I've trashed a couple of pairs of nice wire cutters by using them on guitar strings; you really need a pair of hard wire cutters rated to cut 2mm piano wire. StewMac sell a perfectly satisfactory pair for $12, but I'd suggest a pair from Knipex or Xuron if you do a lot of string changes.

https://www.stewmac.com/Luthier_Tools/Types_of_Tools/Pliers_...

https://www.knipex.com/nc/en/products/?page=group_detail&par...

https://xuron.com/index.php/main/industrial_products/11/18

Yep, came here to say the same thing. "Hard wire cutter" is a tool you need to own apart from "wire cutter."

If you ever try to cut a spring, you will get the same issue.

Yes. Here's a photo of my Lindstrom cutters (good, but for copper) and they show the diameter wire they're rated for. And these were not $10 snips.

http://imgur.com/a/Zk3LBCE

$10 is not inexpensive for wire snips though. Which is my complaint.

I worked in electronic sub-contract manufacturing for over ten years. We built products for coal mining, and test equipment for aerospace, and products for a variety of domestic and commercial uses. All of this involved use of a wide range of hand tools.

A few people have told you that wire cutters come in two forms: hardened and not hardened, and that if you wish to cut steel you should buy cutters that are rated for steel. The price does not tell you this information. The data sheet for the tool does.

Here's a pair of snips that cost over £50. I'd be displeased if you borrowed mine and used them to cut guitar wire. https://uk.rs-online.com/web/p/cable-cutters/0614766/

One thing you can't see in the images is that these cutters tell you what wire you can cut on them: https://imgur.com/a/Zk3LBCE

If you want to cut steel you need snips that specifically say they can cut steel. These don't have to be expensive: Here are some for £7. https://uk.rs-online.com/web/p/cable-cutters/0732820/

$10 is nothing compared to the cost of high end, quality hand tools that will last. In the case of a expecting to cut hardened wire, the cutter needs to be of a good alloy and hardened adequately to hold an edge. $10 doesn’t buy anything from the knipex catalog, for instance.

Guitar wire should be perfectly fine to cut with $10 snips. The $5 Stanley brand snips that I got to replace my terrible ones work like a charm.

I recognize I don't have the heaviest duty cut-through-anything shears that I could have with more money, but where I'm mainly doing light jobs like speaker wire and guitar strings it's not a problem... unless the snips themselves are terrible.

I don't expect to have to replace the Stanley set unless they become rusty from disuse.