How Are Gas and Infra-Red Grills Different?

The difference between gas and infra-red grills is not a fuel difference - they both use gas for fuel. The difference is in how the heat actually makes it to the cooking surface. In a traditional gas grill, a direct flame is used to heat the flame taming device and the cooking surface. In infra-red grills, the burner assembly is made from a stainless steel housing with a ceramic top. The ceramic top has thousands of tiny little prots in it, and the burner itself is inside this assembly (but it is not visible without taking the assembly apart). What happens is the burner heats up the ceramic plates, which in turn radiate heat up to the cooking surface. As a general rule, infrared grills get really hot (but they don't do low temperatures), where regular grills give you a broader range of temps (but usually don't get as hot. The exception is some of the high end grills reach infra-red grill temps but still back down to low temps as well).