Vosteed Shark Bomb Pry Bar Family Guide: Every X0118 to X0175 Variant Compared (2026)

Most people find Vosteed through a folding knife and then discover, somewhere in the checkout flow, that the brand also sells a titanium pry bar shaped like a shark. Ten versions of it, in fact, spanning two generations and thirty-six dollars of price spread.

The Shark Bomb is not a knife and does not pretend to be one. It is a small solid titanium bar with a pry tip, a nail puller, a bottle opener and a pocket clip — the kind of tool you reach for when you want to lift something, scrape something or open something and you would rather not use a knife edge for the job. That is the entire pitch, and it is a better pitch than it sounds.

Here is every configuration in the catalog, plus what actually separates the first generation from the 2.0.

What a titanium pry bar is for

A few jobs that a folding knife handles badly:

• Lifting staples out of a cardboard box or a stack of paper
• Pulling small nails and tacks
• Prying apart press-fit plastic housings, paint can lids, or a lid that is stuck
• Scraping dried gunk off a flat surface
• Opening a bottle at the end of the day

Every one of those tasks puts lateral load or twisting force on an edge, which is exactly how people chip blades and snap tips. A pry bar takes that abuse instead — it is a short lever with a flattened tip, nothing more — and a solid titanium bar will not care. If you want the broader context on how a small tool like this fits into a pocket loadout, we covered it in EDC titanium gear: pens, flashlights and pry bars.

Shark Bomb 1.0: X0118 and X0119 — $39 each

The original Shark Bomb is a 3/16-inch solid Grade 5 TC4 titanium bar with a shark-bomb silhouette and a fish-bone laser-etched pattern running along the body. It weighs 0.92 oz / 26 g — light enough that you forget it is clipped to your pocket.

Two finish options:

• X0118 — black stonewash
• X0119 — blasted and stonewashed

Both versions carry the same feature set: a staple and nail puller at the tip, a built-in bottle opener in the body, dedicated jimping with a fine chamfered edge for grip, a reversible wire clip that works from either side, and a keyring attachment at the tail so you can move it between a pocket and a keychain without hunting for a screwdriver.

Grade 5 titanium — formally Ti-6Al-4V — is the workhorse alloy of the titanium world: aluminum and vanadium as alloying elements give it roughly double the strength of commercially pure titanium while staying light and effectively rust-proof. It is the right material for a tool whose whole job is being leaned on.

At $39, the 1.0 is the cheapest way into the family, and if you only want a pry bar for staples and bottle caps, it is also the most sensible.

Shark Bomb 2.0: eight finishes, $59 to $75

The 2.0 is a Vosteed × ReyLight collaboration — ReyLight being the flashlight maker, which tells you the design was developed with people who care about small machined titanium objects. Vosteed's own product copy says the redesign came out of user feedback and widened the body for better leverage, smoother force distribution and a steadier feel under load. The full 2.0 spec sheet lives on Vosteed's own product page.

Weight confirms it: the 2.0 is 1.20 oz / 34.10 g, up roughly 30% from the 26 g original. All eight variants share that body, a stainless steel deep-carry pocket clip, the keyring hole and the jimping. What changes between them is the finish.

Read that table the way it should be read: the finish is the only variable. There is no steel upgrade, no lock, no blade geometry to compare. If you like the beadblasted look, the X0169 at $59 does everything the $75 Seawaves X0172 does.

That said, the finishes are not purely decorative on a tool you will pocket daily. Stonewashed and beadblasted surfaces hide scratches well — anything that looks slightly uneven to begin with keeps looking intentional after a year of keys and coins. Black Oil is a coating rather than a texture; it looks the most deliberate when new and shows wear first. The pattern finishes — Seawaves, Clouds, Purple Threads and the gold circuit design — are the ones people buy when the pry bar is going to sit on a desk rather than in a pocket.

One structural note: a couple of the 2.0 variants are still listed under coming-soon handles in the catalog, specifically the Distressed Blue X0171 and the Purple Threads X0174. Stock on those two moves around, so if either finish is the reason you are buying, check availability before you commit.

1.0 vs 2.0: what actually changed

The honest read: 2.0 buys you leverage, not features. A wider body means more surface under your thumb when you are prying something stubborn and less chance of the bar twisting in your hand. For opening boxes and popping caps, the difference is academic. For anything you have to lean into, it is real.

If you want the $39 version, the X0119 in blasted stonewash is the more subdued of the two 1.0 finishes and hides wear best.

Clip, keyring, or both

The Shark Bomb gives you two carry methods and they are not mutually exclusive. The tail has a keyring hole; the body has a clip.

• Clipped to a pocket. The 1.0 uses a reversible stainless wire clip that can be moved to either side, so left- and right-handed carry both work out of the box. The 2.0's clip is a stainless deep-carry design, which sits the tool lower against the pocket seam.
• On a keyring. Thread it onto your keys and it becomes the tool you always have. At 26 g, the 1.0 is genuinely unnoticeable in a key bundle; at 34.10 g the 2.0 is still light but you will feel the difference in a tight pocket.
• Loose in a bag. Some owners skip both and drop it into a pouch, which is when the finish argument flips — a stonewashed or beadblasted surface shrugs off contact with keys and cables, while a coated finish will show every rub.

There is no wrong answer here, but it is worth deciding before you buy, because the finish you want depends on how the tool travels. A pocket-carried pry bar benefits from a texture; a keyring tool benefits from the smallest and lightest version.

The 3D-file angle is the most interesting thing here

Vosteed publishes downloadable 3D files for the 2.0's center plate and invites owners to design their own. That is unusual for a sub-$100 tool, and it turns a fixed product into a small customization platform: print or machine a replacement center plate, swap it out, and a $59 pry bar ends up with a finish nobody else has.

If you go that route, the finish you start with matters less, since you are changing the visible face anyway. Start with the cheapest one and treat the plate as the project.

Living with titanium: care and wear

Titanium does not rust, but it does scratch, and it does show fingerprints on polished surfaces. Two practical notes:

• Stonewashed and beadblasted finishes are self-hiding. Small scratches blend into the texture instead of catching the light.
• Anodized or coated finishes wear differently. The color is a surface treatment rather than a property of the metal, so abrasive contact in a pocket will eventually wear through it.

For deeper refinishing — brushed titanium, scratch removal, restoring a uniform grain — the technique is the same one we documented for removing scratches from titanium handles, and it works on a pry bar as well as a knife scale.

One thing you do not need to do is oil or protect the metal. Titanium forms its own oxide layer immediately and does not need the maintenance a carbon steel blade requires.

What does need occasional attention is the grit that collects in the jimping and around the clip screws. A soft brush and warm water is enough; there is nothing inside to disassemble, and no pivot to adjust. It is one of the few EDC items that gets simpler the longer you own it.

How it fits into an everyday carry setup

The Shark Bomb is a supplement, not a replacement. It does not open a package faster than a knife, and it is not a cutting tool at all — the pry tip is blunt by design. What it does is remove the temptation to use a blade as a crowbar, which is the single most common way people damage an otherwise healthy knife.

Most people who carry one land on the same arrangement: knife in the front pocket, pry bar on the keyring or clipped in a back pocket, flashlight within reach. If you are building that from scratch, our EDC kit guide lays out how the pieces complement each other, and if your carry changes with the season, camping versus urban EDC kits covers which tools earn their place in each. It is also worth knowing the parts and anatomy of the tools you already carry before adding another one to the pile.

Bottom line

• Cheapest sensible pick: the Shark Bomb X0118 or X0119 at $39 — same titanium, same functions, no leverage upgrade.
• Best 2.0 value: the X0168 Stonewashed or X0169 Beadblasted at $59. Wider body, wear-hiding finish, lowest price in the second generation.
• Best-looking 2.0: the Seawaves X0172 at $75, if you are buying it as an object as much as a tool.
• The tinkerer's pick: whichever 2.0 finish is cheapest when you order — then use the published 3D files and make the center plate your own.

Ten variants sounds like a lot for a tool with no moving parts, and it is — the entire decision comes down to generation, weight and finish. Pick the body width you want, then pick the finish you can live with after a year of pocket carry.