13 Of The Best European Tools Brands That Rival Makita

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Discovering and owning tools from a European brand is something of a status symbol. I can't tell you how many times during my time as an automotive technician I saw a Wera screwdriver or a Knipex pliers set and immediately started grilling the owner on how they found the tools, or how much more expensive they were than the more familiar brands we're used to seeing here in the United States. European brands also have more interesting backstories, which makes sense when you consider that the U.K. has a head start at, well, existing over the U.S.

The brand we've chosen to use as a measuring stick for these European brands is Makita. Makita was founded in 1915, and in its long history the brand has grown from an electric motor sales and repair company to a global brand with manufacturing plants in eight countries. Makita's woodworking tools in particular compare well with many of the European rivals we'll be looking at.

While all of the brands on our list are manufactured overseas, they're all available stateside. We've included links to the brands' Amazon storefronts where applicable, and distributor links when Amazon isn't an option. And, if you're doing some comparison shopping, Makita products are available at most tool retailers and via the brand's Amazon store.

Founded in Germany in the 1930s, Wera makes some of the most popular screwdrivers in the world. Wera Kraftform handles, introduced in 1968, have distinct zones for providing comfort and transferring more manual torque, making for a comfortable and efficient experience every time you turn a screw. The Kraftform handle is far from the only innovation Wera has introduced; a quick browse of the company's catalog reveals uniquely-designed products like the Joker open-ended wrench and the Zyklop Mini, a small ratcheting bit wrench.

While Makita's focus is mostly on power tools for the professional, the brand does have a good-sized lineup of bits and hand tools available as well. Wera's focus on making exceptional screwdrivers and innovative hand tools for tradespeople has allowed it to expand in a different direction, making products that are revered for their distinct features and quality craftsmanship. Wera also makes some bit-based tools that rival Makita's in functionality, like its Tool-Check Modular system. The Tool-Check system allows for quick swapping and compact storage of a wide variety of sockets, bits, allen wrenches, and more.

Many Wera tools are available for purchase here in the states via the brand's Amazon store.

Owned by one family for five generations, DeWit makes some of the most respected gardening tools in the business. While Makita has been around since 1915, DeWit's history traces back to 1898, starting as a blacksmith in the Netherlands. Much like Makita, DeWit has a product lineup that includes construction equipment as well as landscaping tools. However, the brands do differ in their production. Where Makita is well-known for its power tools, DeWit's legendary hand tools are used for landscaping, gardening, and road construction.

America has all kinds of driving surfaces that connect towns to cities, from paved highways to dirt roads. One type of street that isn't used as much anymore is the brick road. I personally grew up on a brick street outside of Chicago (shout out to Forest Park, Illinois) and while it made learning to rollerblade a chore, it wasn't without its charms. DeWit claims that most Dutch brick paved roads were made with DeWit pave hammers, making this story relevant to our subject matter while also presenting DeWit as both a trusted and venerable toolmaker.

DeWit tools can be ordered from the brand's Amazon page.

This Swiss toolmaker is legendary among professional gardeners for its Felco 2 pruners, widely considered some of the best in the world. The company's history is equally interesting — in 1945, engineer Félix Flisch acquired a watch dial factory in Switzerland and converted it to the manufacture of tools. By 1948, the release of the Felco 2 pruning shears became the global standard of the tool, capable of quick, sharp, reliable cuts. While Felco's prices are a little high, you'll never hear anyone complain about the quality of it's gardening tools.

While Felco's manual pruners are some of the best in the world, this isn't just a hand tool manufacturer. The brand makes one of the best electric pruners on the market, with only a high price tag holding it back from grabbing the top rank on our list. Felco's power pruner and accessory lineup is actually more robust than you might think, with pole extensions, loppers, and even battery backpacks available to minimize fatigue and increase ease in portability, all while protecting your hefty investment in its tools. For those hobbyists and professionals in the know, Felco is worth considering if you take your gardening seriously.

Many of Felco's premium garden tools are available from the brand's Amazon store.

Knipex has been around for over 140 years, growing from a basement business in Cronenberg, Germany to the world's leading manufacturer of professional pliers. Like Felco, this brand knows its wheelhouse, and the sheer variety of pliers that Knipex produces is staggering. Professionals and DIYers around the world love Knipex pliers because of their dependability, innovative design, and hardy construction. The manufacturer is perhaps best known for its Cobra line of pliers, which are some of the most useful pliers this side of a Channel Lock.

Comparing Makita to Knipex is like comparing apples to oranges. They aren't really rivals, since Makita is more focused on power tools, while Knipex stays in its lane as a hand tool manufacturer. However, Knipex and Makita do share a reputation as fantastic toolmakers. And as a brand focused on quality, which has put a ton of effort into perfecting dozens of different styles of plier, Knipex deserves a spot in your pliers lineup, especially if you're in the automotive industry. One of my first tool upgrades was going from a cheap set of generic pliers to the Knipex Cobra Water Pump Pliers, and those tools have saved me a ton of headache. 

Knipex tools are available via the brand's Amazon store.

Unlike a lot of the European tool brands on this list, Hazet could be considered a legitimate one-to-one rival for Makita. The company got its start making wrenches and screwdrivers way back in 1868, and it's grown into one of the most popular European toolmakers for mechanics of all kinds. Its product lineup includes hand tools, as well as pneumatics and battery-powered tools like impact wrenches and cordless drills. In the tradition of Milwaukee's red or Makita's teal, Hazet's power tools come in a quickly recognizable shade of blue reminiscent of the North Carolina Tar Heels.

Alongside Hazet's various hand tools and powered variants, the brand also produces a variety of specialty tools. From torque wrenches to its "Smart series" of tool holders, professionals can count on Hazet to produce the specific tools they need for their chosen field. Hazet also makes a line of tool storage units, including tool chests, portable tool boxes, all the way up to full-sized workbenches.

While Hazet makes tools for pros and handy folks of all persuasions, automotive technicians in particular are fond of the brand. Its ratchets, torque wrenches, air tools, and storage solutions cover just about everything you'd find in a mechanic's bay, and the brand also sells fully-stocked tool carts with different loadouts based on tool count or trade.

Hazet tools can be purchased here in the U.S. via distributor KC Tools.

We've written about Bosch a number of times here at SlashGear, and with good reason — the brand and its various subsidiaries and spin-off companies make all kinds of products. The massive global brand got its start as a small workshop in Germany in 1886, and since then Bosch has grown into a beast of a company that generates over 90 billion euros (over $105 billion) annually while employing over 400,000 people worldwide. Whether you're looking for spark plugs or smart fridges, Bosch has you covered. This is a brand that rivals Makita, with a power tool division known for making reliable, powerful products that are well-designed and have some unique features, too.

Bosch's blue cordless products are a shade or two darker than Makita's trademark teal, but it offers many of the same tools at a similar price and quality level. In fact, Bosch appears on SlashGear's rankings of circular saw brands right alongside Makita, and both brands show up on several of our other tool rankings. If you're looking for a power tool brand to invest in, particularly if you're interested in woodworking, you could do a lot worse than either Bosch or Makita.

Bosch's tools are available basically everywhere, including on its Amazon page.

A family-company with over 350 patents and 80 awards, Festool's woodworking products are pretty much good as it gets. In its 100-plus-year history, the German toolmaker has become one of the go-to recommendations for woodworkers looking to upgrade their equipment. Festool makes a wide variety of stuff, from woodworking and power tools to a literal exoskeleton to help relieve weary joints during overhead tasks like sanding and drywall installation.

Nearly all of Festool's woodworking products include some kind of feature that puts them above the competition, whether it's sanders with well thought out dust collection ports, track saws so reliable they can replace a circular saw, or the Festool domino joiner, which basically reinvented furniture connection joints.

While Festool makes some of the same tools as Makita, it specializes in high-end woodworking tools for the demanding professional or the hobbyist who takes their work seriously. It sells high quality tools that consistently produce near-perfect results, at significantly higher prices than most other toolmakers.

Festool products are available via its Amazon store.

A tool company that markets to professional tradespeople, Beta makes everything from tools to tool storage, and over 16,000 products in between. An Italian company founded in 1923, Beta's automotive, aeronautics, and industrial tools are some of the most trusted in their respective trades, and the brand also has multiple motor racing partnerships.

Beta Tools' massive lineup includes a little bit of everything, but you can see a focus on automotive and industrial tools. Welding and measuring products are available, as well as standard tools like wrenches, screwdrivers and pliers, but Beta also makes spark proof tools, power tools, pneumatic tools, and has special sections of its catalog for motorbike, bicycle, and automotive repair. There's even tool storage of all sizes, and even workwear and safety equipment. In fact, when comparing overall selections, Beta Tools might have a more even comparison to Milwaukee than Makita, although Beta Tools has both companies beat with its vast array of hand tools.

It also has some unique offerings, including a set of T-handle wrenches with long shafts, available with Torx, allen, or socket heads at the ends. I have a set of these, and find them way more convenient and reliable than the combination of a ratchet, extension, socket, and universal joint you'd need for the same result.

Beta Tools can be purchased on our side of the pond via its Amazon store.

One of the coolest things about researching lists like this one is the odd trivia you pick up along the way. For example, Fein tools, perhaps best known today for its fantastic oscillating tools, was founded in 1867, and found almost immediate success by improving upon the then-brand-new telephone. Founder Wilhelm Emil Fein went on to improve and innovate in the field of handheld power tools, with the introduction of the electric hand drill, portable sanding machine, and the electric pneumatic hammer, the latter of which was such an excellent design that it's still in use today.

Fast forwarding to today, the German toolmaker's power tools cover a wide array of applications, from drilling and grinding to sheet metal work and dust extraction. Like Makita, Fein focuses its manufacturing efforts on power tools for professionals, specifically tools for the metalworking and woodworking industries. Wilhelm Fein's spirit of innovation is still hanging around his namesake company, too, with fascinating tools like the VERSAMag vise, a powerful and portable vise that uses a powerful permanent magnet to hold the tool in place.

Fein tools are available from the brand's Amazon store.

Best known for its screwdrivers, PB Swiss is a 145-year-old company that's grown from a "traditional village smithy" into an environmentally-conscious manufacturer of dependable hand tools. Professionals often talk about the brand's comfortable, well-built products and how these Swiss-made tools just feel good, like a custom-made screwdriver in your hand. And, because it bothered me to not know, a little trivia: PB Swiss is named for Paul Bauman, who put his name on the family business when he took over in 1918.

PB Swiss' screwdrivers have a trademark red, transparent handles and are incredibly popular overseas due to their quality workmanship, comfortable grip, and great balance. While these professional-grade tools can be a bit more expensive than brands like Makita, someone who uses them every day will appreciate the little differences that separate a thoughtfully crafted piece of equipment and a cheaper alternative. And while it's worth pointing out that PB Swiss, along with a few others on this list, mostly focuses on well-made hand tools over power tools, its still worth comparing to Makita because of its commitment to putting good quality products into the hands of pros who need those tools the most. 

PB Swiss tools can be purchased from its Amazon store.

Once you stop giggling at the name, you'll learn that this Birmingham, England toolmaker has been in business for almost 200 years. Its wrenches, in particular, are beloved by U.K. auto mechanics as both effective hand tools and collectors' items. It's also got one of the more interesting histories in tools; after all, how often does a company go from manufacturing motorcycles to creating the tools to maintain them?

When it was founded in 1856 as the Abingdon Engineering Company, one of the brand's most popular tool lines was the King Dick spanner, a wrench named for the company owner's bulldog. By 1945, The brand had changed its name to Abingdon King Dick Ltd, off the back of the success of those tools. Abingdon also made motorcycles in the middle there, from 1905-1932, but while King Dick remains to this day, the bikes are long gone. King Dick is also the only line of hand tools entirely produced in the U.K.

Makita is better known for its construction and woodworking equipment, but it does also make impact wrenches and cordless ratchets that make that kind of work easier, making the difference between Makita and King Dick less a rivalry and more of a complementary relationship.

German toolmaker Gedore is an innovator and trusted toolmaker, though some complain that the brand was too quick to absorb cheaper brand Carolus and rename it Gedore Red. Several top-of-the-line tool manufacturers have released separate, more affordable lines of tools — one that comes to mind as a former mechanic is Snap-On's Blue Point, which some tool truck guys won't even mention in the same breath as Snap-On, even though the tools are made by the same company. However, the idea of slapping an industry leader's name onto a lower quality tool might leave a bad taste in a new customer's mouth. Imagine Makita buying Pittsburgh tools and labeling it something like "Makita Blue" without explaining the name to its customers.

Those minor complaints were only raised because Gedore itself makes some really good tools. Gedore's torque wrenches, sockets, ratchets, and wrenches are all considered some of the best for industries like auto repair, construction, and machine upkeep, but also for more intricate jobs like electronics.

Gedore (and Gedore Red) tools are available in the United States from the brand's Amazon page.

German brand Two Cherries has been in business since 1858, and its handmade chisels, whittling knives, and saws are made to be used, treasured, and passed on from generation to generation. It becomes immediately apparent that you're dealing with a bespoke creator of tools when you browse Two Cherries' catalog, or that of its U.S. distributor, the Robert Larson Company — dozens of cutting tools with minor differences amateurs may not even notice, but the professional will immediately appreciate. But much like a menu at a fancy restaurant, there's no prices listed in that physical catalog.

Makita's woodworking tools are very good products, but its difficult to compare them to Two Cherries' products. Makita's focus is on providing tools for industrial woodworkers and construction tradespeople; Two Cherries' boutique-style chisels, saws, and carving tools are fine handmade and hand-forged tools for hobbyists and woodworkers who put their hearts and souls into their craft. However, there's nothing that says you can't use those same Makita products to make initial cuts on lumber, or for other parts of woodworking like dust mitigation and cleanup.

Two Cherries woodworking products can be ordered via the Robert Larson Company.

In choosing 13 of the best European tools brands that rival Makita, we sifted through a variety of toolmakers from throughout the region. Reviews, forums, and YouTube videos helped to whittle down the dozens of European toolmakers that were comparable to Makita. We also researched sales data for those brands, as well as looking through Reddit posts and blogs that discuss European toolmakers to select some of the most popular manufacturers with the best reputations.