Are Blade and Knives Illustrated all that’s left?

JDRanger

JDRanger

Joined
Aug 14, 2017
Messages
399
Hi All,

It appears that Blade and Knives Illustrated are the only knife centric magazines being published.

Does anyone know of other publications?

Also, what do you think of these magazines and do you prefer one over the other?

Thanks
 
I get nearly all my knife related news here. I haven't read an actual magazine in years. Last time I did, I leafed through an issue of Off-Grid and came to the knife-section, and all of the "hot new, COMING SOON" knives listed had already been available on BladeHQ for like, two months.

It's just not possible for a magazine released monthly or quarterly to be up to date with relevant info. I think they'll all be gone at some point.
 
I think you may be right. Both magazines seem very similar to me. There’s so little compelling content it literally takes me about five minutes to read through an issue.

That said, I prefer Blade but I don’t really know why.
 
Knife Magazine is excellent. I subscribed for years even way back when it was Knife World.
 
Knife is much better than Blade. I used to get both, but when Blade's quality dropped down the toilet & their price went up, I didn't renew. I think Knife will send you one free issue to find out if you like it.

Knife has actually been more successful in the last 5 years than in the past. The editor bought the publication, expanded it, went from newsprint to color magazine and they recently launched a new web outlet. Their lag time on breaking news is about 30 days and often they are told ahead of time.
 
Quiet said:
I get nearly all my knife related news here. I haven't read an actual magazine in years. Last time I did, I leafed through an issue of Off-Grid and came to the knife-section, and all of the "hot new, COMING SOON" knives listed had already been available on BladeHQ for like, two months.

It's just not possible for a magazine released monthly or quarterly to be up to date with relevant info. I think they'll all be gone at some point.
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I bet you’re right. Print is going the way of the dinosaur. I worked at a local weekly shopper here and at the 40th anniversary party, the owner said they wanted to see the paper and the company make it to 100 years. Folded up 6 years later.

Come to think of it, ALL physical media is disappearing. I personally still like physical media. I was sad when Best Buy did away with their already meager selection of CDs.

The last knife mag I remember reading was Tactical Knives. That’s long gone.
 
JDRanger said:
Hi All,

It appears that Blade and Knives Illustrated are the only knife centric magazines being published.

Does anyone know of other publications?

Also, what do you think of these magazines and do you prefer one over the other?

Thanks
Click to expand...

Yeah man, I think magazines are going the way of the dodo. There's just no market for them anymore, especially not a topic like knives. Kinda sad, really.
 
Knife Magazine is still a good read, I like the history of knives, maker profiles, and see a good review once and awhile, plus I like the maker photos, and I enjoy the Levine section of "What is it?" But I do pick it up to read a little less since there are more relevant discussions here, I hope it can stay the course. I still enjoy getting it in the mailbox and leafing through it. I stopped getting Blade magazine when more adds upon adds starting to make up the bulk of the pages, only a few articles about old knives, and cost went up.
 
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I think only some old guys like me will stay with paper media. And, there is so much good knife content here and elsewhere on line.

I still have to have my newspaper at breakfast, and never read the phone, especially not on the throne. Paper in hand is a must there, on a couple of levels.
 
Knife Magazine is the best cutlery pub out there right now. Blade spends too much time promoting Blade and twisting everything to fit that model. I hear Knives Illustrated has a new editor. Anyone know anything about her?
 
I subscribe to a state conservation type magazine which is paper. It is the only magazine I subscribe to except for the NRA magazine. I like the info that is state oriented and the parks. They offer a digital subscription also I believe. They always published the magazine on glossy paper. Beginning this year they went to "recycled" paper and not glossy (even for the cover). It is very LOW QUALITY paper. Thinking seriously of dumping the magazine when my subscription runs out.

I do think printed magazines and newspapers are moving to extinction. I just looked at my local newspaper and they want almost as much money for a digital subscription as a print version delivered to your door.
 
FYI - in doing some research prior to making my post I saw that Knives Illustrated had 40,000 subscribers. I don’t know if that’s completely accurate.

When I buy either Knives Illustrated or Blade I buy it off a rack at a store so people like me don’t affect subscription numbers.

As said before, my biggest problem with both publications is that there’s so little real content I can read through an issue in 5-10 minutes and i never feel like I get my value out of the purchase.

I can browse through this forum for hours at no cost.
 
To me, blade and knives illustrated are just big advertisements for what are often poor to mediocre knives and knife companies. I don't even bother looking at them anymore.
 
I used to read Blade, Knives Illustrated and Tactical Knives. Of the three, my favorite was Tactical Knives. But I stopped buying knife magazines many years ago.

I still prefer physical books to e-books, but I have no need for paper knife mags anymore.

Jim
 
Blade Magazine is only 22 dollars for a year. Not exactly expensive. About as much as a book of comparable size after a year. It's fine if you don't like the content but I don't think you can say they're overcharging. How can you produce, print, and ship a magazine for less than 2 dollars an issue?
 
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