The Best Massage Gun

What star.shop is for

star.shop finds the single best product in a category and hands you that one answer, so you can buy with confidence without doing the research yourself. For the best massage gun, that answer is the Ekrin Athletics B37. Reaching that decision on your own usually means one of two things: reading a long, thorough Wirecutter or other editorial review — they test extensively and write up every contender, which is excellent but a lot to read and weigh — or piecing together scattered Reddit threads, old forum posts, and reviews yourself. We do all of that reading and reconcile it into the pick above; what follows is how we got there.

A firewall between research and revenue

There is a firewall between our research and our money, and we mean that literally. During the research stage we are blind — deliberately, structurally blind — to whether a product carries an affiliate tag at all, let alone what it might pay. The analysis above happens before any of that is known: the team and tools making the pick have no visibility into commission rates. Affiliate links, where they exist, are added only after the recommendation is locked, and they have no bearing whatsoever on which product wins. Editorial and monetization sit on opposite sides of that wall, the same church-and-state separation a newsroom keeps between its journalists and its ad sales.

In this case, an Amazon affiliate tag is included in the Ekrin Athletics B37 buy link — we take part in the Amazon Associates program, the same way sites like Wirecutter do — so if you buy through it, star.shop may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. That tag was attached only at the very end, after the Ekrin Athletics B37 (also Wirecutter's pick) and every alternative we considered had been evaluated the same way on the evidence. We're glad to name the best product in a category whether or not there's any money in it for us.

Why this category is hard to research well

Massage guns are easy to spec and hard to judge. Two guns can list nearly identical numbers and feel worlds apart in the hand. What actually separates a good one from a bad one shows up in a few specific places:

• Depth of hit (amplitude) and stall force. These decide whether the gun actually reaches deep muscle or just buzzes the surface. Owners describe the gap bluntly: "The theragun punches you, the off brand ones were tickling," and another who tried cheaper models with equal-or-better specs on paper found them "miles apart" in practice. Amplitude is how deep it travels; stall force is how hard you can press before the motor gives up. A cheap gun with impressive marketing can still tickle.
• Handle shape and self-reach. A recurring complaint even about strong guns is that you can't work your own back and shoulders: one Theragun owner said "It's not really possible to use on your own back or shoulders I find." Where you can and can't reach without straining is a real, daily-use difference the spec sheet never mentions.
• Noise at the power you actually want. Multiple owners rate a quieter gun above a stronger one they already own. A common Theragun knock is that it's "so damn loud," and one owner said an old gun "sounded like it was full of rocks after 6 months of use."
• Force floor. A gun that can't drop to a gentle setting is a problem for some buyers. One Theragun owner: "you cannot drop down to a lower RPM setting for soft massaging. It's like a machine gun even at its lowest setting."

None of this is visible in a first-look review or a spec table. It surfaces after weeks of daily use, and it lives in owner threads on r/BuyItForLife, r/running, r/crossfit and r/bjj, where people report what held up, what stayed quiet, and what they could actually reach.

How we research a pick

We don't run our own product tests. Plenty of outlets already do rigorous, independent testing, and adding one more set of results to that pile is less useful than weighing all of them together. So star.shop is a meta-analysis: we synthesize the credible testing and the long-term owner record across every source we can find into a single pick.

• Sources: owner threads across r/BuyItForLife, r/running, r/crossfit, r/bjj, r/trailrunning and r/HybridAthlete, plus repeated head-to-head comparisons between Theragun, Hypervolt and cheaper alternatives.
• Recurring independently-reported issues: cheap guns that "tickle" instead of hitting deep despite good specs; motors that get loud after months of use; the near-universal difficulty reaching your own back and shoulders; and guns strong enough that even their lowest setting feels aggressive.
• The core tradeoffs buyers weigh: deep percussive power versus quietness; full-size reach and battery versus pocketable travel size; specs-per-dollar versus ergonomics, warranty and long-term satisfaction; and paying a brand premium (Theragun, Hypervolt's app) versus getting the same hit for far less.

The single most telling detail is a runner who bought the B37 after being "overwhelmed with options," compared it directly to a friend's roughly $500 Theragun, and called it "very comparable," adding that "the angled handle is really nice for using it on myself." That's exactly the combination this category rewards — Theragun-class depth plus a handle you can actually reach yourself with. One report proves nothing on its own; a single enthusiastic owner is noise. What earns the pick is the same story — deep hit, quieter than a Theragun, easy self-application, backed by a lifetime warranty — recurring across unconnected owners who bought at different times for different sports.

The Ekrin Athletics B37 versus the alternatives we considered

Each of these is a legitimate choice for a specific buyer; here's where each one loses to the B37.

Ekrin Athletics B37 vs Bob & Brad D6 Pro (a Reddit favorite)

• Strongest case: a long 16mm amplitude and ~85lb stall force for roughly half the price, with a loyal following ("I've been using a massage gun from them for a number of years," "Half the price as theragun") and a well-regarded PT YouTube channel behind the brand.
• Where it loses: the B37 matches its deep hit but adds a more ergonomic angled handle, a quieter motor, and a lifetime warranty.
• Why the B37 won: equivalent depth without the ergonomics and warranty gap. The D6 Pro is the right pick for the buyer who cares most about raw specs-per-dollar and nothing else.

Ekrin Athletics B37 vs Hyperice Hypervolt 2 (a Reddit favorite)

• Strongest case: the companion app and Bluetooth speed control genuinely win people over — one owner was "75% sure that the app was going to be an unnecessary gimmick" and admitted they were wrong, and another syncs it with health-tracking apps for guided recovery routines.
• Where it loses: the B37 delivers the same or deeper percussion for far less money, and most owners never lean on the app enough to justify the premium.
• Why the B37 won: same hit, less spend. The Hypervolt 2 is right for the buyer who specifically wants guided, app-driven recovery routines and will actually use them.

Ekrin Athletics B37 vs Therabody Theragun Prime (Wirecutter's pick)

• Strongest case: the brand name and the widest ecosystem of attachments, plus a deep-hitting reputation owners trust ("I have never been disappointed by a theragun product").
• Where it loses: it's noticeably louder ("so damn loud"), harder to reach your own back with, and costs meaningfully more.
• Why the B37 won: it hits just as deep, runs quieter, adds an easier-to-hold handle, and costs less. The Prime suits the buyer who wants the name and the largest attachment library.

Ekrin Athletics B37 vs Therabody Theragun Mini (Wirecutter's pick)

• Strongest case: pocketable, throw-in-the-bag size that travels well — "Best thing I've ever purchased," said one owner who prized the portability.
• Where it loses: for everyday home recovery it can't match the B37's reach and usable power.
• Why the B37 won: more usable power and easier self-application at home. The Mini is right for the traveler who prioritizes packability over reach and power.

What we filter out

• SEO and blog spam — thin articles assembled to rank on Google, often by writers who never used the product, restating spec sheets and each other.
• Junky affiliate roundups — "best of" lists ordered by commission rate rather than time spent using anything, where somehow every product is a winner and there's a buy button on every line.
• Astroturfing and fake Reddit comments — coordinated or paid promotion dressed up as organic enthusiasm. Recent, oddly polished praise from brand-new or low-history accounts gets heavy skepticism, especially in the past year as this has gotten cheaper to manufacture at scale.
• Fake and incentivized reviews — fabricated or comped star ratings, the kind that pile up fast on a new listing and rarely survive contact with what long-term owners actually report.
• N-of-1 blog posts — one person's single unit, briefly used, written up as a verdict. A real signal needs the same story from many unconnected owners, not one enthusiastic account.

We also separate preference from defect here. Plenty of owners note a massage gun "won't fix" recovery on its own or that stretching and strength work matter more — that's a fair reality check, not a mark against any specific gun. And "even the lowest setting feels intense" is a genuine tradeoff for someone who wants a gentle massage, but it's the flip side of the deep-hitting power this category is bought for; it's a fit question, not a flaw. We weight what deciding buyers actually report: does it hit deep, stay quiet, reach your own muscles, and hold up.

Why the recommendation above stays short

The buyer doesn't need this essay. The pick, plus the short list of pros and cons, is the compressed answer — deep Theragun-class power, an angled handle you can reach yourself with, quieter running, and a lifetime warranty for well under Theragun money. This longer write-up is here for the few who want to see the reasoning and the alternatives we passed over before they buy.

What the star.shop score means

Every pick carries a 1–5 star score for how good the product is and how happy its long-term owners are, judged against the best in its category and the ideal — never against price; an expensive product still scores high if it's excellent. The scores skew high since these are category winners, but they're not all the same: a 5.0 is rare and means essentially no real flaws, and the score steps down as common complaints or compromises add up — lowest where even the best option in a category is mediocre.

What the badges mean

• Wirecutter — a current Wirecutter pick
• r/BuyItForLife — a favorite among owners who prize long-term durability
• Reddit — a broad favorite across Reddit communities

A pick can carry several. When community consensus clearly outweighs the editorial pick, the community product takes the top spot.

Using this content

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