The Test Cut

Wood Species

Janka hardness, specific gravity, workability, and safety notes for common woods.

Wondering what one looks like finished?The Finish Simulator previews oils, poly, shellac and more on these same board photos, and tells you what sanding each one needs.
Color
Red Oak1290 lbf$6.00#1
Poplar (Yellow Poplar)540 lbf$3.00#2
Eastern White Pine380 lbf$4.00#3
SPF / Whitewood (Spruce-Pine-Fir)480 lbf$1.50#4
Hard Maple1450 lbf$7.00#5
White Oak1350 lbf$7.00#6
Black Walnut1010 lbf$11.00#7
Soft Maple (Red Maple)950 lbf$4.50#8
Douglas Fir620 lbf$3.00#9
Southern Yellow Pine690 lbf$2.50#10
American Cherry950 lbf$9.00#11
Ash1320 lbf$5.50#12
Red Alder590 lbf$5.00#13
Yellow Birch1260 lbf$5.50#14
Hickory/Pecan1820 lbf$6.00#15
Beech1300 lbf$5.00#16
Basswood410 lbf$4.50#17
Aromatic Red Cedar (Eastern Red Cedar)900 lbf$6.00#18
Western Red Cedar350 lbf$6.00#19
Sapele1360 lbf$7.50#20
African Mahogany (Khaya)830 lbf$9.00#21
Bald Cypress510 lbf$5.00#22
Redwood450 lbf$8.00#23
Teak1070 lbf$20.00#24
African Padauk1970 lbf$14.00#25
Purple Heart2520 lbf$9.50#26
Acacia / Monkeypod900 lbf$10.00#27
American Sycamore770 lbf$4.50#28
American Elm830 lbf$5.00#29
Honduran Mahogany (Genuine Mahogany)900 lbf$14.00#30
Wenge1930 lbf$16.00#31
Red Meranti800 lbf$5.00#32
Zebrawood1830 lbf$14.00#33
Brazilian Cherry (Jatoba)2350 lbf$8.50#34
Ipe (Brazilian Walnut / Lapacho)3490 lbf$9.00#35
Yellowheart (Pau Amarello)1790 lbf$12.00#36
Black Locust1700 lbf$6.00#37
Bloodwood2900 lbf$14.00#38
Bamboo1650 lbf$4.50#39
Sitka Spruce510 lbf$12.00#40
East Indian Rosewood2440 lbf$40.00#41
Santos Mahogany2400 lbf$8.00#42
Spanish Cedar600 lbf$10.00#43
Bubinga2410 lbf$25.00#44
Butternut (White Walnut)490 lbf$8.00#45
Cocobolo2960 lbf$60.00#46
Canarywood1520 lbf$14.00#47
Merbau1925 lbf$8.50#48
Bocote2010 lbf$35.00#49
Osage Orange2620 lbf$15.00#50
Eucalyptus1125 lbf$5.50#51
Tigerwood2170 lbf$9.50#52
Leopardwood2150 lbf$18.00#53
Black Limba (Korina)670 lbf$12.00#54
Gaboon Ebony3080 lbf$100.00#55
Ziricote1970 lbf$45.00#56
Olive2700 lbf$30.00#57
Heart Pine1225 lbf$8.00#58
Brazilian Teak (Cumaru)3540 lbf$8.50#59
Macassar Ebony3220 lbf$80.00#60
Blue Mahoe900 lbf$18.00#61
Holly1020 lbf$20.00#62
Iroko1260 lbf$12.00#63
Peruvian Walnut960 lbf$9.00#64
Chechen (Caribbean Rosewood)2400 lbf$9.00#65
Bolivian Rosewood (Morado)1900 lbf$12.00#66
Doussie (Afzelia)1810 lbf$11.00#67
Kempas1750 lbf$6.50#68
Massaranduba (Brazilian Redwood)3190 lbf$7.00#69
Australian Cypress1375 lbf$6.50#70
Caribbean Walnut1400 lbf$7.50#71
Royal Mahogany (Andiroba)1400 lbf$7.00#72
Amendoim1780 lbf$7.50#73
Caribbean Heart Pine1240 lbf$7.00#74
Lignum Vitae4500 lbf$100.00#75
Tiete Rosewood (Sirari)3280 lbf$13.00#76
Sucupira (Tiete Chestnut)2900 lbf$10.00#77
Timborana1570 lbf$6.50#78
Patagonian Rosewood (Curupay)2800 lbf$11.00#79
Brazilian Rosewood2790 lbf$150.00#80
Brazilian Ebony3692 lbf$15.00#81
Brazilian Maple1700 lbf$7.00#82
Bolivian Cherry3650 lbf$9.50#83

83 of 83 species

Prices are rough US averages and vary by region, grade, and season. Popularity rank is a general estimate, not sales data.

A board of monkeypod, sold as acacia -- dark streaked heartwood against pale sapwood
Acacia / Monkeypod
The wood behind almost every live-edge slab table and big-box 'acacia' cutting board -- a genuinely nice material sold under a name that means almost nothing.
Janka hardness: 900 lbf
A quartersawn board of African mahogany (Khaya) -- the regular ribbon stripe produced by its strongly interlocked grain
African Mahogany (Khaya)
What 'mahogany' actually means at most lumber dealers today -- a real relative of the genuine article, at half the price, with more attitude about being planed.
Janka hardness: 830 lbf
A board of African padauk -- the intense fresh-cut orange, which will darken to reddish brown within months
African Padauk
The most aggressively orange wood you can buy, and the one that reliably disappoints people who didn't know it turns brown.
Janka hardness: 1970 lbf
A board of Amendoim -- light to medium reddish brown, mahogany-like in appearance
Amendoim
A South American hardwood that could pass for mahogany in a lineup, and only gets more convincing as it ages.
Janka hardness: 1780 lbf
A board of American Cherry -- the medium reddish brown it darkens to with light exposure
American Cherry
Cut it and it's pinkish-brown; give it a few weeks under a window and it turns into the reddish-brown patina everyone actually wants.
Janka hardness: 950 lbf
A board of American elm -- reddish brown, ring-porous, with the wavy interlocked grain that makes it nearly impossible to split
American Elm
Almost impossible to split, excellent under steam, and increasingly hard to find -- Dutch elm disease has been working through the species for a century.
Janka hardness: 830 lbf
A quartersawn board of American sycamore -- the dense freckled ray fleck that only appears on this cut
American Sycamore
Plain-sawn it's forgettable. Quartersawn it produces one of the most distinctive ray-fleck surfaces in North America, at a fraction of the price of the imports that copy it.
Janka hardness: 770 lbf
A board of aromatic red cedar -- violet-brown heartwood streaked with pale sapwood and studded with small tight knots
Aromatic Red Cedar (Eastern Red Cedar)
The closet-lining wood -- a juniper, not a cedar, whose smell is the entire product and stops working the moment you finish over it.
Janka hardness: 900 lbf
A board of Ash -- pale beige-to-light-brown, straight and regular grain, plain and consistent rather than dramatically figured.
Ash
A light, shock-resistant domestic hardwood that used to be a boring, reliable default -- the emerald ash borer has made it anything but boring to source now.
Janka hardness: 1320 lbf
A board of Australian Cypress -- honey-gold heartwood with the scattered darker knots that give this wood its rustic character.
Australian Cypress
A softwood that didn't get the memo -- harder than red oak, termite-resistant, and dressed in honey-gold with dark knots.
Janka hardness: 1375 lbf
A board of bald cypress -- pale yellowish tan with straight grain and even texture
Bald Cypress
The rot-resistant softwood of the American South -- and the source of 'pecky' cypress, a fungal defect people now pay extra for.
Janka hardness: 510 lbf
A natural (non-carbonized) edge-grain laminated bamboo panel -- the form bamboo is actually sold and worked as, not a solid tree trunk.
Bamboo
Not a tree, not even close -- a grass that grows absurdly fast and still earns a spot on every hardness chart because flooring doesn't care about taxonomy.
Janka hardness: 1650 lbf
A board of basswood -- pale, even, and nearly featureless, which is exactly what carvers want from it
Basswood
The carver's wood -- so soft, even, and featureless that it does almost nothing to resist a sharp gouge, which is the entire point.
Janka hardness: 410 lbf
A board of American Beech -- pale cream color, straight grain, plain and consistent.
Beech
Hard maple's less expensive sibling -- pale, straight-grained, and perfectly happy playing the budget alternative.
Janka hardness: 1300 lbf
A board of black limba (korina) -- pale gold with the dramatic dark streaking the heartwood grades are bought for
Black Limba (Korina)
Pale gold shot through with black streaks, light as poplar, and the wood Gibson called korina when they built the Flying V out of it.
Janka hardness: 670 lbf
A board of black locust -- greenish-gold heartwood with strong ring-porous banding
Black Locust
The domestic answer to ipe -- nearly as hard, genuinely rot-proof, grows like a weed, and costs a fraction of what shipping a tropical hardwood across an ocean does.
Janka hardness: 1700 lbf
A board of Black Walnut -- chocolate-brown heartwood with darker streaks, straight grain.
Black Walnut
The domestic hardwood everyone wants for fine furniture -- chocolate-brown, stable, and about as easy to work as hardwoods get.
Janka hardness: 1010 lbf
A board of Bloodwood -- bright, vivid, saturated red heartwood.
Bloodwood
The name is not a marketing exaggeration -- this South American hardwood is genuinely, vividly red, and that's the entire reason anyone buys it.
Janka hardness: 2900 lbf
A board of blue mahoe -- gray-brown with the metallic blue-green and purple streaking unique to the species
Blue Mahoe
Jamaica's national tree, and the only commercially available wood that is genuinely, unmistakably blue-green -- for a while.
Janka hardness: 900 lbf
A board of bocote -- golden brown with the bold black swirling stripes and eye figure it's bought for
Bocote
Golden brown with dramatic black swirls and eye-shaped figure -- the wood that looks like it was designed rather than grown.
Janka hardness: 2010 lbf
A board of the dense reddish-brown hardwood sold as Bolivian Cherry -- shown as the ipe-family wood it most likely is
Bolivian Cherry
An extremely hard Bolivian hardwood whose exact identity nobody seems willing to commit to in writing -- our best guess is below.
Janka hardness: 3650 lbf
A board of Bolivian Rosewood (Morado/Pau Ferro) -- reddish-violet brown with darker black streaking
Bolivian Rosewood (Morado)
Sold as Bolivian Rosewood, Morado, or Pau Ferro, depending who's selling it -- none of which make it an actual Dalbergia rosewood.
Janka hardness: 1900 lbf
A board of Brazilian Cherry (Jatoba) -- orange-brown to reddish brown with darker streaks
Brazilian Cherry (Jatoba)
Not cherry, not even a distant relative -- a very hard, reddish-brown Brazilian hardwood that earned the name purely by looking the part.
Janka hardness: 2350 lbf
A board showing the very dark reddish-brown to near-black heartwood sold as Brazilian Ebony
Brazilian Ebony
Marketed as an ebony stand-in, though it's no relation to true ebony -- closer kin to katalox, and honestly a bit of a mystery wood.
Janka hardness: 3692 lbf
A board of Brazilian Maple (guatambú/pau marfim) -- pale cream to yellow-cream, minimal contrast between sapwood and heartwood.
Brazilian Maple
Maple doesn't grow in Brazil -- this is guatambú wearing a marketing name, picked because it's pale like the maple American buyers already know.
Janka hardness: 1700 lbf
A board of Brazilian Rosewood -- dark chocolate to purplish-brown, with the black web-like streaking real Dalbergia nigra is known for.
Brazilian Rosewood
The rosewood every other 'rosewood' on this list is trying to imitate -- CITES Appendix I since 1992, and effectively gone except as reclaimed or antique stock.
Janka hardness: 2790 lbf
A board of Cumaru (Brazilian Teak) -- medium to dark brown with interlocked grain
Brazilian Teak (Cumaru)
No relation to actual teak whatsoever -- an extremely hard, dense Brazilian hardwood that smells faintly of vanilla and outworks most decking materials.
Janka hardness: 3540 lbf
A board of plain-grain bubinga -- pinkish red with darker streaking; the figured grades look nothing like this
Bubinga
Available in slabs wide enough to be a whole tabletop, figured enough to look like flowing water, and wrapped in enough CITES paperwork to explain the price.
Janka hardness: 2410 lbf
A board of butternut -- walnut's open grain structure in a light golden tan
Butternut (White Walnut)
Black walnut's pale, soft cousin -- the same open grain and easy machining, half the weight, and a fungus quietly removing it from the market.
Janka hardness: 490 lbf
A board of canarywood -- yellow-orange shifting to reddish brown across the same board, with darker streaks
Canarywood
Yellow-orange streaked with red, and one of the few dramatic tropicals that's genuinely easy to work and reasonably priced.
Janka hardness: 1520 lbf
A board of Caribbean Heart Pine -- reddish-brown heartwood with pronounced growth-ring banding
Caribbean Heart Pine
Marketed next to true Heart Pine for looking the part -- a reddish-brown Central American and Caribbean pine that's actually its own species.
Janka hardness: 1240 lbf
A board of Caribbean Walnut (Macacauba) -- reddish to purplish brown with darker stripes
Caribbean Walnut
Sold as a walnut alternative despite sharing nothing with actual walnut but a marketing department's optimism.
Janka hardness: 1400 lbf
A board of Chechen (Caribbean Rosewood), showing the bold, high-contrast figure the trade name trades on -- vivid orange-red heartwood streaked with near-black.
Chechen (Caribbean Rosewood)
Sold as Caribbean Rosewood, striped bold enough to justify the name -- just not, technically, a rosewood.
Janka hardness: 2400 lbf
A board of cocobolo -- oranges and reds shot through with black streaking, and the oily luster it polishes to unaided
Cocobolo
Probably the most beautiful wood in commercial trade, and the one most likely to give you a rash you don't get over.
Janka hardness: 2960 lbf
A board of Douglas fir -- orange-brown with the sharp earlywood/latewood contrast that makes it splinter and makes it stripe under stain
Douglas Fir
The structural backbone of the American West -- stiff, strong, cheap in construction grades, and the reason so many workbench tops are made of laminated 2x material.
Janka hardness: 620 lbf
A board of Afzelia (Doussie) -- reddish-brown heartwood with a coarse, open-pored texture
Doussie (Afzelia)
One tree, two names -- a durable West/Central African hardwood that's rock-stable and reddish-brown, whichever label the supplier reaches for.
Janka hardness: 1810 lbf
A board of East Indian rosewood -- purplish brown with darker streaking and the fine, tight texture of a true Dalbergia
East Indian Rosewood
The rosewood you can still actually buy -- a real Dalbergia, plantation-grown in India, and the standard back-and-sides wood since Brazilian rosewood became unobtainable.
Janka hardness: 2440 lbf
A board of Eastern White Pine -- pale creamy straw color, fine straight grain with soft low-contrast growth rings and the small tight knots typical of select-grade stock
Eastern White Pine
The pale, knotty, forgiving softwood stacked in every big-box lumber aisle -- the board most people learn on, and the one most people underestimate.
Janka hardness: 380 lbf
A board of Eucalyptus (Rose Gum) -- pink to reddish brown with a moderately coarse texture
Eucalyptus
Over 700 species deep, so 'eucalyptus flooring' tells you almost nothing about what you're actually getting until you check the fine print.
Janka hardness: 1125 lbf
A board of Gaboon ebony -- near-uniform jet black with almost no visible grain
Gaboon Ebony
The actual black wood -- so uniformly black it reads as painted, so dense it sinks, and endangered enough that you should think before buying it.
Janka hardness: 3080 lbf
A board of Hard Maple -- nearly white to off-white, the pale sapwood face most commonly sold.
Hard Maple
Pale, dense, and quietly the toughest domestic hardwood in the room -- the reason your butcher block hasn't given up on you yet.
Janka hardness: 1450 lbf
A board of Heart Pine -- rich golden-orange to reddish-amber, with the tight, regular growth rings old-growth Longleaf Pine is prized for.
Heart Pine
The resin-rich prize cut from old-growth Longleaf Pine -- mostly sold reclaimed now, since the original trees are long gone.
Janka hardness: 1225 lbf
A board of Hickory/Pecan, showing the sharp natural contrast between reddish-brown heartwood and pale cream sapwood the same board often carries.
Hickory/Pecan
One of the toughest domestic woods there is -- the reason your grandfather's axe handle outlived several axe heads.
Janka hardness: 1820 lbf
A board of holly -- the near-white, nearly grainless surface that makes it the inlay wood of choice
Holly
The whitest wood in commercial trade -- used wherever something needs to read as pure white, and ruined by a fungus if you look away during drying.
Janka hardness: 1020 lbf
A board of Honduran mahogany -- the deep reddish brown it ages into, with a subtle ribbon stripe
Honduran Mahogany (Genuine Mahogany)
The wood every other 'mahogany' is named after and none of them are -- still the benchmark for workability, now CITES-listed and priced accordingly.
Janka hardness: 900 lbf
A board of Ipe -- olive to reddish brown, extremely dense, with a faint waxy sheen
Ipe (Brazilian Walnut / Lapacho)
Sold under enough aliases (Brazilian Walnut, Lapacho, and more) to make a witness protection program jealous -- one extremely dense, decay-proof Brazilian hardwood underneath.
Janka hardness: 3490 lbf
A board of iroko -- golden to reddish brown with interlocked grain and a coarse, open texture
Iroko
Sold as 'African teak,' and for outdoor work the comparison mostly holds -- right up until your planer hits a stone deposit.
Janka hardness: 1260 lbf
A board of Kempas -- warm orange-brown to reddish-brown heartwood, straight grain, moderate luster.
Kempas
A Southeast Asian hardwood that gives you a mahogany-adjacent look on a flooring budget.
Janka hardness: 1750 lbf
A quartersawn board of leopardwood -- the dense field of ray flecks that exists only on this cut
Leopardwood
A dense field of pale flecks over reddish brown, produced by medullary rays big enough to see across a room -- and only if the board is quartersawn.
Janka hardness: 2150 lbf
A board of lignum vitae -- dark olive-green, oily, and the densest wood ever traded commercially
Lignum Vitae
The hardest and densest commercial wood ever traded, self-lubricating enough to have served as propeller shaft bearings, and now CITES-listed and essentially gone.
Janka hardness: 4500 lbf
A board of Macassar ebony -- black and gold striping, the figure that defined Art Deco veneer work
Macassar Ebony
Ebony with the contrast turned up -- black and gold striping that made it the Art Deco veneer of choice, and it's endangered too.
Janka hardness: 3220 lbf
A board of Massaranduba (Brazilian Redwood) -- dark reddish brown, fine and tight-grained
Massaranduba (Brazilian Redwood)
Sold as Brazilian Redwood despite having nothing to do with an actual redwood tree -- just an extremely dense decking hardwood that happens to share the color.
Janka hardness: 3190 lbf
A board of Merbau -- orange-brown to reddish brown with characteristic yellow mineral deposits in the pores
Merbau
Rot-proof and insect-proof enough to dominate the decking market -- unfortunately not proof against the demand that comes with that.
Janka hardness: 1925 lbf
A board of olive -- cream and gold with bold black streaking and wildly swirling grain
Olive
Cream and gold with black swirling streaks, dense enough to sink, and available almost exclusively in small pieces from trees that stopped producing fruit.
Janka hardness: 2700 lbf
A board of Osage orange -- the vivid fresh-cut yellow that will oxidize to russet brown within a year
Osage Orange
A shockingly yellow, shockingly hard domestic wood that used to be planted as fencing -- the best bow wood in North America and one of the most rot-resistant.
Janka hardness: 2620 lbf
A board of Curupay (Patagonian Rosewood) -- pale-to-medium reddish-brown, streaked with irregular, interlocked darker figure.
Patagonian Rosewood (Curupay)
Also called Curupay or Cebil, sold as Patagonian Rosewood -- the rosewood connection is marketing, not botany.
Janka hardness: 2800 lbf
A board of Peruvian Walnut -- deep chocolate brown, darker than temperate walnut
Peruvian Walnut
Black walnut's South American cousin -- darker, more evenly chocolate-brown, and a bit less patient with sunlight.
Janka hardness: 960 lbf
A board of yellow poplar -- creamy background with the green and gray mineral streaking the species is known for
Poplar (Yellow Poplar)
The cheapest hardwood at the lumberyard and the correct answer to more projects than people admit -- as long as you're painting it.
Janka hardness: 540 lbf
A board of Purpleheart -- the deep eggplant purple the wood turns within days of being cut
Purple Heart
Cut it and it looks like an ordinary brown board playing a joke on you -- give it a few days of sunlight and the eggplant-purple punchline lands.
Janka hardness: 2520 lbf
A board of red alder -- uniform light reddish tan with almost no distinction between heartwood and sapwood
Red Alder
The Pacific Northwest's default cabinet wood and the body of an enormous number of electric guitars -- plain, even, and easy in every direction.
Janka hardness: 590 lbf
A board of Dark Red Meranti -- uniform reddish brown with a coarse, open-pored texture and a faint ribbon stripe from its interlocked grain
Red Meranti
Sold as 'Philippine mahogany' despite being no relation to mahogany at all -- a cheap, stable, easy-working Southeast Asian import with a real sourcing problem attached.
Janka hardness: 800 lbf
A board of Red Oak -- light-to-medium brown with a reddish cast, coarse texture, large open pores.
Red Oak
The default domestic hardwood -- widely available, honestly priced, and the board every lumberyard assumes you mean unless you say otherwise.
Janka hardness: 1290 lbf
A board of redwood -- pinkish to reddish brown, straight grained and coarse textured
Redwood
Light, dimensionally stable, rot resistant, and cut from the tallest trees on Earth -- which is exactly why where it came from matters.
Janka hardness: 450 lbf
A board of Andiroba (Royal Mahogany) -- medium reddish brown with a subtle ribbon stripe
Royal Mahogany (Andiroba)
Sold as 'Royal Mahogany' for the marketing appeal -- it's andiroba underneath, harder than red oak and perfectly fine standing on its own name.
Janka hardness: 1400 lbf
A board of Santos Mahogany -- golden brown to purplish red with a subtle striped figure
Santos Mahogany
Rides mahogany's reputation into premium flooring aisles despite no actual family ties -- the hardness and color earned it a pass.
Janka hardness: 2400 lbf
A board of Sapele -- reddish-brown to mahogany-brown, with the subtle ribbon-stripe figure its interlocked grain produces.
Sapele
Marketed as mahogany, related to mahogany only loosely, and honestly more interesting-looking than the wood it's standing in for.
Janka hardness: 1360 lbf
A quartersawn board of Sitka spruce -- the tight, straight, evenly spaced grain that soundboard grading is built around
Sitka Spruce
The best strength-to-weight ratio of any common timber -- which is why it built biplanes, and why it's under the strings of most steel-string guitars.
Janka hardness: 510 lbf
A board of soft maple -- near-white with a faint warm cast and fine, even, close grain
Soft Maple (Red Maple)
Hard maple's cheaper, friendlier sibling -- 'soft' only in comparison, and the better choice for most furniture that isn't a chopping block.
Janka hardness: 950 lbf
A board of Southern Yellow Pine -- orange-amber with the hard, dark, high-contrast latewood banding that makes it strong and makes it blotch
Southern Yellow Pine
The dense, orange, resin-heavy pine holding up most of the houses in America -- stronger than it gets credit for, and far harder to finish nicely than it looks.
Janka hardness: 690 lbf
A board of Spanish cedar -- pale reddish brown, open-pored, and much lighter than the mahogany it's related to
Spanish Cedar
Neither Spanish nor a cedar -- a lightweight mahogany relative whose aromatic oils are why every decent humidor is lined with it.
Janka hardness: 600 lbf
A board of SPF (whitewood) construction lumber -- very pale and slightly cool-toned, fine close grain, with the tight knots ordinary stud grade allows
SPF / Whitewood (Spruce-Pine-Fir)
The stack of 2x4s at the front of every lumber aisle -- not a species at all, but three genera graded together and sold as one, which explains a lot about how it behaves.
Janka hardness: 480 lbf
A board of Sucupira (Tiete Chestnut) -- reddish brown with contrasting lighter parenchyma banding
Sucupira (Tiete Chestnut)
Sold as Tiete Chestnut, and about as consistent in reported hardness as a game of telephone -- we split the difference and said so.
Janka hardness: 2900 lbf
A board of Teak -- golden to olive-brown, with the coarse texture and soft, slightly oily sheen natural teak oil gives it.
Teak
The wood boats are built to outlast you with -- golden-brown, naturally oily, and thoroughly unbothered by weather.
Janka hardness: 1070 lbf
A board of Tiete Rosewood (Sirari) -- soft pink-tinged russet, with a calm, clean, straight grain much more uniform than a true rosewood.
Tiete Rosewood (Sirari)
Another 'rosewood' that's actually closer kin to bubinga -- very hard, and it reddens with age whether the name is accurate or not.
Janka hardness: 3280 lbf
A board of Tigerwood (Goncalo Alves) -- medium reddish-brown, boldly streaked near-black, genuinely earning the trade name.
Tigerwood
Named for the stripes, and some boards genuinely earn the name -- others show up looking suspiciously tame for a wood called Tigerwood.
Janka hardness: 2170 lbf
A board of Timborana -- creamy yellow to light-medium brown, with the visible open pores and interlocked grain typical of this wood.
Timborana
Sold as Brazilian Pearwood or Brazilian Oak depending on the day -- even the botanists writing about it can't fully agree what it is.
Janka hardness: 1570 lbf
A board of Wenge -- medium brown crossed by near-black streaks, with a coarse open-pored texture
Wenge
About as close to black as wood gets without cheating -- striking on a guitar fingerboard, and increasingly hard to source responsibly.
Janka hardness: 1930 lbf
A board of western red cedar -- reddish brown with the irregular tonal banding typical of the species
Western Red Cedar
The default outdoor softwood of the Pacific Northwest -- light, stable, naturally rot resistant, and soft enough to dent with a thumbnail.
Janka hardness: 350 lbf
A board of White Oak -- light tan to medium brown, with the prominent silvery ray fleck this wood is known for.
White Oak
The reason bourbon tastes like bourbon -- a durable, water-resistant domestic hardwood with pores tight enough to trust with liquid for years.
Janka hardness: 1350 lbf
A board of Yellow Birch -- light reddish-brown heartwood with nearly-white sapwood clearly demarcated.
Yellow Birch
A domestic hardwood that reads a lot like maple, at a price that reads a lot better.
Janka hardness: 1260 lbf
A board of yellowheart -- clean, saturated, unusually uniform yellow that stays yellow
Yellowheart (Pau Amarello)
The reliable yellow in a cutting board -- bright, clean, unusually colourfast, and one of the few vivid woods that doesn't fade to brown on you.
Janka hardness: 1790 lbf
A board of Zebrawood -- cream to light brown with the dark stripes it's named for
Zebrawood
An African hardwood that looks exactly like its name promises -- bold cream-and-brown stripes, zero subtlety, zero regrets.
Janka hardness: 1830 lbf
A board of ziricote -- dark brown crossed by the black spiderwebbing streaks that make it a luthier's wood
Ziricote
Black spiderwebbing over dark brown, sometimes with a landscape figure that looks like a photograph of trees -- the luthier's dramatic pick.
Janka hardness: 1970 lbf