Carbon fiber reinforced polymers (CFRPs) are known to be difficult to cut due to the abrasive nature of carbon fibers and the low thermal conductivity of the polymer matrix. Polycrystalline diamond (PCD) drills are commonly employed in CFRP drilling to satisfy hole quality conditions with an acceptable tool life. Drill geometry is known to be influential on the hole quality and productivity of the process. Considering the variety of CFRP laminates and available PCD drills on the market, selecting the suitable drill design and process parameters for the CFRP material being machined is usually performed through trial and error. In this study, machining performances of four different PCD drills are investigated. A mechanistic model of drilling is used to reveal trade-offs in drill designs and it is shown that it can be used to select suitable feed rate for a given CFRP drilling process. © 2015, Shanghai University and Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.