we've gathered 10 of the top string trimmers in the industry from Milwaukee DeWalt Makita ego steel Ryobi husqavarna Echo skill and Toro in this video we're going to put these to the test in search of the best Flagship string trimmer so which one of these string trimmers is best I'll get to that but first let me tell you what we look for in a string trimmer and how each one of these stacked up in the tested categories starting at the business end of the tool we're going to talk about maximum cutting swath The Cutting swath advertises the full radius these trimmers can cover but it's worth noting that many battery power string trimmers have reversible Cutters built into the guard set it for the longer string length you can cut a wider swath set it to the shorter length you'll get better runtime The Cutting swath range varied from 16 in on the small side to the largest being husqavarna at 18.1 in Makita was the only other tool that was rated for 18 in and all the rest coming in between 16 and 17 in while most of our battery powered string trimmers are capable of using 95 in line some were able to Beef It Up to the larger .105 in that's better at cutting through tough overgrowth DeWalt Echo ego and Toro are rated for 95 line Milwaukee Makita husqavarna Ryobi and still are equipped for line up to 0.105 the budget skill model is the only one rated below the 095 standard at 80 one of the most important elements of using a string trimmer is ergonomics if the weight weight and balancers off it can leave you with back pain or give you unwieldy and uncomfortable trimming experience good balance is critical but objectively testing is difficult the front handles are adjustable so you can customize the fit to your specific arm length and height with the front handle in the stock position with many trimmers having a mark for this we weighed how much of the trimmer weight was in the front handle and how much was at the trigger handle for example consider the following hypothetical measurements total weight of 11 lb front handle weighs in at 4.5 lb the tri trigger handle weighs in at 6.5 lb this model would have a balance rating of 2.0 lb bias towards the rear indicating that your trigger hand would hold two more pounds in your front hand the most neutral Balan tool in our test with the steel where there is nearly the same amount of weight on both the front and back handles with the echo being a close second to a neutral fuel the numbers quickly change with many of the tools having a bias towards the front of the tool with just a rear handle used to maneuver and speed control the trimmer in some extreme cases like the ri the front Vibes is so much so that it actually makes using a tool quickly fatiguing with nearly 3/4 of the weight is felt at the trimmer head and this is most likely caused by the motor being positioned at the trimmer head the Tor was the only tool with a significant rear bias which could be attributed to its motor and large battery Design Line loing is another critical piece of the puzzle when it comes to the full package a trimmer has to offer as we changed out the stock lines for our husk ofon test lines we noted the style of each head design and how easy it was to change the line out even though rapid loading heads are common there are some differences in design that make some easier than others to use the Milwaukee and ego were the easiest to unload and then reload with new string the heads on these two tools were logical and had clear markings indicating where to load the string the bul of the trimmers were in the Middle with very similar loading systems but in some cases I had to break out the manual to make sure I did it correctly the steel was the most difficult to load in that I had to open the head cut the length of string in half and then manually wind the string onto the spool while not terribly hard it wasn't inconvenience when compared to the rest of the trimmers when it comes to vibration since we don't have a vibration meter we have to test it more subjectively than some of our other tests for this we run the trimmer at high speed with the longest cutting swath under no load and feel how much vibration it has we keep testing side by side until we find the ones with the lowest vibration levels and separate them into categories from 1 to five with one having the best vibration control and five the worst if you spend a lot of time with a tool one of the things that quickly becomes evident is her vibration the echo hands down had the lowest felt vibration as we work through our testing also the ego DeWalt steel Toro and hosco all came in at a close second a few tools earned an average of three and only the Ryobi was rated the worst with a five using a digital tachometer we tested each model's maximum rpm with the largest rated line and its largest cutting SWA under no load the RPM shows a spread of about 769 RPMs and while that might not sound like much a few hundred RPM could be the factor that gives one trimmer a little more momentum to get through tougher materials than the next the slowest trimmer is the ego at 5,46 and the husar is close behind at 5,490 the fastest tool measured was the Milwaukee at 6,175 and the skill in second at 592 RPM to test cutting speed we set up a rig using three layers of vigaro read fencing that ran 8 ft long this material is similar to the kind of tall stock of grass we CAU in overgrown areas in Central Florida and offers better consistency than Lawns or Fields the results are the amount of time it took each model to complete the 8ft section average between two runs of all of our tests this one test is the most defining one that really communicates what these trimmers can really do the fastest trimmer by significant lead was a Makita at just 9 seconds flat the next closest was the husk ofar at 11.03 seconds and the third goes to Ekko at 11.9 seconds the slowest in the batch was the ego at 18.9 seconds and we think that might be because the line IQ automatic adment the trimmer string did not allow us to manually Advance the string to the needed length to really be competitive now with all that data in context let's hand out some Hardware we've got some specific categories we think certain trimmers excelled in and then we've got our best overall trimmers one for homeowners and one for professionals let's start with a closer look at what we believe to be the most powerful battery powered string trimmer Milwaukee's M18 fuel dual battery string trimmer emerges the most powerful model we tested its two battery design puts 200 188 W hours of capacity on board when you use a pair of 8 Amp Hour high output batteries that netted more than 30 minutes of runtime during our review the downside is that it's also the heaviest model in the group however there's a shoulder strap that comes with a tool that I highly recommend that you take advantage of when you're trimming larger properties we ran into an issue during our cutting speed test where the line was frequently breaking against the tough material that's not something we saw from other models or that we experienced on a regular grass and moderate overgrowth you can find this wherever you buy me walk tools $3.99 for a bear tool $699 for a kit with two 8 Amp Hour high output batteries we chose the echo eforce 56 volt trimmer as our best lightweight battery powered string trimmer at just 12 lb the ekko's dsrm d2600 might seem like a strange pick as the best lightweight battery power string trimmer but that's with a 5 amp hour battery if you go with a kit that comes with a 2.5 a battery it's an easy to manage 10 pounds while there are lighter options available they don't have the performance Echo does the 2600 has legit gas replacement power plus a pro bu excellent balance top tier vibration control making an easy recommendation with either battery configuration when it comes to Performance we're looking for the best balance of cutting speed and power cutting swath runtime vibration control our best performing trimmer in the Pro category was the Makita Gru 07 tiing the power of a 35cc gas model it feels like it has all the power of a high-end brush cutter while employing a string trimmer head with its 18-in cutting swath it's well suited for clearing large areas quickly the downside to that much power is a lower runtime but an indefinitely variable cruise control can help you management by dialing in the power you need for what you're cutting the trimmer high torque boost mode can help you deal with tough patches you might come across before returning the power level you previously set this trimmer is only available at Makita dealers it will run you a hefty 959 for a kit with two 5 a hour batteries if you're looking for the easiest most convenient cordless string trimmer to use ego's st16 23t is the way to go it's telescoping carbon fiber handle lets you adjust the length of the tool rather than Shifting the handle position plus line IQ takes care of automatically feeding line power load makes reloading the line of Breeze and its low vibration keeps things more comfortable beyond the convenience this model easily had the longest runtime in our test even if you use 2 and 1/2 amp hour batteries to shave some weight you'll still have close to 30 minutes of trigger your time at the highest cutting speed while this model does a great job on most tasks it does struggle when you get to heavy overgrowth if that's something you encounter often you may want to step up to a more powerful option you can find this model at Acme Tools for 219 as a bear tool and 329 for a kit with a 4 aamp Hour battery finally our team crowned the steel FSA 135r as the best battery powered string trimmer for professionals steel designed this trimmer to be an electrified version of its popular fs91 arm gas model confident under load this model has near perfect balance and very low vibration while this trimmer is heavy still has options to shift the battery to your belt or back it's something to keep in mind for both weight savings and customizing your workflow you can grab our favorite trimmer acne tools it'll cost you $449 for the bear tool and 860 for a kit with a ap300s battery there you have it folks the best battery power string trimmer do you have any questions about the models we featured in our testing leave it in the comments below what tools you want to see in the next round of testing let us hear that in the comments as well don't forget to hit that like button and subscribe to the channel so you don't miss out on our next video and as always thanks for watching [Music]