A squeegee is the essential tool for pushing ink through a screen in screen printing — the blade forces ink evenly across the mesh, transferring your design cleanly and consistently onto the substrate below. The quality of your squeegee directly affects ink deposit, edge definition, and print consistency across a run. Choose based on blade durometer (soft for textured or absorbent surfaces, medium for most general printing, hard for fine detail and halftones), blade profile (square for maximum ink deposit, rounded for softer ink laydown), and handle width relative to your screen size.