Bosch GSB 18V-55 Review: The B&Q Combi Drill Worth the Blue Badge?
Every source we found says the same two things: this is a light, well-balanced 18 V combi that drives screws beautifully, and it is the entry of Bosch's blue Professional range rather than the powerhouse. What almost nobody tells you is that the 55 Nm on the box is Bosch's own hard-joint figure, that the 1 kg weight is the bare tool, and that B&Q sells this drill in at least four different boxes — one of which contains no battery at all.
Where the reviews line up
Nobody in the UK consumer press has bench-tested this drill, so the evidence comes from three different kinds of source: PHPI Online, the plumbing and heating trade title, where installer Drew Styles used one on site for his “Drew's Reviews” column; The Garden Patch at greengaffer.co.uk, a specialist tool blog whose reviewer James Fletcher ran one for four weeks of mixed DIY and light trade work; and the retailer rating blocks at Screwfix and Tooled-Up, which are small — 21 ratings and one rating respectively — and which we quote with their sample sizes precisely because they are small.
They agree on three things. It is light and short — around 1 kg without a battery and under 190 mm nose to tail, which is what gets it into a joist bay or the back of a kitchen carcass. The clutch and the brushless motor are the good bits: twenty-odd settings and a genuinely progressive trigger, so it is a better screwdriver than most drills at the money. And it is honest about masonry: 10 mm in brick is the published limit and both hands-on sources reach the same conclusion — fine for wall plugs, wrong for a day of chasing.
Where they diverge is the same place the spec sheets diverge. Bosch's 55 Nm is a hard-joint number; the soft-joint figure, the one closer to driving a screw into timber, is 28 Nm, and The Garden Patch flags the 55 as the lowest in its comparison group against Milwaukee and DeWalt. Our advice is to read 28 Nm as the working figure and stop comparing headline torque between brands altogether.
The buying decision here is the box, not the drill. Bosch's own list price for the L-BOXX kit with two 2.0 Ah batteries is £307.69 including VAT (Bosch Professional, checked 18 September 2026), and we found the same class of kit at £119.99 at Kelvin Power Tools and a bare unit at £117.95 at Tooled-Up on the same day. B&Q lists it in at least four configurations, including a “bare + 25 pc set” that has no battery in it. Check the Ah figure and the battery count in the title before you compare any two prices.
The three reviews this summary is built from
- PHPI Online — Drew's ReviewsTrade press. A working installer, on site, in a van, in the cold. Published 14 April 2020, so it is the oldest source here.
- The Garden Patch (greengaffer.co.uk)Specialist blog, hands-on for four weeks, 8 May 2026. Rates it 4.2/5. Its spec figures do not all match Bosch's.
- Screwfix & Tooled-Up ratings4.5/5 from 21 reviews at Screwfix and 5/5 from 1 review at Tooled-Up, both checked 18 September 2026. Small samples, on pages that sell it.
Before the review: blue Bosch, green Bosch, and which 18V-55 this is
This page is about the GSB 18V-55 Professional — the blue trade tool, part number 0 601 9H5 xxx. The GSR 18V-55 is the same tool without hammer action, so it will not touch masonry. Bosch's green DIY range (UniversalImpact 18V-60 and friends) uses a completely different battery that does not fit the blue tools and vice versa. If you already own green Bosch batteries, this drill does not join them up.
Specification at a glance
| Spec | Figure | The trap |
|---|---|---|
| Type | 18 V cordless combi drill (drill, screwdrive, hammer), brushless | Combi, not SDS. Hammer here is percussion through the chuck, not an SDS piston. |
| Max torque | 55 Nm hard joint · 28 Nm soft joint | Bosch's own figures, from its GB product page. The 55 is a hard-joint lab number; the figure that matches driving a screw into timber is 28. Screwfix and Toolstation list only the 55. |
| No-load speed | 0–460 / 0–1,800 rpm (Bosch GB, Kelvin Power Tools) 0–450 / 1,750 rpm (RS product data sheet, Toolstation) | Two published sets. We print both; the difference is trivial in use but tells you how loosely these sheets are copied. |
| Hammer rate | 27,000 bpm | Screwfix and Kelvin publish it; Bosch's GB page does not show an impact rate at all. |
| Clutch settings | 20+2 (Bosch) · 20+1 (RS data sheet) · 20 (Toolstation) · 21 (Screwfix) · 25 (The Garden Patch) | Five sources, four answers. Bosch's own “20+2” — twenty clutch steps plus drill and hammer — is the one to trust; The Garden Patch's 25 looks wrong. |
| Weight | 1.0 kg bare tool (Bosch GB) 1.1 kg bare tool (Kelvin Power Tools, Tooled-Up; The Garden Patch says 1.1 kg body only) 1.7 kg as supplied (Screwfix, with a 5.0 Ah battery fitted) | Which battery the weight includes decides the number. A 2.0 Ah GBA adds roughly 350 g, a 5.0 Ah roughly 700 g. Anyone quoting “1 kg” is quoting a drill with no battery in it. |
| Length | 179 / 189 mm head length (RS data sheet) · 185 mm (The Garden Patch) · “under 190 mm” (PHPI) | Bosch quotes two head lengths for the two variants; everyone else rounds. |
| Chuck | 13 mm all-metal Röhm keyless, 1.5–13 mm, with Autolock spindle lock | Metal chuck at this price is the genuinely good news. Bosch GB. |
| Drilling capacity | 35 mm wood · 13 mm steel · 10 mm masonry | Bosch GB. Tooled-Up prints “13 mm steel/masonry”, which contradicts Bosch's 10 mm masonry figure — believe Bosch. |
| Noise | 88 dB | Toolstation's listing is the only place we found a figure, and it does not say whether that is sound pressure or sound power. |
| Battery platform | Bosch Professional 18 V, all GBA and ProCORE packs; AMPShare compatible | The platform is the purchase. Green Bosch DIY batteries do not fit. |
| In the box at B&Q | B&Q lists it as 2 × 2.0 Ah, 2 × 4 Ah, 2 × 5.0 Ah with L-Case, and as a “GSB18 Bare + 25 pc set” | The bare listing has no battery and no charger in it. Four listings, four very different things for your money; B&Q's page is JavaScript-rendered so we could not read its live price. |
| Manufacturer list price | £307.69 inc VAT for the L-BOXX 136 kit with 2 × 2.0 Ah and quick charger; £197.31 inc VAT for the tool in a cardboard box | Bosch Professional GB, 18 September 2026. Nobody sane pays it — see below. |
| Street price, 18 Sep 2026 | £119.99 kit with 2 × 2.0 Ah, charger and L-Case (Kelvin Power Tools) · £117.95 bare unit (Tooled-Up) · £199.99 kit with 2 × 5.0 Ah and L-Case (Screwfix) | Compare the battery capacity, not the headline. A bare unit at £117.95 is not cheaper than a £119.99 kit. |
| Warranty | 1 year standard, extendable to 3 years by registering the tool with Bosch within 4 weeks of purchase | Kelvin Power Tools states the 4-week registration deadline; Toolstation's listing says simply “1 year”. Bosch's own guarantee page would not load for us, so check the deadline on the paperwork in the box. |
What the parts do
PHPI Online — Drew's Reviews
Professional Heating & Plumbing Installer is a trade title, and this is its installer column rather than a laboratory test — there are no measured figures, and the magazine is funded by the industry it covers. What it does give you is the thing a spec sheet cannot: a tool judged after it has been thrown in a van, left cold overnight and used on real fixings. Styles calls it a “higher mid-range drill”, well balanced and reliable, and recommends it specifically as the tool to start a kit around because of the platform behind it.
His figures are the ones to watch, because they are quoted as the tool in his hand: about 1.3 kg with a 1.5 or 2 Ah battery fitted, under 190 mm long, 1,800 rpm, 55 Nm, 13 mm all-metal auto-lock chuck, two-speed metal gearbox, work light and belt hook. That 1.3 kg is the single most useful number on this page: it is the honest answer to “what does it weigh” for the small-battery kit, against the 1.0 kg bare-tool figure Bosch publishes. The review is now more than six years old, and the price and the battery line-up have both moved since.
Watch: Bosch Professional GSB 18 V-55 Brushless Combi Drill - Eric Explains
A walk round the tool by Bosch UK's long-standing demonstrator, so treat it as manufacturer-side rather than independent. It is the clearest look at the mode ring and the Autolock chuck the trade review describes.
Watch on YouTube ↗The Garden Patch (greengaffer.co.uk)
This is a specialist blog, not a consumer title with a laboratory, and one of its spec lines is wrong — it credits the drill with a 25-position clutch when Bosch publishes 20+2. We are flagging that because it matters for how much weight you give the rest. What earns it a place is that it is the only recent hands-on account we could find: timber drilling, masonry fixings and cabinetry across four weeks, in 2026 rather than 2020.
Its conclusions are consistent with the trade review and with the physics. Screwdriving precision is where the drill shines; the LED ring light beats a single-LED rival; timber drilling is “clean and efficient”; masonry is “adequate for domestic fixings but not the right tool for sustained heavy masonry work”. The criticisms are the honest ones too: 55 Nm is the lowest in its comparison group against Milwaukee and DeWalt, the hammer action is modest, and buyers keep confusing blue Professional batteries with green Bosch DIY ones. Its verdict — “the drill that does the everyday stuff better than tools twice the price” — is a fair summary of every source on this page. Its £110 body-only price is close to the £117.95 we found at Tooled-Up on 18 September 2026.
Watch: Bosch GSB 18V 55 Combi Drill | Exclusive Toolstop Demo
A tool retailer demonstrating the same model. Retailer-made, so promotional in tone, but it shows the two-speed gearbox and clutch behaviour the blog is describing.
Watch on YouTube ↗Screwfix and Tooled-Up buyer ratings
Say the sample size out loud and this source shrinks to what it is. Twenty-one ratings is a hint, not a finding, and a single five-star review — “top purchase”, from a self-described Bosch loyalist — is an anecdote. We include it because a rating block is the only place buyers of this specific kit speak at all, and because the two retailers' own spec lines are themselves evidence of how confusing this drill's numbers are.
The useful content is in the listings rather than the scores. Screwfix's £199.99 kit is the 2 × 5.0 Ah one with a quick charger and an L-Case, and its “1.7 kg” weight is that drill with one of those big batteries on it — the heaviest honest number you will see for this tool. Tooled-Up's £117.95 is a body-only price with batteries as an option, and its listing prints “13 mm steel/masonry”, which contradicts Bosch's 10 mm masonry limit. Toolstation's listing of the 2 × 2.0 Ah kit adds an 88 dB noise figure and a flat “1 year” warranty. Three shops, three different pictures of the same drill.
Watch: GSB 18V-55 Brushless Cordless Combi Drill | Screwfix
The retailer's own film for the kit whose 21 ratings we quote — useful for seeing exactly which box, batteries and case that £199.99 buys.
Watch on YouTube ↗Strengths and weak points
What holds up
- Light and short: 1.0–1.1 kg bare, about 1.3 kg with a 2 Ah pack, under 190 mm long — the trade review and the blog agree.
- Screwdriving is the strength: twenty clutch steps and a progressive trigger, praised independently by both hands-on sources.
- Brushless motor with Bosch's electronic motor and cell protection, at a price where brushed motors are still common.
- 13 mm all-metal Röhm chuck with Autolock, not the plastic-bodied chuck this money usually buys.
- The 18 V Professional platform: every GBA and ProCORE pack fits, and AMPShare opens it to other brands.
- Street prices sit at roughly a third of Bosch's own list price for the kit.
What people complain about
- 55 Nm is the entry figure in Bosch's blue range, and the lowest in The Garden Patch's comparison group.
- Masonry tops out at 10 mm and the hammer action is modest — fine for plugs, wrong for chasing.
- The published numbers are a mess: four different clutch counts and two different rpm figures across five sources.
- Blue Professional and green Bosch DIY batteries are not interchangeable, and buyers keep getting caught.
- Only 1 year of warranty unless you register the tool within 4 weeks.
- Evidence is thin: no consumer-title test at all, and 22 retailer ratings between two shops.
Who it actually suits
Buy it if most of your drilling is timber, plasterboard, flat-pack and the occasional wall plug, and you want a light tool you can hold overhead without your wrist complaining — or if you are starting a cordless kit and want to start it on Bosch's blue 18 V platform, which is the real long-term decision here. At £120 for a two-battery kit it is very hard to argue with.
Look elsewhere if you drill masonry all day, want the biggest torque number your money will buy, or already own green Bosch DIY batteries and assumed they would fit. If it is heavy masonry you are after, a corded or SDS tool is the honest answer, and so is the higher-torque GSB 18V-90 C if you want to stay blue.
What we could not check
- B&Q's live price. diy.com is JavaScript-rendered and returns no product detail to us. We have confirmed from dated search results on 18 September 2026 that B&Q lists the GSB 18V-55 in at least four configurations, but the price you see at B&Q is the one on the page in front of you, not one we have read.
- B&Q's own rating block — same reason. Any star rating on the B&Q listing is unread by us.
- The YouTube pages themselves. YouTube is blocked from our tooling, so the three videos are confirmed from dated search listings that return the exact watch URL and title, not from the pages. Channel attribution is solid for Toolstop and Screwfix, whose names appear in the video titles and channel listings; the uploader of the “Eric Explains” film we have not been able to verify.
- Bosch's guarantee terms. Bosch Professional's 3-year guarantee page returned an empty document to us twice. The 4-week registration deadline comes from a retailer, Kelvin Power Tools, not from Bosch.
- The hammer rate at source. 27,000 bpm is published by Screwfix and Kelvin Power Tools; we could not find it on Bosch's own GB page.
- Whether 88 dB is sound pressure or sound power. Toolstation prints the figure with no qualifier, and it is the only noise figure anywhere.
- Independent editorial testing. There is none. No Which?, no Expert Reviews, no TechRadar or T3 test of this drill exists that we could find — nothing on this page should be read as consumer-title backing.
- Runtime in amp-hours. No source tested how many screws or holes a charge gives on any battery size.
Sources and prices last checked 18 September 2026. Tool prices and kit contents change constantly — check the battery count and the Ah figure in the listing title before you compare anything.