The most important element of a knife sharpener is its ability to sharpen an edge across the length of a blade. That said, plenty of other factors might make other devices a better fit for you. Here are some of those factors:
- Ability to sharpen different types of knives
- Cleanliness
- Sound
Generally, sharpening a serrated blade specifically requires a serrated knife sharpener, but you still may want to sharpen straight paring knives, boning knives, a fillet knife, cleavers or utility blades (or even a pocket knife or hunting knife). While the Chef’s Choice sharpener is the best for chef’s knives, both the Presto Three Stage and Work Sharp devices offer a little more flexibility for different blades. Presto, for instance, can adjust its slots to guide different blades more effectively. Work Sharp uses attachments and belts of varying coarseness for kitchen knives, pocket knives or scissors — a modular approach that may put off casual cooks, but will likely appeal to DIY enthusiasts.
Despite fair results, the Work Sharp looks much more at home in a garage than on a kitchen counter.
Another consideration is how clean your sharpener is: if you’re sharpening in your garage, then you might not sweat the steel filings that sprinkle out of some sharpeners, like the Work Sharp or the Presto sharpeners. In a kitchen setting, cleanliness is a must, and Chef’s Choice Trizor and the $23 AnySharp Pro sharpener were the cleanest. That said, all the above recommendations required minimal cleanup, if any at all.
Finally, sound is a concern for some — and some of these devices are significantly louder than others. The Chef’s Choice Trizor is slightly quieter than the Presto sharpeners, but none were silent. If you want a quiet option, non-electric sharpeners will be your best bet.
Out of all the testing, the only device that seemed to have no upside was the $8 Kadell 3 Stages Sharpener (no longer available), which wasn’t as affordable as the KitchenIQ sharpener and also performed worse than any other sharpening tool I tested. Besides that one, it seems pretty much any knife sharpener is better than no knife sharpener. So invest in the high end or pick up a $6 tool. Either way, food prep will get a lot easier when you do.