I have a medium and I have no complaints. It leaves plenty of room for the ring-o-wings, and give a large enough hot zone for searing. I think the small might not give a big enough hot zone for searing larger items. I'm also not sure if the small one would give you enough room to do a beer can chicken (if you do chicken that way instead of spatchcocking) using the vortex with the small end down. I think the small would probably work fine for wings and give you a little more room to do two rings-o-wings, but not sure if you could do two batches or not. If you have the gourmet grate system the vortex is really easy to add coals to! I also think removing the center grate saves a lot of wear and tear from the super high heat of the vortex. If you have a grate over the vortex when it is really cranking it will red the grate red hot!