I cannot give you a scientific answer, but having used many different steels, I can say that SR77 has edge retention comparable to some 1095 blades. Since 1095 is pretty much a standard cutlery steel, and SR77 is much tougher than 1095, that makes the steel ideally suited to large choppers and other big hard use knives. Those knives that have 1095 tempered more for edge holding tend to be a lot more brittle than SR77. I have found the edge holding of SR77 to be quite acceptable for hard use big knives. In the smaller blades where edge retention and not toughness is the more important quality, I prefer SR101 or even 154CM.