Which Router Should You Buy?

If you only break edges, buy a trim router. If you want one router to do handheld joinery now and live under a table later, buy a mid-size combo kit. If you are building a router table and nothing else, buy a big fixed motor. There is no fourth answer, and horsepower is not the deciding factor in any of the three.

The confusion is real and it is the word's fault. “Router” covers a one-handed tool that weighs under four pounds and a table-mounted motor that weighs fifteen, and buying advice that treats them as points on one scale is useless. They are three tools. Work out which one you need, then rank within it — that is what our router roundup does.

The three types, answered directly

Trim router (also called compact or palm router)

One hand, around 1 to 1.25 HP, a 1/4-inch collet and nothing bigger. What it is genuinely for: round-overs, chamfers, flush-trimming laminate and veneer, hinge mortises, small dados, signage and inlay. What it is not for: raised panels, big rail-and-stile cutters, deep mortises, or anything mounted under a table.

Buy this one if your honest answer to “what will I use it for” is “softening edges and flush-trimming.” That is a large share of real woodworking, and a trim router does it better than a mid-size machine does, because you can control it one-handed and see what you are doing. Being cheaper is a bonus, not the reason.

Mid-size combo kit (fixed base plus plunge base)

Around 2 to 2.25 HP, one motor with two interchangeable bases, and both 1/4 and 1/2-inch collets. This is the honest default for a first router in a shop that intends to build furniture. The fixed base is steadier for edge work and is what goes under a table; the plunge base drops a spinning cutter into the middle of a board for mortises, stopped dados and inlay recesses — something a fixed base physically cannot do safely.

The two bases are cheaper bundled than bought separately, which is why combo kits dominate the market. If you want the full argument for one base over the other, we make it in plunge vs fixed base router; the short version is that most people should stop choosing and buy both.

Big fixed router for a table

Three horsepower and up, usually sold as a bare motor or a plunge unit with above-table height adjustment, and always a 1/2-inch collet. This exists for one reason: large cutters. Rail-and-stile sets, raised panel bits and big profile cutters need the mass to stay steady and the low-end torque to hold speed through a heavy pass. A mid-size router in a table will run them, but slowly, in more passes, with more chatter.

Do not buy this as a first router. It is a second router, bought when the table is built and the mid-size machine is tired of being unbolted from it.

The decision, by what you make

The three specs that actually decide it

• Collet size. The most consequential number on the box. A 1/2-inch shank is far stiffer than a 1/4-inch one, which means less chatter on wide profiles. A trim router gives you 1/4-inch only; a mid-size machine accepts both. If you are choosing between two otherwise similar routers and one takes 1/2-inch shanks, take that one. We work through the trade-off properly in 1/4 vs 1/2-inch shanks.
• Variable speed.Not a luxury. Large-diameter bits have published maximum RPM figures well below a router's top speed — Whiteside rates a 3-1/4 in. raised panel bit at a maximum of 12,000 RPM against 24,000 for a 1/4-inch straight bit. A single-speed router cannot legally or safely run the big cutters. The published figures are in our router bit speed chart.
• Above-table adjustment. Only matters if a table is in your future, and then it matters a lot. Reaching under a table to set depth on every pass is the single most irritating thing about router tables, and machines designed to be adjusted from above solve it. Covered in our router table roundup.

What is not worth paying for

Peak horsepower on a handheld router. Above about 2.25 HP a handheld machine is getting heavy and harder to control, and the extra power only pays off in a table. Weight is a genuine cost in a tool you hold above your work.

Soft-start on a trim router. Useful on a 3 HP motor, which genuinely lurches. Barely noticeable on a machine you can hold in one hand.

A large boxed bit set bundled with the router. Almost nobody uses more than six profiles regularly. Our router bit roundupmakes the case for buying a cheap set to discover your habits, then replacing the three bits you actually wore out with good ones — which is a better use of the same money than a bundled set of fifteen you did not choose.

Corded or cordless?

For a trim router, cordless is genuinely good now and the freedom from a cord matters on edge work where you walk around a piece. For a mid-size or table router, corded, without hesitation — sustained heavy cuts drain batteries fast and a table router never moves anyway.

Two routers is a normal answer

Plenty of shops end up with a trim router and a mid-size combo, and that is not over-buying — it is the two tools doing different jobs. What is worth avoiding is buying the mid-size machine twice: one bolted under the table and one for handheld work is a real pattern, and if you are heading there, the second purchase should be the big fixed motor for the table rather than a duplicate.

What we could not verify

We have not tested any router. Horsepower, collet sizes, weights and speed ranges are the manufacturers' published figures, and the bit RPM limits quoted are Whiteside's own published per-product figures. The decision framework above is reasoning about what each base and each collet can physically do, not a measured comparison.