This a great blender for the price it sold for on Overstock. It only has three settings (lo, hi, and pulse) but honestly, I have never in my life understood why blenders needed 18 speeds...must be hard for the makers to come up with synonyms for "blend" to label each speed, I imagine. I use this blender for smoothies so my only disappointment is that even with the powerful motor and the 6 blades, I still find unblended chuncks of frozen fruit in my smoothies even after blending for a minute or so. Someday, I hope to find a blender that will blend all my fruit, but for now this blender is a great cost-effective addition to my kitchen.