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What is the difference between a joiner and a jointer?

If you are making joints to join together two pieces of wood, it is a joiner that you need. If you are trueing or flattening the face of a board, or squaring a face with an edge, then it is the jointer that you need.

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Handyman's World is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to amazon.com. There is a multitude of woodworking tools out there to choose from, and they all serve very important tasks. Some of these tools may have very similar names, but very different functions. What we are talking about here is the difference between a joiner and a jointer. Yes, they may sound alike, but they’re actually two totally different machines. Let’s figure out what the two tools are, what makes them similar, and what makes them different.

Joiners and Jointers: The Basics

Before we get into similarities and differences, let’s first determine what exactly both joiners and jointers are.

What Is a Joiner?

First, we have the joiner. The joiner is also sometimes known as a biscuit joiner or a biscuit jointer. The terms do seem to be used interchangeably. This is a relatively small handheld power tool that is light enough to lift up. It is indeed a somewhat portable woodworking tool. The joiner is a bladed machine designed to cut small joints into wood. To be exact, a joiner features a very small circular blade. This blade is designed to cut small crescent-shaped grooves into the ends of boards. In fact, it cuts the same crescent-shaped grooves into two opposite pieces of wood, with the aim of joining them together. Once the joiner has been used to cut those crescents, small circular pieces of wood, known as biscuits, along with plenty of glue, are inserted into them. What you end up having are two boards that are joined together in the middle with biscuits and glue. Simply put, biscuit joiners help join two pieces of wood together.

What Is a Jointer?

Next, we have the jointer, which is also a woodworking tool, albeit a very different one. A jointer is a much larger machine, usually a large stationary machine that is far too heavy to lift or move. These jointers feature very large infeed and outfeed tables that handle very long boards. These are flat surfaces that the wood being worked on rests on. A jointer features a very wide cutting blade or knife. To be exact, the center of the machine features a metal drum or roll, kind of like a roll of paper towel, onto which many very sharp blades are fitted. This bladed drum spins at very high speeds, and it protrudes up through the base of the table. Wood is then passed over these blades, and those blades shave off a little bit of material from the surface. The aim of a jointer is to therefore true or flatten one face of a board. A jointer can also create a perfect 90-degree angle between that same trued face and an adjacent edge.

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Similarities of Joiners and Jointers

To compare these two, let’s first take a look at some similarities the joiner and jointer share. As you are about to see, they don’t share many at all.

1. They’re Both Strictly Woodworking Machines

A basic similarity shared by both of these tools is that they are strictly designed for woodworking. Although their functions are very different, they are both meant to work with wood, and only wood. You cannot use either of them with metal, plastic, or any other material.

2. They Run on Electricity

These are of course power tools or power machines, not manual ones, and yes, they run on electricity. For the most part, both joiners and jointers run on AC electricity, or in other words, they are corded machines. That said, some joiners may be battery-powered, although not very often at all.

3. They Remove Material from a Piece of Wood

As you will find out, the way in which these machines remove material from wood is very different, but this is what they do. The blades on both tools are designed to remove a certain amount of wood in a certain way to achieve a specific goal.

Differences Between Joiners and Jointers

Joiners and jointers are fundamentally different machines. Let’s find out exactly what makes them so different.

1. Intended Function

The primary difference between joiners and jointers is of course the intended purposes. A joiner or biscuit joiner cuts away crescent-shaped grooves into the ends of two opposite pieces of wood. The aim is to allow a biscuit to be inserted, along with glue, into both pieces, to join them together. As the name implies, a joiner joins together two pieces of wood. They can also create a variety of joints including biscuit, tenon, mortise, and plate joints. A jointer on the other hand is designed to true or flatten one face of a board. It can remove warps and bends, and just help make a face of a board flat and even. On that note, a jointer can also square one face of a board to an adjacent edge at a 90-degree right angle.

2. Type of Blades

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A joiner uses a very small circular blade to achieve its task. This blade is not unlike the blade on a table saw or circular saw, although much smaller. On a jointer, the blade(s) looks like a large paper towel roll or cylinder that has many sharp knives lining the circumference.

They are fundamentally different.

3. Size and Portability

Another major difference here is that joiners are generally relatively small handheld tools, smaller than your average circular saw. This also helps make them quite portable. A jointer on the other hand is usually much larger. The most commonly used type is the cabinet jointer, a very large and stationary machine.

4. Types

With joiners, you simply have one. However, with jointers, you actually have a large cabinet model as well as a slightly more portable tabletop model.

5. Safety

Due to the way in which they function, and because of how they are built, a joiner is generally a much safer tool to use than a jointer.

Joiner vs. Jointer: Which of the Two Should You Use?

What it all comes down to is the task that you are looking to accomplish. If you are making joints to join together two pieces of wood, it is a joiner that you need. If you are trueing or flattening the face of a board, or squaring a face with an edge, then it is the jointer that you need.