And then wreck it by putting most reviews behind a login wall (sure it’s free but I don’t want another account). Reader mode to the rescue!
I have never seen a paywall for Wirecutter
It's not consistent. It only seems to trigger after a few site visits. (So I don't see it if using a private mode browser, Safari, or temporary containers in Firefox.) Obnoxiously, if you're configured to visit in a fresh browser/container, you have to click away the dickbars on every visit. (And they use similar html obfuscation as facebook, so the dickbar element can't be blocked with uBlock.)
Login wall != paywall.
Other sites like Outdoorgearlab do this as well, although, I could be wrong, it seems like they strongly favor items that can use affiliate links to make them money, which makes sense.