Skillet vs sauté pan: which shape fills your gap?

A skillet, or fry pan, has low, sloped sides, so a spatula slides under food easily and you can toss what's in it. A sauté pan has taller, straight sides that hold in liquid, which suits dishes you brown first and finish in a sauce.

Makers don't all use the names the same way, and some small pans called “open sauté pans” look like fry pans. Our product pages keep each maker's own name for its pan, and the drawings show its shape.

Skillets are sold by the inch and sauté pans by the quart, so the labels can't be compared directly. Look at the flat floor for browning room, the quarts for how much liquid it holds, and the handles for how you'll lift it full.

A lid is handy for covered cooking but doesn't turn a skillet into a sauté pan. Check that the set you're buying includes the lid, and look up the lid's own oven limit if you finish dishes in the oven.

If your skillet already handles all your frying, a sauté pan adds more than a second skillet of nearly the same size would. If you already cook one-pan meals in a wide braiser, a sauté pan may just repeat that job.

The gap finder treats sauté pans and braisers as one job to keep things simple, but they don't handle alike: a long handle and two short loop handles feel very different with food inside. Compare the empty weight, the full length with handles and your storage before choosing.