have been using it for 2 weeks always preferred the big one but had to buy 8 place setting because of space constraint if you have enough space in home then please go ahead with 12 place setting or higher as for cleanliness it cleans well and apart from burnt vessels everything gets cleaned including milk vessel also and lot of cleansing is dependent on the detergent or tablet you use we tried with 45 brands and settled with finish detergent so keep that in mind