The best lawn aerators in 2026, as tested by our expert team

A lush, green lawn is a source of pride and joy for many gardeners, but as the focal point for gatherings with friends and family, it can suffer from overuse and too much wear and tear. Terrific turf needs a good lawn care regime to achieve it, and while regular mowing and watering will take you so far, there are a couple of additional tasks for you to do on your to-do list, which will help keep your lawn in tip-top condition.

Regardless of how often you cut your lawn, over time the soil underneath the turf becomes compacted, while above ground a thick, impenetrable layer of thatch and organic debris develops around the roots. This undesirable combination prevents air, water, and nutrients from reaching the root system, ultimately weakening its growth and leaving the plant susceptible to pests and diseases.

Scarifying your lawn will help remove thatch and debris, but if you need to relieve compacted soil underneath the turf, it's best to aerate it. Aeration is the process of making air holes in the lawn to create ventilation. In small lawns, a simple garden fork can be used to push holes into the ground, but you can also buy manual aerators, either solid or hollow-tined, which require the same effort as a fork. However, if you have a lot of lawn and not much time, other types of aerators are probably the best option. Whether you’re pushing a roller covered in spikes or using a powered machine, these aerators are a labour-saving version of the trusty garden fork, mechanically making a series of holes in the lawn.

The best lawn aerators to buy at a glance

• Best aerator for manual hollow-tined aerating: Kent & Stowe 4 Prong Lawn Aerator
• Best aerator for manual aerating: Greenkey Lawn Aerator
• Best combination aerator for safety: Stihl RLA 240 Cordless Lawn Scarifier

Jump to:

• Best Buy lawn aerators in 2026
• The best of the rest
• What is a lawn aerator, and what does it do?
• Types of lawn aerator
• How to choose the best lawn aerator

In every review, we award the outstanding products our coveted Best Buy award. To see these and the others we recommend, browse our pick of the best hedge trimmers below:

Best lawn aerators

Kent & Stowe stainless steel 4 prong lawn aerator

RRP: £39.99

Our rating: 4.3 out of 5

Available from: Marshalls Garden

Pros

• Lightweight
• Comfortable
• Removes good whole soil plugs

Cons

• Needs strong treading to work

Awarded a BBC Gardeners' World Magazine Best Buy for manual hollow tined aerating, this simple aerator from Kent & Stowe works well. The smooth, FSC-grade ash handle is comfortable, lightweight and doesn’t rub, even after using it for a while. The handle runs into a single-riveted steel socket above wide steel treads, and these treads are great for striking and pushing into soil. However, the 9cm stainless steel tines don't go in smoothly every time, despite being pointed. Its best feature is that it produces good, solid plugs of soil that are great for breaking down and reusing as topsoil.

Buy Kent & Stowe Lawn Aerator 4 Prong from Marshalls Garden, Amazon and ManoMano

Greenkey Rolling lawn aerator

RRP: £49.99

Our rating: 4.5 out of 5

Available from Amazon

Pros

• Adjustable height
• Easy to use
• Lightweight
• Good for storage
• Plastic caps to cover the spikes when not in use

Cons

• Needs assembling – though it’s straightforward
• Hard work, so best suited to small gardens

Awarded a BBC Gardeners' World Magazine Best Buy for manual aerating, the Greenkey Rolling lawn aerator is basic but does the job well. Lightweight with sturdy spikes, it’s just the tool if your small lawn needs aeration. Made from aluminium and plastic, it’s lightweight but feels substantial and features a T-bar grip as well as an adjustable shaft to suit different height users. The drum is 30cm wide, which covers a lawn quickly and easily, and there are 30 x 4.5cm spikes to ensure deep, even aeration. It comes with a two-year warranty.

Read the full Greenkey Rolling Lawn Aerator review

Buy Greenkey Manual Lawn Aerator from Amazon, B&Q and Crocus

Stihl RLA 240 cordless lawn scarifier

RRP: £224 (without battery and charger)

Our rating: 4.5 out of 5

Available from Just Lawnmowers

Pros

• Excellent safety features
• Easy to use
• Comfortable

Cons

• Struggles with inclines

Awarded a BBC Gardeners' World Magazine Best Buy for safety, this combination machine is powered by a 36V, 4.8Ah battery. It takes 205 minutes to charge, but is easy to plug in and has a helpful charge indicator, although this is faint in daylight. The battery also has great safety features – it won’t work without a safety key, and there’s a lock on the powerbar for an effective dead-man switch. It lasts long enough to cover a 250m2 lawn, about the size of a tennis court. Thanks to smooth, high-quality wheels, it feels lightweight and easy to manoeuvre, which is surprising given that it weighs 15kg.

Powerful aerating blades cut through the top layer of soil well, to help improve lawn health, rather than relieve compacted soil or open the structure of heavy clay and, in doing so, also tackle most of the thatch and moss in the lawn. The scarifying drum attachment was effective on moss, too, though not as efficiently with thatch. Although this machine struggles with inclines, catching on the surface and shutting itself off if your lawn isn't level, this isn’t too much of a problem, because you can easily adjust the heights from +7.5mm to -9.5mm to avoid this problem. The automatic shutdown is also a great safety feature.

Buy Stihl RLA 240 Cordless Lawn Scarifier and Aerator from Just Lawnmowers

Best of the rest

Although this model didn’t quite achieve a BBC Gardeners’ World Magazine Best Buy award, it still had features that made it worth recommending.

Cobra S3840V Cordless Scarifier

RRP: £360.99

Our rating: 4 out of 5

Available from Just Lawnmowers

Pros

• Comfortable to use
• Very effective
• Quick to charge

Cons

• Scalps the lawn
• Very poor instructions

The Cobra S3840V Cordless Scarifier handles well. It’s big, and the wheels are prone to being a little stiff, but it’s lightweight and has a soft-grip handle, which makes it comfortable to use. At 92dB, it’s relatively quiet, too. The 40V 5Ah battery charges quickly in just 90 minutes and lasts for 40 minutes. The machine itself is easy to use, and we loved being able to see the charge indicator through the transparent window. The aeration blades and spring tine scarifying drum can be set at five heights, which range from -10mm to +5mm. Unfortunately, the instructions are poor, so it takes a while to get this machine up and running. On the plus side, at 38cm wide, it covers a large area of lawn, reducing how long you spend on the job, but its size makes this combination machine very bulky and difficult to store.

Buy the Cobra S3840V Cordless Scarifier from Just Lawnmowers

Time to show your lawn some TLC? Check out our round-up of the best lawn scarifiers and expert tips on how to improve your lawn in 12 weeks. You can also keep edges looking neat with our pick of the best lawn edging.

In addition to aerators and scarifiers, we've tested a range of lawn mowers, including the best cordless lawn mowers, the best robotic lawn mowers and the best electric lawn mowers and the best grass trimmers. For those with small lawns, our guide to the best hand push mowers will be helpful.

What is a lawn aerator, and what does it do?

Aerating your lawn is part of a spring and autumn lawn care regime, and there are two different methods of aerating your lawn:

• Spiking – this involves using solid spikes to create holes in the lawn, which are a couple of millimetres in width and several centimetres deep, to help relieve compacted soil
• Hollow tining – as it sounds, hollow tines are pushed into the ground to remove cylindrical plugs of turf, around a centimetre wide and a few centimetres deep. Depending on the soil type, you may wish to fill these holes with a sandy mix or leave them to let the soil expand and close the holes, which helps with waterlogged clay soil

Types of lawn aerators: the different ways to aerate your lawn

There are four types of aerators, each with their own pros and cons:

• Spike shoes - these are cheap and easy to use and most effective on soft – but not soggy - ground in small gardens
• Manual aerators - although these are useful tools, which can do specific jobs (see above), using them requires a lot of effort, as it gets tiring, even on a small lawn. But they’re cheap, and a great idea if you’re after a workout
• Manual Rolling Drum Aerators – these are time and labour saving, as you simply walk across the lawn pushing the roller
• Powered Aerators – the obvious advantage of using these is that they’re labour-saving. They're also almost always available as part of a 2-in-1 combination machine that scarifies as well, so you get two jobs done for the price of one. However, it’s important to note these mechanical aerators don’t aerate in the same way that a manual aerator does - they use metal blades rather than spikes or tines. These blades create shallow slits rather than deep holes, and although they will help maintain a healthy lawn by allowing air and water to move through this top layer of soil, they won’t improve your lawn if it’s compacted or you have heavy clay. Mechanical aerators are quite an investment too, as you’re using them twice a year at the most – even if they’re a 2-in-1 combination of aerator and scarifier – and they require more space to store than the other alternatives

How to choose the best lawn aerator

Depending on the type of aerator you’re going to choose, there are several key features to look for:

• Manual hollow tine – look out for strong, solid tines that will cope with compacted turf, a decent tread to prevent your foot from slipping, and a soft-grip handle for comfort
• Manual rolling drum – ideally, you want a good number of metal spikes on the drum to create plenty of holes – as a guide, 27 spikes will give you about 180 spikes per square metre. The spikes should also be at least 5cm long to ensure they penetrate the ground deeply
• Mechanical aerator – go for strong, good-sized blades and a collection box. If storage space is an issue, look for handles that fold down and a collapsible collection box rather than a solid one

How to get the perfect lawn

It’s not just aerating that will improve the quality of your lawn; look at our other tips below:

• Always rake up clippings when mowing at the start of the year, so they don’t smother younger, emerging shoots
• Neaten edges with a lawn edger
• Dig up small weeds like plantain and dandelions with a hand trowel
• Use a spring-tined lawn rake to rake out dead grass and moss in areas where there is poor growth
• Once the lawn is established, and later in the year, leave the clippings in place to act as a nutrient-rich mulch that will feed the grass
• If you notice bare patches, break up the soil, scatter grass seeds then sprinkle with potting compost. Cover newly sown seeded areas with netting
• When mowing on hot, dry days, raise the mower’s cutting height and make sure newly sown areas are watered

How we tested lawn aerators

To see how well lawn aerators perform, the GW reviews team tested a range of models across a range of garden situations – creating holes and slits in different turf and ground conditions. Before we started, we checked for any wildlife in the grass and organic debris on the lawn surface. The lawn aerators were compared, and the following criteria used to calculate the scores, with equal weight given to each:

• Set-up & storage: We looked at the assembly needed, ease and clarity of instructions, any storage features and, where relevant, the cable length
• Handling: We assessed ease of use, weight, noise levels, comfort and safety features
• Performance: Considered the strength of the tines or blades, as well as how well they created holes and slits in the lawn. For the 2-in-1 machines, we also evaluated how well the spring tines removed moss and thatch in the scarifying mode
• Value for money: We reviewed all of the above, plus quality and design, the RRP and the length of warranty

For more information on our testing process, see How we review

Meet our testing panel

Oliver Parsons, Strategic Projects Editor
Oliver is a gardener and magazine journalist of 20 years’ experience. He trained as a professional horticulturalist at RHS Garden Hyde Hall in Chelmsford and has also worked for Gardening Which?, as a freelance gardener and with the gardening team at Down House in Kent. He is now Strategic Projects Editor at BBC Gardeners’ World Magazine and GardenersWorld.com, heading up our reviews desk, Apple News output and weekly newsletter.

Kay Maguire, Magazines Editor
Kay trained at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew and has been writing and making films about gardening ever since. She has written for websites and magazines, including The Garden and Amateur Gardening, was Horticultural Editor on BBC Gardeners’ World Magazine for five years, and has also written several books on a range of gardening topics from growing house plants to making the most of a small space. After several years as Reviews Editor, building up our reviews section into a leading resource for UK gardeners, she has now become Magazines Editor for BBC Gardeners’ World Magazine, responsible for all print output.

Harry Duncton, freelance powered tools tester
Harry has a wealth of experience, from being a language teacher to a tree surgeon, and has built this into a career writing about all things DIY and gardening. A passionate believer in self-reliance, his aim is to inspire others to give it a go themselves and not worry about making a few mistakes along the way. A regular contributor to popular DIY blogs and a recent addition to the BBC Gardeners’ World Magazine team, he loves tracking down the best new tools and writing about them.

Sue Fisher, freelance garden writer
Sue’s extensive horticultural career spans over 40 years, starting with a decade in the garden centre and nursery industry before developing into an accomplished gardening writer, designer and speaker. Sue writes regularly for BBC Gardeners’ World Magazine, GardenersWorld.com, and Garden Answers magazine. She has written 10 books on subjects including container gardening, plants for small gardens and designing with colour, and she has co-authored other books with some of the biggest names in gardening.

Emma Crawforth, Horticulture Editor
Emma holds the Kew Diploma in Horticulture and has been working in horticulture for 18 years, including roles in public gardens, a plant nursery supplying plants for the RHS Chelsea Flower Show and a training college for young horticulturists. She looks after an ornamental, fruit and veg garden at home and regularly undertakes trips to see plants growing in their natural habitats. She is the author of the Kew Publications book, Things to Do with Plants.

This review was last updated in January 2026.