This Best-Selling Pumpkin Carving Kit Is Over 30% Off on Amazon Right Now

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Just as important as sizing up the ideal Halloween costume is mapping out a plan for carving up a jack-o’-lantern.

If you’ve ever simply snagged a knife out of a kitchen drawer (even the good knives) before attacking your chosen pumpkin, you know that’s not the best plan for your pumpkin artistry. Instead, you’re going to want to invest — and we’re talking the potential for a minor monetary investment that will pay dividends in production — in pumpkin carving tools. You can go full multi-piece kit or simply get a little something extra to boost your potential skills. It will make the task easier and possibly up your abilities.

The best pumpkin carving kits not only allow you to hollow out the guts of your gourd, but they also provide the tools you need to etch, cut, and sculpt your way to a next-level design. Then show off that masterpiece along with the rest of your Halloween lights and decorations.

The Best Pumpkin Carving Kits

• Best Overall: Shuttle Art 20-Piece Halloween Pumpkin Carving Kit

• Best Budget: Greatever Heavy-Duty Halloween Pumpkin Carving Kit

• Best of Both Worlds: Antner Professional Pumpkin Carving Tool Kit

• Most Convenient: Elmchee 13-Piece Halloween Pumpkin Carving Kit

• Most Illuminating: Comfy Mate 17-Piece Pumpkin Carving Kit

What to Consider

When selecting your pumpkin carving kit and tools, you really need to ask yourself how intricate you plan to get. Do you need just a little bit of help scooping out the gunk, a bit sharper approach to some rudimentary design, or do you plan to etch your way to fantastical work? There are kits and tools for every level of need.

You’ll want to consider if you need a large set of tools to keep multiple people happy at one time — we’re talking a bit of a carving party or a larger family event — or if you plan to do your work in solace, only revealing the masterpiece when completed. Quality is of consideration too. How much do you care about the durability of a product that may (or may not) only get used one time?

Then comes the questions on the extras. Do you need stencils, lights (which are helpful for setting a different ambiance when fully carved), or any extra helpers to complete your task?

Of course, there’s always the age-old question of money. How much do you want to spend? Most decent sets can be had for south of $20 or even under $10, but you can spend even less. Or you can spend more — it is all up to you.

How We Selected

The world of pumpkin carving opens when you start exploring the possibilities. By researching best-sellers on some of the top retail sites, scouring the comments, and looking at the ratings, we were able to come up with a solid starter list. From there, we put the tools to the test.

Heading to a local farm, we carted our tools along for the ride (the highly mobile aspect of the carrying cases sure makes this an easy task), having them in hand when we selected the pumpkins best suited for the task, grabbing a mix of gourds to offer up the best variety.

Then came the incredibly hard work: carving pumpkins (okay, the hard part is all the scooping out of the mushy insides). We put multiple tools and kits to the test, pitting them against each other, dipping the blades into the skin and flesh of our chosen pumpkins, and coming out with reviews on the effectiveness, quality, and overall carving aptitude of the kits. Let’s stay silent, though, on our artistic skills.

Halloween Pumpkin Carving Kit

Focus on the jack-o’-lantern creating with this 20-piece set. With a durable handle complete with rubber overlay, the pieces are some of the most comfortable to hold you’ll find. And with an array of carving tools, you’ll be able to locate the sharp edge you need for whatever design you’re crafting. The array of tools also makes this kit easy to share between multiple folks.

We appreciated the feel of the tools, the range of blades, and the fact there was enough variety to keep virtually any carver happy. You do forgo some of the intricate detailing work to get a larger range of knife edges, although some edges you won’t find in any other set.

The stencils are nothing more than folded-up pieces of paper, so rely on the fact that the suitable carrying case easily holds your range of 20 comfortable tools and you’ve still got the best all-around carving kit available.

More: 21 Gifts For the Pumpkin-Obsessed That Are Simply Gourd-geous

Heavy-Duty Halloween Pumpkin Carving Kit

When you need an affordable, go-to basic pumpkin carving kit, the Greatever option fills the void. With a simple plastic handle and seven pieces that stash quickly in a carrying pouch, don’t expect frills with this set other than it being a basic range of tools to get your pumpkin to jack-o’-lantern in a jiffy.

The assortment of blades ran the pumpkin range from getting started to digging out the gourd’s innards right down to detail work, you just won’t have a lot of options to choose from in each category. The carrying case doesn’t organize the tools but does keep them all corralled in a bag. If you need a solid set of tools without any extras that will get the job done, look no further.

Professional Pumpkin Carving Tool Kit

When you need your do-it-all blades and your mix of intricate detail-making edges, the Antner 10-piece kit fits the bill. While this kit does focus slightly more on the detail work, you still have the essential larger pieces you need to get the jack-o’-lantern to the point where the small edges come in handy. Still, with so many detail-oriented tools, this kit skews toward the designers who are doing something fancier than the basics.

We appreciate the stainless-steel tools embedded in a nice wooden handle. The carrying case keeps the array easily organized and folks looking to really take their design prowess up a notch can do so with the range of quality tools from this kit.

13-Piece Halloween Pumpkin Carving Kit

Buy this bargain-friendly kit once, and you’ll always have the right tools on hand for crafting the jack-o’-lantern of your dreams (or nightmares!).

The Elmchee Halloween Pumpkin Carving Tools is an impressive 13-piece set that includes scoops, saws, and fine-point tools. It comes with a convenient carrying case, too!

The range of tools mixes between plastic orange handles and wooden handles (for the finer points), but the assortment ensures you have the tool on hand for detail work (we especially appreciate the drill-like fine-tip tool).

Pumpkin Carving Kit

This ultimate carving kit has all the tools necessary for newbies and pros alike to carve some bone-chilling pumpkins. This set includes two saws, an etching tool, a poker drill, a scoop, and six stainless steel double-sided detailing tools.

But what sets this apart is that the case also allows for storage and five LED candles. So, now, when your pumpkin carving is wrapped up, it’s ready for a front-step display with one (or more) of the small LED candles.

Commenters enjoyed the quality of the kit. “I had a group of friends over to carve pumpkins and I was pleasantly surprised by the durability,” one wrote. “I bought five sets in total, and eight adults used them. There were zero breaks, bends, or complaints.”

Another commenter said it is “a great set that has all you’ll need to make some pretty good carvings.”

Pumpkin Carving Kit for Kids

This kit helps make jack-o’-lantern sculpting a little safer for little ones, and all the extras add a bit more flair to the party. The stainless-steel carving tools offer six different blades with a few of the basics and a few extra kid-friendly designs.

Along with the blades, you also get candles, carving stencils, stickers, rings, and even some little bags. The extra assortment of goodies might not be what you need, but if you have a group that could quickly get bored with the pumpkins themselves, the stickers and extras may make the event a little livelier.

Just make sure you’re still supervising your little monsters while they work.

Wood Carving Tools Set

This 12-piece set of carbon-steel tools was made for wood carving, and that means it can handle pumpkins just as well.

If you want your pumpkin creation to take on a more sculptural look with engravings and shadowing details, the differently shaped knives in the Augsun Wood Carving Tools Set can help you achieve the look you want.

Commenters reviewed the product for wood, a tougher surface than pumpkins, but still say they work well, especially for folks new to the carving world. “As a beginner,” one wrote, “I will say they are truly easy to use.”

Pumpkin Gutter and Carving Tool

Before you cut, you must gut your gourd! The Dakota Products Pumpkin Gutter and Carving Tool is a whisk-shaped slicer that can be used with any electric or cordless drill. Any time you’re adding power tools to the pumpkin experience, you’re upping the level of fun (especially at a party).

Its purpose is to easily — and quickly — remove the strings and seeds while also allowing you to thin the inner rind of your pumpkin. From there, let the decorating begin.

One commenter said they gutted 29 pumpkins in an average of just a couple minutes per pumpkin. Another comment said it is more than a kitchen beater. “It is beefier, and the leading edges are thinned down enough for good scraping action. The shaft is also a lot longer to reach down into a big pumpkin.”

Cordless Rotary Tool and Accessory Kit

An ideal tool for shading and engraving or used in conjunction with other pumpkin carving kits, this rechargeable rotary carver lets you add precise details to your pumpkin. You can punch in pinholes and shave off the excess rind with barely any effort at all.

The KeShi Cordless Rotary Tool comes with a variety of tips for drilling, engraving, grinding, buffing, and sanding. You can also use it for home projects well beyond the Halloween season, so if you’re an artistically minded person, this may prove handy all year long.

Stainless Steel Pumpkin Carving Stencils

If your kids want to be a part of the pumpkin-carving fun but they’re too young to hold a knife, the cookie-cutter stencils help them make their mark on an already hollowed-out gourd.

This seven-piece pumpkin carving kit is endlessly versatile, allowing them to mix and match the pieces until they create the spookiest face imaginable.

As one commenter said, “This was great for my 3-year-old to carve pumpkins! It’s nice to not have to worry about knives, and he can pick what shapes he wants to use!”

Double-Ended Melon Baller

We admit, the Norpro Melon Baller is intended for, well, melons. But it works for pumpkins, too, especially when newbies want to try their hand at some unique designs without graduating into more complex tooling.

With the two-sided melon ball tool — each side has a different-sized scoop — both young and old not quite as adept at the artsy side of jack-o’-lantern crafting can scoop out bits of pumpkin rind.

This style offers a fun way to teach folks how to craft a jack-o’-lantern face before they’re ready to get more intricate. Plus, when you’re done, use it to start making melon balls for your next summer party.

Craft Linoleum Block Cutters

For adding finely engraved lines, pumpkin carving pros are likely to reach for a set of linoleum cutters like this one from Falling in Art.

This pumpkin carving kit comes with six interchangeable edges — all conveniently stored inside of the handle — letting you create contrasting ribbons of varying widths around the exterior of your gourd.

Art-capable pumpkin carvers may gravitate toward this piece, both for the unique way you can design the jack-o’-lantern and because it can prove useful in art projects outside of the pumpkin season. Mobility and storing are a breeze, too.

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