Tested: After talking to a half-dozen experts, surveying more than a thousand readers, researching 127 different models, and going hands-on with seven of them, we've discovered that the best general-use mechanical pencil for most people is the $5 uni-ball Kuru Toga. Thanks to an innovative internal mechanism, it'll never get blunt as you write, meaning your words and diagrams will always be at their sharpest and most defined.
6 comments:
I am absolutely floored this research exists in the world. I am, and formally deem myself, a huge mechanical pencil nerd. I just really appreciate all forms of writing utensil, but after being forced for many years in public school to use the standard wooden pencil the skin has torn away from my nail and now a calloused gap remains on my middle finger, never to heal from all the previous wear and tear. Needless to say, I am a huge mechanical pencil fan, and the rotating lead in the uni-ball Kuru Toga sounds super fancy, but also innovative, especially for hand drafting because technically you’re supposed to rotate your pencil as you draw a line to keep it completely even (but I doubt any of us really do). So the fact that this pencil essentially calibrates itself as you are writing is an amazingly misunderstood feature and hopeful it will make its way into the mainstream.
All of my writing utensils are mechanical pencils, literally all of them. I have maybe a couple of pens laying around for use when writing a check or filling out important documents, but for 99.9% of the writing I do, It is mechanical pencils for 99.9% of the writing that I do. I even have a mechanical carpentry pencil that advances a toothed piece of 1/8”x1/4” lead out of a plastic body (Oddly I have never really used it for carpentry). It is no surprise that I have opinions about which pencils I like to use in a given circumstance. It seemed like the article mostly focused on mechanical pencils for use by writers or office workers, I found that I use maybe half my pencils for shop and carpentry work. That pencil need to be a different kind that a note taking pencil. Ideally it should by a .5mm HB lead on a cheap body with NO rubber hand grip, eraser optional. For me, the most important thing about a carpentry pencil is if it can be stuck in a ponytail or not, if it cannot be, it is practically useless to try and keep up with it in the shop.
As soon as Monica told me about this article, I started googling what the best mechanical pencils are. It seems that there is a lot of consensus that the Kuru Toga is the best for everyday. However, there are so many specialty pencils out there! I had no idea this even existed, and after geeking out for a while I found that most pencils are rated based on what they do best. The metal drafting pencil featured in this article, for example, has a thin metal sleeve that covers the lead and allows one to draw really close to templates and rulers (a big bonus, for hand drafting). There were also pencils disguised as sleek silver pens, and made tiny to fit in the spine of a small notebook where normal pencils could not go. A calculus professor on campus demonstrated a very cool pencil (which I have not been able to find) that writes almost like a pen, with bold, dark lines that look very much like ink. Overall, very cool article and even cooler pencils!
I really liked this mechanical pencil comparison article. I use mechanical pencils for most of my writing purposes. Anything that I write in my notebooks is written with mechanical pencils because pen is too much of a commitment for me and I haven’t used a regular pencil to take notes since middle school. The pencils that I use are pretty crappy, but they’re also really cute. They’re called Cadoozles, and they’re very simple. There’s nothing fancy going on with them, and the have a light duty wooden shaft. What I like about them though is the length, which is a bit under 6 inches, that they’re pretty cheap so I don’t care as much if I lose them, and they come in really bright colors and patterns so if I do lose them I know that they’re mine. I’ve let someone borrow a pencil before and not gotten it back, and then a few weeks later seen them using it a class, and I know that nobody has pencils quite as flamboyant as mine, so I asked for it back after class. The pencils in this article are in a whole other league though. I’m really considering getting a Kuru Toga now, because there are times that I need to spend a few seconds rotating my lead after it breaks and that does get tiresome. The fact that it’s always sharp is really cool. My only concern is that I don’t want to lose a $5 pencil, and I like buying office supplies in bulk. I can get 28 cadoozles for less than $10. I still want to buy some Kuru Togas though, and I’m considering getting a couple to keep in my backpack (I keep Cadoozles in my pocket because I don’t care if I lose them and I’m fine lending them out) for note taking reasons. Something that concerns me about the Kuru Toga though is that I think that the pencil should be expressive the owner. If I lose a Cadoozle, or even the purple pens that I buy in bulk and use (though I’m thinking of switching brands because they fade after a while; any suggestions for a good purple pen? I’m thinking G2, but I’m open to anything), people who know me moderately well know that they’re mine. That’s why I like having office supplies that don’t look standard. (Also (yes, I know that mechanical typically mechanical pencils don’t write in pencil) as far as pens and sharpies go I like writing in purple that way people know I wrote something. If a spike is questionable or a comment I make on a drafting is questionable, people can look at it and know to ask me about it). So, if I see a Kuru Toga that comes in purple, I’m definitely going to get it. If not, I’ll just think about it. Maybe I’ll see hoy easily they come apart and try to color it myself, but honestly I don’t want to deal with that.
Thankfully, this article started off with telling us the best mechanical pencil. I don't think I could have handling waiting for end, as the anticipation was too much. I have used the Pentel Graph Gear 1000 at times, mostly only because I found it somewhere once and kept it. It's actually very nice. I would recommend. From a stage management perspective, it's mechanical pencils or bust. And within that niche, it's 0.5mm or nothing else. Especially when writing blocking or just general notes in your book, it's imperative that you be able to read wheat you actually wrote, as odds are it was written very fast and in between thoughts. I don't have time to sharpen pencils and plus, finding a good hand sharpener that keeps the shavings in the body and can get the wood pencil to a point is pretty near impossible. Like Chris, my ideal pencil better not have a grip. Since I don't hand draft anymore, the deciding factor for a mechanical pencil is whether I can put in a ponytail. If I end up having to re do my hair when I take it out, it's a useless tool. Women's pockets cannot handle an object as big as a standard pencil, mechanical or otherwise. Storing it in my hair is the way to go and if can't pull in and out of my hair easily, it's not useful to me. Also, to respond to Thomas, I was a big user of purple ink in high school, but coming to college he as completely destroyed my entire sense of written identity now that he has claimed that color.
I would first like to say that I am in love with the idea that a pencil experts is a thing that exist and that there are more than one of them. I was also excited to see Pentel dominated this list. I think that they make great mechanical pencils, which are durable and constantly as sharp as you need them. Before and during college I took a lot of Asian language classes, where writing requires a really steady hand and a sharp writing instrument. I found that Pentel’s mechanical pencils were the best writing instrument because they aided in steadying your hand. I also used the Kerry version of their pencil a lot during classes that required hand drafting and it became a lot quicker and easier than when I was using regular wooden pencils. I am excited to try the Uni Ball pencil that was chosen by this article as the way the inner mechanism works to keep the pencil sharp sounds interesting.
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