While plenty of Monster Hunter World players will favor specific debuffs or elemental attacks when it comes to hunting monsters, a large portion chooses raw damage over anything else. And even though there are plenty of skills and decorations in Monster Hunter World that boost attack or affinity, players might not know all the ways they can gain a little extra damage.

One of the most standard ways to maximize damage in Monster Hunter World is through weapon sharpness. Every melee weapon has a sharpness level with various tiers starting at the bottom with red, and going up to orange, yellow, green,  blue, and (very rarely) white.

As players do damage with their weapon they will see the sharpness gauge go down and eventually change color. They might not notice what the color change does at first, but once the weapon is in the orange range it will start to bounce off the monster and do minimal damage.

But sharpness is not just a critical hit opportunity meter, it actually buffs or debuffs damage based on the color of the gauge. Moreover, if players are using a weapon with blue or white sharpness, they are actually doing extra damage, which makes sharpening and skills that preserve sharpening very useful.

monster hunter world sharpness

For a full breakdown on weapon sharpness, see below:

  • Red: 50% of Potential Weapon Damage
  • Orange: 75% of Potential Weapon Damage
  • Yellow: 100% of Potential Weapon Damage
  • Green: 5% Extra Weapon Damage
  • Blue: 20% Extra Weapon Damage
  • White: 32% Extra Weapon Damage

As you can see, having a sharp weapon in the blue gauge can be very useful since it delivers a good chunk of extra damage, while a red sharpness weapon is actually doing less damage than it should. Obviously white sharpness is even better, but achieving white sharpness and maintaining it requires a very specific build. In most cases, it will be better to focus on sharpening the weapon during the hunt rather than worrying about catering to white sharpness before.

That being said, there are some builds that will benefit from focusing on white sharpness, like the dual blades. With skills like handicraft (extends sharpness gauge) and protective polish (sharpness doesn’t deteriorate for a limited time after sharpening), a dual blade build can deal out white sharpness levels of damage and stay that way for longer.

Of course, sharpness is but one weapon stat to consider in a wide sea of stats and skills. Some may favor weapon affinity over sharpness, for example, and choose to tailor their build in that direction. But either way, it’s good to know what sharpness can add to a weapon.

Monster Hunter World is out now for PS4 and Xbox One. The PC version releases later this year.