The Shuffle is a little multifunction knife made by Kershaw. It started a line of similar blades (like the Shuffle II or the Antic). But how is the original Shuffle? Does it actually have much utility?
I ended up getting two Kershaw Shuffles (due to a mix-up with my order… the reason why really isn’t important). One of them I used and abused and the other mostly just lies around. So, how did the Shuffle hold up from the abuse I put it through? And what’s the quality control look like between the two?
Specs
First off, let’s dive into the specs so we know what we’re dealing with here.
| Overall Length: | 5.75 inches (14.6 cm) |
| Closed Length: | 3.24 inches (8.3 cm) |
| Handle Thickness: | 0.42 inches (10.6 mm) |
| Handle Material: | Glass-Filled Nylon with K-Texture Grip |
| Blade Length: | 2.4 inches (6.1 cm) |
| Blade Thickness: | 0.11 niches (2.8 mm) |
| Blade Steel: | 8Cr13MoV |
| Blade Coating: | Bead-Blasted Finish |
| Weight: | 2.8 oz (79.4 g) |
Basically, the Kershaw Shuffle is a pretty small, lightweight budget knife.
The 8Cr13MoV steel (if you don’t know much about knife steel) is a pretty standard budget steel. When done right (like Kershaw often does), it can perform pretty well. You’re not going to see world-class performance out of it, but it can do pretty well and will hold up to most that you throw at it. And even if it doesn’t, at the average price point of an 8Cr13MoV knife, you’ll probably not feel too bad about it.
For the price that the Shuffle is, all of the specs are pretty much expected. There’s nothing with crazy value, and there’s nothing that’s in dire need of improving.
Design & Functionality
In terms of the design of the knife and what it comes with, it’s got a manual opening with thumb studs, a drop point blade, a deep carry pocket clip, a liner lock, and ambidextrous capabilities. It also comes with a bottle opener and a lanyard/mini pry bar/screwdriver.
The knife is meant to be used as an EDC (fairly obvious), but I, uh, decided to go outside the recommended use with my beat-up Shuffle. And, well, we’ll just see what that was (and what it did) in a bit.
Real World Use
Overall, the Shuffle comes with quite a few features for a fairly cheap knife. Now, let’s check out how it holds up in the real world.
The Blade
First off, the blade. Without that, a knife isn’t really a knife.
Out of the box, my first Shuffle wasn’t too sharp. My second one, however, was able to shave hairs. Obviously, with only two Shuffles, that’s really not enough to definitively declare that you’ll have a sharp blade or you won’t, but that’s been my experience with them straight out of the box.
In terms of how my Shuffle held up, the blade’s done really well. I’ve used it for a lot of odd, everyday carry tasks like cutting open boxes and such. I’ve also done some stuff like carving up sticks to see how well it did there, and it was able to handle that. Really, the blade just got dirty, but there were a few, really small deformations in the edge (which my camera wasn’t strong enough to pick up).
The other task I used my Shuffle for was… throwing. If you were expecting batoning, there’s a pretty easy explanation for why I didn’t do that: It’s small. I would’ve likely ended up hitting my thumb more than I hit the blade.
I’m not exactly the best knife thrower, so I didn’t always nail the target with the blade, but the Shuffle overall held up pretty well–aside from the fact that the thumb stud broke off. But, that’s what I get for trying to use it as a throwing knife. The blade, though (since we’re on the blade section) did just fine.
Overall, I’d give the blade a 10/10 for the price. It exceeded my expectations and held up to all my tests.
The Handle
The handle, like the whole knife, is pretty small. But they were able to extend the gripping area of the handle by adding another finger groove to the very end of the handle and back of the blade (which you can see in the picture below). All of the grooves make it a lot easier to grip. You’re a lot less likely to lose your grip with those grooves.
The handle also has Kershaw’s K-Texture grip, which is basically where there are a bunch of patterns thrown into the handle for texture that may or may not resemble a K depending on how you’re looking at it. It does add some extra friction and grip to the knife, so it fulfills its function.
The handle also has some jimping in about the middle of the blade, which again, adds for some extra friction and grip.
Depending on how you grip the knife and how big your hands are, you may only be gripping it with about three of your fingers. Like I said, it’s pretty small. I tend to grip my knives with my thumb sitting on the spine (in the “Filipino” grip) and my thumb extends almost to the tip of the blade.
One thing to note about the handle is that there is a little section where there’s not any texturing and it slopes downward towards the thumb stud–on the right side. On the left side, there’s not one of those, mostly because there’s the liner lock on that side. It’s not too big of a deal, but if you’re left-handed, it’s not quite as smooth of an opening compared to using your right hand.
Aside from the liner lock and the lack of a slope on the left side, the whole knife is pretty ambidextrous.
The only potential worry about the handle is if you’re going to be using it to puncture stuff (AKA stab it). There’s not a crossguard or anything to block your hand from sliding onto the blade, so there’s a slight danger that could happen. The grooves do protect against this, but it still could be an issue if you try to use the knife to puncture (which I can’t say I recommend; it’s not really made for that).
Overall, the handle gets a 9.5/10 from me. The lack of a crossguard is the main reason why–just for that added safety–but the knife isn’t really made for puncturing, so it’s not a big deal.
The Action
The action is another thing that differs on the two Shuffles, but I have a feeling it’s because I threw the first one…
On the first (beat up) one, it’s a little stiffer and harder to open. The pivot feels like it’s grinding a bit more. It’s also harder because, well, the thumb stud is gone. But that, again, is what I get for throwing it.
The second one opens up fairly smoothly. It’s not buttery smooth (like a knife with a ball bearing pivot), but it still works pretty well.
The liner lock also has this area where it starts to catch, but doesn’t quite, and in that area, it can be a little tough to try to close the knife. Once you push past that part, though, it’s pretty easy.
Depending on how big your fingers are, the liner lock could be something that’s kind of hard to close (or do you open a liner lock?) so you can shut the knife. The whole knife is small, so if you have big hands, the whole knife could be problematic for you. Just something to keep in mind.
Overall, the action on the knife gets an 8/10 from me. For the price, it does about what is expected, but it can be a little inconvenient to open and close from time to time.
The Other Tools
The Shuffle also comes with a bottle opener and a lanyard/mini pry bar/flathead screwdriver.
The bottle opener sits on the spine of the handle near the end of the handle. It can make it a little inconvenient to take it out of your pocket, but we’ll go into that more in a bit. For now, let’s look at how it works.
The bottle opener can be a little tough to actually use. It’s pretty small, so it can be hard to actually get it around the lip of a bottle cap and towards the middle of the bottle cap where you can get enough leverage to open it up. Basically: It’s not quite as long as you’d need it to be.
It certainly does still work, but it takes a few tries. Sometimes, though, it doesn’t pop the bottle cap all the way off, so you may need to use the screwdriver at the end to pry it all the way off. Speaking of…
The Shuffle also has a lanyard attachment that doubles as a flathead screwdriver (and–what I’ll use it for–a mini pry bar). The lanyard attachment works about as you’d expect, but the screwdriver is a little on the big side to be practical for most of the screws you’ll encounter (at least, that was the case for me).
It does work just fine as a mini pry bar, though. And it works especially well to open up paint cans, which is primarily what I used it for. Obviously, with how small it is, you won’t be prying apart 2×4’s or anything, but you’ll be able to pry some small stuff open.
Overall, the tools the Shuffle comes with get a 7.5/10 from me. The bottle opener is a little on the short side and the screwdriver is a little on the big side for most of what you’ll encounter.
How It Sits in Your Pocket
Here’s where the Shuffle starts to get some points knocked off.
The Shuffle’s got a deep carry pocket clip which hides all but the lanyard attachment and it sits just fine in your pocket. You hardly notice it’s there. It also doesn’t rip up your pocket (I have pretty rugged pants, though, so your mileage may vary). That’s not the issue.
The issue is when you have to actually put it in your pocket. The clip is so tight that it often took me two hands to slip it onto the lip of my pocket–at least, for the first one. I had to bend the clip up a bit so I could actually put it on the lip of my pocket.
The second one wasn’t as bad: I could put it into my pocket no problem, but it was pretty difficult to take out–especially with the bottle opener. The bottle opener can sometimes get in the way and catch, impeding your ability to take the Shuffle out of your pocket. I found that that really only happened whenever I tried to rip it out of my pocket.
The whole issue is pretty easily solved by bending the clip upwards just a bit. Just put the edge of the clip on something you can lever on and spread the clip out a bit. Of course, if you don’t run into any of those issues, then you don’t really need to worry about fixing it.
Overall, the Shuffle gets a 6/10 from me in this area. Out of the box, the clip was just too tight to be able to easily put the knife in my pocket and smoothly take it out. The bottle opener also occasionally got in the way, but that was a lesser issue.
Conclusion
Overall, the Shuffle works great as a compact, cheap, multifunction knife. If you’re looking for a small, budget EDC knife with added tools, you’ll probably like the Kershaw Shuffle. You can check it out on Amazon here.