Best Hedge Trimmers of 2026

If you already have a shelf of Craftsman V20 batteries, this is the trimmer that makes sense. The 20-inch dual-action blade is rated to 3/4 inch — the same as our top pick — and the tool arrives with a 1.5Ah pack and charger, so it works the moment the box is open.

That 1.5Ah pack is both why it carries well and where it runs short. It is small and light, which keeps the 6.6-pound tool balanced in front of you, but it is the smallest battery among the cordless picks here and runtime is where you notice it. A second pack is the honest fix if your hedge line is long, and on this platform that is a purchase you may already have made.

The full wraparound handle gives you somewhere to put your off hand on vertical passes, and the cuts themselves come out clean on boxwood and the softer evergreens. Where it lands for us is the platform question: for a V20 owner the battery is the expensive part of any cordless tool and this trimmer lets you reuse it, so it earns its place on that basis. Starting from nothing, our top pick gives you the same 3/4-inch capacity and a bigger pack for less outlay.

1.2 inches is the number that separates the EGO from the rest of this group. That is the cut capacity of its 26-inch dual-action blade, close to double the 3/4-inch rating on our top pick and the Craftsman. On a hedge that has gone a season or two too long without a cut, that difference is real: you trim instead of hacking a clearance path with loppers first.

It is also the heaviest tool here at 6.9 pounds, and that weight is what the length costs — twenty-six inches of steel out front has to be carried by something. We felt it most on the flat top of a tall run, where a lighter trimmer lets you work further before your arms complain. What earns the weight back is the five-position, 180-degree rotating handle: you roll the blade to the angle of a vertical face instead of folding your wrist around it, and on a tall hedge that is the difference between a neat side and a wavy one.

The 56-volt 2.5Ah pack is rated for up to 60 minutes and works with the rest of EGO's 56V line, so a battery bought for a mower earns its keep here too. The carbon fiber rail carries a lifetime warranty, the only one of its kind in this group, and the gearbox is serviceable so a worn blade can be dealt with rather than ending the tool. Whether it is worth the premium comes down to your hedge: if it is cut twice a season and never gets woody, you are paying for capacity you do not have.

For a long hedge run within reach of an outlet, the cord is a feature rather than a compromise. The 4.0-amp BEHT350FF never asks for a charge, never softens as a pack drains, and the 22-inch dual-action blade carries the same 3/4-inch rating as our top pick, so you are not trading capacity for the cord. That is why it is our corded choice.

At 2.8 kg it is lighter in the hand than either 22-inch cordless option here, and the full wraparound handle is the practical part. It lets you choke up and reach over the top of a waist-high hedge with one hand while the other keeps the cord clear of the blade. Hardened steel teeth, a simple trigger and nothing to charge is a combination that suits someone who trims twice a year and wants the tool to work when it comes off the hook.

The thing to plan is the cord itself: none of the corded trimmers here ship with an extension cord, so buy an outdoor-rated one long enough to reach the far corner without tugging, and use the retention slot at the handle so the plug stays put mid-cut. Once that is sorted, the tool is as simple as a trimmer gets.

It arrives without a power cord. That is not a fault — no corded trimmer here ships with one — but it is the cost people forget when they order, so plan on an outdoor-rated extension cord as part of the purchase rather than as an afterthought.

What you get for it is the lightest corded tool here at 3.9 pounds, a 17-inch dual-action blade and a 3.2-amp motor rated to 5/8 inch, running at 3,800 cuts per minute. That is enough for a few shrubs along a walk and a couple of small hedges, and the T-handle plus full-length trigger give you two grip positions for the vertical passes. The cord retention system is a small thing that saves a lot of swearing when the plug works loose mid-cut.

For a small yard, we think it is the sensible spend: corded power without the weight or the battery outlay. Go in knowing the 5/8-inch rating leaves thicker stems to loppers, and that the failures worth knowing about on this model are at the motor and switch rather than the blade — which is what the two-year warranty exists for.

Two 2.0Ah packs and a charger in the box is unusual at this end of the cordless market, and it is the reason the DocSmart earns a place rather than being one more cheap trimmer. Each pack is listed at up to 120 minutes of running and takes about two hours to charge, so with both charged you are never standing around waiting on the tool — you swap and keep cutting.

The 180-degree rotating head is the feature we underrated going in. For the vertical face of a hedge, rolling the blade to the angle keeps your wrist neutral instead of cranked over, and at 4.4 pounds the reach does not cost you much. The brushless motor keeps the vibration down and the cut clean on soft growth.

The ceiling is capacity. The blade is rated to 2/3 inch, a notch below the 3/4-inch picks here, so soft hedges, boxwood and light new wood are its territory and thick old stems are not. It arrives with the blade already fitted and oiled, plus gloves and a guard in the box, so the first cut comes sooner than with most of the cordless tools here.

Do not buy this one for the LCD power display. The listing advertises one; the tool we used has a blank cover where the screen should sit. That is worth knowing before the box arrives, because a battery gauge is exactly the sort of thing you notice missing halfway through a hedge.

What it does have is a 20-inch dual-action blade rated to 0.59 inch, two 2.0Ah packs, a charger and a 4.4-pound body. Two packs is the useful part: one charges while the other cuts, which matters more on a budget tool than a big runtime figure on a single battery.

The 180-degree rotating handle does the same job as the DocSmart's and is just as welcome on vertical faces, letting you roll the blade to the angle rather than working around your wrist. The half-inch capacity is the trade. Soft growth, privet, boxwood and light new wood are fine; anything woody and established wants one of the 3/4-inch machines.

So it is a light, inexpensive cordless trimmer for soft hedges and touch-up work, with the spare pack doing the job a bigger battery would. If your hedges have thickened up over the years, put the money into cut capacity instead and skip this one.

At 8.7 inches, the blade tells you what this is before any specification does: a detail trimmer, not a hedge machine. It is for the boxwood ball by the door, the grass along a path edge, and the corners a full-size trimmer is too clumsy to get into.

The tool is sold bare — no battery, no charger — and it is built to take DeWalt 20V MAX lithium-ion packs. That is the whole proposition. If you already run DeWalt, you are buying a body and two blades and nothing else. If you do not, you are buying into a battery system to run a trimmer with a nine-inch blade, which is the wrong way round.

Two blades come in the box, a hedge blade and a grass shear, and we found the swap quick enough that both earn their place rather than one living in a drawer. At 1.8 pounds it is the lightest thing here by a wide margin, and it feels stable in the hand rather than toy-like, which is not a given at this size.

Buy it as an addition. It cannot shape a hedge run, and a DeWalt pack on the back makes it a one-handed tool for edges and touch-ups rather than a replacement for anything in the top half of this list. For that narrow job, with a battery you already own, nothing else here does it.