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If you know anything about how to smoke weed with a pipe, then you ought to know that first you gotta grind your pot leaf before you can pack your pipe and blaze away! Inquiring aspiring cannasseurs and novice pot smokers are going to want to know how to grind weed by hand, how to use a 4-piece grinder, where to buy a weed grinder and how much is a grinder – this is the place where we are gonna attempt to answer all your weed grinding questions! We’ve also got a buying guide to give you a rundown on the best of the best weed grinders, the best weed grinders for kief for kief, where to find cheap grinders, how to make a weed grinder, and all about cleaning weed grinders. The marijuana grinder is as essential a tool to a pot smoker as the lighter! So, you’re probably going to want to know how to grind weed by hand, unless you buy yourself an electric grinder – but even an electric grinder has parts that you’ll want to understand when you assemble, use and clean your own pot grinder.
From diamond teeth tooth design to zinc alloy construction, all the way down to your collection tray, there's a lot more to finding the best grinder to get a fine grind than one might think. Fear not though! We've got all the know how to ensure you get the coveted fluffy grind you're after.
(Marijuana nugs in a weed grinder, image from Stoned Alone 4 Days on Instagram)
Why Grind Your Weed
Marijuana has to be shredded or ground so that it burns better; finely ground ganja exposes more of the THC crystals or trichomes to the heat source during combustion and thus gets you higher, giving you more potent effects from whatever cannabis strain you are smoking or vaping – the finer the cut, the more THC is released. Also, ground weed fits in your weed bowl or dry weed vape chamber better. Yes, you can grind weed without a grinder simply by tearing nugs of cannabis flower apart with your fingers. But that is a pretty inefficient way, because you end up burning big chunks in your weed bowl, ashing the outside while the inside is unburned, and when you tear up your buds of marijuana all the cannabinoid-laden resin and kief get all over your oily fingers – that’s THC you aren’t smoking (however, you can rub your fingers together until the resin balls up and grows as it collects more resin, making hash! Believe us, investing in a grinder with proper grinding teeth and maybe even a pollen catcher is well worth it!
Let’s go Shopping for a Weed Grinder
Two popular places where you can buy a weed grinder are at offline headshops (marijuana dispensaries sometimes also have a limited inventory of things like herb grinders and weed pipes) and online.
How much is a grinder? Cheap herb grinders, the two-part twist kind, can be had for as little as $10-12 at a brick-and-mortar store and around $15 online at eBay or Amazon. There are also 4-piece grinders out there. Obviously, the more parts, the more mesh screens and chambers that a pot grinder has, maybe it even comes with a lifetime warranty, the more it will likely cost. Your least expensive marijuana grinders are going to be a billet aluminum grinder, simple twist-to-operate lettuce shredders, whereas electronic weed grinders will cost a lot more – simple economics, the more parts and the more it costs to make the more you will pay for it! Beyond your basic high school economics class though, there are some practical reasons why it may be worth it to pay a little more!
If you want the one of the best grinders for kief, or the best grinder for conduction vaporizer or convection vaporizers, then you’re going to want something with a screen and a compartment to catch your kief; if you don’t care so much about kief, but want a quick and easy grinder for on-the-go, then a simple two-piece twist grinder may be ideal. Your own budget may also dictate what pot grinder you buy, simpler ones can be as cheap as $10-15 USD, a decent electric grinder will run $25-$40 USD but the most expensive weed grinder – a Phoenician Grinder solid-gold grinder – costs a mind-boggling $1500 USD, so you better save your allowance for that one! With so many grinders on the market, it's easy to be overwhelmed, but fear not. That's why we're here with this trusty list!
Now, the Best Weed Grinders in the World:
Well, some of the highlights anyway! Here are our top picks for best grinders that really enhance your smoking experience.
(1) The Santa Cruz Shredder
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The Santa Cruz Shredder (also known as the Santa Cruz Crusher) 4-piece grinder with anodized aluminum has unusual, sharp 4-point blades, or teeth, and is a good basic grinder with an extra fine stainless steel screen that allows the powdery cannabis trichomes to fall through into the grinder kief screen. The grinder teeth cut multiple ways; that is how to fluff weed for optimal burning! Santa Cruz uses “Medical-Grade Ultrasonic Cleansing procedures” in their manufacturing process, which removes all traces of contaminants like dust, dirt, and toxic chemicals from their product before it is shipped. The Santa Cruz Shredder grinder will be your trusty new grinder you can take everywhere with you.
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(2) The 2.5 inch Sharpstone Grinder
(3) The Black Tie Cannabis Grinder
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The Black Tie Pot Grinder is fashioned from a single piece of shiny black anodized aluminum alloy, has a grinding chamber with no less than 50 diamond-shaped super-sharp teeth or blades, has extra strong neodymium magnets to hold all the pieces together, comes in a fancy velvety carrying pouch, and has a fine metal kief straining screen, plus two scrapers or brushes to sweep out the rounded bottom, so you don't miss out on any ground material. Your dry herb will be in proper toking shape in no time! There is also a pink weed grinder for anyone who fancies pink. Black Tie marijuana grinders also come with a 100% money-back guarantee if you’re not completely satisfied!
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(4) Death Star Weed Grinder
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Remember up top in the title of this blog article we said ‘No. 4 Will Blow You Away’? Well, if you saw the original Star Wars movie, then you know that there is a line that Han Solo says in the movie: ‘That’s what I'm trying to tell you, kid. [The planet Alderaan] ain't there. It's been totally blown away.’ Thus THIS novelty idea, and movie-tie in, for a weed grinder! You can even smoke Death Star cannabis strain in it! The Death Star is a sturdy small grinder that is a very discreet 1 ½ inches in diameter, made from aluminum, and has a small pollen catcher in the bottom.
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Prefer anime and manga to sci-fi? Get the Pokémon Pokéball Weed Grinder also on Amazon. Either of these would definitely fall under the category of cool weed grinder!
(5) Mendocino Mulcher
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Then there’s the Mendocino Mulcher, or Mendo Mulcher grinder, which is a 2-piece or 4-piece grinder made in Mendocino, California. The manufacturer of the Mulcher grinder has been in the grinder biz for 20 years. The Mendo Mulcher grinder has more than 88 teeth, twice the blades of a typical weed grinder, and they’re constructed out of billet aluminum on a CNC machine for exacting design precision. The Mendocino Mulcher grinder has a metallic finish that resists fingerprints and scratches, and the grinder comes with a full lifetime warranty!
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(6) 2.2" Kannastör 4-Piece Grinder
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The 2.2" Kannastör 4-piece Grinder Jar features a 60 monofilament, stainless steel easy change screen on the bottom of its transparent middle section, over the grinder's pollen catcher. So you can admire and, more practically, store, that ground herb! That makes the Kannastör Gr8tr among the best kief grinders out there! The Kannastör 4-piece grinder comes in a matte black finish made from 61/60 anodized food grade aluminum.
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(7) Space Case Grinders
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The Space Case Grinder is a 4-piece grinder that includes a pollen screen, and is as simple and easy a way to grind weed as you could have. The Space Case grinder is made with top of the line aerospace aluminum and is renowned for being strong and durable; Space Case grinders are the kind you’ll have around forever because they never wear out!
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(8) The Golden Gate Grinder
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This 4-piece grinder with a pollen screen is purported to be the best weed grinder on Amazon, with over 2,000 customers’ favorable Golden Gate grinder reviews. Made from heavy duty materials and no plastic parts, the Golden Gate grinder is available in small grinder, medium and extra-large grinder sizes and in a variety of colored finishes. You're sure to get a fine grind of your cannabis plant thanks to the sharp teeth and diamond tooth design.
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(9) Platinum Grinders with Pollen Screen
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Platinum Grinders grinder with a kief catcher is a precision milled, aircraft quality aluminum grinder with scratch-resistant matte black anodized finish and has a reputation for extra toughness, durability and quality. It has 49 blades or grinder teeth for creating a fluffy grind, a thin poly o-ring for smoother grinding with less friction, the stainless steel mesh screen filters fine kief dust down into the grinder's pollen catcher – and there is the usual kief brush included. The Platinum Grinders grinder is held together by powerful neodymium magnets for outstanding closure, odor control and freshness.
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(10) Mamba Electric Grinder
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An excellent powered pot grinder is the Mamba electric grinder. It's compact, portable and has great grind consistency; at the touch of a single button, your marijuana leaf will be mulched in seconds! Whether you have mobility and/or physical needs to accommodate or you just want to simplify your life by eliminating the time it takes to get ground herb into your smoking device, the ease the Mamba brings into our lives is noteworthy. Smooth grinding has never been so simple!
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(11) The Zip Grinder Mega Crusher
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The Zip Grinder Mega Crusher is a 2.5 diameter x 3.5 inch high grinder that is twice the size of most grinders, with a giant clear storage chamber that holds about 6 heaping tablespoons of weed. Just think of the extra kief in the grinder kief catcher from grinding six tablespoons of weed! Zip Grinders come in a variety of colors, designs, and number of pieces per weed grinder; Zip Grinders have easy to turn precision glide rings for ease in twisting, combined with 49 diamond-shaped sharp teeth to shred your green goodness consistently and smoothly.
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Special thanks to all of the pro photogs who took these lovely stock images! All rights reserved.
How Weed Grinders Work
Whether you've picked up the ever-impressive Santa Cruz Shredder or gone for one of the aluminum grinders on the list, all manual 420 grinders work basically the same. Pot grinders tend to have 4 main parts - a grinding chamber, jagged teeth or sharp pegs to do the actual grinding, a screen to separate kief from leaf, and ofttimes, a magnetic lid to keep it all contained! Marijuana grinders generally fall under the categories of two-piece (or single chamber), three-piece (or double-chambered), or four-piece (triple-chambered) herb grinders – there are even deluxe 6 piece grinder sets that are basically a 2-piece and 4-piece grinder sold together (presumably you use the smaller pot grinder when you are in a hurry, and the big weed grinder when you want a fluffy grind, maybe with higher-end cannabis strains).
Whatever kind of weed grinder you have, using it is fairly easy - although twisting some grinders by hand, when you have a lot of weed to grind (say a quarter ounce or more for decarboxylation) or if you have to hand-grind stemmy plant material can be a lot of physical exertion! This is partly why keeping an eye out for a lifetime warranty on a more expensive grinder can be useful - some companies will offer the chance to re-up your model so you once again have sharp teeth and top-notch grinding performance.
1) Taking the top off your marijuana grinder, the first thing you want to do is tear up the weed into smaller pieces and place them in the grinding chamber between the sharp teeth.
2) Replace the cover; at this point you either twist the top and bottom of the weed grinder in different directions, turn a handle on the top of the grinder, or press the start/power button for an electric grinder to chop your weed into smokable shreds. One reason we love a magnetic lid is because this step becomes a whole lot easier!
3) Grind until the fine ganja pieces fall through the holes between the blades and into the catch chamber below – unless it’s a two-piece pot grinder, in which case you just pluck the weed from between the teeth - and you then just put the fresh ground and fluffed weed into your pipe to smoke.
4) One component that many herb grinders have is a bottom compartment for collecting THC-rich kief that falls off the cannabis buds as they are being ground. It takes a while, days or weeks depending upon the rate of your grinding for cannabis consumption, to accumulate any sizable amount of kief; but when you do, most pot grinders come with a handy little whisk broom to sweep out the powdery kief from the grinder catcher. The kief can then be sprinkled over your pipe weed to increase its potency, or pressed into hash.
5) Sit back, thank the powers-that-be for these beautiful cannabis plants, and smoke some of your weed. You can then store the rest in an airtight container, in a dark, cool place. By the way, if you want to know how to fluff weed (actually refluff the weed that was ground and fluffed previously before you stored it), that is rehydrate dried-out weed for a better, smoother burn when you blaze, here are a couple of things to try: put a damp paper towel, wrapped in aluminum foil that has holes poked into it, in with your nugs – they should fluff or rehydrate in a couple of hours; placing orange peels in with your weed for an hour or two also works! Try not to leave weed in your herb grinder, because it will dry out.
That is about it when it comes to how to grind weed by hand, but if you use your marijuana grinder a lot then after a while it will eventually get gummed up with kief and resin and so you are going to need tips on cleaning weed grinder pieces.
(Wood weed grinders, image from Green Leef Global on Instagram)
Cleaning Your Weed Grinder:
Clean pot grinder teeth move better and are sharper so they grind your grass far better! Also, in two-part twist grinders, the halves slide better against each other when you move them back and forth if they are clean. You want the best performance out of your weed grinder, so keep it clean! And, when properly cared for, looking for a lifetime warranty isn't as big of a deal because it will last longer.
1) Disassemble your weed grinder, remove any leftover weed by scraping the parts with a nail or some sturdy wire.
2) Fill a large, airtight glass container with 91% isopropyl alcohol.
3) Submerge your herb grinder's pieces in the alcohol-filled airtight glass container and seal the lid.
4) Gently shake the glass container to loosen any remaining bits of old weed, set the jar aside and wait ten minutes, letting your weed grinder pieces soak.
5) After you remove your herb grinder from the alcohol-filled airtight glass container, scrub away any remaining resin or material with a cotton swab or washcloth dipped in the same alcohol you soaked the grinder in. For those who have an herb grinder with a kief-collecting metal mesh screen, you can gently scrub the strainer mesh screen clean of leftover pot plant material with a tooth brush or baby bottle brush.
6) Let your weed grinder dry in your dish drainer until completely dry and then reassemble so that it is ready to grind your ganja again!
Pro tip! If you want to keep your grinder tidier you can pick up a pollen scraper.
(Pill bottle homemade grinder, image from Officially Baked Azzz Bro on Instagram)
How to Make a Weed Grinder (or How to Grind Your Weed Without a Grinder):
If you don’t have a weed grinder, you have two options: buy one or make one – we’ll cover the first option next, but let’s look at how to make a weed grinder or how to do without.
1) You can cobble together basically the same design as commercially-available cylindrical herb grinders; your homemade pot grinder can be made from two cutoff plastic cylinders (made from the bottoms of two plastic drink bottles, a plastic lid and container or something similar) that fit inside one another so that you have a grinding chamber. Then perforate each half with nails or woodscrews so that the sharp points poke through into the inner compartment space between the plastic cylinders – these will be the teeth that will shred your pot, so make sure the nails or woodscrews are able to pass by each other when you twist the two pieces to grind the buds. Use a hot glue gun or superglue to affix the nails or woodscrews solidly in place. Viola – a quick, easy and cheap herb grinder! No lifetime warranty needed.
Other ways to grind your weed without a grinder:
2) The old coin in a pill bottle trick is probably the most basic homemade weed grinder. You just take an empty prescription bottle, put in a nug or two of weed and a quarter into the pill bottle, cap it and shake it all about. The careening coin mulches your marijuana as it bounces around inside the bottle. The coin and pill bottle are about as cheap and simply effective a pot grinder as you can make!
3) Use something similar to an herb grinder like a coffee grinder or vegetable shredder to grind up your cannabis nugs. Just put them in the grind chamber, like you would coffee or whatever normally goes inside, cap the thing, flip the switch and let the device hum away, grinding your weed!
4) Scissors and a shot glass also work as cheap herb grinders, just shred your buds with a pair of scissors and use the shot glass or a small jar or something to catch the shreds!
5) Yes, you can just pull apart the cannabis flower with your fingers, but again, some of the cannabinoid-rich kief can stick to your fingers, so not the ideal!
(Weed grinders with turn crank handle, image from New Joy Hemp on Instagram)
Summary:
So, you can’t say we weren’t thorough when it comes to explaining how to grind weed by hand, how to use a 4-piece grinder, how to go about cleaning weed grinder parts, how to make a weed grinder yourself or how to grind weed without a grinder, and where to buy a weed grinder. Whether you go with our top choice of the Santa Cruz Shredder, you prefer electric grinders, or if you choose something else, there's a great grinder out there for you! We hope this buying guide helped you in your decision making process.
Sure, you can go with cheap weed grinders that will certainly get the job done well-enough, or you can spend a bit more money on a 6-piece grinder set or maybe an electric grinder. Perhaps a lifetime warranty is of interest to you. You can get a pink weed grinder, a rainbow hue like the Golden Bell, or a matte black one, you can get an aluminum grinder or overspend on a Phoenician Grinder solid-gold grinder; you can pick up a basic small grinder for under $10 or splurge on an extra-large grinder. Most pot grinders have a mesh screen at the bottom that acts as a pollen catcher for the shredded cannabis, and most of them have mesh screens that sift the cannabinoid-laden trichomes from the plant leaf. You may even find a pollen scraper comes in handy so you get every bit of herb off the surface area of the grinder.
We have given you a list of the best weed grinders in the world to pick out your own cool weed grinder! Not all grinders herb fall into are equal, but there are lots of quality options out there.
Now it is time to go forth, patient reader and seeker of weedformation, into the weed wide world and find yourself the pot grinder that is right for you and your budget (none of us are likely to be buying the $1500 Phoenician Grinder anytime soon); once you have grinder in hand, mulch some marijuana in your grinder, pack your fluffy weed in a weed pipe and smoke down like a boss! We wish you smooth grinding!
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Written by Megan Medeiros (BA)
Megan Medeiros has a bachelor’s degree in English and is currently working on a master’s in English at James Madison University. She's the owner and operator of Medeiros Writing, and has been working as a cannabis writer for the past three years, mostly following the legal climate of marijuana, especially in areas like California, Colorado, Oregon, Canada, and other legal areas.
This post contains references to products from one or more of our advertisers. We may receive compensation when you click on links to those products. For an explanation of our Advertising Policy, visit this page. All photos were sourced from Pinterest.com | updated 2021
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