instead, you have to pull the plug. I never assumed a product wouldn't have a switch. Every decent electrical product in my house has a switch so this one seems to me like a glaring oversight. Think about having to unplug your blender or hair dryer to turn it off. Also, a timer would be most helpful. Assuming some people go to bed and to work and will be away form their drying food for a number of hours. Both of these shortcomings are likely $2 options for which I think most users would gladly pay.

This dehydrator has met my expectations for the most part. Its fan and motor are relatively quiet and seem to work well. The drying trays appear well made and have been easy to clean. The jerky gun also has worked satisfactorily. My only criticism is the air temperature runs 12º F hotter than its setting (according to my Thermoworks instant thermometer)--e.g., ground beef was actually dehydrating at 172º F rather than the 160º setting I chose.Have enjoyed drying pineapple the most - both sliced cut into quarters and crushed 2 cans on a tray to make pineapple fruit rolls. Have also enjoyed both walnuts and almonds after overnight soaking and then drying. Least favorite experiments were strawberries which seem to be all seeds when dried and cherries which I found bland.I've done nuts, fruit, and jerky every week since my purchase 6 weeks ago and am glad I bought this product.

We've cut out sweets and carbs from our diet. Jerky has become one of my staple snacks. Store bought jerky is expensive and often loaded with all sorts of stuff. So I did some research and selected this dehydrator.We've made a few batches of jerky so far. One was a couple of pounds of lean ground chuck doctored with some cure and seasoning I found on my own. Following the directions, I mixed the meat with the fixings, loaded the jerky gun and plugged it in. About every half hour or so, I checked and patted down the strips with a paper towel as recommended. Good idea. About 4 1/2 hours later, I had some good jerky.My local supermarket had a deal on shoulder so I bought a bunch. Sliced it, marinated it overnight, and set it in the dehydrator. Again, I checked on it about every half hour but that was pretty much being a mother hen. I had some great jerky in about 5 hours. I layered it in paper towels and let any oils absorb for an hour and then packed it. I had a lot, so I vacuum sealed a bunch and have it in the freezer.My wife is planning on drying out some fruit and herbs this weekend.It's easy to use, pretty easy to clean, and - when you wrap the cord around the top - fairly easy to store.Looking forward to getting a lot of use from this appliance.

This is the first time I have ever had a dehydrator. So I have nothing to compare this too. I will say the product arrived on time and was undamaged. Everything that is supposed to be included seems to be there. I will say the instruction book leaves a lot to be desired. Additionally, this product comes with several jerky seasoning packets and jerky cure. This machine is a good size, but does fit comfortably on my countertop. It is made of plastic material, but that does not bother me. And as someone else stated it does state made in china on the underside of the lid. So for those who want the product totally made in the USA- I guess you are out of luck with this model.I wanted to try the machine out so I decided to try to dehydrate some fruit I had on hand. So i cut up two bananas and a mango, which each got their own tray. The machine does what it states. I took about 7 hours give or take. As I'm new to this, I had to go by several descriptions of what warrants done for these. I'm sure with more experience it will be easier for me to tell, but I did check several time during the last two hours to see what was going on. You can hear this machine when it is on, but it really is background noise- sort of like a quiet dishwasher. I did think the machine got pretty warm, when it was working. I am going to assume this is normal. The one thing the I did not think I would mind, but after using it I really do mind is the lack of an on/off button. I don't like just unplugging it as its running- the sparks fly. I think I can easily fix this by using a timer that plugs into the wall with an on/off switch. I happen to have one of these, but really how hard would it be to put an on/off switch on the machine.In general I am happy with this purchase, at least as far as my one dehydrating experiment has gone. I did buy a dehydrating book to go along with this purchase. And if this is your first experience with a dehydrator, I do think having a cookbook (i bought the dehydrating bible) to help you along is beneficial.

I received this for Christmas. I have been wanting one for a while and have been using a Nesco. This product is fantastic it works so much faster than the Nesco.

so far it has been great. would recomend

I really like this dehydrator, although dehydrating fruits and vegetables is a lot more expensive than I thought it would be. So, I haven't been able to use it too much. Dee and I both agree that we are very excited to try the yogurt making mode because he makes homemade yogurt from time to time.9 Trays is definitely enough. I haven't filled up more than four so far. We decided to go with this size because we didn't want to buy a smaller one now and then upgrade later. It doesn't have the timer, but that is okay. You can purchase a cheap wall timer for it, if you don't plan on being home when it needs to be turned off.I am really looking forward to trying out new and healthy foods with my Excalibur!

So far so good. Dries well. Bulkier than I expected. The noise doesn't bother me. Will keep, but I am not sure it is all that superior to the American Harvester I replaced, which was cheaper. I am hoping it lasts longer. The trays on the Harvester cracked on me...maybe I should not have sent them through the dishwasher...and the heating element gave up the ghost.

Naturally, the first thing we made with this was jerky. Their manual says 4-6 hours, but it took over 8 hours to get our jerky dry enough. Happy to have, though. Didn't realize how huge it was until it came in. Could have gone for one of the smaller ones. You could easily put 15lbs of jerky in this thing at a time.

I have never owned a dehydrator previous to this one, however, I really like it!The dehydrator does a great job, it can fit a lot of food too! So far, I have made beef jerky, dried fruit and veggies. Beef jerky is amazing!!It's not terribly loud or quiet - sounds like a large fan running which is what is happening - the fan is circulating the air to speed up the dehydration process.Only downside, is cleaning the trays :( a bit of a pain in the butt.Overall, very cool product and does an awesome job!

i gave this three stars because the fruit roll trays don't fit properly. they allow liquid to just roll off. i had a mess. this is the second Nesco i purchased. the first one was a little more expensive but only lasted two years. when this one breaks down i will probably buy a different brand.

I love the dehydrator. I used it many times with great success; however, seller indicated the trays were dish washer safe. Unfortunately, the base warped in the dishwasher. Trays no longer sit flat, so circulating air will escape.

Product came fast as stated. The two fruit trays that came with this were stuck together so one ended up cracked when taking them apart. I followed the suggestion of dipping apples in a citrus juice before dehydrating so they wouldn't turn brown; 1/2 the apples made it the other half were stuck to the trays....not sure what happened, maybe too thin. Took longer than expected to dray to crispy. Mango dried well.

Nothing spectacular here. It does in fact dehydrate foods and does it fairly well. The instructions leave a bit to be desired though. The parts of the unit are not identified and their use is not clearly defined anywhere. Only thru reading the recipes does one grasp the idea of how the roll-up trays and the fine trays are to be used. I use it for drying spices/herbs. Rosemary, basil thyme, and sage all dry per chart. Oregano took over 4 days beyond chart value at recommended temp setting. Along with this unit came a jerky gun. There were 5 or 6 unmarked packets (different sizes) of seasoning ? for this purpose. Unable to use as nothing more than a production code is present and contents are not identified.

Background: My brother has had one of these for a few years and it works great. I decided to buy one since I have a large garden and didn't want to tie his up all season. I wanted a slightly larger model so I purchased an FD75 from Amazon (also reviewed) When I got it I loaded it up with bananas. They took several days instead of 12 hours. Thinking I might have done something wrong I sliced up some onions and garlic nice and thin. Again, several days... I asked my brother if I could use his to run some performance comparisons between the two. His heated up fast (10-15 minutes) and stayed reasonably well within the thermostat setting. Mine never got up to max temperature and consistently stayed 10-15 degrees cooler than whatever setting I had it on. Fine, a defect. Amazon made it easy to return and sent me a replacement. The replacement FD75 did the same thing, though it was even a little worse. Boxed up and sent back the same day, and Amazon gave me a refund since they didn't want to chance sending a third defective unit.I ordered the FD61 the day I returned the second FD75 and tested it upon arrival - again using my brother's as a benchmark. His heated up to 155d in about 15 minutes, mine took over an hour and struggled to get past 150d at all. Both FD61s... What changed?Will this work for what I bought it for? Sure, but not in the way it was designed. I'll need to determine what setting will achieve the desired temperature rather than use the reference settings on the machine. Since it doesn't seem capable of reaching the 155d necessary for making jerky I probably can't use it for that at all. Useable and does do a nice job, but the quality is questionable.Like my review of the FD75 says: Test it BEFORE you put food in it. (the other review explains how I tested and what the results were)

Love it! We've been working ours nonstop this past month: jerky, cucumbers, potatoes, carrots, onions, potato soup, tomatoes, herbs, onions, apples, oranges, banana chips, lemon, lime, fruit leather and more. We bought extra trays, tray guards and fruit trays as well. Works incredibly well, we ought this to make our own MREs for camping. We were able to convert 2 cases of cucumbers into chips in 3 days. Best dehydrator I have ever owned!UPDATE: I really did love this dehydrator...until it melted down, destroying the entire unit, a batch of jerky and my kitchen wall due to the subsequent fire. Buyer beware

So plastic! Everything is plastic! My previous one was so sturdy and all metal. I suppose it does its job though.

The product seems okay however the sides are designed so flimsy that they bow out to where the shelves could possibly fall if pushed to one side or the other. If you can deal with that it seems to be a decent unit.

I love my new toy! I am making the most amazing paprika, one teaspoon of ground dehydrated paprika pepper and your food will taste better than your favourite restaurant. Also all my herbs look so green and they are so flavourful. The only negative side was that I didn't look carefully with the currency when I bought it and since I am in Canada my credit card got charged US dollars which made my toy extremely expensive, almost double the price.

Oh no!!!!! I'm in Australia ...and Amazon quickly shipped to me (within about 3 days) .... but it is only 140 volt - not the 240v we have in Australia!!!!I'm sooooo disappointed.But - it looks great :)

The reason I bought this was was to make jerky out of deer meat. I decided to buy 5 pounds of ground beef and do a trial run with it. DO NOT USE BEEF in this thing. You will never get all of the grease out of it. I have run the trays AND screens through the dishwasher twice now. They are still slippery with grease. I am now running three at a time through the dish wash, hoping the grease will come off this time and not just wash onto the screens and racks. I have wiped grease out of the inside of the dehydrator several times, using dawn dish liquid. I'm working on it again today, trying to get this grease out. It was about 1/8 of an inch deep in the bottom of it when it was done dehydrating the hamburger. It ran down the front and is even on the bottom of it. I know, what did I expect to happen when dehydrating beef. It was lean beef, but still is real mess. I guess it is not the fault of the dehydrator. I'm mainly warning you about this just to let you know what to expect when doing beef. Think about frying 5 pounds of burger, and then think about all of this grease you'd have in your frying pan. Now, imagine all of this grease inside of this dehydrator, all over the front of the door, under it, and all over the trays and screens. The instructions say just wipe the screens off and not to put them in the dishwasher. If you don't run them through the dishwasher at least 3 times, they will not get degreased. I hope the third time through the dishwasher works this time. I ran the sausage shooter through the dishwasher once and it came out squeekyy clean. It's like these trays and screens and the inside of the dehydrator has a surface that won't let the grease come off. I hope that I don't have this mess when I finally dehydrate some venison. This so frustrating. I gave it three stars because of the level of difficulty in getting this thing clean. It performs it's job just fine. But just try and clean it. You are in for a real job.

Good overall function and simple design but could be better. The thermostat is flimsy and inaccurate so, I replaced it with a digital P.i.D. for $12 and works great. Save $50 by getting the one without the cheap timer and buy a $5 mechanical wall timer. Plastic, just sucks, so I'm making the whole thing out of redwood with stainless mesh screens. Overall, it's a really good design. Had I known how simple a design I would have made one from scratch.

While the functionality and usability of this unit is great the quality is very poor. After less than 6 months of use the plastic cover on the inside top of the unit (covers the fan blades) have begun to crack and break off as the unit is running. This unit has never been dropped or mistreated, but seems to be deteriorating just from use. The plastic grates have also begun to crack and break. It is very disappointing and seems clear I will need to order a new unit right away as this one is quickly becoming unsafe to use. It's very disappointing. I would save yourself the trouble with this one and look elsewhere for a dehydrator.

Bought this as a Christmas gift for my father 8 months ago. We've used it twice and it worked wonderfully both times! Unfortunately on the third use, a fuse blew. After contacting Nesco, they informed me they will not distribute replacement fuses to the public. I understand I can purchase replacements through Amazon, but I'm still dissatisfied that we only got to use this product twice before malfunction.

Was great for about 6 months....looking for a more reliable brand!

This seems to be a nice dehydrator. I doesn't think it was noisy at all like several people complained about. I thought, surely this can't be THAT bad! However, i have to admit, cleaning really is difficult and all i made was zucchini chips and beef jerky. It was the marinate on the jerky that was hard to get off. I hand washed, them i soaked it in the bathtub like i read others do, and finally just put them in the dish washer.The zuchini chips did not get crispy like i was hoping for, yet the jerky came out great. I really wanted it gor veggie snacks, but I'm not making any more. Had i talked with my friends who Jane dehydrated veggies, i wouldn't have gotten this. It IS good i think I'd you have a large garden to save your veggie crop and put them in soups and stews to rehydrate, which i don't eat or want to mess with. So if that's your goal to use for winter soups, i think b this would suit your needs fine.I can't imagine making fruit roll ups or anything messy to clean up those trsys, so i would pay more attention to what ppl ate sayong about clean up unless you want to do all the extra work for cleaning. I thought it was alot of work slicing veggies...i didn't even bother finishing to dehydrate the carrots i sliced up after i saw the finished products of the zuchini.

This product was advertised with the jerkey gun however my dehydrater came by its self the gun was not in the box

The first dehydrator of this model we ordered never worked. We returned it right away and Amazon Customer Service was great - efficiently processing our return and getting us a new dehydrator. The second dehydrator worked well for a handful of jerky making sessions. But this weekend it quit on us in the middle of dehydrating goose jerky. We had to finish the jerky up in the oven and are not interested in purchasing another Nesco dehydrator. We will continue to use racks in the oven to dehydrate until we can afford to purchase an Excalibur!

Looks great and all set up but no manual or instructions. How do I use this thing? Anyone know of a link to an online manual. Help!

The elctricity is not for plug in european curreent so now i can't use it. woud be good to be written wnhen you buy from diferent countries outiside US.

Unfortunately my dehydrator arrived. Broken, screws missing frm the back, the fan couldn't spin (a plastic clip was blocking it) and the thermal fuse was blown. Amazon customer service was awesome and offered a quick and fast resolution to my issue. I ended up going with a different dehydrator and brand all together, but have hears great things about Excalibur and would definitely buy it again!

Not worth the $$...in my opinion. For the price the unit is cheap, is hard to move or handle w/o the drawers slipping out, and ugly...Not that I expect beauty in a dehydrator, but for around 200$, it seems to me the price point should be about 50-60% of what it currently is...

Wanted to store extra food for Emergency & heard this is a great way to put foods away. This is an excellent product but it turned out it's more trouble for me than it's worth. Sent it back & I'll stick to letting the experts work the magic.

Came in a generic box with nothing to keep it from shifting. Some of the parts were broken.

Did not work !!!!

Used 1 time and everything was fine. Used a second time and the fan does not work. Now I must ship to the manufacture at my cost and wait. Purchased this for the good reviews, it certainly wasn't the cheapest. Stay away and find another brand.

I was really excited about this dehydrator when I first got it a year ago and tonight it just stopped working in the middle of dehydrating jerkey...these things should last more than a year. Not acceptable. I was also becoming skeptical about the #7 plastic. Maybe bpa free, but doesn't mean it's not toxic. I will be replacing with a different brand and hopefully one that is stainless and will last more than a year.

Worked the first time I used it without any problems. 2 weeks later I plugged it in after loading it and the motor was dead. Would not turn on.

It was delivered yesterday. I only used 2 trays to dry some apples. It worked for 8 hours and died. 8 hours. Obviously I'm returning it... And yea, it's pretty loud and there's no "off" button.

I have used this 2 times. Went to get it prepared and nothing. No heat or anything just went out like that.

do yourself a favor and DONT get this machine - it is very very LOUD, and does not heat evenly. I have to roatate the racks every 2 hours. I would not waste my $$ on this product again - back to the Nesco - it is quite and heats evenly and reliable. BTW, it was also shipped to me upside down with the label on the bottom, and when I reported it - I did not receive an answer - all in all - Beware

Fan stops working after 10mins, ruined all the food I left in it (120$ of steak) and now it takes almost a week to get a replacement when I had two day shipping on the first model I ordered! So pissed off.

Once we open th dehydrator it did not work. We noticed that the dehydrator had been badly assmbled because the fan did not start. We fixed the fan and the we noticed that the heat was not working. Still trying to figure out how to fix it.

i REALLY hate leaving bad reviews but we JUST got it in thursday night, tried using it friday and the fan worked for a total of 5 minutes. i need to look up the number to replace it but im really bummed i wasted fresh grown veggies from my garden on it over night :/

I bought this dehydrator because of the high reviews. I read through every inch of the instruction manual...I read up on dehydrating online. This thing came in the mail and I was so excited. I rinsed and picked off my basil leaves. Dried them. Laid them in a single layer on the racks. I didn't have a whole lot of basil, so I really only needed to use two racks. I spaced on empty rack in between the two larger ones. I checked it in 4 hours...still moist. Checked it in 8, still moist, so at this point I cranked it up to about 105 degrees from 95. Hours went by and still the same thing, so I decided I would get a thermometer and check and see if the heat was accurate. It was. It was reading 107 degrees. So then I got the humidistat from my daughter's bedroom. The humidity in my house is 58. If a humidity of my house at 58 is too high for the basil to dry then obviously it is not going to work any season of the year except the winter when humidity is at 15. I live in Northern KY, so it is not like I live in a tropical area. The amount of electricity used to dry the basil has to be WAY more than buying actual dried basil would cost. My next project was going to be apples and grapes, but not anymore. I can't imagine how long it would take to dry them! This is going back to Amazon. Oh, and before I forget, I emailed Excalibur and they never responded. I would not recommend this dehydrator.