PETZL Spatha, Yellow, UNI

Product Information

Most remarkable was the sheer cutting power: the Spatha sliced through most varieties of webbing in just one or two strokes.

Lighter than many of the knife options on this list, yet comes with nine different tools–including screwdrivers, scissors, knife blade, and pliers. By nature of its size, the NIAD isn’t nearly as effective for all-around use, but it can manage in a pinch. White Glove Delivery is available on many lawnmowers & other highlighted products and is offered free to customers within a 30-mile radius of our showroom. Learn more.

Half straight/half serrated blade is nearly 3 inches long, making it useful for more scenarios than many of the shorter knives on this list. The ultralight NIAD and Piranha exist for a reason: many climbers only need to carry a knife to trim old webbing or in case of self-rescue. Especially for alpinists, it’s prudent to have a simple knife that takes up as little space and weight as possible. If your needs are similar, look to the NIAD or the Piranha. The other two (the CRKT NIAD and Trango Piranha) are small, ultralight emergency knives with metal handles and no sheath. Like the NIAD, it has a small divot at the base of the blade to allow you to pinch the knife as you cut. The handle is even shorter than that of the NIAD, which means that for those of us with large hands, only the first two fingers can grip the handle. Smaller blades (Piranha and NIAD) are less friendly for general use. While the full-length blades have both serrated and un-serrated sections, the shorter blades are almost entirely serrated. That’s great for cutting cord but less adaptable to other tasks.

If you don’t need to trim every gram, consider the Petzl Spatha. The penalties are slim, adding less than an ounce of weight and a couple inches of size. In exchange, you get the very best performance in a design that works just as well as a camp knife. The NIAD and Piranha are probably smaller than your car key. Budget So aside from sensible design/ergonomics and good build quality, the blade alloy is worthy of consideration. It's surprising how fast some knives will go blunt, some you can cut one rope, go to cut the next and feel the difference in sharpness. All four knives have clip-in points and/or lanyard attachment points. The Spatha and Rope Tooth can be opened while clipped to a carabiner, but the Piranha and NIAD cannot. Size, Weight, & Intended Use The greatest asset of the Piranha is its price. As of this writing it ties the Edelrid for the cheapest in the test and is less than half the price of the NIAD. For comparable emergency performance, that’s a good value.

A good balance of weight and blade length with a reasonable price makes this our all-around best climbing knife.

Most survival references consider a knife the most important piece of equipment you have. There are a lot of deaths that could have been avoided if a blade was handy. But anyway... The other three knives all cut through a standard 18mm sling in under ten seconds. The Rope Tooth took more than a minute and a half. The serrated blade seemed both dull and prone to snags, and it required far more energy to cut through even thin material. For emergency use, the small blade was effective if not exceptional in all our tests. The stainless steel handle makes the Piranha a couple grams heavier than the NIAD, but it’s barely noticeable, and the Piranha is just as comfortable on a keychain. It’s combination straight and serrated long 2.75 inch blade makes it useful for any scenario you might encounter. Choosing a climbing knife comes down to a few basic considerations. Main Features: Handle Material & Blade Length

Due to the size and nature of some items, we're unable to despatch them via our usual delivery services. Surrounding the clip-in point is a textured plastic wheel that allows for easy manipulation with climbing gloves, removing the worry of slicing open a mitt. Both styles have their place, but all climbing knives earn their salt in self-rescue scenarios. To make sure each could serve to clear away tat or cut loose an injured climber, we used all four to chop up a variety of connectors from webbing to dyneema to cord. It didn’t perform quite as well in our testing, but it still got the job done on every type of fabric we could throw at it.