HUB 02 · Sharpening
How to Sharpen a Chef's Knife
Twenty minutes and a stone. The single highest-leverage skill in the kitchen, one step at a time.
We earn a commission when you buy through our Amazon links, at no extra cost to you. It never changes a ranking, and we say so when the cheaper knife is the better buy. How this works.
Sharpening a knife on a stone looks intimidating and isn't. The whole skill is holding a consistent angle and knowing when you've raised a burr. Practice on a cheap beginner knife with a soft-steel blade — it's the most forgiving thing to learn on — and within a couple of sessions you'll have a knife sharper than most people in your life own. You'll need a 1000/6000 whetstone, a towel, and water.
Step by step
How to do it
- 01
Prepare the stone
Soak a soft water stone for 5–10 minutes until it stops bubbling (splash-and-go ceramic and diamond stones just need wetting). Set it on a damp towel or in its base so it can't slide. Start on the coarser side — 1000 grit for a normal touch-up, a coarser grit only to repair damage.
- 02
Set your angle
Hold the knife at roughly its edge angle — about 15° per side for most knives, closer to 20° for a German blade, 12–15° for a hard Japanese one. A rough guide: 15° is about the thickness of two stacked coins under the spine. Consistency matters more than the exact number.
- 03
Raise a burr on the first side
With light, even pressure, push the edge across the stone from heel to tip, covering the whole edge. Keep the angle constant. After a dozen or so passes, feel the back of the edge for a tiny burr (a rough wire) running its full length — that tells you you've sharpened all the way to the edge.
- 04
Repeat on the second side
Flip the knife and do the same on the other side until you raise a burr there too. Match the number of strokes roughly so both bevels are even. This forms the new edge where the two bevels meet.
- 05
Refine on the fine grit
Flip the stone to 6000 grit (or move to a finer stone) and repeat with lighter pressure, a few passes per side. This polishes the edge and removes the coarse scratches, turning a working edge into a keen one.
- 06
Deburr and test
Remove the last of the burr with a few very light alternating strokes, or by stropping on the fine stone or a leather strop. Test on paper: a sharp knife slices printer paper cleanly. Rinse and dry the knife, and hone with a steel going forward to keep the edge aligned between sharpenings.
Questions
Frequently asked
How often should I sharpen my chef's knife?
With regular home use, every one to three months on a stone — sooner for soft steel, later for hard. Hone with a steel between sharpenings, and sharpen when honing no longer brings the edge back.
What angle should I sharpen a chef's knife at?
About 15° per side for most knives — closer to 20° for German blades, 12–15° for hard Japanese ones. Match the knife's existing angle. Details in our sharpening angle guide.
How do I know when the knife is sharp?
Two tests: you raised a burr along the full edge while sharpening, and the finished knife slices a sheet of paper cleanly without tearing or slipping. A sharp knife also bites into a tomato skin with no pressure.
Can I ruin my knife sharpening it wrong?
It's hard to do real damage on a stone with light pressure — the worst case is an uneven edge you can fix next time. That's exactly why we say learn on a cheap soft-steel knife first, not your best blade.
Keep reading
Related
Receipts
Sources
We do not run a test kitchen, and we do not pretend to. Specs are the manufacturer's published figures, attributed as such; where we could not verify something, we say so on the page rather than quietly leaving it out. Read our full method.