Every knife on this site states its blade steel, and that line is the single hardest part of a spec sheet to act on. This is the reference behind it. One entry per alloy we actually stock, each with the published composition and hardness range, an honest account of what the steel trades away to get what it is good at, and the live listings on this site that carry it. Nothing here is a review, and nothing here is a claim about a particular knife.
Powder-metallurgy stainless engineered to stop trading edge holding against toughness against rust resistance. This is the top of what the catalog carries.
The steels that set the standard the flagship tier is measured against, and the ones most premium production folders still ship with.
Where most of this catalog actually lives. Not the steels that win arguments, the steels that get carried.
Budget stainless that earns its keep. Every one of these is on a knife somebody uses every day without thinking about the alloy.
Non-stainless steel with a long history in traditional pattern knives, and its own maintenance rules.
Two steels, one table, and a plain account of which buyer each one suits. Every pair here has a full entry for both steels above.
The figures on this page are the published specification ranges for the alloy, cross-checked against manufacturer datasheets and independent metallurgical references. They describe the steel, not any one knife. Hardness in particular is a range a mill and a knifemaker work inside, and Knives Now does not test the heat treat of individual knives, so nothing here is a claim about what a specific listing measures.