10 Best Digital Caliper in 2020

Digital calipers are a somewhat useful tool for taking measurements, and it’s much harder to make mistakes when they’re being calculated for you digitally. Rather than having to measure something yourself and try to work out unit conversions in your head, the right set of these calipers will be able to tell you precisely what you need at a glance.

However, like every tool, it’s essential to know that you’re getting what you need – whether you’re using it around the home or for work, you need to make sure that you have the right equipment for the job, especially when other people’s safety and wellbeing could be on the line. Below are ten of these digital caliper models, along with some reasons they might be an excellent addition to your toolbox.

Related: Best Tape Measures.

Digital Caliper Buyer’s Guide

Like all tools designed to measure different values, you can’t rely on any random set of digital calipers to be precisely as reliable and accurate as you’re expecting them to be. There’s always a chance that the calibrations can be off, or that they don’t convert between measurement types correctly, and fixing these problems yourself can waste valuable time that could be spent on much more important tasks.

However, if you’re buying a pair (whether for yourself or for work purposes), it’s good to know which features and elements you should focus on first. Simply purchasing the first pair you see will often leave you with a poor-quality product, or even one that’s outright unsuited to the job you need it for.

Calibration

While you can’t usually tell how well-calibrated a set of calipers will be, you can still look at the distributor’s website to see if they talk about the calibration process. Ideally, you’ll want a pair that are already calibrated, especially if you’re entirely new to using digital calipers and/or need them to be ready to use straight out of the box.

Bad calibration will also throw off your measurements, and can even lead to serious mistakes further down the line if you don’t realize that they’re wrong. This is especially important for jobs where there are small but vital components involved since you might not be able to judge whether your measurements are correct through sight alone. You can’t correct them until you know they’re wrong, so it’s best to avoid poor calibration altogether if you’re able to.

While it’s a much rarer situation, knowing that a company claims to have calibrated their calipers can also give you some legal grounds if something goes wrong. If a poorly-set-up caliper leads to something important getting destroyed, especially in the workplace, you won’t be responsible for the mistake.

Measurement Accuracy

Alongside calibration, there’s also the accuracy of the measurements it takes. Not all calipers will display them to the same decimal point, and there can be a big difference between 0.1 mm and 0.01 mm when you’re dealing with small objects. While this might not be too important for DIY work, it can make a massive difference in industrial work and construction, especially when a situation calls for measurements that are too specific for you to measure properly.

Some calipers won’t provide certain measurement types, either. While it’s rare to find one that’s lacking either metric or imperial in some way, they won’t always convert between types well and might be missing alternative measuring systems (like fractions) that could be vital to certain plans or instruction manuals. Even if you can convert between unit types yourself, it still wastes time and takes a lot more effort to achieve the same result.

This can also apply to the Zero setting if that particular caliper has them – while they make it much easier to compared different measurements, they still use the same calibrations as the regular measurement style, and making sure that they’re correct can be just as important as the standard measurements.

Measurement Types

While being able to measure the distance between two points is important, there’s not only one way to do this – ideally, you’ll want calipers that can measure both the inside and outside of a chosen section. Some will also have a step measurement feature, and there are specific designs that use a pull-out depth-measuring stick for judging how deep a hole or dent is in a surface.

Not all of these are necessary, especially if you’re only planning on using your calipers for a very specific purpose, but they can make a big difference if you’re into DIY or need them for a professional job. Being able to measure in more ways opens up more opportunities to check for mistakes, improving the quality of whatever you’re building without forcing you to buy entirely new tools.

A zero setting can also make a difference since it allows you to compare two measurements without needing to record them separately. While it’s not particularly challenging to do this, it still saves plenty of time and can help you avoid measurement mistakes by showing you the comparison directly.

Durability

As with all tools, water, rust, and other types of damage can lead to calipers becoming unreliable and harder to use, especially if important components become damaged. Water can be a big problem for metal tools, as can other liquids like oil or cleaning chemicals, and there’s rarely any downside to choosing a set of calipers that can resist common types of damage.

This is especially important if you’re using them for tasks where damage is quite likely, such as repairing cars, pipes, large machines or anything else that cause damage to both you and your tools if handled incorrectly. While it’s definitely better to break your tool rather than part of your body, it still leaves you stuck without an important piece of equipment.

There’s also the issue of having to replace it – a cheaper caliper without extra protective features might break more often, and the cost of constantly buying a new one will quickly add up, whereas a slightly more expensive set might last much longer while costing less overall.

Expert Tip

Calipers with zero settings might sometimes expect you to reset it using the same button – move the jaws back into the zero position and hit the button again to bring the measurements back to normal.

Did you know?

Some digital caliper models with power-saving modes will only activate them when the jaws are reset – this can either be when they’re closed or when they’re fully open, so check with the manufacturer’s instructions to avoid wasting power.