Hard maple and black walnut sit at opposite ends of the colour range and are often used together: the pale and dark stripes of an end-grain cutting board, or a walnut table with maple inlay. On their own they suit different jobs. This page compares hard (sugar) maple with black walnut using Wood Handbook data.
Maple vs Walnut: the numbers
| Property | Sugar maple | Black walnut |
|---|---|---|
| Janka side hardness, 12% MC | 1,450 lbf | 1,010 lbf |
| Density at 12% MC | 44.1 lb/ft³ | 38.5 lb/ft³ |
| Weight per board foot | 3.67 lb | 3.20 lb |
| Bending strength (MOR), 12% MC | 15,800 psi | 14,600 psi |
| Stiffness (MOE), 12% MC | 1.83 million psi | 1.68 million psi |
| Crushing strength parallel to grain | 7,830 psi | 7,580 psi |
| Shrinkage green to ovendry, tangential | 9.9% | 7.8% |
| Shrinkage, radial | 4.8% | 5.5% |
| Shrinkage, volumetric | 14.7% | 12.8% |
| Tangential / radial ratio (cupping tendency) | 2.06 | 1.42 |
| Width change per 1% MC, flatsawn (Table 13-5) | 0.353% | 0.274% |
| Heartwood decay resistance (Table 14-1) | slightly or nonresistant | resistant |
What the numbers mean
- Hardness: Sugar maple is 44% harder than Black walnut (1,450 against 1,010 lbf), so it resists dents from furniture feet, dropped tools and wear correspondingly better.
- Weight: Sugar maple is 15% heavier. A 1 x 6 board 8 feet long (4 board feet nominal) weighs about 14.7 lb in sugar maple and 12.8 lb in black walnut at 12% moisture content.
- Strength and stiffness: Sugar maple is 8% stronger in bending and 9% stiffer. Stiffness is what decides how much a shelf of the same size sags under the same load.
- Movement: a flatsawn board 10 in wide that goes from 6% to 12% moisture content (a dry winter to a humid summer indoors) swells about 0.212 in (7/32 in) in sugar maple and 0.164 in (5/32 in) in black walnut, from Handbook Eq. 13-2 and the Table 13-5 coefficients. Allow for this in table tops, panels and floors.
- Decay resistance of the heartwood: Sugar maple: slightly or nonresistant; Black walnut: resistant. Sapwood of every species has low decay resistance.
Appearance, working and what to watch for
Hard maple is pale cream, fine and even in texture, and very hard. It is tough on tools, burns under slow cuts and is hard to stain evenly, but it wears superbly and keeps a crisp edge. Black walnut is dark brown, softer and easier on tools, sands and carves cleanly and finishes with very little effort. Hard maple has considerably more tangential shrinkage than walnut, so wide maple panels move and cup more with the seasons.
For cutting boards both are good: closed-pored, food-safe once finished with oil, and kind to knife edges compared with glass or stone. Maple is harder and shows knife marks less; walnut is a little softer and is often said to be gentler on blades. Mixing them in one board is common, but because their movement differs, keep strips narrow and use end-grain or edge-grain construction rather than wide face-glued boards.
Building a maple and walnut cutting board
Mill both woods to the same thickness on the same day, and let them sit together in the shop for a few days first so their moisture content matches. Use a water-resistant PVA glue and plenty of clamps; the dense maple needs firm pressure for a thin glue line. In an end-grain board, keep strips no wider than about 2 in so the different movement of the two woods stays small. Finish with food-safe mineral oil or an oil and wax blend, and re-oil whenever the surface looks dry. Sand each wood with fresh paper and vacuum between grits so dark walnut dust does not smear into the pale maple.
Which to choose: verdict by use
| Use | Better choice | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Cutting boards and butcher block | Either (maple for hardest wear) | Both close-grained; maple is about 1.4 times as hard. |
| Dark, high-end furniture | Black walnut | Colour without stain and an easy, attractive finish. |
| Workbench tops, floors, sports surfaces | Hard maple | Hard, stiff and wear resistant. |
| Wide solid panels and table tops | Black walnut | Moves less across the grain. |
| Carving and hand-tool work | Black walnut | Softer and cuts cleanly; maple is hard work by hand. |
| Light, Scandinavian-style pieces | Hard maple | Pale and uniform. |
Frequently asked questions
Is maple or walnut better for a cutting board?
Both are good choices. Hard maple (1,450 lbf Janka) is harder and shows fewer marks; black walnut (1,010 lbf) is softer and darker. Avoid open-pored woods such as red oak for food boards.
Which is harder, maple or walnut?
Hard maple. The Wood Handbook gives sugar maple 1,450 lbf and black walnut 1,010 lbf of Janka side hardness at 12% moisture content.
Do maple and walnut move the same amount?
No. Flatsawn hard maple shrinks 9.9% tangentially from green to ovendry, walnut 7.8%. Glue them only in narrow strips, or in end-grain boards.
Sources and method
All property values are read from our parsed copy of the USDA Forest Products Laboratory Wood Handbook: Wood as an Engineering Material (FPL-GTR-190, 2010), a US Government publication in the public domain, the same data as the wood species database. The percentages and the board examples above are our arithmetic on those values. The values describe small, clear, straight-grained specimens: real boards with knots or sloping grain differ, and structural lumber is sized from graded design values in your local building code, not from this table.
- USDA Forest Products Laboratory. Wood Handbook: Wood as an Engineering Material. General Technical Report FPL-GTR-190, 2010. Chapter 2 (species descriptions), Chapter 4 (Tables 4-3, 4-4 shrinkage; Eq. 4-7, 4-9, 4-12 density), Chapter 5 (Tables 5-3b, 5-5b strength and hardness), Chapter 13 (Table 13-5 dimensional change coefficients), Chapter 14 (Table 14-1 decay resistance)
- USDA Forest Products Laboratory. Wood Handbook, 2021 edition (FPL-GTR-282)
Last reviewed: 24 October 2026. How we build and check our data: methodology and corrections. Spotted an error? Please let us know.