What Jointers and Planers Do, and Why You Need Both

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Woodworker using a floor-standing jointer in a shop, with a stationary planer in view.

 

When you start getting serious about working wood, you need to make a planer and jointer part of your workflow. Getting serious about woodworking requires making precise joinery, and to have precise joinery, you need square workpieces. Woodworking jointers and planers help you get to square more efficiently than workarounds such as jointing on the table saw or with a router, for instance. Of course you can always joint unplugged. These techniques work, and can get you started, but they require jigs and extra setup.

What is the difference between a jointer and a planer, and why do you need both?

Jointers and planers for woodworking streamline the process and make repeatable accuracy far easier. Jointer vs planer: These are two different tools that perform two different jobs. To understand how they work, it helps to know the anatomy of a board.

The end of a board is the part that shows its end grain, which is what you’d see at the end of a log or tree stump with growth rings. The face is typically the wider part of the board. And the edge is usually the thinner side. Planers and jointers for woodworking are designed to true these surfaces, but they do it in very different ways.

An illustration of a light-colored board showing grain direction.
A man using a floor-standing woodworking jointer to flatten the edge of a long light-colored board in a wood shop.

What Are Jointers for Woodworking?

A woodworking jointer is a machine designed to flatten one face of your board and then make one edge perfectly perpendicular to the flat face. This provides reliable reference surfaces for further dressing your stock.

: A drawing of a board over a jointer’s infeed and outfeed tables, showing cutterhead and feed direction.

Perpendicular face and edge

Jointers use a cylindrical rotating cutterhead set between two tables to flatten one face of a board. That face is then referenced against the jointer’s fence to make one edge perfectly perpendicular to the face. But what is a woodworking jointer used for?

  • Flattening a warped (twisted, cupped, or bowed) board face
  • Straightening and squaring an edge
  • Creating a true 90° relationship between face and edge

The key is reference. Once you have one flat face and one square edge, everything else in your milling process builds from those surfaces.

Types of warp

An illustration showing the various types of how a board can warp: bow, cup, crook, twist.

What Are Planers for Woodworking?

Most woodworkers become familiar with planers first, particularly as tools that make boards a consistent thickness. Machines like Oliver planers and other contenders among the best planers are built to bring boards to consistent thickness quickly and accurately. While that is true, it’s not the whole story, especially when squaring up stock. 

During planing, the machine cuts the upper surface so it is precisely parallel to the bottom reference face. Rollers in the tool’s top grab your board and feed it through while a cylindrical head cuts into the upper face of the board. The board’s bottom moves along a flat bed enclosed in the tool. The key thing to understand is that in the process, the planer trims the upper face to make it parallel to the bottom reference face.

An illustration showing how a planer pulls in a board and cut’s its upper surface.

Parallel faces and consistent thickness

Unlike a woodworking jointer, a planer doesn’t create flatness from scratch; it copies what’s already there. When you place the previously jointed face down, the planer cuts the opposite face parallel to it.

That’s why planers for woodworking are ideal for:

  • Bringing stock to uniform thickness
  • Creating parallel faces
  • Cleaning up rough lumber
These machines are relatively simple to use, but it helps to understand basic planer setup and maintenance.

 

Benchtop planer and jointer on a mobile cart in a woodworking shop.

Why Do You Need a Planer and Jointer?

This is where the jointer vs planer conversation gets practical. These tools are not interchangeable; they’re complementary.

What a jointer does

A jointer for woodworking will flatten a face, but if you flip the board and joint the other side, you’ll likely end up with two flat faces that aren’t parallel. This means your board will vary in thickness across its width and length. It also creates a perpendicular edge from the flattened reference face.

What a planer does

Planers for woodworking create parallel faces only from a flat reference face from the jointer. Every effective workflow for dressing stock relies on both machines working in tandem.

How Do You Use a Planer and Jointer Together?

Using a planer is straight forward but knowing how to use a jointer takes a little finesse. Together, it’s a matter of using them in the right sequence for squaring up rough lumber.

Dressing lumber

Here’s a quick rundown:

  1. Joint one face: Flatten the board’s face on the jointer. This becomes your reference surface.
  2. Joint one edge: With the freshly flattened face against the jointer’s fence, square one edge.
  3. Plane to thickness: Run the board through the planer with the jointed face down. This makes the second face perfectly parallel to the first. If the board’s grain is squirrely, you might skip to the planer after jointing the face. This way, when you jump back to the jointer to joint the edge, you can run the board in whichever direction reduces edge tearout. It’s an extra step, but it could make for a smoother process and save material.
  4. Rip to width: At this point you will have parallel faces with one perpendicular edge. Run the jointed edge against your table saw fence to cut the piece to width and in the process get two parallel edges.
  5. Crosscut to length: Finally, saw off one end with a square edge against the miter gauge. Then reference the newly square end against a stop on the miter gauge to cut the piece to final length. This makes the board perfectly square and dead flat.

It’s smart to allow rough lumber time to acclimate to your shop. The process of dressing rough lumber exposes fresh wood, releasing stresses. So, after all the work of making everything flat and square, the boards may warp again after a couple of days. The fix is to dress your stock slightly oversized and allow those pieces to acclimate. Do this by stickering the pieces, which means stacking them on thin strips of scrap stock, allowing air circulation around all sides of each piece. After a few days, finish dressing the stock.

A woodworker using a benchtop planer to flatten a long board in a wood shop.

Which One Should You Get First: Jointer vs Planer?

If you’re building your shop piece by piece, this is a fair question. The short answer: start with a planer, but don’t stop there. When considering jointer vs planer, you need to understand the tradeoffs.

Consider starting with a planer

Having control of your lumber thickness is a gamechanger. Plus, with a simple sled and some shims, you can get parallel faces without a woodworking jointer. Add in a simple table saw sled or a track saw and you can joint your edges. Even a handheld router and a shop-made fence will work.

But don’t think you can get by without a jointer permanently, especially if you’re building projects at volume or making professionally. The time savings and perfectly square boards every time will justify the cost.

Don’t forget dust collection

Jointers and planers for woodworking produce a surprising volume of chips. With proper shop dust collection, your tools run more efficiently and your shop stays cleaner.

An Oliver planer with its infeed and outfeed tables down.

What Are the Best Planer and Jointer to Buy?

As with any serious buying decision, consider your budget and the kind of work you do. Then pick your tool before moving onto planer and jointer accessories.

Benchtop jointers: pros and cons

Benchtop jointers for woodworking are accessible and compact: 

  • Some models offer 8" capacity in width, which is the widest board you can face-joint, at an affordable price. These are also a good option if your shop space is tight. 
  • What you sacrifice here is length. The accuracy of how perfectly flat your boards can be falls off the longer the board. And benchtop models have a harder time with thicker, denser material. 

If you make smaller projects and won’t typically need anything wider than 6" and longer than about 32", then a good quality benchtop model might serve you well, especially if you need more floor space.

Stationary jointers: pros and cons

Floor-standing jointers step things up:

  • Stationary machines get you more power for denser woods, more consistent flatness for longer boards, and more width. 
  • Keep in mind that these machines take up space. 

If you’re building larger projects regularly, the upgrade pays off.

Benchtop planers: pros and cons

“Lunchbox” planers for woodworking are popular for a reason:

  • These power planers are reliable and a great place to start. With strong performance for their size, they typically accommodate about 12" in width, which is sufficient for most woodworkers. Plus, they’re affordable and portable. 
  • On the other hand, the total thickness and how thin you can cut smoothly is limited on benchtop planers. They may also be underpowered for thicker, denser woods. 

A dedicated planer cart will improve portability.

Stationary planers: pros and cons 

Larger planers offer more capacity and power:

  • Floor-standing models provide more options for thinner stock, wider capacity, and more power for taking off more material in fewer cuts. 
  • But bigger planers have a bigger footprint.

Planer and jointer combo machines

Combo machines combine both functions in one footprint:

  • These come in benchtop models and stationary machines as well, and they work great. Again, the floor models are a step-up in power and capacity. But they do require “transforming” them. Once you’ve jointed your faces and edges, you’ll usually need to reconfigure the machine by removing or adding parts to turn it into the planer. This isn’t a problem, just an extra step or two that you’ll need to consider in your workflow. If you’re tight on shop space, then a combo machine might be right for you.
A woodworker uses a Jet jointer planer combo machine in a wood shop.

What Else Do You Need to Know?

You can also find portable hand planers, but these power tools are more often used in construction and carpentry. Once you get comfortable with woodworking jointers and planers, you’ll find they can do more than basic milling.

  • Jointers do more. By adjusting the fence or employing jigs, you can use your jointer to make tapers, cut wedges, and more. But make sure you tune your jointer for peak performance first. 
  • The same goes for planers. Using sleds and shims, you can plane tapers in boards, both across width and length. 

These tools might not have the flash of a new saw or router, but they sit at the core of precise woodworking. When you understand how to use a planer and jointer together, you can start building with confidence.

 

 

 

CHAD McCLUNG

Chad is a woodworker with nearly 20 years of experience in woodworking and home improvement, covering these topics as a how-to writer, editor, and photographer. He is the former editor-in-chief of Woodcraft Magazine. When not in the shop, Chad is probably adding to a Blu-ray collection that rivals his tool collection.

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