If you grew up using nonstick pans, you probably absorbed one kitchen rule without thinking about it: never use metal utensils. That rule is correct for nonstick. The problem is that I carried it over to my stainless steel pan for months before realizing the two materials have nothing in common structurally.
So can you use metal utensils on stainless steel? Yes. I use them on my Made In stainless pan every time I cook, and after more than a year of daily metal spatula use, the only change is appearance. The cooking surface performs identically to day one. Understanding why is straightforward once you know how stainless steel is built.
Why I Use Metal Utensils on Stainless Steel
A nonstick pan has a thin PTFE or ceramic coating applied onto a base metal. That coating is thinner than a sheet of paper. Scratch through it and the pan loses its defining feature. This is why the "no metal" rule exists for nonstick, and it is absolutely correct there.
Stainless steel is a solid alloy all the way through. There is no coating to scratch through. What you see on the cooking surface is the same material that runs through the entire thickness of the pan wall. (If you have ever wondered why food sticks to stainless steel, that is a separate question about heat management, not surface damage.)
The chromium oxide layer is what makes stainless steel "stainless." Chromium in the alloy reacts with oxygen to form an invisible protective film on the surface. When a metal utensil disrupts this film, it reforms almost immediately once exposed to air again. I looked this up because it sounded too good to be true, but it is genuinely how chromium-bearing alloys work and the whole reason stainless steel was invented in the first place. The protection is self-healing in a way no applied coating can match.
What a Year of Metal Utensils Actually Looks Like
My Made In came with a polished mirror finish. After a year of metal spatulas, tongs, and scraping up browned bits for pan sauces, the interior has developed a brushed finish with fine directional lines running across the surface.
What has not changed: how it sears chicken thighs. How it develops browning on vegetables. How it releases food when I preheat properly. How evenly it distributes heat on my electric glass top stove. The lines are visual. The cooking performance is physics, and physics does not care about surface polish.
Why the Scratches Stay Superficial
Hardness determines whether one material can meaningfully gouge another. Cookware-grade stainless and the stainless used in most kitchen utensils are in a similar hardness range, though utensils can sometimes be slightly harder depending on how they were manufactured. What this means in practice: the utensil can leave visible marks on the pan's surface, but it is not hard enough to carve deep structural grooves. Think of it like two pieces of similar-strength metal rubbing together. You get surface friction marks, not destruction.
The same thing happens when stainless cutlery sits in a drawer together and develops contact marks over time. It changes appearance without changing function.
What About Safety and Metal Leaching?
When I first scratched my stainless pan, I went down a rabbit hole researching whether that exposed anything harmful. A scratch on stainless steel just exposes more of the same metal underneath. There is no separate coating that peels or flakes into your food.
The specific worry people have is chromium and nickel leaching. I spent a while reading up on this because the idea of metal leaching into food genuinely worried me. What I found is that chromium and nickel do migrate in tiny amounts during cooking, especially with acidic foods like tomato sauce, but the amounts are far below what health authorities consider a concern. Food-grade stainless cookware alloys are specifically designed for repeated food contact, which is part of why this type of steel became the restaurant industry standard decades ago.
If you own a cheap pan and have no idea what grade of stainless it is, the simplest check is a magnet. If a magnet sticks firmly to the cooking surface (not just the base), it may be a lower-grade alloy. That does not mean it is unsafe for cooking, but higher-grade pans (the kind with "18/10" stamped on the bottom) have the strongest corrosion resistance.
When to Actually Be Careful With Utensil Choice
Two exceptions are worth knowing about.
First, avoid using serrated knives or forks as stirring tools. The pointed tips and saw-tooth edges concentrate force into tiny contact points, which can leave deeper marks than a flat spatula that distributes pressure across a wider surface.
Second, think about the motion. A smooth sliding motion (flipping, turning, scraping up browned bits) leaves minimal marks. A stabbing or digging motion concentrates force into one spot. Use the flat of the utensil, not the tip.
Why I Switched to a Thin Fish Spatula on Stainless Steel
The reason to choose specific metal utensils for stainless is not about protecting the pan. It is about what metal lets you do that thicker tools cannot. Silicone spatulas are too thick at the edge to slide under a piece of fish or a fried egg without shoving the food sideways. A thin metal fish spatula conforms to the pan's curve and gets into the gap between food and cooking surface with precision.
I went through a cheap no-name slotted spatula (too stiff, bent the slots within a month), a silicone-tipped turner (could not get under anything delicate), and a thick restaurant-style spatula (great for burgers, terrible for eggs) before landing on the Victorinox Slotted Fish Turner. The blade flexes enough that I can slide it under a fried egg without the egg tearing, and the slots drain oil when I lift fish out of a pan. I have been using it daily on my stainless pan for about eight months now.
For jobs that need rigidity rather than flex, I keep a Lamson Chef's Slotted Turner. Smash burgers need a spatula that stays flat when you press down hard. Quesadillas need even pressure across the surface. The Victorinox is too flexible for those tasks, so I tried a Lamson after seeing it recommended repeatedly on r/Cooking. The leading edge is genuinely thin (thinner than any spatula I have found at a kitchen store) and it does not flex when I press. Eight months of use and zero warping. Between the two of them I have not reached for silicone on my stainless pan once.
Silicone and Wood Still Have a Place
If the appearance of your pan matters to you, silicone utensils and wood prevent surface marks entirely. They are a valid choice. The tradeoff is reduced precision at the edge. My approach is metal on the stainless pan and silicone on the nonstick. Dedicated utensils per pan type eliminates the entire question. If you are still deciding which type of pan belongs in your kitchen, my nonstick vs stainless steel comparison covers when each one earns its spot.
The Nonstick Fear Does Not Apply Here
This point is worth emphasizing because it is the source of most confusion. Metal utensils destroy traditional nonstick pans. That is a real problem with real consequences. Those coatings are thin, fragile, and cannot heal themselves. I covered why nonstick pans stop working in detail elsewhere.
Stainless steel has none of these vulnerabilities. If your pan still sears, browns, and releases food the same way it did before the scratches appeared, the scratches simply do not matter.
