Must Have Woodworking Tools: The 5 That Feel Like Cheating in My Shop

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By Matt Outlaw  ·  731 Woodworks  ·  August 21, 2026

There are five must have woodworking tools in my shop that feel like cheating. They make certain parts of woodworking so easy that you feel like you are getting away with something. Below I break down all five, including the SKIL TS6307-00, the DeWALT DWE7491RS, the Makita SP6000J1, and the Wahuda 50110CC-WHD, plus what I would buy at every budget.

The 5 Must Have Woodworking Tools That Feel Like Cheating

I have been woodworking about 10 years and in the trades for around 30. These are the five tools that still give me that same feeling every time I use them. They are not the only tools in my shop, but they are the ones that changed what I was able to build.

One, the table saw. It gives you accurate parallel rip cuts and clean crosscuts, and it gets more capable every time you add a jig. Two, the track saw. Every cut rides a straight rail, so every cut comes out straight and clean. Three, jointing. A jointer removes the gaps between glued up boards, and there are cheap ways to get the same result. Four, layout tools. Accurate squares, rulers, and a good tape make everything downstream better. Five, joinery methods, which is where a project stops looking homemade.

The reason I group them this way is that each one removes a specific problem that used to stop me. Gaps in a tabletop. Cuts that wander. Measurements that were off by a sixteenth. Solve those and you will keep coming back to the shop.

Watch Me Use All 5 Tools in the Shop

The video shows the cuts, the jointing jig in use, and the level trick on the table saw. Those are easier to understand watching them happen than reading about them.

Best Table Saw for Woodworking at Every Budget

The table saw is not an end all be all, and honestly a lot of people could get away with not having one. But if you have one and you use it on the projects you are making, it will hook you. Cutting through a fresh piece of walnut and getting that smell is a thing of beauty.

What makes it worth the space is versatility. You can rip sheet goods like plywood, cut short boards, cut long boards, and cut dados with a dado stack. Add jigs and it does even more.

If you are on a budget, look at the SKIL TS6307-00. It runs somewhere around $320 depending on the time of year and the sale, and in my opinion it is the best table saw under $400. For the best saw under a thousand, I really like the DeWALT DWE7491RS contractor style 10 inch. If space is a concern, the DeWALT DWE7485 8 1/4 inch is the smaller option. Stepping up, I like the SawStop PCS31230-TGP236. They are pricey, but you can hardly put a price on your fingers, and it is a really good machine beyond the safety features.

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What Table Saw Blade Tooth Count Should You Use

Just like routers and miter saws, the blade tells a lot of the story. It does not matter what table saw you have. If you upgrade the blade, you are going to get a better cut.

For most people a general purpose 40 tooth blade is the right pick. If you do a lot of crosscutting, step up to a higher tooth count like an 80 tooth. If you are ripping down the length of boards most of the time, a 24 tooth is what you want. Most people can do both rip cuts and crosscuts well with a good 40 tooth. If you want to cut dados, a stacked dado set opens that up.

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Best Table Saw Sled for Accurate Crosscuts

A sled is where a table saw really opens up. The Rockler is probably one of the best I have used, and if you are only going to own one sled, that is the one I would get. The Powertec is a good option if you are on a budget.

I put every sled I could get through the same cuts when I tested the best crosscut sleds for the table saw in my shop, if you want the longer breakdown before you buy.

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Is a Track Saw Worth It for Woodworking

I cannot leave this one out because I love it too much. The track saw is by far my favorite woodworking tool on the planet. A lot of people think it is just a circular saw. It can do circular saw things, but it rides on a straight rail, so every cut you make is perfectly straight and clean.

I love the way they plunge and I love the depth adjustments. There is just something about a track saw gliding smooth in a perfect straight line. I ranked 15 of the top track saws from worst to first, and you can read which track saws won and which ones I would avoid if you want the full ranking.

The Milwaukee 2831-21 sits at the top of my list, though it does tie you to the M18 platform. If you want corded, the Makita SP6000J1 is one of the better ones. If you are on a budget, get the Kreg ACS2100. It is a fantastic track saw for the price. Coming in September 2026, Kreg is redesigning the base so it works with other brand tracks including Festool, Milwaukee, and Makita, and they are adding anti-tip.

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Track Saws I Would Not Buy

There are some stinkers out there. I did not care for the Grizzly. I thought it had a little too much flex. I did not like the Ryobi either. It uses proprietary tracks, so you can only run their track with their saw. The cut quality was not there for me on deflection, because the saw moved too much off the base and I could not get accurate cuts.

If you are a DeWALT fan, hang tight. There should be a new 20V DeWALT track saw landing soon, and I plan to review it.

How to Joint Boards Without a Jointer

When I started woodworking, the biggest challenge I had was getting two boards to come together with a perfect seam. I would buy lumber, try to build a tabletop, and end up with gaps and holes all the way down the joint. The edges of those boards are not perfectly flush or square, and I had no way to fix that.

Once you can joint boards, that goes away. You get seamless joints, and it looks like a professional did it even if you are a beginner. That is the part that gets people addicted, because now the tabletops and cutting boards actually come out right.

I have used the old level method for a long time. It is a 4-ft level that rides along with the board on the table saw, giving your board a straight reference edge. It is not the same as putting the board against the fence and cutting. Push both through together and do it safely, and you get a really straight edge. I have proved that over and over again, and it is a very inexpensive method.

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Building a Jointing Jig for the Table Saw

Better than the level is a jointing jig, and it is very easy to make. Mine is about 3-ft long. You route grooves in it and clamp the board down, and I used the MicroJig dovetail system to build it. This works really well on live edge boards where you are taking the live edge off.

Clamp the board, run it through, and you have a perfectly straight jointed edge. Do that to two boards and you can bring them together for a tabletop or a cutting board with no gap. I put the plans for this jointing jig in the plan section on the website.

Benchtop Jointer Size: 6, 8, 10, or 12 Inch

The jointer is the easiest method if the budget is there. I like the Wahuda 50110CC-WHD and have had it multiple years now. It does edge jointing and face jointing, so if a board is twisted you can take the twist out on the face.

Mine is an 8 inch. Benchtop jointers usually come in 6, 8, 10, and 12 inch, and that number is how wide of a board you can joint. Wider is better. A 10 inch is a good solid middle ground, but a 6 inch will still get you edge jointing and a 6 inch wide board.

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Woodworking Layout Tools That Are Actually Worth Buying

Good layout tools are the fourth thing that keeps pulling me back to the shop, and they do not have to be expensive. WEN makes rulers and T squares that are dead accurate, and most of them are under $30. That is a lot of accuracy for very little money.

My favorite tape measure is the Fastcap Lefty/Righty PSSR16. It has the measurements printed right on the surface, so you can read the 1/8, 1/4, and 3/8 marks without counting lines. Beginners love it for a good reason, it is a good quality tape, and it is only about seven bucks.

For higher quality layout, iGaging makes a good bench square with a ton of features built in, model 36-BS-47. If you have the budget, look at Woodpeckers. People bash them on price, but they are high quality and really nice to use. For marking, the Pentel Graph Gear is one of the most popular pencils out there. It comes in 0.5, 0.7, and 0.9 lead, and I like the 0.9 because it is thicker and does not seem to break as much for me.

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Easy Woodworking Joinery Methods for Beginners

Number five is joinery methods that most beginners do not think they can use, but they can. When you start using them, you stand back and think you cannot believe you made that. That is what makes woodworking addictive.

Start with dowel jigs. They range from very inexpensive on up. The Milescraft 13330003 comes with all the parts and pieces you need to cut dowels. I put the outside frame of my workbench together with dowels and the inside frame with pocket holes, so it is a multi joinery method bench. Dowels open up a different level of joinery because there are no pocket hole screws showing on the back of anything. They are very strong and very easy to use.

It does not matter much which one you use. I like the JessEm dowel jig a lot, and the DowelMax I used on that workbench also worked extremely well. When everything goes together and you cannot see any fastener, it looks like the board is floating.

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Loose Tenon Joinery: Festool Domino and Kreg Edge

You can go traditional with mortise and tenon, or go the loose tenon route with the Festool Domino. More recently the Kreg Edge made that style affordable for a lot more people. Both cut fast mortises, and the tenon itself is the loose piece that goes in between.

I have built tables with Dominos and I have built picture frames with them. They are extremely fast, dead accurate, and easy to use. Somebody like me who has never cut a traditional mortise and tenon, and probably never will because I am not big into hand tools, can still make that style of joinery.

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See the Kreg Edge KPTBEDGE100B at Kreg

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