FYI. Ryobi has nothing to do with Home Depot. It's owned by a Hong Kong power tool manufacturer, and used to be Japanese (in fact, Ryobi still exists as a tool manufacturer, just not the power tool division)

Probably the reason they're not in any of the hauls is because they have a reputation for not being very good, and are harder to sell/fence...

Almost nobody think Ryobi is the best, and almost everybody agrees they’re plenty good for a non-professional toolkit.

If you are a diyer that needs it for maybe 1-2 jobs a year, ryobi is usually not a bad choice.

Personally, I stick with DeWalt because I like quality even though I fall under the “diyer” category. This impact driver has survived 5-6 moves, at least a handful of projects across a few years, and it’s still working as if I just picked it up from the store. Haven’t had to do any maintenance or repairs.

One of the cheaper harbor freight or off brand power tools I picked up many years ago lasted at most 1-2 yrs with only a few projects. Which is the reason I started investing in higher quality (prefer dewalt, but will buy Milwaukee).

What is the brand with the best reputation these days?

If you want gold-plated, there's Hilti, but you're paying a lot extra for a marginal increase in reliability. Milwaukee, Bosch, Makita, and DeWalt are all in the same range, ie contractor/prosumer (and all mostly are manufactured in China). Ryobi is slightly lower but generally fine, ie consumer / price sensitive. Below that is Harbor Freight / no-name electric drill you'd find in am Amazon Basics "essential tools" kit.

festool is up from hilti, maybe

WOW I've never heard of festool and hilti but simple googling has turned up amazing stores of their customer service. Unfortunately it looks like they don't overlap completely in the types of tools Ryobi offers.

I really like Ryobi's 18V and 40V 'ecosystem'. Every time I am browsing Home Depot or their website, I come across new items that are compatible with these two ecosystems.

Just recently I saw everything from 18V Ryobi Glue Gun to a Portable Power washer that can suck water from a bucket (eliminating the need for a hose) to even a portable soldering iron! Hell they even got a boombox ha ha!

For the 40V I saw cool things such as a portable power generator, lawn mowers, wet dry vac and even a portable refrigerator.

Its really cool that there are like a bazillion things that your existing batteries can plug into.

It’s probably Ryobi’s No 1 advantage, particularly as a lot of stores seem to stock a lot of the range (at least here in Europe).

Makita also has a large range but I usually have to order the less popular stuff but when I get it, it’s usually worth it.

And Mafell can be better than festool. Though different manufacturers tend to have different advantages.

Hilti makes some very large tools that if needed Festool does not have alternative. I have also seen a comparably priced Hilti drill/driver give up where a Makita kept going.

Seconded, though I've found the HF Hercules wired line pretty comparable to Dewalt.

But there's a fair amount of inter-model variety within those four/five brands. My 12v Dewalt impact punches above its weight/price and I have two Bosch 18v drills, similar in form factor but one is frankly inferior quality.

Tools are weird like text editors where people get religious about some brands over others. But if your hustle is fencing the most reputable and easy-to-move tools, you would probably want to acquire the standard ones you see in Home Depot and Lowe's, such as Dewalt, Milwaukee, Craftsman, etc. Reputation-wise they're all about the same. Personally I like Makita.

> Tools are weird like text editors where people get religious about some brands over others.

That’s because time is money.

Milwaukee seems to have a strong reputation. in Europe, mafell too.

If money is no object for most non-specialized tools the best brand is unequivocally Festool

I would say Festool is a brilliant system, but different manufacturers can make better tools for certain jobs. Mafell’s jigsaw is excellent, Metabo for grinders etc, Hilti SDS plus and Max.

Festool domino system I hear is probably the best, but that is rather specialized.

Pick the color you like best of the reputable manufactures.

I spent hours researching the various pro-sumer level brands when upgrading my tool collection this winter. And settled on Milwaukee. Because red. Ok fine, their track saw played a part. But mostly red.