The 3rd Annual KnifeNews Readers’ Choice Awards are Here

Presented by: Work Sharp Knife & Tool Sharpeners

Hello everyone! The crew at KnifeNews is beyond stoked to be able to announce the Readers’ Choice Awards for 2020, the third year in a row! Thanks once again to sponsor Work Sharp Knife & Tool Sharpeners, next Monday we’ll start announcing the best knives of the year – as chosen by you, our readers!

To state the obvious: 2020 has been a hard year on everybody. The onset of the COVID-19 global pandemic changed our personal and professional lives in ways we couldn’t have imagined back in January. As the world was forced to engage with this disaster, we saw the mechanisms of daily life grind to a halt everywhere. In the knife community the effect was palpable, too: scheduled releases were delayed, projects pushed back, and shows rescheduled or outright cancelled. Most tragic of all, members of the community lost their lives to this awful disease.

So a bad, difficult year. But, we’d still like to celebrate the good things that happened in our little corner of the universe. In 2020 there were plenty of new knives, new collaborations, even new knife companies; and we’re once again asking you to pick your favorites!

The details of how and when to vote are down below. We’ve made one change to the categories this year: we decided to get rid of Most Innovative New Knife, replacing it with Best Kitchen/Culinary Knife instead. We feel that the biggest innovations occur in the custom knife realm, which is a beast unto itself, and thus not up for inclusion in the (so far) production knife-focused Readers’ Choice Awards. But kitchen cutlery has become a pretty big part of that production world, so 2020 will mark the first time they have a category of their own.

When and How to Vote

We’ll be opening the polls on the main KnifeNews page this Friday, November 27th, at 9am EST; you can vote any time until 9am EST, Monday, November 30th. You’ll be able to cast a vote for your favorite knife in each of the ten categories; an option to write in a nominee for each category will also be available.

Then, starting on Monday afternoon, we’ll kick off the award announcements, with a new one each day, five days a week, starting with Best New Tactical Fixed Blade and ending with Best Overall Lineup on Friday, December 11th. You can see the complete schedule below.

We strive to be as comprehensive as possible when deciding on which knives to include as named options in each category. That being said, we’re sure that we’ll leave some folks’ favorites out. So we encourage voters to take advantage of the write-in option if they don’t see their favorites listed as a standalone option. Also, any time before Friday you can send us your picks for knives that you think should be included in one or several categories; we’ll go through these emails before compiling the final poll to see if we missed any stand out knives for named inclusion. Email your picks to info@knifenews.com with the subject “READERS’ CHOICE AWARDS SUGGESTIONS.”

Thanks so much for participating once again in the Readers’ Choice Awards! We’re proud to be able to present these awards to you, with you.

AWARDS SCHEDULE

Monday, November 30th: Best New Tactical Fixed Blade

Tuesday, December 1st: Best New EDC Fixed Blade

Wednesday, December 2nd: Best New Outdoors Fixed Blade

Thursday, December 3rd: Best New Kitchen/Culinary Knife

Friday, December 4th: Best New Slipjoint/Non-Locking Knife

Monday, December 7th: Best New High-End Knife (MSRP of $300 or more)

Tuesday, December 8th: Best New Value Folder (MSRP of $100 or less)

Wednesday, December 9th: Best New Folder

Thursday, December 10th: Best Knife Upgrade

Friday, December 11th: Best Overall Lineup