Serrated bread knives may seem like specialized kitchen tools, but you’d be hard-pressed to slice that beautiful loaf of sourdough you brought home without one. Unlike standard kitchen knives, serrated knives have, well, serrations—a line of individually sharpened teeth along the edges that dig into whatever you’re cutting with each stroke. This sawing action easily cuts through a soft bread crumb without smooshing it, and it’s also helpful for slicing delicate tomato skin or peeling a watermelon.
Our top picks
- Best bread knife overall: Mac Superior Bread Knife
- The best cheap bread knife: Mercer Culinary M23210 10″ Bread Knife
- A worthy splurge: Shun Classic 9″ Bread Knife
For years, the common thought was that a good serrated knife didn’t have to be expensive, and we generally agree—you can find an affordable bread knife that’ll do the job well and free up more of your knife budget to invest in the rest of your knife set. Some of that is because part of what makes a chef’s knife expensive, the high quality steel forged to hold a fine, sharp edge for a long time, isn’t as much of a thing for serrated knives. The design of the teeth makes it so that the blade can still function even if it isn’t that sharp; that’s not really the case for straight edge knives. And, because sharpening a serrated knife is a much more involved process than sharpening a a straight edge knife, some people think it’s better to replace a serrated knife after several years rather than try to maintain it.
However…
After testing over 35 bread knives over the last few years, I think it’s worth investing in a higher-end bread knife that’ll stay sharper longer, with blade geometry that makes slicing as easy as possible. And so I recommend one of those along with a variety of more affordable picks below. Regardless, the best bread knives at any price point are sharp, long enough for large loaves of bread, and sturdy in the hand. The top picks below all aced that criteria even with long-term testing.
New in this update: We adjusted replaced the top pick in this piece after long-term testing of our favorite knives, and because of pricing and availability issues with a longtime favorite brand Tojiro. We also updated additional reviews, including on knives from Made In, Winco, and Mac after more testing. Finally we added a section on serrated knife sharpening and tested a well-liked serrated knife sharpening rod.
Best bread knife overall: Mac Superior Series 10.5” bread knife
Mac
Superior 10.5 Inch Bread Knife
Pros:
- Long blade makes slicing through wide bread loaves easy
- Curved shape offers extra leverage
Cons:
- On the pricier end of the spectrum
Knife length: 15.38″
Blade length: 10.75″
Weight: 6.6 oz.
What we love: Mac’s Superior Series bread knife features an extra-long curved blade that makes slicing bread a breeze. Even the crustiest, oversized miche loaves were no match for this knife. It features rounded teeth that cut easily into the crust without snagging, making each stroke smoother and more deliberate. It also sliced neatly through tomato skin and glide effortlessly through the pulp, delivering perfectly uniform tomato slices.
The Mac is made from high-carbon stainless steel that will keep an edge longer—a plus because serrated knives are so labor-intensive to sharpen. The curve to the blade is another excellent design choice. That curve adds cutting force to the knife because the belly extends about half an inch beyond the handle, creating immediate leverage with each stroke. In long-term testing, I found that Mac’s Superior Series offered sustained performance that cheaper knives just couldn’t match, bumping this knife into our top-pick slot.
What we’d leave: My biggest gripe about this knife is the price point and handle construction. While the blocky handle scales are comfortable, it seems reasonable to expect a $100 knife to have an integrated bolster and nicer finish. For those looking for a nicer handle and are willing to spend money, you can check out the Mac Professional Series below.
NOTE: The Mac Superior series is sometimes listed as the Mac Professional series on Amazon and other large marketplaces. It is not! The Professional series has a metal bolster between the blade and the handle. No bolster, not Professional. The actual Professional series knife should also cost about 50% more than the Superior series model.
A cheap (but very good) bread knife: Mercer Culinary M23210 10″ Bread Knife
Mercer Culinary
M23210 10″ Bread Knife
Pros:
- Great value knife
Cons:
- Not full tang
- Plastic handle
Knife length: 15.5″
Blade length: 10″
Weight: 5.9 oz.
What we love: Premium bread knives have their perks, but a good one doesn’t have to break the bank. The Mercer Culinary Millennia 10″ bread knife is less than $20, and it’s the one we use most frequently in the Bon Appétit Test Kitchen. “This bread knife came in the kit bag I got in culinary school, and I am still using it today,” food director Chris Morocco says. “It won’t split atoms, but it is dependable, and for this price, you will love it all the more.” It has deep, wide serrations, also known as a wavy edge, as opposed to the pointy teeth you see on the Wüsthof or Tojiro.
Instead of a wooden handle, the ergonomic handle of the Mercer is made from a combination of rubber and plastic. While this knife isn’t full-tang (no knife at this price is), it still feels stable and comfortable to hold. Our editors have used this knife for every slicing task you can imagine: crusty bread, pineapple, ripe tomatoes, overstuffed BLTs—and it always gets the job done.
What we’d leave: This knife performed admirably for its price point, but it was the least sharp of our other two winning bread knives, requiring a bit more effort to cut crustier loaves. Some people also didn’t like the Mercer’s plastic handle, which wasn’t as comfortable as our other picks.
Read more here about our favorite cheap bread knives.
A beautiful bread knife splurge: Shun Classic 9″ Bread Knife
Shun
Classic 9″ Bread Knife
Pros:
- High carbon steel will stay sharper longer
- Beautiful knife
Cons:
- Pricey
Knife length: 14″
Blade length: 9″
Weight: 6.8 oz.
What we love: While chef’s knives are often praised for their steel quality and appearance, bread knives are typically prized for their functionality. While you don’t need to spend as much on a bread knife to get top-tier performance, we really loved the total package from Shun’s Classic line bread knife. It’s made from Damascus steel with a VG-MAX core, which is a much higher-carbon-content steel than most bread knives. This means that the serrated edge of the knife is less likely to dull over time—key for a knife that needs to be maintained professionally to keep sharp edges. In testing, it sliced tomatoes beautifully thin, and even the crustiest sourdough provided almost zero resistance.
We also appreciated the height of the blade, which provided some extra heft and cutting force without adding extra weight. Finally, the Japanese wa-style handle was comfortable to grip when you needed a little extra leverage. Because there’s no palm swell or shape to the handle, it lets the user find the position that’s most comfortable for them. Shun’s bread knife might be pricier than our other top picks, but the price definitely matches the performance and knife quality. If you’re looking for a serrated knife that will stay sharper for longer, then this might be the right pick for you.
What we’d leave: The 9″ blade was plenty long for most loaves of bread, but wider boules were tricky to cut all the way across without having to angle the knife. It’s hard to ignore how expensive this knife is. While it does have the highest quality fit and finish of our winners, its performance boost over our two budget picks might not quite be enough for some people. Still, if you’re picky about the details of knife construction and steel quality, this knife justifies its price point.
How we tested bread knives
We spoke with our Test Kitchen editors to find out which blades they’ve relied on throughout their careers. Then we tested more than two dozen bread knives on crusty sourdough and winter vine tomatoes—ideal examples of that tricky firm-outside, soft-inside texture that serrated knives handle so well. We also conduct long-term testing on our top picks to evaluate how they hold up with daily use, noting whether the blades retain their sharpness and if the handles show any signs of cracking.
What makes the best bread knife
We focused on evaluating the following factors when it came to making our selections:
The ideal knife practically does the work for you, creating clean cuts with minimal downward pressure. In our testing, we found that thin knives usually got the job done best.
Your knife should have enough heft to cut through foods that have a firm exterior and a delicate interior. A too-heavy knife, however, will be cumbersome to wield.
A serrated knife is defined by its toothlike edge, but there are a few variations on the design. A serrated knife can have rounded, scalloped teeth; pointy teeth; and even double serrations that feature a combination of the two. While scalloped teeth might seem like the least effective option, our testing proved that this is not always the case. In fact, knives with teeth that were too pointy risked snagging and tearing on bread interiors or tomato flesh.
We considered the knife as a whole—from the tip of its blade to the end of the handle. We looked for knives that had ergonomic handles that fit the natural contours of our hands and paid attention to the balance of weight between the handle and the blade. We wanted a knife that felt hefty enough to give us proper leverage when slicing hardier loaves, but not so heavy as to become unwieldy.
The ones we picked above were the most stable and comfortable to hold, the easiest to work with, and they made the cleanest cuts.
Other bread knives we like
Dexter Russell Basics 10″ Scalloped Bread Knife
Dexter-Russell Basics 10″ Scalloped Bread Knife
This knife from Dexter-Russell was a top contender for the best budget spot thanks to its super sharp scalloped blade, which made easy work of slicing through tough sourdough crusts and delicate tomato skin. In the end, the Mercer edged out the competition because of its grippy, more comfortable handle, slightly sturdier construction, and (just barely) lower price tag. That said, this would be a good option if the Mercer is ever out of stock.
Hedley & Bennett 8.6″ Bread Knife
Hedley & Bennett
8.6″ Bread Knife
Senior test kitchen editor (and Bon Appétit’s resident baking expert) Shilpa Uskokovic loves this bread knife from Hedley & Bennett because it’s sleek and light. While it has a smaller 8.5″ blade, its angled, serrated edge becomes more pointed at the tip, making it easier to maneuver and offering heightened precision for more fragile slicing tasks.
It’s relatively affordable at $90 at the time of writing, and it comes in a variety of colors. However, for all those positives, the Hedley & Bennett doesn’t offer quite the force you get from a longer blade.
MAC Professional Series 10.5″ Bread Knife
Mac
Professional Series 10.5″ Bread Knife
After long-term testing, this knife is a personal favorite of Bon Appétit writers and editors—but the price makes recommending it tricky. With nearly the exact same blade as MAC’s Superior series, MAC’s Professional Series bread knife is also a high performer. The slight curve on the spine gives you tons of leverage to get through crusty bread with little effort, and the sharpness of its rounded teeth lets it slice without snagging. The big thing that sets this knife apart is its fit and finish. With a full bolster that has enough room for a pinch grip, full tang construction, and three handle rivets, this knife is built to withstand heavy-duty wear and tear. Is it overkill for a bread knife? Absolutely. But for knife aficionados, the high price tag might be worth it.
Performance-wise, the MAC Professional bread knife easily sliced through the crustiest loaves and glided through tomatoes. It also felt great in the hand, even if it was a little heavy. Overall, the price-to-performance ratio kept this bread knife from the top picks, but if you want an upgrade on our top pick, it is a great option to consider.
Wusthof
Classic 9″ Double Serrated Bread Knife
This German-made knife is another pricey blade, but it justifies that price tag with its interesting and super-effective design. While this one has a shorter 9″ blade, it’s double serrated, which means it has mini teeth within the larger, scalloped serrations. All those extra sharp points give it a better grip on waxy surfaces like the exterior of a tomato or watermelon and make for fast, easy slicing.
It’s also a knife that asks very little of you—during testing, the double set of serrations cut through hard crust with very little exertion from the tester and produced such thin slices of tomato that we could see right through them. One final advantage of a double-serrated blade: because there are more of them, each individual serration will wear less, so the knife stays sharper for longer.
The shorter blade did make it tricky to cut wider loaves straight across, though it was an adequate length for most batards and pan loaves.
Mercer Culinary 8″ Züm Bread Knife
Mercer Culinary
Züm Wavy Edge 8″ Bread Knife
Sharp and with a comfortable handle, the ZüM knife from Mercer Culinary excelled in our testing. It neatly sliced through the tomatoes, piercing the tough skin easily without smashing the delicate flesh. It also perfectly sliced through the sourdough crust and crumb without snagging. The only thing we didn’t like was the 8″ blade length, which was a little short for bigger sourdough loaves, but for around $50, it’s an effective budget option with high-end handle construction and a full bolster. Not quite our favorite budget pick, but a good alternative, and a good option for people who want a very comfortable handle.
Misen 8″ Serrated Knife
Misen’s bread knife was a mid-tier performer in our tests, cleanly cutting through tomatoes and bread without any notable issues. We also thought the handle was comfortable, and its overall build quality was high. The blade’s taller heel also meant it performed well slicing through larger sourdough loaves. However, its performance didn’t quite match our top picks, and our two budget models performed better at half the cost. We recommend either spending a little more for a nicer bread knife, or saving a bit of cash instead—unless you can find this knife on sale.
Bread knives we don’t recommend
A former top pick, I still stand behind this knife’s performance and build quality. What I don’t love, however, is its spotty availability and fluctuating price. At around $60, I thought this knife was a steal. Now that its price has rocketed up to match Mac’s Superior Series bread knife, I can’t recommend it when the Mac offers better build quality and consistency. Still, if you can catch this knife on a deal, go for it—it’s sharp and nimble, but sturdy enough to tackle most tasks.
Like its sturdier cousin, this bread knife from Tojiro is sharp and swift. But when we originally picked this serrated knife, its price was around $40. For that price, this knife was a great pick. But its cheaper build quality, lack of a full tang, and slightly smaller wood handle mean we don’t see much value in recommending this knife now that it’s price has nearly doubled.
Bob Kramer is a legendary knife maker, but the Bob Kramer Essential Bread Knife by Zwilling felt like overkill for a serrated knife. Its $400-plus price point is excessive for a tool with such a narrow set of uses (no matter how often you bake homemade bread), and because this knife is made from carbon steel, it’ll be prone to corrosion and rust. Does it work well? Definitely; it was one of the better tomato knives we used. But is it worth the sky-high price? In our opinion, no.
This knife has a nice weight to it—stable without being heavy—and it’s easy to control through longer cuts. However, it wasn’t as sharp or efficient as the top performers.
Global’s great knives have won the hearts of many a BA staffer. That said, their metal handles are divisive—some people think they’re comfortable to hold and others find them too thin and slippery. While our testers say this knife is well-balanced and decently sharp, they ultimately disqualified it from our winners list due to its handle shape, short blade length (8.5″), and less-than-perfect performance in the tomato test, where its large teeth snagged just a bit on the tomato’s flesh.
Henckels’s riveted handle is comfortable, the knife tracks cleanly, and it performed especially well on tomatoes, but the 8-inch blade struggles on larger loaves.
IKEA’s $25 bread knife handled bread and tomatoes competently without excelling at either. The serrations weren’t the sharpest we tested, but they cut cleanly enough for everyday use.
We were impressed by the sharpness of Kuhn Rikon’s serrations, which allowed for precise cuts. Its limitation is its reach; at under eight inches, wide bread loaves demand more back-and-forth. But if you’re not into sourdough boules, this will be an impressive performer.
This is a beautiful knife (just look at that gorgeously curved handle grip), but the Lamson’s teeth weren’t sharp enough. The knife snagged on crusty sourdough boules and required a lot of force to make cuts. Its 8″ blade was also too short to cut through entire loaves, and it snagged slightly on tomato skin. Lamson does offer complementary sharpening for life, but for this price ($90 at the time of writing), we feel the bread knife should be sharper out of the box.
Sharp and well-made, we do like Mac’s Chef’s Series bread knife. But it’s only slightly cheaper than our top pick and doesn’t feature a curved belly. Again, the decision not to recommend it comes to value; you’ll get a much more better slicing experience if you drop an extra $10 on the Mac Superior.
Though it was razor sharp, MAC’s offset knife was too short to effectively slice bread. At only 7.5″, we had to maneuver it to make it through an entire sourdough loaf. We also didn’t like its offset blade, which made it hard to intuitively feel where the blade was compared to the handle. It did excel as a tomato slicer, but it would be hard to recommend it at this price point.
The first time we tested Made In’s bread knife, we found it lacked sharpness. That’s no longer the case—their slightly updated model has sharper serrations and slices through bread and tomatoes with ease. The big issues are with the weight and the price—the heftier handle does balance well against the blade, but overall it’s a heavy knife. It’s also more expensive than our top pick while having a shorter, straighter blade. This knife is fine, but there are plenty of others that offer better value.
A little too flimsy, this knife struggled to neatly slice through sourdough bread. Even though it was sharp, the blade tended to flex when cutting, creating uneven slices of bread. We also didn’t like the cheapness of the handle or the offset blade shape, but it did offer solid performance at a very affordable price.
For how pricey this knife is, we were disappointed in how dull the blade appeared to be. Since it’s difficult to sharpen a serrated knife, initial sharpness is a key factor in picking out the best option for your kitchen. This knife snagged on tomato skin and tore apart the delicate sourdough bread crumb. Though the handle was beautiful and felt nice in the hand, this knife was the most expensive model we tested and had some of the worst performance.
Considering it’s one of the most expensive bread knives we tested, we were hoping for better performance out of the Miyabi Kaizen 9.5″ Bread Knife. Instead, it crushed most loaves of bread instead of cutting them, and it got stuck on tomato cores.
The Opinel Intempora fell short—in some cases, literally—in a few areas. Its 8″ blade is shorter than we’d like, making it hard to cut through sourdough boules without changing the slicing angle. Its teeth weren’t quite as sharp as we’d like either. It didn’t mangle the tomatoes (a win!), but we had difficulty keeping the blade straight—the knife typically snagged on the fruit’s core, creating wobbly, inconsistent tomato slices. We do like the round polyurethane handle and the high-quality high-carbon stainless steel, but we expect better performance from a knife of this price.
The Shun Classic Master Serrated Knife has a unique wavy edge that adds to the overall serration pattern. It excelled at slicing paper-thin tomatoes and was comfortable to hold, but its edge shape didn’t consistently cut through bread well. Its blade was also on the shorter side, making this knife less well-suited for large loaves.
This knife has a lot going for it: The Shun Ultimate Utility looks almost like a toy shark and, accordingly, has plenty of bite—we loved how sharp its rounded teeth were. Its flat sides and curved tip mean that this knife is able to both slice your sandwich toppings and spread mayo on a piece of soft bread. It also sliced tomatoes perfectly and slid right through the crust of the sourdough boules. But its tiny 6″ blade, which is more similar to a santoku than a typical bread knife, made it hard to cut even slices. And when you factor in the price ($140 at the time of writing), we just can’t recommend it.
This model from Victorinox, the makers of one of our favorite budget-friendly chef’s knives, performed pretty well overall. Testers found that while the plastic handle looks flimsy, the knife cut really well and felt sturdy. However, this is an incredibly light knife—so much so that it verges on too light—and at more than double (or triple, at some stores) the cost of our affordable picks, it costs more than we think is worth spending.
The Victorinox Swiss Army 8″ knife sliced bread okay, but it required more effort than most other models; worse, it crushed tomatoes. It was also too lightweight to maneuver comfortably.
Sharp, well-made, and great at cutting, there’s a lot to like about the Wüsthof Classic bread knife. It easily sliced through tomatoes, and it cut swiftly through crusty sourdough bread. But its 8″ length struggled to span the entire loaf, and then there’s the price. As one of the most expensive bread knives we tested, we think there’s better performance for less money—or, you can upgrade to the double-serrated version, which was one of our top picks.
This knife from Wüsthof was sharp out of the box, but its short (8″) blade and lack of heft kept it from earning our recommendation.
The double serrations of this Ikon series knife performed as well on waxy surfaces as the Wusthof Classic double serrated knife above, but struggled a bit against crusty bread. The bigger issue is that this knife regularly retails for about $200 (30% more than the regular Classic series knife). You’re paying for the Ikon finishes, which are lovely, but if you’re interested in double serration, we think the standard Classic offering (listed above) is a better bet at a slightly more affordable price.
Although billed as a “13-inch” bread knife, Zulay’s blade is only 8 inches. The short blade struggled with thick, wide sourdough loaves. It was also hard to control; the blade wandered during cuts, making it difficult to produce straight, clean slices. Both bread and tomatoes eventually yielded, but the process felt imprecise compared to most knives we tested.
We struggled to make clean cuts with Zwilling’s entry-level Gourmet series. While it sliced tomatoes just fine, its teeth often caught on crusty sourdough loaves, interrupting the sawing motion and requiring more force to power through. During testing, its handle scales felt clunky, making the knife awkward to hold and even more awkward to wield, and it failed to perform as well as our two budget picks—both of which are significantly less expensive.
Zwilling’s double-serrated knife is a good slicer, and its double-serrated edge is similar to the Wüsthof model we recommend. It performed well in testing, yielding thinly sliced tomatoes and perfectly straight slices of bread, but ultimately, this knife’s overall weight and high price tag kept it from being a winner. A bit heavier than much of the competition, Zwilling’s bread knife was trickier to wield comfortably, and its longer handle made it hard to find a good balance point.
Offset knives are awkward to cut with because they remove the leverage you can create with the handle. While this knife from Winco slices tomatoes nicely, it struggles with crustier bread and dulls more quickly than other serrated knives we tested. It does have a bargain price tag though, so there’s that.
How to sharpen a serrated knife (and whether or not you should)
Jesse Raub
Serrated knives feature dozens of individually sharpened teeth, meaning that, if you do want to sharpen your bread knife, you need to sharpen dozens of edges instead of the single edge most kitchen knives have. While this process can be tricky and is generally best left to professionals, you can pick up a serrated knife sharpener that lets you add more bite to your blade. These sharpeners work best with pointy serrations that create neat half-circle teeth—simply run the diamond-coated rod in the interior of each curve until they’re sharper than they were before.
The only issue? The rod is shaped to work best with pointy serrations, so rounded scalloped edges won’t easily sharpen with a tool like this. Also, even the finest diamond surface is still rougher than ceramic—you can sharpen each pointy tooth on a bread knife with this thing, but it won’t be as highly polished and smooth as a professionally sharpened bread knife. Overall, I recommend these tools for budget-tier bread knives that you want to breathe some life into. Since bread knives don’t smack against hard cutting boards the same way as chef’s knives do, they also don’t dull as quickly. And if you have a higher-end bread knife made from harder steel, it’s likely your knife will hold an edge for a long time without any intervention from you.
Diamond Machining Technology Diafold Serrated Diamond Knife Sharpener,
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Get to know the experts
Jesse Raub: I’ve been a professional kitchen product tester since 2021, where I tested nearly everything: espresso machines, wooden spoons, bread proofing baskets, pizza stones, garlic presses, and more. My fascination with kitchen knives began in 2003 when the chef at the kitchen where I worked let me use his personal Wüsthof knives during prep work one day. Over the last two years, I’ve tested over 70 different knives for Bon Appétit and written about the best knife sharpeners and how to best sharpen your knives at home. If you’re ever on the phone with me and hear a light scraping noise in the background, just know that I’m likely touching up my kitchen knives on a whetstone and testing their sharpness by slicing sheets of paper.
Additional reporting and testing by Alaina Chou and Jamie Thilman.
