The Best Fishing Lines of 2025

Our Picks of Fishing Line

Best Fishing Line for Most People

SpiderWire Stealth Braid

Tested Line Weight: 10 lb | Color: Moss Green

With its reasonable price point, the SpiderWire Stealth Braid is our favorite braided fishing line because it's extra thin and super flexible, making it easy to cast. It also has very low stretch, which makes it sensitive and great for feeling light nibbles. When it's time to set the hook, its lack of stretch creates a near-instant taught connection to a fighting fish. “I really like this line because it's much thinner than monofilament of the same pound test, which helps it cast like a dream,” tester Chris Maxcer said. The diameter of 10-lb test Stealth Braid, for instance, is roughly equivalent to many 4-lb monofilament lines.

Test Weight	10 lb
Best Use	Lake, river, boat, ocean
Type	Braided
Materials	Dyneema PE Microfiber

The biggest downside of SpiderWire Stealth Braid, and braided lines in general, is that their slick material can let the line literally slip through its own knot, requiring users to avoid common Clinch Knots, which most beginners use. “If you're willing to learn the simple Palomar Knot, which SpiderWire diagrams on the back of its box, you'll gain awesome knot strength with braided lines,” Chris notes. “For braid, it's my go-to knot, hands down.” The so-called “Stealth” feature requires that you match the color to the type of water you'll fish, but that's only an issue for line-shy fish. If you're after very smart, pressured fish in clear water, a better, stealthier option is to consider a good low-vis fluorocarbon line like Berkley Vanish Fluorocarbon that is truly difficult to spot underwater.

Best Bang for Your Buck

Berkley Trilene XL Monofilament

Test Line Weight: 6 lb | Color: Clear Blue Fluorescent

If you want the most affordable combination of versatility, strength, and casting performance, look no further than the time-tested Berkley Trilene XL. It's our favorite everyday monofilament fishing line. You might not get the absolute best performance compared to more expensive lines in specific situations, but you'll never go too far wrong with it either. We can't count the number of fish we've caught with Trilene XL over the years, it's that good. Testing showed that it had reasonably low memory for a monofilament line, which helped it resist spool coils for better casting. It ran smoothly through the guides on multiple rods and helped us place the bait right where we wanted it. “This is a really versatile line. I found that it also worked great in both freshwater and saltwater,” said tester Kit Smith.

Test Weight	6 lb
Best Use	Lake, river, boat, ocean
Type	Monofilament
Materials	Nylon

One of our primary concerns with the Trilene XL is its limited abrasion resistance. Though better than some of the other mono lines we tested, breaking the line was still reasonably easy if an underwater fish drug it around some rocks. As such, we lost a few lures while fishing this line, so we recommend you feel the last several feet of this line every now and then to detect abrasion before it breaks. If you want better abrasion resistance, consider the Berkley Trilene Big Game, which is a bit stiffer than Trilene XL, as is the Berkley Vanish Fluorocarbon — just know that both of these lines also have a bit more memory to contend with.

Best Buy Fluorocarbon for Sneaking Up on Fish

Berkley Vanish Fluorocarbon

Test Line Weight: 8 lb | Color: Clear

Landing a trophy fish is difficult if you've spooked them all into hiding. That's precisely where the Berkley Vanish excels. When in the water, it was seemingly invisible, solidly living up to its name in our tests. Another nice feature is its impressive sensitivity and low stretch. “This line allowed me to detect even the smallest bites and set the hook when a fish took the bait,” one tester noted. Fluorocarbon is also typically a bit thicker than monofilament, which gives it improved abrasion resistance.

Test Weight	8 lb
Best Use	Lake, river, boat
Type	Fluorocarbon
Materials	Fluorocarbon

The biggest drawback to the Berkley Vanish is that it gained spool memory when left on our tester's spinning reel for just two weeks. “I found that for best results, I needed to connect my lure to a bush or log and then walk back along shore so I could stretch the memory coils out of this line before attempting any far casts,” Chris said. “This is a great tip for dealing with memory in the field, and you'll likely need it if you don't fish with this line every weekend.” If you're willing to spend more than twice as much on the premium Seaguar Tatsu 100% Fluorocarbon, it was just as hard to see underwater, but it had far less memory and cast farther. Still, if you're willing to stretch it every now and then, the Vanish is a great value.

Best for Larger Fish

Berkley Trilene Big Game

Test Line Weight: 10 lb | Color: Clear

If you need a no-frills fishing line that gets the job done in nearly any environment, the Berkley Trilene Big Game is the one for you. It's wonderfully durable, resisting abrasion well. “I got a lure stuck in some rocks, and the line was nearly impossible to break, even after scraping over the rocks many times,” noted Kit. This line was also great for different fishing styles, whether casting with a lure or simply dropping a hook with a worm on it. It was also one of the best when it came to knot strength. Once we tied a knot, we were confident it would hold.

Test Weight	10 lb
Best Use	Lake, river, boat, ocean
Type	Monofilament
Materials	Nylon

Despite the many advantages of Berkley Trilene Big Game, there are some disadvantages to consider. Of all the lines we tested, this one had the most stretch. This diminished its feel quite a bit, so we missed more than a few bites, and trying to set the hook was an issue several times. It also has a fair bit of memory, so you can expect to have some issues if you leave this on the reel for an extended period. For a line with less memory, we recommend looking at the SpiderWire Stealth or KastKing Superpower. Shortcomings aside, this line is great for a range of styles and techniques, and it can handle the rigors of everyday fishing. Plus, the stretch can be helpful to absorb shock when fighting a large fish with strong head shakes and fast runs.

How We Tested

Testing took place in streams and lakes around Mammoth Lakes, California, Jackson Hole, Wyoming, the coast of Southern California, and mountain lakes and rivers in Idaho. We fished from shorelines, boat decks, and kayaks to get a good mix of testing environments. We wrangled several fishing buddies to head out on the water with us to give feedback on each product, and in the process, dozens of fish were hooked, landed, and released. This helped us gain real-world experience with each line, and we gained insight through intentional in-the-field testing on the sensitivity, as well as the versatility and memory after each line was stored on reels for more than two weeks. Once we understood the advantages, we compared them in side-by-side real-world use to tease out the differences.

Why Trust GearLab

Our gear tester and reviewer, Kit Smith, is a life-long angler. He's fished streams, lakes, oceans, and bays for over three decades. Kit's initial fishing experiences include catching halibut and salmon in the San Francisco Bay and alpine stream and lake fishing in the Central Sierra. Later, he moved to Colorado to attend college, where he continued to perfect his angling craft. Kit spends a lot of his free time fishing and reading about fishing gear to stay up to date on the latest products and trends in the world of angling.

He's joined by Chris Maxcer, another life-long angler and outdoor gear tester who loves to fish for high-mountain trout, whether he needs to hike in to a lake or float through some whitewater on a raft to find the fish. He's cast well beyond his home waters, having landed coho salmon in Alaska and Idaho, brown trout in Nevada, cutthroat trout in Colorado, and smallmouth bass in Washington.

Analysis and Test Results

During field testing, we assessed five metrics for each fishing line: Strength, Memory, Casting, Versatility, and Knots. Below, we'll discuss the importance of each, as well as which lines stood out among the competition.

What's the Best Value?

We don't take price into consideration during our product testing, but we certainly consider it after all is said and done. We loved the Berkley products for their great price-to-performance ratio, particularly the Berkley Trilene XL, which offers strength, sensitivity, and versatility for a low price.

Strength

A line's raw strength is a crucial component to consider and can mean the difference between reeling in a trophy fish and coming up empty. If it's not strong enough, a line always seems to break when it matters most. Because all fishing line is rated at a pound-test breaking strength, for the most part, any good 10-lb test line can hold as much weight as another 10-lb test line. Where it gets tricky is when we add other important factors, such as the thickness of the line and its abrasion resistance. When evaluating a line's strength, we also consider its abrasion resistance and diameter.

The Berkley X9 Braid is one of the strongest lines we tested, blending very good abrasion resistance with a remarkably thin line. At just 0.12mm thick in 10-lb test, it's far thinner than SpiderWire Stealth, which was 0.20mm in 10-lb test. Frankly, if the X9 didn't cost so much, it would be the line we'd recommend for most people — well worth the money if you can afford it.

In general, fluorocarbon lines are a bit thicker than many comparable monofilament lines, offering increased abrasion resistance. The Berkley Vanish Fluorocarbon fended off scratchy rocks remarkably well and occasionally outperformed its 8-lb rating in our strength break tests on our lab bench. The Seaguar Tatsu 100% Fluorocarbon also excelled here, as did the Berkley Trilene Big Game when compared to other monofilament lines.

Casting

When you're trying to drop your bait in a specific spot or get a lure to where a fish just jumped, casting distance and control are critical. There were some standouts based on this metric. Casting performance is affected by line diameter and material, with some types of fishing lines being naturally slicker, allowing them to pass through the guides on a fishing rod more easily. In addition, memory is a key factor — and it's so important we cover it specifically in its own category below.

The true king of casting in our tests was the Berkley X9 Braid. While many braided lines have eight strands of a polyethylene material, Berkley uses nine thin strands — hence the name. Better yet, the X9 braid is remarkably thinner than most braids we've used, giving it an edge for casting lures farther. Let's put it this way: If we were in a casting test and needed to pick a line to cast right this minute, we'd choose the Berkley X9 Braid, hands down. It's that good. However, we have to give props to other braids — they all scored very well. Even though the SpiderWire Stealth is thicker, its special coating makes it quite slick, and it casts far with ease.

For clear lines, the Berkley Trilene XL monofilament lived up to the “Smooth Casting” claim on its package, making it easy for us to sling lures across rivers and gently flip bobbers into ponds. It's one of the best casting monofilaments we've used.

Memory

This might be one of the most overlooked aspects of fishing line. Memory is a line's tendency to take on the spool's shape, resulting in coils when you cast. The more it takes on this shape, the more memory it's said to have—and a lot of memory is not something you want your line to exhibit because it can lead to tangles and make it harder for the line to move through a fishing rod's guides.

For the most part, braided lines win every memory contest because they all tend to have very little memory, if any: Good braided lines are supple. The Berkley X9 has so little memory and is so limp that it was sometimes annoying to feed through the eyes of hooks. If you're not ready for braid, though, the classic monofilament Berkley Trilene XL is a remarkable outlier. While mono line is not typically known for having low memory, this one was impressive and showed only a little memory, even after being on the spool for several weeks.

The KastKing FluoroKote fits the low memory bill, too. It never spiraled off the reel and made for a smooth cast every time. Conversely, the Berkley Trilene Big Game had a little too much memory, which decreased its casting distance a bit.

Versatility

Having a line that can handle whatever fish you hook is certainly a desirable trait in a fishing line, but not all lines are created equal. Some lines are better suited for lakes, some for oceans, some for very large fish, and some require more skill to tie effective knots.

The Berkley Trilene Big Game is one of the most versatile fishing lines we've tested. With its equally impressive performance in both fresh and saltwater, as well as its versatility for various fishing styles and species, it's hard to go far wrong with it. Plus, you can choose it in a wide variety of sizes, all the way up to 130-lb test.

Surprisingly, braided lines, including the excellent SpiderWire Stealth Braid, don't score as well for versatility because they're more visible to line-shy fish and require specific knots that won't come loose, making them harder to use for beginners.

Knots

With as many knots as you'll tie on a fishing trip, we think this is an important metric to include when assessing lines. When we evaluate a line's ability to hold a knot, we consider its knot strength in addition to the difficulty required to tie a good, strong knot. Most knots create weak spots in a fishing line, resulting in breaks that occur anywhere from 60-90% of a line's rated test. For example, a knot tied to a lure in a 10-lb fishing line might result in a 20% drop in rated strength, giving you about 8 pounds of pulling power.

But knots are even more complicated. Some knots perform better on some types of fishing line and even do better (or worse) on different pound tests of the same line. At the same time, a perfectly tied knot will always hold better than a poorly tied knot. And some lines — we're looking at you, braid — are so slick that they require special knots or they'll come untied after just a bit of pressure. With all that in mind, here's how each line scored in our knot evaluations:

If you use a common Clinch Knot with most any braided line, your knots will frequently fail; however, if you learn to tie the relatively simple Palomar Knot with braided line, your knots will be very strong. In fact, the best knot strength results during our bench tests came from the Berkley X9 Braid using a Palomar Knot. In one knot strength trial, our 10-lb test managed to maintain its knot — and its line integrity — up to a mind-blowing 14 lbs 10 oz! However, most other trials broke much closer to the 10-lb rating. Remember: Like a chain, a fishing line is only as strong as its weakest section, which is why we tend to recommend high-quality lines made by manufacturers who've been in the business for decades.

Interestingly, we scored the Berkley Trilene XL Monofilament slightly higher than the more premium fluorocarbon lines because the Trilene XL has a bit of stretch in it that makes it easier for beginners to tie knots that are less likely to break, even though they might not tie them perfectly. In addition, even though we could sometimes tie knots with fluorocarbon that were technically stronger than with monofilament, we noticed that when the fish were biting and we were excitedly tying on new hooks and lures, we were a bit more likely to tie a poor knot with fluorocarbon that easily broke in a quick tug test, forcing us to slow down and re-tie the knot with more precision. We believe that beginners will make fewer catastrophic mistakes when tying knots with Trilene XL than with most fluorocarbon lines.

Conclusion

Fishing line is an essential piece of angling equipment, despite being frequently overlooked. But the right line could make or break (literally) your fishing outing. Before making a purchase decision, it's crucial to consider what kind of fishing you'll be doing in what kinds of waters and for which species of fish. If you're willing to use the correct knots, braided fishing lines are a dream to cast and offer outstanding strength — but are highly visible to line-shy fish, requiring extra knots with clear leaders. On the other hand, fluorocarbon lines are nearly invisible underwater, making them great options for fishing in popular spots in clear water — but they aren't likely to win any distance casting competitions. Monofilament takes a middle ground, doing everything well but nothing extraordinarily well. No matter which line you choose, take the time to tie good knots, have fun, cast your line, and have fun catching fish.