Garden shredders are designed for slicing up general garden waste. Most of the time it consists of dead leaves and small dead plants. Rarely, this will also contain harder pieces of wood as well. However, to handle larger pieces of wood, you will need high power shredders. Wood chippers, on the other hand, are specifically designed for solid pieces of wood. Wood chippers will have a chute through which you can feed the wood. The blades inside the wood chippers cut the wood into relatively larger pieces than a shredder. Typically, wood chippers will cut the wood into pieces that are around a couple of inches in size.