Milwaukee Vs. DeWalt: Who Sells The Better Tire Inflator? (According To Users)

A typical visit to your local Home Depot store yields not just a host of different tools, but a lot of the same kind of tool from different brands. Considering each brand has its own battery and charging ecosystem — not to mention potentially differing price points — it can be difficult to make a quick decision whether you're shopping in person or online. Thankfully, you're not all on your own these days; it's for this exact reason that we have user reviews posted to Home Depot's online storefront, gathered from brand websites and Home Depot shoppers.

Let's say, for example, you're looking to get a portable inflator for the purpose of keeping your car or truck tires topped up. We've already guided you to some top-rated tire inflators, but two that didn't make that list were the Milwaukee M18 Tire Inflator and the DeWalt 20V MAX Inflator. Both of these products are available for purchase at Home Depot, and both brands made the top five in our ranking of the best power tool makers. These two inflators earned praise from buyers, but which one is the one for you? That can depend on a variety of factors — including pricing and use case — but for the sake of science, let's see if we can narrow it down.

First, let's go over the specs and talking points for each inflator based on information from their respective Home Depot online store pages. The bare tool version of the Milwaukee M18 18V Cordless Tire Inflator is priced at $179.00. According to the listing page, this device is built with medium-duty tires in mind — like those on a passenger car or light truck — with a maximum PSI of 150. According to the manufacturer, it can top off a 33-inch light truck tire in less than a minute. The onboard computer automatically checks the pressure and turns the inflator off when the desired PSI is reached. It has a four-slot memory, allowing you to save several PSI presets for quick use.

On the other hand, we have the DeWalt 20V MAX Cordless Portable Inflator, available without a battery or charger for $139.00. This inflator has a rated max PSI of 160, although it's best suited for light-duty use on car tires, pool toys, sporting equipment, and the like. While it takes a 20V battery pack, it can also run on 12-volt DC for on-the-road emergencies and 110-volt AC power if you have an outlet you can use. It has dedicated modes for high-volume inflation and deflation, as well as high-pressure and deflation modes and an automatic shutoff.

The Milwaukee M18 Inflator has  an average rating of 4.8 out of 5 stars on Home Depot's website. Those ratings are compiled from both Home Depot shoppers and the 600-plus reviews left on Milwaukee's own website. It's also worth noting that this tool is listed as a Home Depot best seller at the time of writing. According to user reviews, this is a fairly reliable inflator. While it's rated for medium-duty use, one buyer notes that it works great for river tubes, basketballs, and bike tires. Another user favorably compares this product to the DeWalt inflator, saying that a friend lent them their DeWalt inflator for a toy hauler. 

The DeWalt unit was able to inflate the trailer's low tire in around 30 minutes, but when they put the Milwaukee inflator to a similar task, it took less than 10 minutes. Multiple users offered praise for the convenience of the memory storage system, which allows them to quickly flip to a preset PSI with a couple of button presses. Convenience is a recurring factor throughout the reviews, with users praising the compact size, relatively light weight (8.4 pounds), and fast operation. One commonly mentioned concern is that the inflator hose can get very hot while in operation.

The DeWalt 20V MAX Inflator has an average rating of 4.7 out of 5 based on over 2,000 reviews. Again, these reviews are compiled from both Home Depot buyers and those who rated it on DeWalt's website, although all but 13 of the reviews are from Home Depot customers. Feedback on this inflator is generally positive, with several users attesting to the reliability of the device and its sturdy hose connection. 

Users also enjoy the convenience of its multiple power options, though using 12V DC power does require the purchase of a special adapter. According to some users, there is no convenient place to stow the adapter when not in use. Other reviewers mentioned that the speed of the inflation process leaves a bit to be desired. One of the positive reviews notes that it took about 15 minutes to inflate a small tire to 20 PSI.  And while the DeWalt inflator's online description says it's rated for up to 160 PSI, one user says that this claim is exaggerated. According to them, car tires of up to 30 PSI are fine, but if you go above 50 PSI the proverbial cracks begin to show. They attempted to inflate an 80 PSI tire, but after 30 minutes it had only reached 78 PSI before completely exhausting its 4Ah battery pack.

Both the Milwaukee and DeWalt inflators are highly-rated, quality products. For simple purposes like inflating regular car tires or sports equipment, either would probably be fine. However, if we had to pick a definitive winner between the two, based on the available user feedback, we would favor the Milwaukee inflator. While the higher price is a bit of a sore spot, many users agree it's a worthwhile investment for what is a very powerful and reliable tool. It can handle larger, higher-pressure jobs without exhausting its power and with a generally shorter runtime. 

Users are also enthusiastic about the memory storage feature, which the DeWalt inflator lacks. The only tangible edges the DeWalt inflator has over the Milwaukee inflator are its 6.39-pound weight and multiple power formats, which are convenient if you need to fill a flat out on the road and don't have a battery handy. But if you store a battery pack from Milwaukee's M18 system with the inflator in your car or truck, that's a moot point.

When weighing any two products against one another based on user reviews, it's not as simple as picking the one with the higher star score. Even if that were the case, the Milwaukee inflator has a 4.8 average rating to DeWalt's 4.7, so it would still win in that respect. In addition to the average star rating,  we factored in the number of user reviews included on the products' respective Home Depot pages.

The fact that the Milwaukee inflator still has a higher average score despite having nearly 700 more reviews means that more people have spoken positively about it compared to the DeWalt inflator. To ensure fairness, we checked both positive and negative reviews on both products to gauge the scope and severity of any potential problem, and determined that customer complaints with the DeWalt inflator were slightly more noteworthy than those of the Milwaukee inflator.