Blades are long flakes that have been removed from stone blocks using a stone or antler hammer. The blades are flaked in parallel from the main block. This method can produce many blades of a standardised form from a single block or core. It was used throughout the Upper Palaeolithic, which in Britain was from about 35,000 years ago.

The edges of the blades can be altered in different ways to produce a variety of tools such as endscrapers, awls and points. Tools called burins were made by removing long splinters from the end of a blade to create a chisel-like edge, probably used for working antler, bone and ivory. The standardisation of many of these tools made them easier to place into wooden or bone handles or onto shafts, using natural materials such as resin and animal glues. The straight edges of the blades would have allowed several to be mounted end-to-end onto the same handle to increase the length of the cutting edge.

Different peoples made different types of blade tool. In Britain, five groups can be distinguished, which are named either after sites where their tools were first identified or by the stone technology. In order of appearance these are leaf-point industries, Aurignacian, Gravettian, Creswellian, and other Late Upper Palaeolithic industries.