Technology Connections did an excellent video on this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_yMMTVVJI4c

tl;dw -- kettles in the U.S. only take about 4+ minutes to boil a liter of water. So when you say "now" you really mean it.

I just nuke a mug of water for a minute or two when I'm making instant coffee. I never understood the big deal about electric kettles.

A water kettle lets you consistently heat water to the same temperature (not just boiling, high-end kettles have additional temperature options), regardless of:

- Amount of water

- Initial temperature of water

- Position of water container

They also prevent superheated water accidents.

Yes and: Kettles are much easier to clean than microwave (interiors).

Boiling water in a microwave does not make the microwave dirtier.

In fact if it boils it can help clean it!

True. The mess comes from a son reheating food, often tomato sauce based, without a lid.

most lid are plastics, so i suggest people heating without lids. Cleaning mwave is east anyway. I am sure ppl don't want microplastic laden food.

Better that than reheating it in a kettle!

Well our kettle is 2.4kW, our microwave is 800W or so effectively. Also our induction stovetop is much faster, so the nuking option is slowest by a lot.

Electric kettles make it easy to pour for pour over.

Microwaving has the undesirable side-effect of also heating the exterior of your beverage's vessel.

I live in the US and have an induction stovetop. It can dump 3600 watts of targeted heat into a pot of water. It can boil 2 liters of water in ~3-5 minutes.

Plus, when you reduce the heat the heat reduces almost immediately.

Nothing else compares with the speed it works that I've ever used before. Definitely worth the upgrade in time saved at the stove.

When the other options just need to be poured, waiting 4.5 minutes for boiling alone is a significant waste of time.

You can improve that by using less water, but I would still like to double the power.