I’ve got, like, five different kinds  of cutting boards in my kitchen.

But there’s one that I want to use every time. It’s got a good groove along  the edge to catch all the juices.

It goes in the dishwasher so I don’t have to do  a bunch of cleaning after preparing a whole meal. But I do consider those other cutting  boards whenever I open the cabinet. I look at them.

Maybe I should reach for the wooden  one to avoid all of the microplastics. But maybe also the nicks and ridges in a  well-loved wooden cutting board harbor tons of   bacteria and I should opt for the glass cutting  board all the way in the back of the cabinet. To cut down on my dinner time  deliberations, the SciShow team   has actually sliced through the research and has  compared different cutting board materials.

And though the winner isn’t clear cut, I  know which one I’ll be using from now on. [♪ INTRO] One of the most popular options for  cutting board materials is plastic. Of course it is! Plastic cutting boards are durable,  the USDA says they’re safe to use,   and most of them can go into the dishwasher.

But over time you’ll see  that it gets scratched up. And those nicks can release microplastics  into the food you’re chopping. And of course you’re not going to notice this.

Microplastics can be thousands of  times thinner than a human hair. But one study from 2023 suggests  that people consume up to 50 grams   of microplastic particles per  year just from cutting boards. So this is probably something that affects  you if you use a plastic cutting board.

The question is: Do microplastics affect you  enough to switch to Team Wooden Cutting Board? So we don’t know that much yet about how consuming microplastics can affect your health. But we have some health issues crop up in mice who   ate microplastics as part of a diet  prepared on plastic cutting boards.

I love the thought of the researchers  preparing mice dishes on their little   cutting boards and being like, “Gotta use  this cutting board for this group of mice!” These researchers tested two  different kinds of plastic cutting boards:   those made from polypropylene,  like the stuff in drinking straws,   and those made from polyethylene,  like the stuff in shampoo bottles. After 12 weeks of this chef-researcher-prepared  cuisine, mice who ate a diet that included   polypropylene microplastics had some  inflammation in their intestines. Versus the polyethylene microplastics,  which seemed to change their gut bacteria.

So both kinds of plastic cutting  boards had a physiological effect. But you can take that serving of data with a grain   of salt because we don’t know yet if  humans experience the same effects. Especially because the amount of  microplastics that gets released when   you chop food on a plastic cutting  board depends on a lot of things.

Like older plastic cutting boards  shed more microplastics than new ones. That same study found that  polyethylene cutting boards   released more microplastics  than polypropylene boards. But the polypropylene microplastics tended  to be smaller than the polyethylene ones.

And those smaller microplastics might make  their way deeper into your body’s tissues. So maybe a newer board made of polyethylene  could reduce your exposure to microplastics. But there are still other factors.

Even the way you chop could affect  how many particles get released. In a 2023 study, researchers had five different  people use polyethylene cutting boards. And despite chopping the exact same number  of times on the exact kind of board,   the scientists found different amounts  of microplastics from each board.

On top of that individual variation,  what you’re chopping also matters. That same study showed that some plastic  cutting boards released more microplastics   when cutting vegetables than they did if  a scientist just cut the board itself. This is my son’s dream, to discover that  vegetables could maybe be bad for you.

Considering that cutting nothing on  a cutting board really won’t do much   toward putting food on the table,  scientists have found a workaround. But it is far from perfect. Washing your food extensively after cutting  it can get rid of some of the microplastics.

It’s a whole process. We’re not talking about a quick rinse here. That will not cut it.

A 2021 study found that by rinsing  meat that had been cut on a plastic   cutting board for three whole minutes, you  could remove most of the microplastics. So that’s imperfect for several reasons. A) It’s a pain to do every  single time you dice something,   and B) that actually might open you  up to some bacterial contamination.

Washing meat or poultry can splash bacteria  onto other surfaces in your kitchen. If you don’t sanitize those surfaces,  the bacteria could make you sick. So at this point, we know of some potential  issues with plastic cutting boards,   but we can’t say for sure if they’re  actually problematic for people.

So you don’t necessarily need to throw  out your plastic cutting board …yet. But if you don’t want to worry about  adding more plastic to your diet,   there are some other kinds of  cutting boards you could use. And we’re going to get into the research  on – whoa, somebody’s on the phone.

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Just make sure all products are in  the cart for the code to take effect. Some people go with glass cutting boards. Although of course breaking one of  those is a lot more dramatic than   when you cut into a plastic cutting  board with a little too much force.

Ask Skyler, who wrote this episode,  apparently the drama is real But maybe this one is worth the risk. One study published in the journal, “Foodborne  Pathogens and Disease,” showed that salmonella   bacteria did not grow as well on glass as  they did on plastic or wood cutting boards. On top of that, glass is a  little easier to sanitize.

But glass is also really hard, which means  it can quickly dull any knives you use. And that’s not great for your  knives’ longevity, and it also   means you’re more likely to  cut yourself while chopping. For a hard cutting board that’s  a little easier on your knives,   you might want to check out one made from bamboo.

Bamboo boards don’t tend to scratch up that  much and don’t absorb a lot of moisture. And that makes them resistant to bacteria. But bamboo stems are also on the thinner side,   and sometimes they’re not big enough  to make a whole cutting board.

So manufacturers often make  bamboo cutting boards the   right size by gluing strips of bamboo together. Depending on how the glue  and the boards is arranged,   that process can put glue  in contact with your food. Now, most cutting boards use food-safe  glues that are approved by the FDA,   you would think all of them would, but some can  release the carcinogen formaldehyde over time.

So you might opt for another  microplastic-free, durable,   safe-for-knives alternative: regular old wood. Like, a slab, because glued pieces would  pose the same risk as bamboo boards. But even those one-piece wooden  cutting boards aren’t perfect.

Wood has tiny pores. If bacteria hide in those pores and make their way  back out later, they can contaminate your food. A few studies in the 90s really put the  fear of bacteria into would-be wood users.

First, in 1994, researchers at the  US Food and Drug Administration   and their collaborators compared  wooden and plastic cutting boards. They found that rinsing plastic cutting boards   with water removed more bacteria  than rinsing wooden boards did. And they traced it back to some  of the bacteria that was left on   wood cutting boards surviving inside of the pores.

Then, in 1997, another study  took that lesson a step further. They found that even if you’re careful  to wash your wooden cutting board well,   you might not get all the bacteria. After hand-washing, wooden cutting  boards were less clean than plastic.

E. coli bacteria occasionally survived a wash on  a wooden cutting board and grew into colonies. And some types of E. coli can make you sick. But since those investigations, more  studies have been brought to the table.

And they provide a bit more nuance. Like, how long bacteria persist  depends on both the bacteria and   the type of wood used to make the cutting board. In 2023, scientists exposed cutting boards made   from different types of wood  to listeria and salmonella.

Both of those bacteria can spread  through food and make people sick. Right away, cutting boards made  from European beech had less   salmonella on their surfaces than other woods. And boards made from untreated oak  had less listeria on their surfaces.

But bacteria growth over time also  varies by wood type and bacteria variety. So the relative dangers of bacteria depend on what   bacteria may be lurking and what kind  of wood shelter you’re giving them. Ultimately, having a bunch of hiding places for   bacteria seems like it would be a pretty  big strike against wood cutting boards.

But as it turns out, those pores might  not be such a bad thing after all. Other studies suggest that wood might have   bacteria-killing properties  because of those pores. To understand how that works, you need to know  what the pores are doing there in the first place.

Remember, wood comes from living  trees that need water to survive. So they need to attract and hold  onto water from their environment. Which scientists describe as being hygroscopic.

Even a wooden cutting board can  pull in water through its pores   and distribute that water throughout itself. But water isn’t the only thing along for the ride. When a wooden cutting board soaks up water,   bacteria that are on its surface  or in the water get sucked up too.

So far, this all supports the early ideas that   wooden cutting boards harbor  bacteria deep in their pores. But a few studies suggested a  different ending to the story. Researchers proposed that bacteria get trapped  inside the wood and eventually die there.

In a 2025 paper, scientists put  different kinds of bacteria on   a wooden cutting board made from  sugar maple and a plastic cutting   board made from a material called  high-density polyethylene, or HDPE. After two hours, there was no detectable E. coli  on the surface of the sugar maple cutting board! And this was after no cleaning.

Eventually, the HDPE cutting board  achieved no detectable E. coli   too as its surface dried out,  which dried out the bacteria. But it took more than four times longer. A quick note, however!

This does not mean you should leave your cutting  boards overnight and get to them in the morning,   assuming all the bacteria will die on their own. That’s just one kind of  bacteria on one kind of wood. A type of bacteria that causes staph  infections was still present on the   sugar maple board after 12 hours  and on the HDPE board after a day.

So, assuming you want to avoid that  bacteria and also maybe others,   you’re better off just doing the dishes. When the boards were washed,  bacteria couldn’t be detected. And no, they didn’t come back  out of their pores later.

So it takes longer for plastic cutting  boards to achieve bacteria killing   outcomes like wooden cutting boards  if you aren’t promptly washing them. But let’s cut to the chase. They’re not equally bactericidal.

In fact, plastic boards are better  growth environments for bacteria. A study published in the “Journal of  Food Protection” showed leftover food   fostering bacteria growth on a plastic  cutting board, but not on a wooden one. These scientists left chicken juice  on plastic and wooden cutting boards   overnight in humid conditions that  kept the boards from drying out.

The bacteria on the plastic  cutting boards multiplied. But on wooden cutting boards, there  weren’t any bacteria left the next day. The wooden boards soaked up the  bacteria soup within a few minutes.

Which makes me feel like that in  the ultimate cutting board debate,   wood takes the lead no matter how you cut it. The one caveat is it might depend  on what you’re using it for. Especially if you eat meat.

One study found that meat left more bacteria   on plastic and glass cutting  boards than on wooden ones. But vegetables left more bacteria  on wooden cutting boards. So vegetarians might weigh  their options differently.

If you work at a restaurant, though, the  convenience of plastic might be more important. Plastic cutting boards can more  readily go through the dishwasher   and be good to go again during the dinnertime rush. But regardless of which type  of cutting board you prefer,   there are a few ways of minimizing bacterial  contamination and preventing food-borne illness.

You could keep separate cutting  boards for meat and produce. And wash your cutting board after  every use with soap and hot water. Ultimately, cutting boards  aren’t meant to last forever.

If yours has deep cuts or grooves that are hard  to get clean, it might be time for a new one. The best cutting board really  depends on how you’ll use it. And scientists are still doing research  to answer open questions about bacteria,   microplastics, and newer materials.

But in my house, hand washing a wooden  cutting board sounds like the best option. I’m definitely going to miss throwing a  plastic one in the dishwasher, though. [♪ OUTRO]