I am a big fan of Dewalt Carbide Edge utility knife blades, and have enthusiastically recommended them before.
These aren’t a new technology; Stanley Black & Decker launched similar blades under their Stanley brand in 2011, and they rebranded them under Dewalt labeling in 2014.
At the time, Dewalt said that these blades lasted up to 5x longer than competing blades.
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Fast forward a decade, and Dewalt currently advertises their Carbide Edge blades as staying “10 times sharper than traditional competitive blades.”
On the packaging, Dewalt says these blades are “10x longer lasting.”
At the time of this posting, Home Depot has the 50-pack of blades for $20, or around 40 cents per blade.
Home Depot also carries Dewalt ToughSeries utility knife blades.
Dewalt says that their ToughSeries blades deliver up to 5x longer life compared to “standard carbon blades.” Home Depot sells a 50-pack of Dewalt ToughSeries utility knife blades for $24, or around 48 cents per blade.
10x longer than competing blades for 40 cents per blade vs 5x longer than standard carbon blades for 48 cents per blade. Which is better?
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I asked Dewalt the following questions 9 days ago, but have not yet heard back beyond an initial (and prompt) acknowledgement (that was much appreciated).
Q1) How do the 2 blade types compare against each other?
Q2) Why buy the new Tough Series over the Carbide?
Q3) Why buy the Carbide over the Tough Series, aside from cost?
I continue to look forward to the answers.
How am I supposed to know the difference between “stays up to 10x sharper than competing traditional blades” at 40 cents each and “up to 5x longer life compared to standard carbon blades” at 48 cents each, how do I know which is the better value?
Milwaukee’s General Purpose utility knife blades – still made in USA to my knowledge – are also said to last 5x longer than standard blades, and they’re much less expensive at $11 for the 50-count dispenser.
Once I run out of my Dewalt blades, I’ll likely buy another pack, unless they discontinue the line. Since the Carbide Edge blades were replaced at Home Depot stores by the pricier ToughSeries blades, there’s a non-zero chance of this happening.
See Also: The Best Utility Knife Blade: Dewalt Carbide Edge
Also, I’ve been using the new Dewalt ToughSeries utility knife (provided by Dewalt and available at Home Depot for $17 with free shipping), and like it a lot. See also: New Dewalt ToughSeries Utility Knife Looks Tougher.
Blocky
Time for a shootout!
Stuart
Sure, let me know what you discover. The equipment is pricy, tests are time-consuming, and the work’s already been done by Stanley/Dewalt.
randy
Peak journalism right here /s
Goodie
I understand it’s a joke, but I also think there’s a lot of stupid “shootouts” for products today on websites and on youtube. Many of which are some dude timing himself and holding an impact driver in each hand and claiming that they are applying “equal” pressure. I don’t need more product shootouts like that.
I worked at a timber and wood products company in college and saw their testing methods for particle board firsthand. It involved calibrated test for deflection under various loads across specified spans. They were fairly simple tests, but it involved a couple employees, a dedicated lab and calibrated test equipment. There were testing labs at the stud mill and at the plywood plant that involved a similar employee count.
To me, it’s more interesting to try to understand DeWalt’s claims. They need some legally defensible method for testing that substantiates their claims to have some defense against a false advertisement lawsuit. Looking forward to seeing their answer to Stuart.
Eric
Independent testing is important. The manufacturer is likely to go find the cheapest lowest quality widget they can find to test against. And then design the test to make sure their widget has the best chance possible. Especially when it’s to back up a claim that theirs is 10x better. Whereas an independent tester will hopefully test actually comparable widgets against a variety of different tasks to give the end user a more realistic idea of what they can expect. And ideally you look at several sources for important purchases because you never know who’s on which companies payroll or being pressured by the companies to make sure their product looks good if they want to keep getting new things to test.
Stuart
@Eric, Aside from the considerable costs involved in a reliable and consistent testing apparatus, you still need a starting point to vet claims.
If the claims are not transparent, or the baseline is unclear, then you’re just guessing and need to run many more tests of various blade make sand models to establish independent baselines.
When SBD says “last 5x longer,” they *should* have test data that shows data for 2 specific blades under identical test conditions.
All of that work is done and ideally the results would be 100% reproducible.
I have a lot of faith in SBD being able to fully support their claims. My frustration here is that they haven’t done that here, and I feel they should.
You *can’t* take a utility knife with a fresh blade, cut through 50 feet of carboard and then deem whether manufacturing claims are accurate or not. Everything has to be controlled and repeatable. That means building or buying a test jig (e.g. by Catra).
“Why don’t you just test it?” I could, but to do so to standards where I can support my results against scrutiny would require a lot of time and money. What would be the outcome or ROI?
I see a lot of “independent testing” and “head to head testing” online, and most of it is bad and filled with holes.
One YouTuber tried to test cordless drills and were taking speed measurements right out of the box. I asked them if they retested after x-number of holes drilled or y-amount of time in case the motor and drive components need some time to break in and reach full performance. It could very well not change at all, but you don’t know that unless you test for it.
Some YouTubers use a torque adapter (https://14cyiuhvcgv.com/torque-adapter-cordless-drill-specs/%3C/a%3E ) to measure cordless power tool torque. NONE of their numbers are valid because you shouldn’t use a manual use-only torque adapter to test for powered torque delivery.
Those types of test are entertaining, but far from scientific.
When testing cordless power tool performance or battery life, what’s the ambient temperature? That could make a difference. For competitive testing, you might need simultaneous testing to ensure identical test conditions.
Doing independent testing properly takes time and money. I’m always up to it, but there needs to be *impact* or ROI.
In this case, I trust SBD’s testing enough where a couple of words and a chart or two would make all that time and expense unnecessary.
If a brand said “we’d like to pay you $XYZ to show how long our blades last against competitors’ ” that’d make it worth it.
But even then, common testing methods involve cutting paper strips. What about drywall? Scribing wood? That might require a custom apparatus to create more useful data and results. All of a sudden, this is now a costlier and monthlong project. Even then, would the results influencer purchasing decisions? Utility knife blades are consumables typically purchased based on convenience. Most people reorder what they know and like, or they quickly grab whichever from the shelf at the hardware store or home center.
Claims, results, or conclusions *must* be defensible, and that tends to take a lot more work than most people realize.
will
Jun 1, 2025
Yeahs but they can find the cheapest blades and the claims would more likely match if not succeed their claims. That is unless they named a brand for comparison.
Stuart
@randy, I don’t see you volunteering to buy a Catra machine. If you don’t like my stance, put up your own time and money and show me how it’s supposed to be done.
Ryan Guldbrandsen
You can just cut rope. Its not hard to find out of the 10x lasts 5x longer vs the 5x. Either it last longer or it doesn’t. It doesnt need to really be that indepth.
You dont need a catra machine. Test 3 different common materials. Rope, drywall and plastic zip ties.
Really isnt all that hard.
Stuart
Sounds good – let us know how it goes! Just be sure to use even pressure and the same stroke length with every cut.
will
Obviously the carbide blades will top the high carbon blades. Not sure if the cuts will be as clean so they both have there place in your toolbox. Though the price for the non carbide blades is ridiculous. The regular blades seem a bit steep,what kind of steel are they using magnacut?
Kurt
Good suggestion for Todd at Project Farm on YouTube!
Blocky
Project farm actually ran a utility blade test about five years ago. The results affirmed many of the observations in these comments— for example, that coated blades often have less initial sharpness, but are more durable under abuse, maintaining a usable level of sharpness. Most blades cut cardboard well but are destroyed by one staple; a few maintain far better through drywall. Ymmv, and rather than keep different blades for different uses, most users will always use the blade that’s in their pocket.
Laughably, I actually do enjoy a well-designed shootout, but I also accept anecdotes and equally enjoy rigorous marketing-wank dissections.
Ty Stuart— you’re not the only one who wonders.
Robert
On the 5X versus 10X ratios, could the (3) Dewalt Marketeers have switched which “traditional competitive blades“ they compare against, in that the “traditional competitive blades“ have gotten worse? Perhaps gotten worse because there are more alphabet soup name blades now, so 10X is legitimate in that narrow respect?
Stuart
No. It’s not uncommon for Dewalt to make relative product claims against different baselines depending on the marketing contexts.
Standard practice for many brands is to identify an industry de facto standard and set that as a baseline. In this case we don’t know if Dewalt used the same baseline to make different claims for the two product types.
Years ago Dewalt was showing off their new adjustable wrench at a media event, and I pointed out that other existing models were already superior. They explained that they were setting their claims against Crescent’s adjustable, which was the industry standard at the time.
Stanley – Dewalt’s sibling brand – could still be considered an industry standard, but we can’t make assumptions that the Stanley product is the baseline for either or both Dewalt products.
Matt_T
Did a little digging. Stanley do use their classic 1992 “heavy duty” blade as the baseline for the 10x claim for their carbide blade. Good to see them using what most folks will consider the industry standard.
https://www.stanleytools.com/product/11-800l/carbide-knife-blades-50pcs?tid=576261
Dewalt says “Compared to traditional single material blades” for theirs so I dunno?? Is their carbide blade a rebranded Stanley or something else??
https://www.dewalt.com/product/dwht11131l/carbide-utility-blades-50-pack?tid=577306#disclaimer
Couldn’t find the tough series blade on dewalts website and Stanley don’t appear to have a direct equivalent. Closest they have is an uncoated induction blade with a 3x 1992 claim.
Anyways it looks like the carbide blades might be a good choice for folks who dull blades. Personally I tend to screw blades up so I’m sticking with the 15 cents per industry standard.
Robert
Matt,
Thanks for checking.
Stuart
When they first came out, the claim was that the Carbide Edge blades last up to 5X longer than competitors’ blades.
https://14cyiuhvcgv.com/new-stanley-carbide-utility-knife-blades/%3C/a%3E%3Cbr /> https://14cyiuhvcgv.com/dewalt-carbide-utility-knife-blades/%3C/a%3E%3C/p%3E
Here’s a chart they provided for cutting cycles vs depth of cut:
Images of the current packaging show “up to 10x longer” claims.
The website says both:
“stay 10 times sharper than traditional utility blades”
“Lasts more than 5 times longer than competitive blades”
Stanley: “Blade stays sharper 10X* longer”
Original claim: “last 5x longer than competitors’ blades”
SBD tends to ensure that every claim they make is supported and legally defensible.
But these claims aren’t clear to me, and need to be explained. If *I* don’t understand the difference between various 5x and 10x claims at uneven price points, what hope is there for the average consumer just looking at blade packages on the shelf?
With the chart above, we can see that after several dozen cuts the competing or baseline blade starts to dull and cut less with each pass while the Carbide Edge maintains even cutting performance.
The bottom line is this – what’s better, “stays up to 10x sharper than competing traditional blades” at 40 cents each or “up to 5x longer life compared to standard carbon blades” at 48 cents each?
Jared
What is “micro carbide deposited metal” on the Milwaukee blades?
That makes it sound, especially when they point to the edge, like they’re somehow precision-applying carbide particles to the blade. They didn’t exactly make that claim outright, but I would be skeptical if they did.
Seems more likely their blades are made with a high carbon content, but if they’re using some new tech to apply carbon to the edges – I’d be curious about that.
Stuart
Broadly speaking, when you treat a steel edge in specific ways, you can promote the formation of carbide particles to improve edge retention and wear resistance. Basically, and again broadly speaking, this would be done to create a blade edge that stays sharper for longer. There are different ways to do this.
With Dewalt Carbide Edge, they say they deposit tungsten carbide power to the blade edge.
You want the blade to be flexible and yielding, and the cutting edge to be harder and more resistant.
A tungsten carbide-treated edge is going to be more resistant than a blade treated to form iron carbide precipitates.
But that allows for approximate positioning between Dewalt Carbide Edge and Milwaukee General Purpose. I don’t see how the Tough Series blades compare to either.
If left to assume, I would think Tough Series are not as durable as Carbide Edge while costing more, and maybe comparable to Milwaukee while also costing considerably more.
Amos Dudley
Carbides like WC can be deposited on the surface of steel via magnetron sputter PVD.
If we’re talking about some nano-thin PVD coating, which I’m guessing we are, this isnt some radical technology. Cutting tools have had ultra hard PVD coatings for many years, and yes, they improve wear resistance, until they chip off.
As an aside, I rather doubt this marketing terminology has anything to do with carbide precipitates in the steel. That’s a bit too big a stretch into metallurgical hand waving when it could more plausibly refer to a well established coating applique. Occams razor and all. (Pun intended).
Stuart
Could be similar to the Dewalt blades. Powder, laser, deposit, localized increase in hardness, improved wear retention. These are inexpensive consumables sold in 50 to 100 count packs.
S
I bought the carbide blades quite a while back.
For the most part, they hold up to their name. Carbide is a sharper material. But it’s also far more brittle.
If all I was doing was opening cardboard boxes, they’d last an eternity. But instead I was a tradesman. So that meant cutting/notching 2×4’s, carpet, drywall, and generally any other non-metal material that got in my way.
They’re very much a double-edged sword type product.
Because the carbide is sharper, it cuts better. The first 1-5 cuts are always amazing. But because carbide is brittle, bending, hard cutting, and stabbing into materials tends to break the carbide edge off.
Would I buy them again? Not for the packages stated benefits. But if they’re cheaper, They’re not bad. It really comes down to the end user.
My personal preference is going to be Irwin’s bi-metal blades. They remain flexible, and maintain an edge the longest in most of my uses.
The standard ‘5x’ blades seem to be about on par with every other blade on the market. I would rank them as a register add-on purchase, but not something I’d run out specifically for.
Robert
In no point in history has tungsten carbide been inherently sharper than steel. It should retain its sharpness longer. As you said, it’s more brittle than most steel alloys. Generally carbide is not ground and honed anywhere near as sharp as a steel cutting blade or chisel.
MattW.
This is why I use the black coated tajima blades. There 30 for 100 last i checked and they seem to resist rust also last a really long time. I use to be dewalt carbide or thoes gold edge ones at lowes but never looked back. Tajima blades are about the only made in China tajima product that really have no issues paying the price.
Jerry
Carbide is hard, so it really holds an edge, but has essentially no flex, so the blades, or at least the carbide edge will be brittle. If all you did was ‘cut’ IMO, that would be the way to go.
Toughness to me means the opposite of brittle, so a ‘tough’ blade would be springy, and would also resist chipping when used in odd positions, or when trying to cut a curve, etc, so to me the Tough series and Carbide edge blades are intended for two different purposes.
I do think Milwaukee is somewhere in between, with their microcarbides, the edge is not solid carbide, but rather steel with little bits of carbide mixed in if I understand right. This ‘should’ keep most of the springiness of a steel blade, but with added edge hardness of the carbides. The drawback IMO would be that under a microscope, the edge could get a kind of jagged look because the carbides in the edge suspended in the steel would wear more slowly than the steel. If the little jags are small enough, it would still cut good, but not as good as a smooth sharp edge would.
Besides hurting my brain, all this thinking has me leaning towards a good bi-metal blade as maybe being best for all-around utility knife work, which is what I generally use anyway.
will
The carbide would work well for cutting shingles ,cardboard etc. All things that wouldn’t require precision or a clean cut.
LuisR.
I have tried both and for me and in my opinion is a waste of money, They appear to be sharper than most but, we do lots of demolition removal of old windows and doors and it seems the edge is brittle and breaks off easily.
Tried different brands and so far what works best for us is Kobalt blades, they’re inexpensive the packaging makes it easy to get them out, they’re not the sharpest out of the box but have good durability.
It is also very important the packaging and how easy is to get the blades out, some packages make it tough they get stuck and you’re wasting time trying to get them out.
Jason
This was a good reminder, I finally finished a 100 pack of blades off without losing it. Had been living on just the blades in my various knives and went to order the MKE 50 pack on depot that you linked.
To my surprise it’s getting delivered (by itself) today, in the next 7 hours. They can’t be making money on that transaction
Blocky
I think Home Depot warehouse piggybacks on Walmarts delivery algorithm. They’ve been optimizing for decades. You could be directly on route or next door to something already scheduled.
Matt_T
I’ve noticed something similar with Lowes. Delivery is generally a few days out and I think $80. Cheap enough I’ll pay it rather than waste two hours pulling a trailer.
But every once in a while it’s same day and free. I figure it has to be when they’ve already got deliveries scheduled near us.
Stuart
Home Depot switched to free delivery with no minimum on a lot of orders around the time of the pandemic lockdowns.
I ordered Dewalt drill bit sets on Friday and they arrived Saturday.
The increased convenience, and with no Prime subscription fees or similar, have definitely increased the number of times I choose Home Depot over others. I’m sure this pays off for this over time.
Nate
I’ve been using Meepo blades from Amazon with the black coating. They seem to last longer for me than any of the Dewalt and Milwaukee blades I’ve tried and I think I’ve tried most. YMMV……
Kingsley
The best thing to test them on is the latest iPhone or Samsung .
ElectroAtletico
Going out right now before they close the Home Depot for…..the Milwaukee set!!!
eddiesky
I got a box of 50 razor blades for the decal scraper like DOT uses with the long handle. First 6 out of box would break off tips and edge … and it was scary! Thank God I wear eye protection! I would advise against cheap blades.
But DeWalt reads like gimmick with “triple hardened” and coated. I mean, most cut drywall or score boards. Drywall work will need 5 blades a day … atleast. Just my nickel since pennies are doomed!
Rick
Ordered a pack of the Dewalt carbide blades based on recommendations here from Home Depot. They now say Made in UK on the back of the package
Stuart
It could be “new old stock.” Sometimes I’ll see dated packaging with made in UK labeling, but it’s almost always “made in USA with global materials.” I haven’t seen new made in UK versions in a while.