If your recipient is prepping veggies and meat, I would generally warn that a hard-blade knife with great edge retention may hit a bone at some point and land you more work, unless this person is aware of that during food prep and misses the bones in the meat.
I tested out the Global G-46 and landed on that. 56-58 HRC isn't that impressive, but I'm a home cook and I'm vegetarian. I cook once a week every week, and I only use maple/cherry/walnut boards. I mean, I'll probably have to sharpen the thing maybe 4 or 5 times a year, I can't see myself actually having to sharpen it more often. People on this forum may disagree, but if my knife strays from factory sharp and it can still do it's job well, I'm not gonna be bothered enough that it isn't "razor sharp" to go running to the stone. If I get a knife with harder steel, the edge will last longer, but I feel as though I'd miss the sharpening and I'd be extra scared of someone other than me dropping or breaking or knocking over the knife somehow. Also I'm brand new to a lot of this, so the thrill of knife sharpening has not worn out on me just yet.
I liked the Global because the blade is right up against the handle, I like the roundish handle (D handle?idk) vs. the "Western chef" handle, and the thing is super light and cuts like a dream. I tested it on onions, bell peppers and sweet potatoes. I do mostly chopping and push cutting, but it can rock chop as well. I'm 5'5" so the small handle on their Classic series fit like a glove when compared against basically any other handle I tested. The Global G-2 and G-46 were the lightest-feeling knives I've ever held of that size. I don't know why, they just felt lighter, which is better for me. I'm not 100% sold on Granton divots or whatever they're called, so I picked a knife that doesn't have them.
I bought the global (online in Canada) for $101.89 all-in (Canadian), from some website called Williams Food Equipment. Perhaps you can deal-hunt a bit and find some comparable price where you are for whichever knife you end up picking, I searched daily on Google Shopping until that price eventually came up.
I heard the Globals are "tough to sharpen". I got some good counter-opinions to that point of view on here, so that doesn't bother me. I heard the handle collects food. Whenever I tried it, though, I never used my handle hand for anything other than holding the knife, so it never got greased up or fooded up, so that doesn't bother me either.
I can't speak accurately to how comparatively thin the Global is vs other knives. It felt mad thin.
