Main Guitar Types in the World

There are a lot of musical instruments in the world. Among the different types of musical instruments in the world, one of the most famous is the guitar.

As a human, what comes in your mind while we tell you guitar? Probably, the first things that comes in your mind while we tell you about guitar must be –

Guessed it right?

If not, we want to tell you that today, you will know a lot about these main guitar types. More than these, there are lots of different guitar types in the world. But today in this blog, we will be only talking about these main types of guitars, which will ultimately help you to choose your perfect instrument for your guitar journey.

Ranging from dreadnought, nylon stringed classical guitar to High end pickup designed electric guitar, we will talk about all of them in this blog and make you fully informed about its uses and features in brief. So let’s get started-

Guitar Types

Classical Guitars

Innovated and designed as the first models of the term “guitar”, classical guitars is one of the leading representation of guitars for many people around the globe. It is a type of guitar which is famous for the renowned fingerpicking style with its mellow nylon string sound.

Compared to acoustic guitars (it’s counterpart), classical guitar have much brighter and soft tone and are much more easier to place the hands in the frets, thanks to it’s wider fretboards. So for those who are starting out, this guitars are definitely considerable. However, if you are more into the Mids and lows tones and want more versatility then Acoustic guitar is another option to consider.

Hence, with the presence of it’s nylon strings, lightweight size, and wide and flat fretboard, this guitar is definitely a type for both beginners and experience players. Explore the market, you will get range of options to select by comparing the price and features of the instrument.

Acoustic Guitars

Played by lot of musicians, acoustic guitar is leading representation of the guitars in the modern day world. The sound of its steel strings is the most heard sound all around the world.

There are lost of shape and sizes within acoustic guitars, but the most impactful one is the dreadnought style acoustic which produces powerful and fuller voice with enough loudness.

First manufactured by Martin Guitars in 1930, this type of guitar is popular since then. Acoustic guitars are one of the guitar types that have been in the hands of around all popular guitarists of the world. To be more specific, we want to say that there are also other large shape jumbo guitars which are good for rhythm and strumming, and auditorium shaped guitars that are perfect for both soloing and rhythm.

For travelling, you can also find parlour and travel size guitars, which doesn’t much compromises much on the sound. Mostly, you will find bigger than parlour and smaller than dreadnought guitars mostly in the hands of the people.

Furthermore, we mentioned the shapes, but, the shape is not only the factor that determines the sound of the guitar. The other main components of the acoustic guitar are the wood used inside the guitar. The acoustic guitars’ most common choice of wood is Mahogany, Spruce, Basswood, Rosewood, Maple, Sapele, Walnut, Koa, and Cedar. These are the woods that are mostly used to build up the entire guitars with some hardware into it.

Hence, most of the Songwriters and singers all around the world use acoustic guitar, thanks to its versatility, impactful and loud tone which gives enough backing for the singer to sing along with the chords.

Electric Guitars

Able to secure itself as one of the leading Instruments in the 20th and 21st centuries, Electric guitars are one of the dream instruments to be played by people. Every person who picks up this guitar wishes to be a Rockstar. Famous for giving the plethora of electric sounds, electric guitars are the unmissable instruments when it comes to creating a complete music piece.

With most important part being the pickups, electric guitar produces the sound based on the pickups. There are varieties of pickups which are made to create different kinds of sounds. For eg- Single coil pickups are best for the funk, whereas the humbuckers are great for the Metal genre. This is just the example whereas you can experiment different genres with different pickups.

Usually, in most of the guitars, you will find two kinds of pickups, single coil and humbucker. The Single coil pickup gives you thin and twangy sound whereas humbucker gives you fuller and heavier sound. In comparison to single coil pickups, the humbucker also cuts off more noise that comes through the pickup. So relatively the price of guitar with humbucker pickups is relatively higher than the guitar with single coil pickups.

Further, know that this not just only the game of the pickups. There are many additional effects, control knobs, selector switches, devices and software that can be used to create varieties of sound. Simply, the pickups are the source of the sound and the other components are in charge for changing the sound.

The wood is also important in electric guitars, but not so important in comparison to the acoustic guitars. Here the neck and hardware play the most important roles, and then only comes the wood. So, depending on your playing style, you will have to choose the neck profile and hardware in electric guitars. For soloing, most of the players prefer thin necks, whereas for the Rhythm playing players choose the wider neck electric guitars.

Hence, With your budget you can explore the market where you will find out the guitars that ranges from 100$ to 10000$. At first glance, you will not find any differences, but as you play you will find lots of differences in these guitars.

Fun Fact – The more you play the guitars, the more you will want to explore the guitars. This will then ultimately lead you to buy more guitars. I don’t know how, but ask any professional guitar players, they will give you the same answer with multiple guitars in their Rooms.

Bass Guitar

Similar to the electric guitars, bass guitars are also operated with the pickups. But the size and the the strings are little bit different than the electric guitars. Make the neck long, the fretboard more narrow, and strings lot more thicker, then there is a bass guitar for you! Designed to make the lower punches and lead lines in the music, bass guitar is mostly used in most of the music genres. Invented in 1950’s by Leo fender, bass guitar was originally built for the replacement of the double bass.

With the electric bass guitar you can project different kinds of tones based according to genre, just like electric guitars. Same like electric guitars, you can get lowest sounds through the classic pickups and heavy distorted output with the help of the humbucker pickups that is mostly played in the hard rock and metal genre.

Generally, you can consider bass as the backbone of the band and its music. Gripping the lower ends, this instrument gives soul to the music.

In music genres like Heavy metal, Funk, and Rock Genres, this instrument plays the lead lines and undoubtedly mesmerizes the audiences.

Finally, if you are looking for a purchase, you can try the classic 4-string bass guitars in the market. Developed with single coil pickup, these bass guitars will be all good to go and can match different styles of music.

Conclusion

In this blog, we have explained to you the main guitar types. If you had completely no idea about the guitars, then we think that you have now got the overall picture of guitars. There are also other different types of guitar, but these are the main guitar types which is all of the other guitars are based upon.

In the present day, among all of these guitars, the most used guitar is the acoustic guitar. With its features of portability, versatility and low costs, the tunes of the acoustic guitar are the most heard tunes in the world. Hence, if you want to particularly choose another of above mentioned guitar types, then you can do some research on it, then finally you can buy and pursue your musical journey through it! Keep Rocking and Keep Practicing! See you in the next blog!