If your spice collection has outgrown your existing rack, you know the frustration of losing that jar of smoked paprika when you need it most. While there are several ways to tackle this problem, we explore why a storage solution that scales with your collection and keeps everything visible is the best way to keep cooking easy.
Spice Storage Racks For Compact Kitchens: Why Visibility Matters Most When Storing Spices
The Spicy Shelf Deluxe is a versatile spice storage option for cabinets that hugs the back and sides for maximum visibility. Over 66% of homeowners are making kitchen drawer organization a top priority for 2025, but specialised storage solutions such as spice rack drawers and integral chopping boards can make everyday items easily accessible without requiring any unnecessary bending or stretching. The trick to an efficient spice storage solution isn't necessarily being able to fit everything onto a single rack or into a single drawer - although those certainly have their merits - it's finding a home for every spice that's easy to access and view from any position in the kitchen.
In our America's Test Kitchen evaluation, the Spicy Shelf Deluxe outshined the competition in this regard. Securing to the back of a cabinet with included clips - this clever spice rack fits four or more rectangular jars per tier and can be expanded from three to five levels simply by sliding out a divider. This compact kitchen hack is perfect for organizing herbs and spices in a way that allows you to see everything at once, so you're less likely to buy duplicates.
The National Association of Professional Organizers (NAPO) reports that on average we spend one year of our lives looking for lost items. Finding the right home for your spices and other kitchen tools can save you time and money over the long run - and help prevent unnecessary waste.
What you have to understand is that visibility is not just about seeing the label and so it also means being able to read the label without picking up the jar and turning it around and so racks that angle the jars toward you or store them face-up in a drawer solve this problem better than flat horizontal racks do. A common mistake people make is storing jars with the lid facing up on a flat shelf and so you have to pick up every single jar to find the one you want and that slows down cooking and makes the whole rack feel more frustrating than helpful. The fix for most people is to either tilt the jars or lay them flat with the label facing up and so you can scan the whole collection in one look.
How to Choose Spice Storage Racks for Compact Kitchens
The mDesign 3 Tier Plastic Expandable Kitchen Spice Rack Organizer is a tiered cabinet option with a large capacity, though it tends to hide items on the back tiers. When organizing your kitchen, consider which storage hacks could have the greatest impact. In a recent survey, homeowners ranked custom drawer inserts as their number-one kitchen storage upgrade - with 88% of participants agreeing that they would make their kitchen more functional and enjoyable. Other popular choices included platform organizers for cabinets and lazy Susans for cabinets or drawers.
But when it comes to storing spices, which tend to be small and come in varying shapes and sizes, a specially designed rack or drawer insert is usually the best choice. There are plenty of options available that can fit into a cabinet or drawer, mount to the wall, or hang from the door. Beyond finding a home for every spice that's easy to access - the most important consideration may be finding a solution that grows with your collection.
One example that fell short in our evaluations was the mDesign 3 Tier Plastic Expandable Kitchen Spice Rack Organizer. While this rack organizes spices in a cabinet with a roomy, expandable design, testers found that it hides the spices on its middle tiers. "Unless you pull this unit out entirely, you won't know what's hiding along the back," they wrote. Instead - look for a rack or organizer that allows you to see all your spices at a glance, so you're less likely to misplace something - or purchase a duplicate.
What you have to understand is that expandability matters more than total capacity right now and so a rack that fits your current collection but has no room to grow will force you to buy a second rack sooner than you expect. For most people the better move is to choose a rack that can add tiers or sections later and so you avoid having to reorganize everything from scratch when your collection gets bigger. Keep in mind that a rack with a large footprint is not automatically better because a rack that fills your whole cabinet shelf leaves no room for the other items that also need to live in that cabinet.
A common mistake people make is buying a rack based on how it looks in a product photo and so they do not check whether the jar sizes shown in the photo match their own jars and the rack ends up not fitting their actual collection. The fix is to measure your tallest and widest jars before you buy anything and so you know the minimum slot height and depth the rack needs to have.
DIY Spice Racks and Drawer Inserts
A survey conducted on January 9, 2025, with 1,000 U.S. homeowners aged 18-99 revealed that 58% of respondents said messy drawers and cluttered countertops cause daily stress. If purchasing a new spice rack or drawer organizer isn't in your budget - there are some inexpensive DIY alternatives that will help reduce that stress.
According to the experts at America's Test Kitchen, square spice jars have the most efficient footprint for DIY spice racks, allowing you to fit more spices into a smaller amount of space. Using that knowledge, it's simple to cut foam board into rectangles that act as dividers to organize spices in a drawer. You can cut a spice drawer liner made of silicon - typically used to keep labels facing upward - into any size or shape needed to accommodate a collection of any size.
And since many spice racks are just a series of rectangles, all it takes is some plywood - a saw, sandpaper, and paint or stain to make a rack that fits your needs. One tip from America's Test Kitchen: Use plywood with tongue-and-groove connections, which allows you to easily expand your rack as your spice collection grows.
What you have to understand is that the material you use for a DIY divider matters more than most people think and so a foam board divider that gets wet from a damp drawer will warp and stop holding your jars in place. The fix for most people is to use a thin piece of wood or a cut piece of rigid plastic instead and so your dividers stay flat and keep working for a long time. Keep in mind that you should sand any cut wood edges so the jars slide in and out without catching on rough spots.
A common mistake people make with DIY drawer inserts is cutting all the slots the same width and so square jars fit fine but round or tall jars end up falling over. The simple fact is that measuring your actual jars before you cut anything saves you from having to redo the whole insert and so it is worth taking that extra step first.
What to Consider Before Hanging a Spice Rack
The Lynk Professional Adjustable Expandable 4 Tier Steel Spice Drawer Organizer is a sturdy, expandable option for drawers. As much as we love the idea of hanging a wall-mounted spice rack over the door - it may not be worth the investment - or even a DIY weekend. In our evaluation, the Home-Complete Over the Door Storage Rack was the only one of three door-mounted spice racks to earn an Excellent rating, but it's made of flimsy hardware that requires a sturdy door to attach to, and doors often open wider than a typical wall rack can allow. The other two struggled to hold spice bottles, and all three were challenging to access.
While over-the-door racks do free up cabinet or drawer space for other items - there are better solutions that keep your spices organized, protected from light and moisture, and within easy reach. We recommend sticking with spice racks and organizers that fit inside a cabinet or a drawer.
The simple fact is that wall-mounted and door-mounted racks expose your spices to more light than a closed cabinet does and so spices stored on open racks can lose their flavor and potency faster than spices kept in a drawer or cabinet. For most people this is a slow process but if you cook infrequently and your spices sit on an open rack near a window the problem gets worse faster. Keep in mind that storing spices away from heat and light is a basic step that helps your spices stay useful longer.
A common mistake people make is mounting a rack on a hollow-core door and so the hardware pulls loose over time because hollow doors do not hold screws well. The fix is to check that your door is solid before you attach anything to it and so you avoid the rack falling and breaking your jars.
What People Get Wrong
A lot of people think that buying more rack space solves the problem and so they end up with a large rack that takes up most of their limited cabinet or counter space when the real fix is to first remove duplicate or expired spices and then find a rack that fits what is left. On top of that people assume that alphabetical order is always the best system but for most people grouping spices by how often you use them works better because the spices you reach for every day should be at the front and the ones you rarely use can go in the back. People also think that a tiered rack inside a cabinet always lets you see everything but the simple fact is that deep cabinets swallow the back tiers of most racks and so you still lose track of what you have unless the rack pulls out or angles the jars toward you. What you have to understand is that the shape of your jar matters and so mixing round jars and square jars on the same rack wastes space and makes the rack feel messier than it needs to be and so picking one jar shape for your whole collection makes any rack work better. Keep in mind that over-the-door racks feel like a space-saving win but for most people the door clearance and the flimsy hardware end up being a bigger problem than the storage benefit is worth.
What This Does Not Cover
This article covers general spice storage ideas for typical compact home kitchens and so it does not apply if your kitchen has unusual cabinet depths or non-standard door sizes because those situations may need a custom solution. The advice here is also not meant for people who store large quantities of bulk spices because bulk storage has different weight and container requirements that a standard rack cannot handle. If your kitchen has rental restrictions that prevent you from drilling into walls or mounting anything permanently then wall-mounted options described here may not be available to you and so you should focus only on freestanding or drawer-based solutions. On top of that if you have mobility or reach limitations that make bending down to a low drawer or reaching up to a high shelf difficult you should talk to an occupational therapist or a kitchen design professional who can recommend storage heights and configurations that fit your specific needs.
References
- are making kitchen drawer organization - eaglewoodworking.com
- Tier Plastic Expandable Kitchen Spice - americastestkitchen.com
- jars have the most efficient - domino.com
