5 Tools & Gadgets DIYers Say Are A Waste Of Money

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When it comes to tools, it's surprisingly difficult to find a truly bad one. Most have their use, and some tools simply have more uses than others. A good cordless power drill is useful in an untold number of DIY and professional settings. Most rotary tools have so many attachment options that there are tons of niche use cases that they can fill. Even sub-$50 tools like flashlights and step ladders have nearly everyday usability. Every category has its duds, but they are few and far between. 

However, there are some tools that are a flat waste of money. In this case, we're not referring to tools once performing fill a specific need once and then sit in a toolbox until the heat death of the universe. Those are useful, they're just niche. We're talking about tools that you would have been better off without or ones that try to compete with something that does the job better. Tool brands discontinue and revamp products all the time and whole brands go under if their tools aren't good enough. So, truly bad products usually don't stay on store shelves long. 

With that said, there are a few that you can buy today, but we really don't recommend you do. In all cases, there are either better options or different tools you can buy that do the job better. 

DeWalt makes good tools, and its power washers even rank well on our best pressure washer brands list. However, every toolmaker drops a dud eventually, and the DeWalt DWPW3000 is arguably that dud. The pressure washer looks good on paper. The 1.1 gallons per minute (GPM) unit promises to deliver up to 40% more pressure than DeWalt's smaller DWPW2100 pressure washer, and puts out 3,000 PSI of pressure. It's designed for vertical or horizontal storage, comes with four nozzles by default, and you can store the wand on the device, making it very easy to store and use. 

This is a pretty stacked spec list for a pressure washer, made all the more stacked by range afforded by the 35-foot power cord and 25-foot tangle-resistant hose. However, user reviews tell the story here, and it's not a favorable one for DeWalt. It has a 3.6 rating on Home Depot, a 3.4 rating on Acme Tools, and a paltry 2.3 rating on DeWalt's own website across 250 total reviews across all three websites. Users complain that the pressure isn't consistent, that quality assurance issues cause it to break down early, and a lackluster customer service experience. 

Home Depot complicated matters by merging this model's reviews with that of the 2,600 PSI model, but many of the positive reviews are for that model and not this one. We suspect 2.4 rating on DeWalt's website is the product's true rating, despite having fewer reviews there. 

Dremel makes some of the all-time great rotary tools. The Dremel 4300 is supremely popular and well regarded by its users, while the 4000 model is a less expensive variant that people still largely enjoy. Sitting between those two is the Dremel 4200, which may well go down in history as the worst tool Dremel ever made. On the surface, it looks like any other Dremel, with dozens of attachment options to morph into whatever tool you need it to be. It also comes with what Dremel calls the EZ Change system for swapping out bits faster than the other models, which don't have it. 

Despite having a feature that the others don't have, users really don't seem to enjoy this one. It has a 2.5 rating on Home Depot with nearly 300 reviews, and a 2.2 rating from Walmart shoppers out of 235 reviews. Whatever sauce Dremel cooks with, metaphorically speaking, on the other models simply doesn't appear to be here, as customers complain about the quality of the tool and its penchant for breaking down earlier than expected. In addition, a few customers cite that the EZ Change system doesn't always do the best job of holding bits, causing them to fall out of the Dremel while in use. 

In short, if you plan on purchasing a Dremel, you should probably step up to the 4300 model or down to the 4000 model and leave the 4200 model on the shelf. 

Most of Ryobi's tools are perfectly usable for DIY homeowners, and its lawn equipment is usually quite good and reliable. It make all sorts of tools, and many of them can be surprisingly useful. Even many of the brand's discontinued tools are still pretty neat. None of that can be said for the Ryobi Brushless Cordless Leaf Blower/Mulcher/Vacuum. 

This tool sits comfortably toward the bottom in terms of user reviews among Ryobi tools. It's a 40V leaf blower that can change directions and vacuum leaves out of your yard. It comes with a bag to deposit said leaves, and in blower mode, it boasts 600 CFM of airflow, which would place it on the higher end of Ryobi's leaf blowers in terms of power.

Sadly, the problem isn't the part that blows, it's the part that sucks. Ryobi's blower and mulcher combo scores a lukewarm 3.5 rating at Home Depot with over 5,000 product reviews, and two other kits score 3.1 with a little under 800 reviews and 3.4 with over 6,400 reviews. That is nearly 3,500 1-star reviews. The problems are simple. The suction isn't strong enough for anything other than dry leaves, and the system clogs easily if you get a stick or other debris. Plus, it tends to break down rather frequently

Once upon a time, Black & Decker sold a 48-in-1 socket wrench people rather enjoyed. It spent some time at the top of Amazon's bestselling wrench list, and pro reviews were appreciative of its versatility, despite apprehension around the tool's weird design. Black & Decker discontinued the wrench some time ago, and in its stead have been several replacements, including one by D-Unique and another that was available for a time from Husky.

These tools are meant to be used for simple jobs, and house several socket sizes that would be relatively useful for day-to-day use. However, while the Black & Decker model received reluctant praise, its replacements haven't been so fortunate. Pro reviews noted that the Husky model was chunkier and less ergonomic than the Black & Decker model, while customer reviews note that the D-Unique model is okay at best, and that while the brand labels it as a torque wrench, it definitely is not a torque wrench. 

It's one of those uncanny valleys where it might be useful for some things, but many, including pro reviewers, recommend just grabbing yourself a nice socket set from a trusted brand, which will last longer, be usable for more things, and is easier to integrate into an existing home tool kit. All-in-one tools can be good, like this Klein Tools 15-in-1 Multi-Bit Screwdriver, but the 48-in-1 ratchets aren't one of those tools.

The Black & Decker Dust Buster is one of those tools that only gets worse the longer you look at it. It's seemingly fine on paper, with a simple design that is easy to clean, a brush attachment for tougher jobs, and a wall mounted charger for easy storage. It also boasts three times as much suction power as any of the brand's other vacuums. Running for $55, it's not that expensive, either.

The dust buster has an average rating of 3.9 with just over 600 reviews, which would normally mean that's it's good enough, but nothing to write home about. The devil is in the details, however, as Home Depot has a penchant for stuffing its pages with good reviews that were "collected as part of a promotion." If you remove all of those reviews, the rating for this vacuum craters pretty significantly. And several 3-star reviews were actually collected as part of the promotion, so not even they could save it from mediocrity.

Common complaints include short battery life, a much louder motor than prior Black & Decker vacuums, ineffective suction, and other inefficiencies. It's not necessarily bad, but it appears to be underwhelming compared to other products on the market. We recommend skipping this one and maybe looking around a little bit longer for something better. 

As stated in the intro, bad tools can be hard to find. People don't tend to buy them en masse, so it's exceedingly rare to find one with thousands, or even hundreds of reviews. In addition, something being a waste of money is often subjective. An inexpensive wrench set from Harbor Freight may be just what the proverbial doctor ordered for a DIY homeowner putting together a piece of furniture, and also pale in comparison to expensive professional-grade tools. 

Thus, we attempted to be as objective as possible, to ensure that the above products were widely disliked by multiple demographics and not just one or two. Every product above had to have a 3.5-star rating or less, with as many reviews as we could find. For products without a ton of customer reviews, like the D-Unique 48-in-1 ratchet, we augmented with pro reviews who shared similar sentiments. 

We could've easily have stuffed this list with a bunch of tools with bad reviews after only two or three customer reviews, but that's not a reliable indication of much. After all, it's fairly well-known that people are more likely to talk about negative experiences online than positive ones, and we can only know so much about the circumstances that lead to each individual's account, so two bad reviews out of five doesn't really mean much. We are confident that with these metrics in place, the products above are a bigger headache than they're worth, and in fact a waste of money.