Tool Buying Guide
Twenty-four tools. Here's how to work out which one you actually need.
Most buying guides are written to sell you the expensive one. This one is written to stop you buying the wrong one. Find the job you're trying to do, and it'll tell you the tool — and just as often, tell you that you don't need a new tool at all.
Part one — the yard
This is where the store started, and it's where most people start too.
"The lawn itself needs cutting, and I'm tired of borrowing one."
The 21-Inch Gas Lawn Mower. A four-stroke walk-behind with a 21" steel deck, seven cutting heights, and a 3-in-1 deck that bags, mulches or side-discharges depending on the week. Take the hand push version if your yard is flat, the self-propelled one if it slopes or you'd rather not push.
Not this if: your lawn runs much past half an acre — at that size a 21" walk-behind stops being sensible and you want a rider. It's also gas, not battery: louder than the rest of the yard range at 98 dB, so wear hearing protection, and it needs fuel and oil rather than a charger. Gas mowers are restricted in a growing number of US towns — check your local ordinance before you order.
"The grass along the fence and around the posts is a mess."
You want a string trimmer, and you want it to edge as well so you're not buying two machines. The 3-in-1 Cordless Lawn Trimmer, Edger & Weed Cutter pivots between trimming and edging without tools.
Not this if: you're clearing a field of thick brush. That's a brush cutter's job.
"The hedge has gone shaggy and I want it square."
The Cordless Hedge Trimmer. The head rotates 180° so you can cut the flat top without holding the machine at a strange angle, which is the thing that ruins hedge lines.
Not this if: the branches are thicker than a finger. Then it's the pruning shears or the pole saw.
"There are branches over the roof and I'm not getting on a ladder with a chainsaw."
Good instinct. The Cordless Pole Chainsaw extends so you can cut from the ground with both feet planted.
Not this if: you're felling a tree, or the limb is anywhere near a power line. Both are an arborist's job, not a tool purchase.
"The branch is at head height. I don't need a pole and I don't want a full chainsaw."
The Cordless Mini Chainsaw, 6" bar, light enough to hold in one hand. This is the tool for the jobs that are too big for shears and too small to be worth dragging out anything serious: a limb across the path after a storm, firewood cut to length, an overgrown shrub taken back to a stump.
Not this if: the trunk is thicker than the bar is long. A 6" bar cuts about a 5" log comfortably — beyond that you are fighting it, and fighting a chainsaw is how people get hurt. Two hands and a full-size saw for anything bigger.
"I'm pruning fruit trees and my hands are killing me."
The Cordless Pruning Shears cut up to 40 mm on a trigger pull. If you have arthritis or a lot of trees, this is the single biggest quality-of-life upgrade in the yard range.
Not this if: the wood is dry seasoned hardwood at full 40 mm. Green wood is what these are for.
"Leaves. Everywhere. Every autumn."
Two answers, and the difference matters. For a normal yard, the 40V Cordless Leaf Blower — quiet, instant, no fuel, and it still moves wet leaves. For acreage, long driveways or a property with real tree cover, the 4-Stroke Backpack Blower has the endurance a battery can't match.
Read the backpack blower page before you order it: it runs at 112 dB, hearing protection is not optional, and a growing number of US towns restrict or ban petrol blowers. Check your local rules first.
"The path to the door is pitch black and I don't want to pay an electrician."
The 30W Solar Flood Light with Remote. No trenching, no wiring, no meter reading going up.
Not this if: you want motion alerts or a camera. This is a light, not a security system.
"Water is somewhere I don't want it."
Rain barrel, pond, pool cover, flooded window well, boat bilge, aquarium. The Portable Water Transfer Pump moves 360 gallons an hour and screws straight onto a garden hose. There's more on watering and pumps if that's the corner of the yard you're solving.
Not this if: your basement is actively filling. That needs a submersible sump pump wired in, not a transfer pump.
Part two — the workshop
If you're buying your first cordless tools, read this bit before you buy anything: buy into one battery system and stay in it. Most of this range runs on the same 21V packs, so your second tool comes with spare batteries for your first. That's worth more over five years than any single feature on any single tool.
"I own nothing. Where do I start?"
Here, every time: the Cordless Drill & Impact Driver Combo Kit. The drill makes holes, the impact driver drives long screws without wrecking your wrist or the screw head. Between them they cover about eighty percent of everything a homeowner ever does.
"A lug nut won't move."
An impact wrench, and the number that matters is breakaway torque. The 1200 N·m Impact Wrench is the strong one and it's the one most people should buy. The 900 N·m is the same idea with less muscle. There's also the 3-in-1 Impact Wrench, Drill & Driver if you want one body that does all three jobs.
Whichever you pick: use impact-rated sockets, and final-tighten wheel nuts with a proper torque wrench. Breakaway torque is for undoing, not for setting.
"I can see the bolt. I just can't get anything on it."
The alternator bolt tucked behind the pulley, the manifold nut under the fuel rail, the bracket screw with two inches of clearance and no room to swing a handle. The Cordless Extended Ratchet Wrench is built for exactly that: a 6.3" extended head slim enough to feed into the gap, on a 3/8" drive, spinning the fastener out instead of you turning it a sixth of a flat at a time.
Not this if: the fastener is seized. This is an access tool, not a breaker — 80 N·m is 59 ft-lbs, and that will not shift a rusted lug nut or a suspension bolt that has been on the car for ten winters. For those, the 1200 N·m Impact Wrench. Crack it loose with that, then reach in with this.
"I need to cut wood. Which saw?"
Straight cuts in sheets and boards — the 6" Brushless Circular Saw. Curves and cut-outs — the jigsaw, in the Jigsaw & Angle Grinder set. Demolition, pruning, cutting through things that are already fixed in place — the Reciprocating Saw.
Check the product page on the circular saw and the reciprocating saw: those two ship from overseas with a EU-style plug, so you'll need an adapter and a longer wait.
"I'm fitting trim, beading or thin panelling."
The 18-Gauge Cordless Brad Nailer. No compressor, no hose across the hallway, and a head small enough that the filler barely shows.
Not this if: it's structural. Brads hold trim, not framing.
Part three — metal
Three tools that turn a shed into a small fabrication shop. They work in sequence: cut it, clean it, join it. All three live on the metalworking page.
1. Cut
The Portable Deep-Cut Band Saw cuts square, cold and quietly — no shower of sparks, no blued end that needs grinding back.
2. Clean
The Cordless Angle Die Grinder deburrs edges and dresses welds. Die grinders have always been air tools — this one needs no compressor.
3. Join
The MIG-160 Synergic Welder sets its own voltage and wire speed, which is the part that stops most people ever learning to weld.
Part four — the driveway
The two jobs everybody knows they should do more often, and nobody does, because the tool for each one is either broken or somewhere else. Both live on the car and garage page alongside the wrenches.
"I never check my tire pressures because the gas station gauge is useless."
It usually is — dropped a thousand times, reading three PSI high, and there is a queue behind you. The Digital Tire Inflator Gauge reads to 0.1 PSI on a backlit screen, inflates, deflates and holds with a lock-on chuck, so you set all four properly on your own driveway in the time it takes to walk round the car.
Two things worth being clear about. It is a gauge and an air chuck, not a compressor — it connects to one, so you need an air source. And use the pressure on the sticker inside the driver's door, never the number moulded into the tire sidewall. The sidewall figure is the tire's maximum, not your car's correct pressure.
"Washing the car means a bucket, and watering means a thumb over the end of the hose."
The High-Pressure Hose Nozzle goes from a jet hard enough to strip road salt and grit out of a wheel arch to a fan soft enough for seedlings, by twisting the head — without walking back to the tap.
Not this if: you want a pressure washer. This is a hose nozzle. It is a very good one, and it is not the same machine — a pressure washer makes its own pressure, this one uses the pressure your tap already has.
Four things worth knowing before you spend anything
Amp-hours are runtime, volts are power. A 4.0Ah battery doesn't make a tool stronger than a 2.0Ah one — it makes it run about twice as long. Don't pay for amp-hours you won't use in a session.
Brushless is worth it. No carbon brushes to wear out, more of the battery turned into work instead of heat, and a longer life. Where a tool in this range is brushless, the page says so.
Buy the tool for the job you have, not the job you imagine. The most common mistake is buying the biggest version of something for a job that never arrives. The second most common is buying two mediocre tools instead of one good one.
Safety gear is not an upsell. Eye protection for anything that throws chips. Hearing protection for the gas blower and the grinder. An auto-darkening helmet and gloves before you strike your first arc. Arc eye doesn't hurt at the time — you find out six hours later, in the dark.
Still not sure?
Tell us the job — not the tool — and we'll tell you what you need, including when the answer is "nothing, you already own it". Email info@yardedgepro.com.