Tried to post and it froze. Hopefully it won’t double post….🤷‍♀️. We had shiny black granite… so sleek and smooth. Very pretty, but did show every fingerprint and smudge. If it had been honed that wouldn’t have been a problem I imagine. Maybe I wouldn’t have liked it as much ( not sure) but keeping it clean would have been simpler. Didn’t choose it this time because of that, but discovered other little issues with our current stone. Can’t plan for everything ( even though I try).

We have a polished black granite in our master bath (we are renting this house while we build our own) and I do not like it. At all. It shows every everything. Water drops, toothpaste spills, you name it. It looks great when it's been cleaned and is completely untouched, but as soon as you touch it, you see everything. Perhaps honed would be less obvious but I will never go w/ a polished black countertop in a wet area (primarily bathroom or kitchen) again. However, I am putting Metropolis Grey (from Arizona Tile) in my laundry room, and that one is a bit darker.

We did leathered negresco granite in our kitchen with white cabinets, and I LOVE it. I have had quartz, and polished granite in several homes and this by far is the easiest to keep clean and love the look.

We had Cambrian Black honed countertops in our kitchen and absolutely loved them . We sealed them with a water based sealant, no finger prints or smudges or water rings. Cambrian Black is extremely dense its not a soft material.

We had a black granite and it was awful for showing marks. It needed to be polished with a rag every time we cleaned it!

We had unsealed unpolished (matte) slate in our last house and i loved it. We have a big family and an active kitchen and the black was no issue.

I had black granite in a house a while back and chose to never get it again. While beautiful, all you had to do was walk past it and it looked dusty or dirty within 5 minutes of cleaning. I'm one of those people who is constantly wiping things down and cleaning floors and it drove me crazy. Yours looks lighter than mine was tho. Mine was very black and yours looks more grey, on my monitor at least, so it might work. I think that is a beautiful selection.

What white do you have on your walls/cabs?

Don’t know your age but black granite countertops need excellent undercabinet lighting to make them optimally usable to middle age eyes. The other problem is, as mentioned by other posters, that black countertops show everything and are hard to keep looking clean.

I have leathered black granite and it's super easy maintenance.  No problems with fingerprints, smudges, etc.

Have had polished Labrador Golden Flake granite in our kitchen since 2007. It’s black with silvery and coppery mica throughout. No regrets whatsoever. We love it still.

Absolutely NO to polished Absolute Black granite!! We were in a rental while waiting for our home to be built and the basement kitchen had shiny black granite…it was horrible. I am a very clean person, but that counter was impossible to get and keep looking clean. Always streaky and every smidgen of anything stuck out like a sore thumb. I can’t speak to honed black material, but just cross off polished black granite from your list. I promise you, if you install it, you will come to regret it big time.

It is a beautiful slab. Now, picture it cut to the size of the counters, and keep in mind any seams.

Your counters will not look anything like the slab.

I have Polished black ubatuba and it’s beautiful. It cleans up nice and looks great 8 years later.

ShadyWillowFarm, I've had the same, polished Ubatuba Granite for over 12 years. I absolutely hate it. Mine has very little shine and then only if just polished. It shows every spot and I hope I am able to change it out soon. I'm so glad yours is a different story and that it makes you happy.

I have Absolute Black granite in my kids' bathroom and hate it -- every little water and toothepaste spot shows up. But we just bought a house with some sort of polished granite with blue and white/silver flecks in it. I would not have picked it out myself, but much to my surprise, I love it. I think it might be Blue Pearl?? It doesn't show up spots (or crumbs) like the Absolute Black does.

Emily, I think that is black ubatuba…😂

@ShadyWillowFarm I think that is Blue Pearl granite not black Ube Tuba. And it is extremely durable.

@ShadyWillowFarm I looked through all the old blueprints from when the house was reno'd 20 years ago, trying to figure out what it is! Googling "blue flecks in granite" brought up Blue Pearl, and the pics look similar. Who knows, though! Not me... ;) But whatever it is, it's really pretty. :)