Weird or Worth It? Best Neck Knives of 2025

August 07, 2025 By: Howard Korn Categories: Best

What is a neck knife? Offering strength and utility in a compact package, neck knives are designed to be carried around the neck on a chain or cord for fast and reliable access. If you’ve never carried a neck knife before, here are some good reasons you might want to consider it.

For one thing, a fixed blade will almost always be more reliable than a folder. They have fewer moving parts to break and are easier to clean when dirty, but may not be as convenient to carry or as socially acceptable as a folding knife. Neck carry solves the second problem as you can tuck the blade under your shirt when not in use, keeping it handy and unobtrusive without advertising its presence on the belt.

As for best uses? The strength during heavy utility work is a definite plus. For tactical-minded folks, they can be a great last-ditch option. They are also useful for campers and especially backpackers and ultralight crowd. A hiking pack will likely have a padded waist belt, so carrying the knife around the neck keeps it accessible without affecting the fit of your pack. We’ll show you some of the best options below for each of the above three categories.

BEST EDC/UTILITY NECK KNIVES

CRKT: Folts Minimalist

This series of neck knives is small and affordable at right around 30 bucks. They are very unobtrusive to carry with an injection molded sheath that can be worn around the neck or on the belt if you prefer, and they are great for opening up packages or boxes or other small daily needs.

There are several blade shapes in the lineup including a clip point Bowie, drop point, a tanto, an aggressive Wharncliffe, and a very popular new cleaver profile.

CRKT Folts Minimalist Cleaver on a white background.

The distinctive handles with three prominent finger grooves are the most striking feature of this knife. Even my big fingers fit in them very nicely and it makes the grip absolutely rock-solid, despite the small size of the knife overall. The braided lanyard that comes standard provides even more grip for your pinky finger as well.

The CRKT Folts Minimalist is a very effective little design, and priced as they are, they make a great way to dip your feet into the neck knife world and still get a very worthwhile design.

CIVIVI: Kiri-EDC

The CIVIVI Kiri-EDC is a solid utility blade designed by Alessandra De Santis and inspired by the kiridashi, a traditional Japanese carpentry knife used for wood carving and marking.

The blade is made from 9CR18Mov stainless to give you performance roughly equivalent to 440C. The stonewash finish is especially nice for hiding scratches resulting from using the knife, and helps to up the corrosion resistance of the steel too. The edge is a bit under 2” and the grind is nice and stout. It is not exactly a slicer but should have the strength for tougher cuts that you may not want to attack with a lesser knife.

The handle designed very smartly – it is skeletonized for weight reduction and has no handle scales to help it carry nice and flat, but the edges are chamfered to maintain decent comfort, despite lacking scales. Finger grooves tell you how to hold this knife which brings your fingers right behind the edge. In a thoughtful touch, they have rounded over the point at the heel of the blade so that it doesn’t poke you while you are using it.

The back end of the handle even has a bottle opener built-in, which technically makes it a multitool! You’ll see a lot of makers sneak something like this into their neck knives, and it doesn’t get in the way, so why not? Just make sure you have the knife sheathed when popping open your beverage!

Kershaw: Brace

With a name that suggests structural integrity, the Brace is a capable little Kershaw is perfectly suited to everyday carry. Its a neat clip/drop point blade shape makes it the most well-rounded choice in our EDC category, and the price ($25) and choice of blade steel (8Cr13MoV) combine to make this a competitive option.

The handle is ultra-minimal: just two thin pieces of glass-filled nylon that sandwich the steel tang of the blade, leaving some of its skeleton exposed. It’s a stylish look and useful too; the hole in the fore of the handle is perfect for a pinch grip, while the aft is just right for attaching a lanyard.

The sheath is arguably the strongest part of the package because it’s naturally ambidextrous. This means that no matter which way the knife is inserted, it will still hold fast.

BEST TACTICAL NECK KNIVES

Spyderco: Swick

Building on the longstanding success of the Spyderco ARK, which was designed for soldiers in Afghanistan to fend off assaulters who had taken to ambushing them in the shower, the Swick offers upgraded cutting performance, edge retention, and handle safety.

Spyderco’s LC200N steel ensures virtually rust-proof performance and boasts huge gains in edge retention as compared to similarly rust-proof alloys like H1. The Wharncliffe shape shape comes to a very sharp point and is available with a plain edge or full serrations for even more aggressive cutting.

The handles are purpose-driven as well, with a finger hole (available in two sizes to suit the full range of human hand sizes) to keep your grip locked in place. Peel-ply G10 scales that have been attached without visible hardware to ensure rust-free performance. The resulting combination provides an insane amount of grip even when things are wet or slippery.

The sheath design is not an afterthought either. It is made from premium Boltaron and includes a breakaway ball chain. As the name suggests, the chain will break away under a lot of pressure, which means it can’t be turned against the wearer as a choking device. An adjustable G-Clip is also provided for belt carry.

Cold Steel: Mini Tac

If you want a tactically oriented neck knife that has a bit of eastern influence, you’ll want to check out the Cold Steel Mini-Tac tanto, coming in at a very affordable $30 right now. It features an AUS-8 stainless blade with a broad tip for strength during penetration. If you’d prefer something more acute there is also a clip point Bowie version which is a little poker.

Cold Steel Mini-Tac Bowie plain edge knife on a white background.

The blade length is balanced out by a slightly shorter handle, which offers a three-finger grip. Despite the length, it is more secure than you might think. The Griv-Ex scales feature a G10 like texture and a big finger guard locks your hand into place. This means you won’t have to think twice about tackling big targets with this blade, yet it is so flat and lightweight that you can virtually forget about it until you really need it.

BEST OUTDOOR NECK KNIVES

ESEE Knives: Izula

ESEE Izula Stainless with stonewashed finish on a white background.

Most Izulas are 1095 carbon steel with a powder coating and you can get a handful of color options. You can also get it with S35VN with a stonewashed finish if you prefer a stainless blade. The sharpened edge comes in a little under three inches and it features a lot of belly. Sometimes this can impact the usability of the tip of the knife, but they have angled the blade down from the line of the handle so that it remains easy to use for delicate work while still leaving plenty of belly for slicing and skinning.

You can easily paracord wrap the Izula handles as well as purchase handle scales separately, with ESEE offering Micarta or G10 choices. The Izula-II is also an option. It has the same blade with longer handles and is comes with Micarta installed right from the box.

ESEE Izula II carbon steel with desert tan powder coat and Micarta handles on a white background.

If the design doesn’t speak for itself – we think it does – ESEE also has one of the best warranties in the business – lifetime, no questions asked. With that kind of confidence in the product, you know you can abuse the knife without feeling guilty.

Morakniv: Eldris

Next we have a bushcraft neck knife, the Mora Eldris which is made in Sweden. Nordic peoples actually have a long history with neck knives as the knife could be accessed without removing cold-weather clothing, something that still holds up today. A neck knife could also be accessed more easily in the event of falling through ice to use as an improvised pick to pull themselves to safety.

The Eldris is a great design and is by far the best whittling and woodcarving knife we’ve looked at yet thanks to a palm filling synthetic handle. The barrel shape lends itself to hours of wood carving with a lot of comfort. Several colors are available including orange and blue, both of which will be highly visible.

The blade is just under 2.25″ long and made from Sandvik 12C27 stainless steel. This alloy is quite tough, easy to maintain, and you can get a very fine edge on it pretty easily. It features a scandi grind which is phenomenal for carving wood, but they have also scalloped the shoulders away near the belly to make it more efficient for general-purpose tasks and slicing.

The sheath is hard plastic with holes at the top for lanyard/neck carry and the knife clicks into place with positive retention. In this configuration, the Eldris comes in at about $25 at this point in time.

Eldris accessory kit including leather snap loop for the sheath, paracord lanyard, and a firesteel with lanyard and leather fob attached, all on a white background.

Also available is a $40 bundle. This package adds a leather snap loop for extra retention when the sheath is inverted and it includes a paracord lanyard, and a firesteel for starting your bonfire or camp stove. The spine of the knife is crisp enough to use as the striker so this package includes everything you need to survive and thrive in a nice compact form factor.

QSP Knives: Canary

QSP Canary fixed blade neck knife a white background.

Next outdoor design is a pick from QSP Knives, the Canary. Like the Morakniv Eldris above, this knife makes the most of its small stature with a handle that is surprisingly comfortable for harder use. This design is particularly suited to bushcraft because of one hidden feature: the holes in the handle make it suitable for lashing to a stick for use as an impromptu spear.

Now, a word of caution. We’re not generally a fan of the idea of lashing your knife to a stick. In a true survival situation, you wouldn’t want to lose your knife, but there are legitimate uses where extending your reach might be worth considering.

The blade is made of 14C28N steel, which is easy to maintain while offering a high degree of toughness. The small drop point blade is a good shape for camp craft or even as a small hunting knife.

White River Knives: M1 Backpacker & Caper

White River M1 Backpacker with stonewashed blade and orange/black paracord wrapped handles on a white background.

Last but not least, the White River M1 Backpacker is probably my favorite neck knife on the market, in any genre, incorporating many of the best elements from all the knives we’ve looked at so far. If you haven’t checked out a White River knife before, you really should, and the Backpacker is a great place to start, offering premium construction, great materials, and a blade that is useful for everything from camping, hunting, EDC utility, and even tactical, especially if you go for one of the black-coated models.

Prices start at $95 at this point in time and the blades are made in the USA from S35VN steel. The 3.25″ blade is useful anywhere with its drop point shape, acute tip, and flat grind. The standard stonewashed finish looks great, while black versions feature an ionbond coating for fewer reflections.

White River Backpacker Pro, Black ionbond blade with High-vis yellow G10 handles on a white background.

The handles are wrapped in paracord wrap right from the box, or for a little bit more money you can get the Backpacker Pro which features bolt-on scales from various colors of G10 or Micarta. Their Caper model is an even more premium option. Despite the different name the profile is the same, but it features permanent handles with a pair of tubes running through the handle for more lashing options.

White River Caper with stonewashed blade and black/maple Richlite handles on a white background.

My favorite detail though is the way they treat the index finger area of the handle. It forms a prominent finger guard for safety, but for increased comfort, that area is crowned very nicely, something we wish more manufacturers would take note of. Whether you are piercing with the blade or powering through a cut, it is a very comfortable and appreciated feature.

The sheath is also, in my opinion, the best we’ve looked at so far, featuring a custom Kydex fit that can be carried around the neck or on the belt with the included attachment hardware. It can even fit popular aftermarket belt hardware such as the Blade-Tech Small Tek-Lok.