Mel Plaut is a Wirecutter staff writer covering pets. They’ve tested hundreds of products, including poop bags, cat litter, pet fountains, and travel carriers, in an effort to make life easier and better for our best animal friends (and for the people who care for them).

This guide builds on research and reporting by senior staff writer Kaitlyn Wells, a lifelong pet companion and an animal-shelter volunteer who has groomed a fair number of pups. Kaitlyn researched why keeping your pet’s nails trimmed is important, as well as the best way to complete the task.

Like all Wirecutter journalists, we review and test products with complete editorial independence. We’re never made aware of any business implications of our editorial recommendations. Read more about our editorial standards.

Generally speaking, you need to trim your dog’s nails every four to six weeks. Letting them grow too long can lead to health problems such as splayfoot and injure your dog’s tendons. If you can hear your dog’s nails tip-tapping on your floor, it’s time for a trim. If you’re lucky, your dog will patiently wait while you tend to their toes, but they probably want the experience over with as quickly as possible. Clippers are the fastest way to get your dog’s nails to a safe length, but wielding them requires a strong, steady hand, and that isn’t always easy when your dog is jerking their foot away. A wrong move can also nip your pup’s quick (the blood vessels beneath the nail), which is upsetting for both of you.

Nail grinders, in contrast, shorten the nail bit by bit, as opposed to cutting them off in chunks. This process is slower but safer, and it doesn’t require as much hand strength. Grinders don’t create splits or splinters like clippers can; instead they leave a smooth nail that’s unlikely to catch on anything or accidentally scratch. Grinders are also good for dogs with dark nails, where the quick is difficult to see. But not all dogs are comfortable around the noise and vibration of a grinder—and the friction can cause both the nail and the grinder bit to heat up, so you need to take frequent breaks.

We spoke with five pet groomers and vets about how best to tend to your dog’s nails, and although their opinions were consistent when it came to clippers, they were mixed on the subject of grinders. Some pet professionals said that grinders’ safety factor made them the ideal choice, while others pointed to the tools’ noisiness as a reason to pass on them. But every pet is different, and if yours doesn’t mind the noise, a grinder is a good option. Just make sure to use a bit that’s coarse enough to work efficiently but not so rough that it pulls on the nail while grinding.

You can also use a household Dremel rotary tool, if you have one, to groom your dog’s nails, but we don’t suggest that for everyone. The Dremel AT02-PGK Pet Grooming Attachment Kit is an option for pet caretakers who own a Dremel tool for other purposes and don’t have the dog-nail grinder model. We haven’t tested that attachment kit yet, but it does come with the same nail guard, grooming discs, and bands as our Dremel PawControl top pick. The nail guard traps nail dust and makes it harder to accidentally sand a pup’s paw pads, and it ensures that first-time users are grinding at a 45-degree angle that matches the nail’s slant. The included grooming accessories reduce the risk of cross-contamination by keeping the tools used in household projects separate. (You should never grind a dog’s nails with the same dirty sanding disc you typically use for rust removal.) The attachment works with a wide variety of Dremel tools.

If the Dremel tool that you have is incompatible with the pet-grooming kit, you can still consider grinding your dog’s nails without it, if you’re very comfortable with the tool. “You don’t have to buy all that stuff,” a Dremel customer service rep told us. But there are some caveats. Regardless of the model you use, you can’t grind a dog’s nails with it the same way you might use it to sharpen knives or cut drywall. Dremel recommends not exceeding 10,000 rpm for pet grooming. Grinding a dog’s nails at a speed higher than recommended can cause heat buildup, which can harm a pet, or it may result in your accidentally hitting the nail quick (the center of the nail, packed with nerves and blood).

Here’s what we considered when testing the different grinder models:

• Power: When you’re selecting a grinder, it’s important to choose one with enough rotational power to make a difference on your dog’s nails. If a grinder is too slow and underpowered, using it would be only slightly more effective than filing your dog’s nails by hand. But if it’s too powerful, it can be hard to control and can heat up the nails quickly.
• Noise: Loud or high-pitched grinders tend to frighten dogs.
• Comfort: Grinding takes longer than cutting, so it’s important for the tool to be both comfortable in your hand and comfortable for your dog.
• Cordless: Some grinders plug directly into the wall, but their cables make them hard to maneuver around your pet.
• Convenience: Consider how easy it is to assemble the grinder, swap out the batteries, and change bits.

For the most recent update of this guide, we tested grinder speeds on a (slightly terrifying) practice hand typically used by manicurists to sharpen their skills. Since dog claws are made of keratin, and manicurist practice nails are made of plastic, we used this test simply to see how fast the grinders worked relative to one another, without having to traumatize any dogs in the process.

We had some help from Dave, a 65-pound mutt who generally dislikes his nails being messed with. For previous tests, a 9-pound Chihuahua mix lent a paw.

We noted how maneuverable each nail grinder was, how easily we could get from opening the box to actually using the grinder, how loud it was, and how well it sanded. We also factored in any extras, such as included batteries or a light.

We also asked Brianna Barksdale, a groomer at The Bark Shoppe in New York City’s Harlem, to try out the contenders with several dogs in her care and to record her findings.

Top pick

Quiet peticure power

Dremel PawControl 7760-PGK

This grinder offers a safe, affordable, quiet, and cordless way to trim your pooch’s nails.

$59 from Chewy

$59 from Amazon

$59 from The Home Depot

The Dremel PawControl 7760-PGK is the best dog nail grinder because it’s fast enough to shorten nails quickly but still easy to control. We also like that it is rechargeable and quiet, and that it has swappable grinding tips.

It has four speeds and enough power to do the job quickly. The PawControl features a variable-speed slide switch with four settings. In testing, we found that the first two speeds, at 8,000 rpm and 14,000 rpm, respectively, offered enough power to grind most dogs’ nails. Even the highest settings on other models we tested didn’t come close to the filing speed and power of the Dremel PawControl. Brianna Barksdale of The Bark Shoppe in Harlem agreed: “It definitely gets the job done,” she said, adding that she wouldn’t go past the number 2 setting unless the dog was large or had really thick nails, like a German shepherd. Note that Dremel’s owner manual recommends the PawControl’s lowest setting as the maximum pet-grooming speed to prevent heat buildup.

Thanks to the rechargeable battery, you can use it without any pesky wires. This rechargeable Dremel grinder comes with a USB cable and a power adapter that can recharge the tool in about three hours. We prefer a rechargeable dog nail grinder over models that use AA batteries, which you can never find in your junk drawer when you need them. This Dremel grinder is also well balanced for maneuverability compared with most of the other grinders we tested. And unlike grinders with sleek exteriors or tapered shapes, the PawControl has a grippy material on the plastic shell that makes it easy to hold and less likely to slip out of your hand while you’re using it.

It’s still quiet, despite having all that oomph under the hood. The Dremel PawControl is surprisingly quiet for such a sturdy grinder, especially next to competitors like the Furminator. Its motor doesn’t create an unpleasant high-pitched whine on its recommended setting, and it’s quieter than our budget pick at both the lowest and highest settings. It comes with six bits: four sanding disks for novice groomers and two sanding bands for experienced groomers, both of which have grinding and polishing grades. The grinding bits worked perfectly in our tests, and the polishing bits will eventually make your dog’s nails shiny if you care to put in the time and effort.

Flaws but not dealbreakers

It can be confusing to set up. Out of the box, the Dremel PawControl 7760-PGK is slightly less user-friendly than other grinders. The collet on ours arrived locked shut with a sanding disk in place and a plastic clasp and paw guide over it, which prevented the insertion of a sanding band and bit. Without diving into the manual, it’s not clear how to open the tool or get going; even our professional groomer couldn’t figure out how to remove the plastic paw cap and clasp, which has interlocking nubs that you need to twist and turn in a mazelike manner to unlock. Reading the instructions easily remedies the problem, but the PawControl is not as intuitive a machine as our budget pick, the Casfuy 6-Speed Dog Nail Grinder, which you can use straight out of the box after charging it up.

Budget pick

A little less power at half the price

Casfuy 6-Speed Dog Nail Grinder

This grinder is louder and less powerful than our top pick, but it has LED lights and is cheaper.

$28 from Amazon

$29 from Chewy

The Casfuy 6-Speed Dog Nail Grinder has six speeds and two convenient LED lights. It’s relatively quiet, and it costs less than half the price of the Dremel PawControl 7760-PGK.

Its dual LED lights help guide the way. If you’re in a low-lit room or have trouble identifying where your dog’s quicks start, the Casfuy grinder’s two bright LED lights can make things a little easier. The lights are especially useful if your dog moves their paw around a lot, so you’re not always chasing the room’s light. (Tip: If your grinder doesn’t have a light, a headlamp can help.) This grinder was also way easier to set up than the Dremel model. After we charged the battery, it was ready to use.

It’s rechargeable and maneuverable. Like the Dremel tool, the Casfuy grinder has a rechargeable battery, so you’re not tied to a wall outlet and you don’t have to worry about buying new batteries. It’s shorter than the Dremel model, and half an ounce lighter according to our scale, so it’s nearly as easy to move around your dog’s paws. It comes with a removable protective sleeve that has three ports, which ostensibly guide your grinding. But we found that the sleeve actually diminished the tool’s maneuverability, so we removed it.

It has decent power. Although this model is nowhere near as fast or powerful as our top pick, it offers six speeds, ranging from 7,000 rpm to 12,000 rpm (in contrast to the 8,000 rpm to 25,000 rpm range of our top pick). At its highest setting, the Casfuy grinder took roughly 20 seconds to file down our practice nail. The Dremel PawControl, in contrast, took only 10 seconds at its highest setting—and 22 seconds at its lowest.

Flaws but not dealbreakers

It’s louder than our top pick. Even at its lowest speed, the Casfuy grinder was louder, at roughly 71 decibels, than the Dremel tool at its highest, which was around 70 dB, according to our decibel meter. The sound of this less expensive model also had an odd high-pitched timbre that we found irksome, but it may not bother you or your dog.

Best for...

Best for dogs who hate grinders

LovIntry M-Shaped Dog Scratch Pad for Nails

This scratch board is like a huge emery board—it makes no noise and doesn’t need batteries. But using it takes longer and requires some training.

$28 from Amazon

$28 from Walmart

May be out of stock

The LovIntry M-Shaped Dog Scratch Pad for Nails is a curved piece of wood covered by a layer of coarse-grit sandpaper. If your dog is afraid of trimmers and grinders, this pad may be your only option if you want to groom their nails at home, but it requires a bit of training.

It’s sturdy and packaged with extra sandpaper. The M-shaped curve of the wood is meant to help sand down claws evenly when the dog runs their paw down the center. We found that getting our dog to aim correctly took some extra training, but eventually he got the message. The scratch board is thick and sturdy, and it has two handles on the side that make holding it easy. It also comes with two extra sheets of sandpaper that you can swap in when the original one wears down.

Flaws but not dealbreakers

It’s hard to use on rear claws, and trimming takes a long time. Scratch boards in general are difficult to use on rear paws, so you still have to find another way to make sure your dog’s back feet are trimmed. And even for the front, the process takes a lot longer than using clippers or grinders to get your dog’s nails into shape.

The Casfuy Dog Nail Grinder is an alternative version of our budget pick. It lacks the two LED lights that our budget pick offers, and it has only two speeds, but it’s the quietest model we tested, barely vibrating at 50 decibels. Our grooming experts said that this grinder’s minimal sound would make it attractive for use on fearful dogs that can’t stand the noise or rough vibrations of a sander on their nails. But that low vibration also made it the weakest model we tested—you would spend twice as long grinding your dog’s nails using this model in comparison with using our top pick.

The Furminator Nail Grinder succeeds at having a cute name but fails at everything else. It’s so loud, you’d be likely to scare dogs three houses over. In addition, the grinding band was slipping off the bit from the moment we turned it on during our testing in 2017, and its battery cover was absurdly difficult to pry open—we were virtually guaranteed to hit the tool’s on button several times while trying to open it.

Susan Arendt wrote an earlier version of this guide. This article was edited by Harry Sawyers.