I don't use a basket. I don't think my Miele came with one at all. They will love the 3rd rack once they start using it. We use one side for spoons and forks and the other for knives. Makes it so easy to empty the DW with less sorting needed.

Choice to use either, or both if the basket is conducive to particular items vs. the 3rd rack. Take the basket out if you wish.

Sometimes the silverware rack fills up but then I tend to not park them super close together. I don't think I got a basket w the Miele I own . If the basket does not rob other valuable space you may find you use it w the rack . If not , remove it. We go through a lot of teaspoons w coffee and tea and yogurts etc

My Jenn Air came with both and our silverware did not fit in the 3rd rack. We are replacing it with a Miele (which we owned in our last house) and I don't think it came with a basket. We just used the top rack. Take out the basket if you'd like, that 3rd rack is great!

Thanks for the feedback. For now I am removing the basket, but I will keep it nearby in case we need it.

Cheryl Hewitt your post made me smile because DS has forgotten the third rack already :)

My basket is now in the basement on the drainboard next to the utility sink. II is doing a very useful job holding washed paint brushes and the like.

We put sharp items in the 3rd rack. That way, I can hand my children the silverware basket knowing it contains only safe items for them to put away independently.

We have a Bosch 800. Initially, my husband thought he’d hate the third rack. However, it didn't take long for him to adjust, and now he likes it. He’s the one who loads and unloads the DW most of the time, and he’s sure the silverware gets consistently cleaner with the rack, since there is no overlapping, or cupping of the forks and spoons. I agree. We’ve never found baked on food on the forks, spoons and knives, that we used to with the basket in our old KA. We‘ve never used the basket that came with the Bosch. It’s in a closet somewhere...

My basket is under the sink and holds some little cleaning tools, the bottle of jet-dry, etc. I love the third rack. Bosch. (I don’t like the bottom rack, though. I wish dishwashers had interchangeable racks.)

We use the top rack for spatulas, condiment dishes, Tupperware lids, etc, so there is almost never room for silverware.

That top 3rd rack is usually used for large utensils, not silverware.

Can you explain that, Anglophilia? My top rack is high enough that some of my large utensils work better on the middle rack (and are especially handy for anchoring plastic containers).

I use the basket for silverware. We use 3rd rack for small prep bowls, spatulas and other assorted gadgets that fit there. We have a Bosch with the My Way Rack.

I beg to differ with Anglophilia. Why do you think there are all those divided spaces on the top rack? They're not for large utensils. However, if you place soup spoons, large forks, and knives at the front of the rack, and teaspoons and salad forks towards the back of the rack, there’s usually room for some large utensils in the middle. The largest of the utensils, like soup ladles, fit better on on the middle rack, like bpath said.

My bosch came with a basket. I removed it. The third rack holds everything without it.

darbuka it will all depend on the particular 3rd rack. This is what my 3rd rack looks like. This is a stock image not my actual dishwasher. I took out the small tray that can be used for silverware.

I love the third rack for our flatware! Our DW came with a traditional basket, too, that we do not use. Good ideas here for re-purposing it, though.

The variety in how people use the third rack is interesting. My next dishwasher may have a third rack based on this discussion!

I have a Bosch with a silverware rack and use it for exactly that, plus lids and measuring cups/spoons. I've never used the basket except to corral small cleaning tools under the sink.

We use the basket for silverware and the 3rd rack for small prep bowls, small containers (they don't flip over and fill with water), Kitchen scissors, etc. My DH found the 3rd rack too much of a pain to use for silverware when loading the DW since each piece has to be carefully placed in the slots vs tossing in one of the baskets. We usually only need one basket, though.

What Buehl mentions about it being a pain to have to place each piece in the slots is exactly why I don't use the top rack for silverware. There are times where I don't even open the door all the way and can still manage to get silverware into the basket. The basket on my Bosch does have a lid with slots but I took that piece off.

I guess I'm the outlier. Our Bosch dishwasher came with a third rack and we removed it completely. Problem is we use a lot of tall plastic 'stadium cups' and they won't fit on the top (well, second) rack with the third rack in place. Same goes for wine glasses, small plates, etc.

We also have a Bosch that had the third rack-we couldn’t get tall glasses or wine glasses to fit in with it so we took out 3rd rack and use silverware basket. No issues and you can load a ton in it—just sorry I paid extra for the 3rd rack model.

Our wine glasses fit:

localeater, we never use the basket. Took them out and put them away as soon as I got the DWs. Everything loads fine including wine glasses. We went from a Miele with a third rack to Thermador with the same. Just take a look at online videos and the manual and you will see the best ways to load everything including wine glasses. With the foldable tines and the adjustability of the middle rack, I have never had to take the third rack out.

I have a Bosch 500 and I use both. I use the basket for my flatware, because it's stored near my table rather than the DW and the basket makes it easy to carry over there. I use the 3rd rack for flat items like spatulas, large spoons, small Tupperware lids, pizza cutter, etc.

I have a KA. I took out the top rack like Frodaddi because things weren't fitting in the second rack. I forget but I'm pretty sure that in my model the 3rd rack was not set up to be a flatware rack. And removing the flatware basket leaves a not-to-useful gap.

My 4 year old uses the 3rd rack. I'm sure your kids will figure it out. I ditched the basket all together.

I put small wine glasses in my basket and sometimes utensils if they don't fit in the third rack. If I have no wine glasses in it I often take it out to fit other stuff in the lower rack - pots, pans, etc.

Thank you all for your replies, the basket is in the utility room and we are using the rack! So far it is working great.

Vinmarks, you’re right! I’ve never seen a top rack in that configuration. I was assuming all top racks were like mine, set up for all silverware with a space in the middle for larger utensils.

In my Bosch 800, all the racks are adjustable, so wine glasses fit without issues.

I <3 my MyWay rack - seriously! We don't use the flatware option, WAY too impatient unfortunately.

We use the basket for silverware and the 3rd rack for small prep bowls, small containers (they don't flip over and fill with water), Kitchen scissors, etc. My DH found the 3rd rack too much of a pain to use for silverware when loading the DW since each piece has to be carefully placed in the slots vs tossing in one of the baskets. We usually only need one basket, though.

I didn't think I'd love the third rack as much as I do. And I love it for the opposite reason of your hubby. Yes it takes an extra second to put the silverware in the slots, but it take 1/8 the time to then put all the silverware away since you don't have to sort it out. Line up all the soup spoons, line up all the teaspoons, line up all the salad forks...

When I was in NY using the basket, I wound up cursing the darn thing because of how things stuck together and how I had to pick out one by one each silverware piece. It took double the time to put it away.

The third rack is pain. I took it out and use baskets for silverware. More headroom for the second rack.

Cp, yes, I sort as I load! My family does not, and they tease me for taking 2 seconds to re-sort their chaos. It‘s a flash to unload!

Would never go back to a dishwasher without a third rack. It uses the space better than the basket, it's easy to load, insanely easy to unload, and washes all my cutlery 100% clean each time. It also ensures that I never get poked by any pointy cutlery.

I feel it's one of those inventions you wonder why it took them this long. But then, it has been around for about 20 years now. It just took a while to catch on

>>"In my Bosch 800, all the racks are adjustable, so wine glasses fit without issues."<<

Same here. We adjusted the middle rack as low as it will go and everything fits.

Ditching the basket in the bottom rack opened opened up a lot of real estate there for bowls and dishes, too.

For those that find the top rack too cumbersome, I figured out that it is faster to load the top rack last. Especially when we have a crowd, we corral the cutlery in the small Ikea wash tub that I keep in the sink and then it takes a minute to separate while loading making it super easy to unload. The tub also saves the sink from unnecessary abuse.