While most people start with pans with nonstick coating, if you wind up doing any serious cooking at all you'll soon want to graduate to stainless steel. Stainless isn't as good for letting a fried egg or pancake just slide out, but for cooking chores non-stick is not your first and foremost goal, stainless is better. First off, unlike non-stick stuff, you don't have a surface that WILL (guaranteed) degrade over time and which limits how you clean things. Beyond durability, stainless steel offers good durability and it just looks pretty. There are plenty of variations on stainless steel, and those will be reflected in the price. I have a high-end set of stainless pans and pots that cost over a thousand dollars. It's great, made of 300-grade stainless (high nickel 18/8) with a copper core for superior heat dispersion, and the riveting and fit, and finish are first class. And it was expensive. This set isn't that. This set is made with an exposed copper layer at the bottom to help with heat dispensation, but not, apparently up the sides. The stainless specification is not provided, which means it's probably 200 series stainless without any nickel. It will cook just as well as other types of stainless, but will be more prone to corrosion over time. All that said, it's a bit silly to nit-pick about these things given the very low price of this set. This set probably won't last a lifetime, but it's a great starter set--would be a perfect housewarming gift. Note that while this is a nice set of useful pieces, it is missing a large frying pan (12") and a larger pot (e.g. 8 quart). Those pieces, especially the frying pan, are probably things you'll want to add to this if it's your only cookware. But what's here is nice. I'll note that the 1qt saucepan is not very well weighted and without anything in it, tends to tip over because of the weight of the handle. Higher-end pans generally wouldn't demonstrate this issue. The two tools, the spoon, and spatula are very lightweight (hollow handles). They are fine for what they are, but you'll probably want to add some additional tools to this set. On the whole, this set won't fool anyone into thinking you spent a thousand bucks, but it offers high value as an intro stainless set (or to fill in some pieces if you need them). It's a perfect starter set for a new homeowner. Based on quality, functionality, and price, thumbs up.
