It was quite useful to have this single burner as our kitchen was being renovated. We used it only to cook breakfast eggs and make tea…not good for heavy duty cooking of course. It does shut off automatically after a few minutes though and takes a while to heat up again.So this hot plate isn't quite okay it's a bit better than that my only real issue with it is you can't keep a consistent heat after it reaches its temperature that you set it for it will automatically cool down and what's it cools down enough it will turn itself back on which takes whatever you're cooking a fair amount longer than normal but if you're like me and you drive professionally and you don't want to eat on healthy it works it is a low wattage hot plate that still gets the job done and it's pretty well built it cools down fairly quickly if the one I have brakes I will absolutely buy this product againUPDATE 7/26/2022: Amazon has since updated the product title to reflect the correct wattage. I have owned this for about a year now and much to my surprise it is still working. It definitely feels flimsy but heats up quickly and I have cooked ground beef using a 1000W portable power station several times and it pulls around 825 watts (less than the advertised wattage). Just be aware it cycles on and off after it has been on for several minutes on high power (I guess to maintain temperature and avoid overheating?). I bought this for emergencies so given it has held up for a cheap appliance, I have changed my rating to 4 stars.ASIN B0006A2ZTS. The Maxi Magic electric single watt burner both on the box and ON the product rate the burner at 1000W contrary to the advertised 750W rating on the Amazon product page. If you were planning on powering this burner say...on a generator (I.e. camping, power outage, emergency preparedness,…), you might want to take this into consideration. FYI, on a 1000W solar generator I own, the output wattage displayed (on average) was ~825 watts; less than 1000W but definitely more than the advertised 750W…So this burner near ‘hi’ will pull over 800W. Overall, is a little rickety and not a quality build but I was able to boil a small amount of water in a stainless steel pan with this (took about 10 minutes). Not sure how long it will last…perhaps 3.5 stars.I would not advise ordering this hot plate if you want to boil water. The first unit I ordered didn't work well: I put a very thin metal pot with 8 cups of already hot tap water on it with the dial set to High and after more than HALF AN HOUR, it NEVER boiled. Steam came off the surface and a tiny bubble formed here and there, but it NEVER boiled. I contacted Amazon and they were very kind to send a replacement unit free of charge with free overnight shipping. The replacement unit did get water to boil, but it was a very light boil with tiny bubbles forming a continuous circle at the bottom; it never brought the water to a full, rolling boil the way stovetop and other burners would. Next time I used it, it was to fry a couple of eggs. It worked fine for that, though it took a little longer for it to get hot enough to cook the eggs compared to a stovetop gas or even electric burner. Now that I have my gas turned back on I will just use my stovetop burners and keep the replacement hotplate as a backup.About 5 years ago I had bought a Kitchen Gourmet brand single-burner electric hot plate from a physical Walgreens drugstore for $9.99. That burner did bring water to a full boil. It had a 2-year warranty and it lasted me 4 years with occasional use before it wore out. It also had a power indicator light to show whether the unit was turned on or off. When I looked online, Walgreens no longer had that brand, and their website quoted $25.00 for a single-burner hotplate, so I ordered this MaxiMatic hotplate, which doesn't even have a power indicator light.I think maybe the reason it lacks power to boil water is that it only has 750 watts. Even my microwave oven, which was very inexpensive, at least has 1000 watts. I don't remember how many watts the previous Kitchen Gourmet brand hotplate had as I threw it and its box away once it stopped working.I also have a West Bend brand "hot pot," a metal pitcher with plastic lid and electrical cord. It has high, medium and low settings but no Off setting; you just unplug it. I have had this pot for at least 20 years, probably longer. It holds 6 cups and WILL bring water to a full, rolling boil in about 5 minutes. When the first MaxiMatic burner failed to boil a pot of water for pasta, I used my microwave oven instead. Then when I wanted to hard-boil an egg, I put it into the hot pot (in the shell) it worked just fine. Of course, the hot pot is meant for boiling water, so I wouldn't put any foods into it that would get the interior all messy. But the difference between that little pot and this hotplate is like night and day. I guess they just don't make small electrical appliances like they used to anymore.Since stores (physical or online) no longer offer the low price that Walgreens did 5 years ago (probably because of the economy), I would guess it would cost a lot more than $12.95 these days to get a hotplate with power decent enough just to boil water. Though the replacement is better than the first unit I received and at least it did get the water to boil even though it wasn't a full rolling boil; and it did fry eggs, my impression is still that it's not very powerful. It would be okay for occasional use if you don't need it to get as hot as a stovetop burner.This very basic hot plate is good for someone who is looking for a bargain appliance at a relatively low cost. In short, it will work in a pinch if you are a person living on your own or working in your first job or a college student in a dorm, this is a good first purchase of a hot plate.When unpacked, the heating element (spiral) is a bit loose and makes a rattling noise when moved around. The coil element is similar to those that came standard in the 60s and 70s. It looks dated, but the real test is in how it functions.When using the hot plate for the first time, there is a strong smell of burning plastic, but this abates after about 10 minutes. Make sure you use it in a room with good ventilation or near an open window. Also, when heating up, it heats from the outside portion of the coil inwards, so you may need to use at least a medium sized pot in order to get any benefit when heating on the lower settings. There are four settings (off, low, medium & high) on the analog dial that are easy to use, but the hot plate often doesn't begin to heat unless you turn the dial beyond the low setting; when lowering the temperature of a boiling pot, it will stay on at the low setting, but clicks off just below that point. The cord is also quite short (about 15 inches), so you'll need to be close to an outlet to use it.If price is your key concern, then this is the hot plate for you; if you have a few more dollars to spend, then upgrading to a better item is the way to go.Funciona perfecto