What Is a Nakiri Knife Used For? Uses, Cuts & Care

The short answer: A nakiri is a Japanese vegetable knife. Its flat, rectangular blade meets the board along its whole length, so one straight chop cuts all the way through — no rocking, no half-severed onion, no bruised herbs. It is not for bone.

What a nakiri actually is

A nakiri is a double-bevelled Japanese knife, usually 6 to 7 inches, with a tall rectangular blade and a completely straight edge. The name comes from na (leaf vegetable) and kiri (to cut), which tells you the whole design brief.

Two features do all the work. The flat edge means the blade contacts the board across its entire length in one downward motion — nothing is left connected by a hinge of skin at the ends of the cut. The tall blade gives you knuckle clearance and a wide face that carries chopped food off the board instead of scattering it.

People often mistake a nakiri for a small cleaver because of the shape. It is the opposite. A cleaver is thick and heavy and cuts by mass; a nakiri is thin and light and cuts by geometry.

What a nakiri knife is used for

Everything on the vegetable side of the board, and it is noticeably better than a chef knife at most of it.

• Dense vegetables. Carrots, sweet potato, celeriac, squash. The thin grind splits them cleanly instead of cracking them apart the way a thicker blade does.
• Cabbage and leafy greens. The blade height lets you press through a whole wedge in one pass, and the flat edge shreds cabbage far more evenly than a curved knife.
• Onions and shallots. Vertical cuts, then straight across. No rocking means no crushed layers and less of the cell damage that makes your eyes sting.
• Herbs. A rocking chef knife bruises herbs against the board and turns basil black. A single clean chop does not.
• Cucumber, radish, anything you want thin. The straight edge tracks in a line, so slices come out at the same thickness end to end.

The two cuts a nakiri is built for

The tap chop

Blade straight up, straight down, no forward or backward movement at all. Your guiding hand walks backwards along the vegetable and the knife follows it. This is the motion that makes a nakiri fast — there is no wasted travel, and because the edge is flat every tap severs completely.

The push cut

Lift the heel slightly, then push the blade forward and down through the ingredient in one motion. Use this on anything dense, or when you want a very clean face on the cut — pushing shears the fibres rather than compressing them.

What you should not do is rock. A nakiri has no belly to rock on, and trying to use it like a chef knife is why people who buy one without knowing the technique sometimes decide it does not work.

What to keep a nakiri away from

A nakiri is thin and hard, and both of those become liabilities in the wrong place.

• Bone and joints. Use a cleaver or a butcher knife. A nakiri will chip.
• Frozen food. Same reason. Let it thaw.
• Hard rinds and shells. A whole winter squash, a coconut, a pumpkin — start those with a heavier blade and finish with the nakiri.
• Anything that needs a point. There is no tip to speak of. Coring, deveining and trimming belong to a paring knife or a petty.
• Glass, stone and steel boards. Wood or plastic only, for any knife, but especially this one.

Nakiri vs santoku vs chef knife

These three overlap enough to confuse people, so here is the honest split.

A chef knife has a curved belly built for rocking and a proper tip. It is the most versatile of the three and the worst of the three at pure vegetable volume.

A santoku sits in the middle: flatter than a chef knife but not perfectly flat, with a rounded sheep’s-foot tip. It chops well and still handles small proteins. It is the compromise blade, and a good one.

A nakiri is fully specialised. On vegetables it beats both. On anything else it is the wrong tool. That is not a criticism — it is why the knife exists.

If you are choosing between them: buy a nakiri as a second or third knife, not as your only one. It works alongside a chef knife rather than replacing it.

Choosing a nakiri

Look at three things and ignore the rest.

Length. Six to seven inches. Longer looks impressive and gets unwieldy on a home board.

Steel and hardness. A nakiri lives or dies on how thin the edge is and how long it stays that way, which means you want a hard core. Our Torii 7" Nakiri uses 7Cr17MoV high-carbon stainless on an octagonal maple wa-handle; the Bara Forge 7" Nakiri runs a 10Cr17MoV core at 60 HRC in layered forged steel with a burl-wood handle. If you want the pattern as well as the performance, the Feather Forge 7" Nakiri wraps 73 layers of feather Damascus around an AUS-10 core, and there are matching versions in the Damascus Dynasty and Silver Dynasty lines.

Balance. A nakiri should feel light and slightly forward, not blade-heavy. You are lifting it hundreds of times in a prep session.

Whichever you choose, every blade we ship is hand sharpened and oiled before it leaves us, and comes with a 99-day home trial and a free lifetime guarantee — chop with it for three months and send it back if it is not the sharpest knife you own.

Looking after one

Hand wash and dry it straight away rather than putting it in the dishwasher, where heat and detergent will dull the edge and dry out a wooden handle. Store it on a magnetic strip or in a sheath, never loose in a drawer where the edge knocks against other metal. Hone it weekly and put it on a stone two or three times a year at a shallow angle, around 12 to 15 degrees per side.

Done that way, a nakiri stays frighteningly sharp for a very long time — which is the whole reason to own one.

Frequently asked questions

Is a nakiri knife worth buying?

If you prep a lot of vegetables, yes. It is meaningfully faster and cleaner than a chef knife on cabbage, herbs and dense root vegetables. If you cook mostly meat, spend the money on a gyuto or a slicer instead.

What is the difference between a nakiri and a santoku?

A nakiri has a completely flat edge and a squared-off tip; a santoku has a slight curve and a rounded tip. The nakiri is better at pure vegetable chopping, the santoku is more versatile across everything else.

Can you cut meat with a nakiri?

Boneless meat, yes — it slices cleanly. Bone-in cuts, joints or anything frozen, no. The blade is ground too thin and will chip.

Why are nakiri knives so expensive?

The good ones are not cheap because the thin grind only works on hard steel, and hard steel is harder to forge, grind and finish. A soft, thin blade would bend; a thick, hard blade would not cut like a nakiri. You are paying for both properties at once.

Shop the range

Browse every nakiri we make in the Japanese chef knives collection, or see the shape alongside its siblings in the Torii series and knife sets. Every blade is hand sharpened and oiled before it ships, with a 99-day home trial and a free lifetime guarantee — the sharpest blades you will ever use or your money back.

Keep reading: Best Nakiri Knife: Top Picks for Precision Vegetable Cutting · Nakiri vs Chef vs Santoku vs Bunka · Japanese Chef Knife Guide: Shapes, Steel & How to Choose