Do you need a FireBoard if you cook on a Traeger?
FireBoard makes excellent hardware. The FireBoard 2 is the gold standard for cook logging: six probe channels, beautiful charts, drive-fan control, works on any cooker from a kettle to an offset. If you run multiple smokers, cook on anything without built-in WiFi, or need lab-grade accuracy, buy one and don't look back.
But if your cooker is a WiFire-connected Traeger, there's a fact worth knowing before you spend $200+: your grill already broadcasts everything a FireBoard would measure. Grill temperature, set point, and every wireless Traeger probe stream to Traeger's cloud the whole time the grill runs. The reason Traeger owners buy logging hardware isn't missing data — it's that the Traeger app throws that data away when the cook ends.
What you're actually buying
With a FireBoard on a Traeger, you're buying three things: a second set of probes to place, a second app to watch, and the thing you actually wanted — a permanent record of the cook. The first two are redundant on a connected grill. The third is a software problem, and software prices differently than hardware: Smokelog records the stream your Traeger already produces — every reading at 20-second resolution, live dashboards, probe charts, the weather at your grill, debrief notes, shareable cook links — for $5/month with no hardware at all. Three-plus years of Smokelog costs less than a FireBoard 2 before you've bought its probes.
When FireBoard is the right answer
Real cases where the hardware wins: you cook on more than one rig (the FireBoard follows you from the Traeger to the kettle to the griddle); your grill is an older non-WiFire Traeger with no data stream to record; you want ambient pit probes placed exactly where you choose rather than the grill's own RTD; or you're doing competition-level calibration where you want measurements independent of the grill's controller. Those are honest reasons, and if they're yours, FireBoard is the better tool.
When it isn't
If you cook on one WiFire Traeger — an Ironwood, Timberline, or Pro Series with built-in WiFi — and what you want is history, live dashboards, and knowing what the wind did to your brisket, the $200 gadget mostly duplicates electronics you already own. Connect your Traeger account to Smokelog once and every cook from then on is recorded automatically: no probes to reposition, no second app during the cook, nothing to charge. The archive shows the full chart of every cook you've ever run, with the weather overlaid so a rough cook explains itself.
Works with Traeger WiFire grills · $5/month after · cancel anytime · no hardware
FireBoard is a trademark of FireBoard Labs; Traeger is a trademark of Traeger Pellet Grills, LLC. Smokelog is an independent product and is not affiliated with or endorsed by either company. Prices mentioned are approximate street prices as of July 2026.