The history of appearance and the current state of instrumented indentation are briefly described. It is noted that the materials instrumented indentation methods using a pyramid and ball indenters are actively developing and are currently regulated by several Russian and international standards. These standards provide formulas for calculating the Young’s modulus and hardness at maximum indentation load. Instrumented indentation diagrams «load F – displacement α» of a ball indenter for metallic materials were investigated. The special points on the instrumented indentation diagrams «F – α» loading curves in the area of elastic into elastoplastic deformation transition, and in the area of stable elastoplastic deformation are revealed. A loading curve area with the load above which the dF/dα begins to decrease is analyzed. A technique is proposed for converting «F – α» diagrams to «unrestored Brinell hardness HBt – relative unrestored indent depth t/R» diagrams. The elastic and elastoplastic areas of «HBt – t/R» diagrams are described by equations obtained analytically and experimentally. The materials strain hardening parameters during ball indentation in the area of elastoplastic and plastic deformation are proposed. The similarity of «HBt – t/R» indentation diagram with the «stress σ – strain δ» tensile diagrams containing common zones and points is shown. Methods have been developed for determining hardness at the elastic limit, hardness at the yield strength, and hardness at the ultimate strength by instrumented indentation with the equations for their calculation. Experiments on structural materials with different mechanical properties were carried out by instrumented indentation. The values of hardness at the elastic limit, hardness at the yield strength and hardness at the ultimate strength are determined. It is concluded that the correlations between the elastic limit and hardness at the elastic limit, yield strength and hardness at the yield strength, ultimate tensile strength and hardness at the ultimate strength is more justified, since the listed mechanical characteristics are determined by the common special points of indentation diagrams and tensile tests diagrams.