Would you install a Bora cooktop again? Honest experiences wanted

I’m considering a Bora cooktop with integrated downdraft extraction and would really appreciate hearing from people who have actually lived with one.

Do you have any regrets after installing it?

Specifically, I’m curious about:

  • How well it handles cooking smells (especially things like onions, garlic, or frying)

  • Whether you notice increased humidity in the space compared to traditional extraction

  • If you’re using recirculation vs. external venting, and how that’s working for you

  • Any day-to-day annoyances or things you didn’t expect

I’m trying to understand the real-life experience beyond showroom impressions, especially in open-plan kitchens.

Would you choose it again?

Thanks in advance—really appreciate honest feedback.

Lucy

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Bear in mind that Bora is not the only option. Eg. we got one of these: Induction hobs with extractor: style and efficiency combined | Elica . At the time (~3y ago) it was much cheaper than Bora.

  • Honestly, I was never concerned much about the smells from the kitchen, so not sure if I’m the right person to answer, but for me it does the job.
  • Cannot say - we installed it in newly bought house, after total transformation - eg. kitchen was closed beforehand and we have opened it. So no idea how the traditional one worked before. Also, ceiling in our case is quite high (~5 meters at the highest point), which makes it harder to see any humidity- or fat-related side effects.
  • We are using recirculation, ours is not even connected to outside. I’m just refreshing the filters in the oven ~once per year.
  • Not really, apart that it can be noisy (again, not sure how it compares with traditional one). Mose of the time we are using automatic mode, which works well.

It honestly depends why you are looking at it.

It works fine. The downward pull is interesting and does work, but it is sort of fighting physics. This means a certain amount of steam does and will always escape upwards as well. Mostly people choose it because they do not want the large overhead filter and extraction system.

That being said it does work better than if you have a very crappy overhead system.

The biggest issue I take with it is the user interface. The touch buttons are horrible and absolutely the wrong decision for a cooking stove. And even ignoring that, the way they work is quite bad. The default mode of up and down sets the speed of the fan and only by pressing a stove number do you have a few second input window where you can set that instead. otherwise it reverts back to the fan. So what actually happens is that you very often want to increase or decrease the heat of your stove but you just change the fan from automatic to some manual speed. Additionally, they have this weird feature where if you long press one of the stove buttons, it will activate power mode where it goes with maximum power. keep in mind that you regularly have to press these buttons to change cooking heat. Long press is only a bit longer than a quick press, so it happens by accident. The number will blink and that’s it, so the chances of you missing it and massively burning a pot on power mode is relatively high.

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100% agree on this one - get one with knobs! We went with “Downline Infinity Pro” from Wesco / Berbel (Kochfeldabsaugung Downline Infinity - WESCO DE/FR only)

There is more smell compared with the previous overhead, external venting system - that’s just plain physics.

No - but I never measured and I guess, there is an increase in humidity (?)

Re-circulation. Working +/- as expected.
→ The “get rid of the overhead system” compensates the “more smell” quite well, IMO.

Not day-to-day, but: Customized filters can- and will cost you money. E.g. my parent’s Bora filter replacement was around 250 CHF. My system works with plain activated carbon pellets…

So that’s what that is.

OP, I love mine. Yes there are drawbacks, but it works just great and the benefit versus an overhead it just insane. No more head banging. So much more open space. My apartment has good vents so I don’t ever notice humidity tbh.

Get it in Germany for 100. And I have been using mine for well over a year. No degradation in performance and no smell. So the replace it every year is also just to get you to spend more money. But agreed, this is a drawback.

Same here. We open our balcony door for a few minutes post cooking to get remaining smell out. Would buy again for sure.

In our Elica’s model it works well, but there is just one drawback - brightness is not too high, meaning when it’s really bright with sun shining etc., one has to look closer…