Forged VS Stamped Knives

Kitchen Knives can be produced by only two methods; Stamping or Forging.

Stamped Kitchen Knives

Stamped kitchen knives are made from a large thin sheet of Steel. The blade shape is cut out from the sheet, then ground, hardened, and sharpened on the machine. Most Victorinox and Global kitchen knives are stamped.

Stamped knives are cheaper and easier to produce, they have decent overall performance in cutting but usually have a flat blade rather than tapered, and are often soft steels making them easier to machine.

Below you will see an image of a very common type of stamped knife. Often stamped knives come fitted with plastic molded handles, but there are many that are fitted with high quality wood, Micarta or other exotic materials also.

Forged Kitchen Knives

Forged chef knives are made from a piece of steel known as a “billet,” the steel is heated up to a bright glow (Can vary depending on steel type) and hammered by hand, or power hammer into shape. It is then ground, shaped further, polished, and goes through heat treatment and sharpening.

Forged blades give better performance, their grain structure is tighter and the edge-holding capability is much higher. But they do cost more produce.

Most Carbon Steel Japanese Knives are forged ( White Steel & Blue Steel ), while many Stainless Steel Knives are stamped due to the complexity of forging Stainless.

Below you can see a Sakai Ichimonji forged Wa-Gyuto,made of Japanese Blue Steel. Forged knives will usually have higher quality handle materials than stamped due to the overall highger cost of production.