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  • Design & Usability

  • The Flex Duo System

  • Rangetop

  • Oven, Broiler, & Convection

  • Warranty

  • Consider This

  • From the Lab

  • Oven & Broiler Performance

  • Rangetop Performance

  • Design & Usability
  • The Flex Duo System
  • Rangetop
  • Oven, Broiler, & Convection
  • Warranty
  • Consider This
  • From the Lab
  • Oven & Broiler Performance
  • Rangetop Performance

Pros

  • Cooktop heats very well

  • Adjustable dual oven

Cons

  • Uneven baking

Samsung's line of Flex Duo ranges means you won’t have to choose: Start with a single, 5.9 cubic foot cavity, but slide a partition in the middle and suddenly you’ve got two smaller ovens.

The Samsung NE59J7850WS Flex Duo electric range (MSRP $1,899) improves on that design even further. With its new Duo Door design, you can open either the whole door, or just the top portion. That means you can broil and bake at the same time—or just leave the divider in and bake in the smaller oven up top.

At $1,279 on sale, it's an outstanding value. The oven has a ton of settings, and the rangetop is great. And the Flex Duo setup works well, too—as long as you know how to use it effectively. Consider us fans. If you like this range but don't want the Flex Duo option, consider the similar NE59J7630SS, which sells for around $749.

Design & Usability

No shortage of options

At a glance, the NE59J7850WS has the appearance of an ordinary freestanding double oven range, complete with transitional design elements and stainless steel on front. Up top, the black glass electric rangetop has five radiant burners, including a warming zone and tri-ring burner. Two of the burners can be combined as a bridge burner. Rangetop controls are located on the backsplash, along with the oven control panel.

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However, when it comes to oven space, the NE59J7850WS is anything but ordinary. The Flex Duo system gives users the option to split the 5.9 cubic-foot cavity in two or use it as a single entity. Unlike Samsung’s previous NE58F9710WS Flex Duo slide-in or FE710DRS/XXA Flex Duo range, the NE59J7850WS has a Dual Door that gives you the option to open just the top section of the oven or the entire oven, allowing you to cut down on the amount of heat that escapes. It also lets you broil up top and bake down below at the same time.

{{amazon name="All About Roasting: A New Approach to a Classic Art", asin="039306526X", align="right"}} Inside the oven, you’ll find a split rack and two standard racks. Oven settings include Bake, Roast, Convection Bake, Convection Roast, Broil, Keep Warm, Bread Proof, Dehydrate, Slow Cook, and both a pyrolytic Self Clean and a Steam Clean cycle. There are also multiple recipe-saving settings called Favorite Cook and Easy Cook.

Below the oven cavities, the NE59J7850WS even sports a warming drawer—a rarity in a double-oven range. If you open this drawer, you’ll also uncover a slot in which to store the Flex Duo divider when you’re using the oven as a large single cavity.

The Flex Duo System

How it works

Since the main draw of this range is the Flex Duo system, it’s worth spending a little more time discussing some specifics.

You can cook with convection in the single oven and in both parts of a divided oven. However, while the lower oven offers true convection—with a heating element inside the fan—the upper cavity only has fan convection. We didn’t find that this had much of an effect on evenness in our convection baking tests, but the true convection did brown our food more quickly than the fan convection.

broiler in cavity
Credit: Reviewed.com

You can broil in the single oven or the upper oven, but not in the bottom oven.

In fact, you can't cook with anything but fan convection up top, as there's no standard bake setting. You can broil in the single oven or the upper oven, but not in the bottom oven.

Unlike other Flex Duo models, the NE59J7850WS actually allows you to broil and bake at the same time, since the Dual Door makes it possible to prop the door open for just the upper cavity—and that's a requirement for broiling in this Samsung. Just be aware that when you’re broiling on High up top, the lower oven can’t be set below 400°F—or 325°F if you’re broiling on Low.

Check your owner’s manual to learn more.

Rangetop

Flexible and effective

The NE59J7850WS’s main appeal may be its flexible oven space, but if not for the unique oven design, we’d be inclined to name its electric rangetop the star of the show. With a right front tri-ring burner and three standard burners—two of which can be combined with a bridge burner for larger items—plus a rear central warming zone, this rangetop proved as adaptable as the oven space.

And our tests found that the rangetop's temperature reach was as flexible as its design. We measured maximum temperatures around 630°F for both rear burners, but every burner on the rangetop climbed to a respectable high heat.

rangetop
Credit: Reviewed.com

Our scientific testing process found rangetop temperature reach as flexible as its design.

Minimum temperatures were all fantastic. The left front burner proved the most balmy, dipping as low as 96°F. Still, with only the right front tri-ring burner’s second ring registering a minimum temp above 140°F, there’s really no going wrong when seeking a place to simmer a sauce or melt butter.

If you want to boil water as quickly as possible, try using the outer ring of the right front tri-ring burner, which boiled 6 cups of water in just over 4 minutes during testing. The rest of the burners lagged behind when it came to boiling speed, but each of the burners on the left still boiled 6 cups in a respectable 8 minutes.

Oven, Broiler, & Convection

Your mileage may vary

We’d hazard a guess that if you’re considering the NE59J7850WS, your interest lies in its 5.9 cubic feet of flexible oven space—or, more specifically, the ability to divide it into 3 cubic feet up top and 2.7 below.

If so, you’re in luck, because we took all three ovens for a spin in our labs. Our findings? If you want this Flex Duo range, you'll need to read the owner's manual and know where to cook for the best results.

As a single oven without any dividers, the oven performed pretty well using the standard bake setting. Results weren’t perfect, but cakes and cookies we baked in the large cavity displayed few issues with browning that couldn’t be fixed by lining the pan with parchment paper. Convection resulted in pale tops and burnt bottoms, but you can fix that by turning down the heat. We didn't find any issues with uneven baking from left to right or back to front, which is good news.

single whole cavity
Credit: Reviewed.com

The Flex Duo system gives users the option to split the 5.9 cubic-foot cavity in two if desired.

When we split the oven in two and ran the same tests, results were varied. For instance, while the lower cavity is the only of the two to offer standard bake, it turned out unevenly baked goods with such a significant combination of burnt and pale spots that we’d advise you not to bother.

Both the upper and lower cavities did well with convection. Cookies baked in the upper cavity had little variation in darkness between their tops and bottoms, but were definitely darker toward the left side of the cookie sheet—indicative of airflow issues. Cookies baked in the lower cavity were evenly baked from left to right but had burnt bottoms and lighter tops. In fact, the lower cavity’s convection setting turned out darker food in general, so you may want to keep a closer eye on things you’re cooking down there to reduce the chance of burning.

upper cavity
Credit: Reviewed.com

The upper cavity only has fan convection and is unable to cook with a standard bake setting.

Preheats were quick for every cavity, with the single cavity taking about 10 minutes to preheat to 350°F, the lower taking about 7, and the upper taking just over 4—which is astoundingly fast.

Warranty

This range comes with a 1 year parts and labor warranty, which covers any defects found during the year after purchase. A 5 year parts warranty applies to just the electric cooktop.

Consider This

More adaptable than ever

The Samsung NE59J7850WS Flex Duo offers a unique chance to have a large oven and two smaller ones all in the same range, all for under $1,300 on sale. The rangetop is adaptable and all-around excellent, and there’s no denying the usefulness of the Flex Duo system.

Yes, the single large oven and smaller double ovens all have their strengths and weaknesses. But overall, the NE59J7850WS's Duo Door makes the Flex Duo system more convenient than ever.

From the Lab

We put the Samsung NE59J7850WS Flex Duo electric range through its paces in our labs, testing the rangetop and the oven both single and divided into two. The rangetop earned high scores, but the ovens had variable results.

For more information on how we test, click here.

Oven & Broiler Performance

We baked two cakes side by side in the single oven using the standard setting. Results weren’t perfect, but displayed better-than-average evenness when it came to browning. The sheet of cookies we baked had light tops and dark bottoms, but each individual cookie mirrored its neighbors almost exactly. This means that lining your cookie sheet with parchment paper or turning down the temperature could solve the problem. The use of convection also resulted in cakes and cookies with light tops and burnt bottoms.

When the oven was divided into two, results were disappointing. The top cavity is not able to bake without convection, but the lower cavity didn’t make a strong case for standard bake, turning out cookies with burnt bottoms and cakes dappled dark and light, burnt on various edges.

single whole cavity
Credit: Reviewed.com

The Flex Duo system gives users the option to split the 5.9 cubic-foot cavity in two if desired.

Convection, however, proved a significant improvement. In the upper oven, cakes were reasonably even, despite being lighter in the middle and darker on the edges. We measured the cookies as evenly browned when we compared their tops and bottoms, but cookies on the left side of the cookie sheet were darker than those on the middle and right.

The lower cavity fared about the same when we measured variation in browning. That said, everything turned out darker than on top, so keep a watchful eye on your baking.

Preheats were quick for every cavity, with the single cavity taking about 10 minutes to preheat to 350°F, the lower taking about 7, and the upper taking just over 4. The upper broiler preheated in about 5 and a half minutes.

Rangetop Performance

The rangetop gave a well-rounded performance during testing. We measured maximum temperatures from 437°F to 629°F. The left and right rear burners led the pack at 628°F and 629°F, but the right front burner’s middle ring didn’t fall far below with a max temp of 600°F.

The left front burner had the lowest minimum temperature of 96°F. The left and right rear burners dipped to 103°F and 100°F, while the right front burner’s inner ring also reached a low 100°F.

Boiling times were speedy enough to satisfy. The quickest was the right front burner’s outer ring, which boiled 6 cups of water in 4 minutes 13 seconds. The left front and rear burners boiled 6 cups in 8 minutes 3 seconds and 8 minutes 2 seconds, respectively. Avoid boiling on the right rear burner, though, which took upwards of 13 minutes.

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Meet the tester

Kori Perten

Kori Perten

Former Editor, Home & Outdoors

@Reviewedhome

Kori began her journalism career as a teenage fashion blogger and has enjoyed covering a wide variety of topics ever since. In her spare time, she’s an amateur poet, avid reader, and gluten-free cake baker extraordinaire.

See all of Kori Perten's reviews

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