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The Best Acoustic-Electric Guitars for Beginners

Things to Consider When Buying a Beginner Acoustic Guitar

Perfect Fit

Acoustic guitars, like all musical instruments, are meant to bring out the musician's distinct style. This is the reason why there really is no one guitar to perfectly fit everyone - rather there are many different guitar designs to cater to personal styles and expressions.

Beginners will usually gravitate towards guitars that are similar to what their favorite musicians use, so the safest choice is to start out on an instrument that looks and sounds familiar. But this is not a strict rule, because some experts will advise beginners to learn on non-familiar instruments like a nylon string guitar to expand their sonic and playing palette right at the start.

Things That Make a Guitar Easy (Or Hard) To Play

Playability is a very important factor to consider when getting guitars for a beginner. Below are the main factors that make a guitar easy or hard to play.

Action

Action is the distance between the strings and the fretboard. If it’s too high (above the fretboard) the strings are hard to press down, and if it’s too low (close to the fretboard) the strings will buzz when you play them, so guitar manufacturers aim to set it at just the right height.

Generally the thickest string on a guitar should be 3/32 inches away from the fretboard and the thinnest string should be 1/16 inches away at the nut (the part of the guitar closest to the tuning pegs). The height of the strings at the twelfth fret (which is in the middle of the neck) should be roughly double the height they are at the nut. As long as the string height is somewhat close to the measurements above you shouldn’t have too many issues. If it’s significantly higher (like ¼”) you’re either going to want to get a set-up or buy a different guitar.

Nut Width

As previously mentioned, a guitar’s nut is what the strings pass through before the fretboard starts. It’s on the end closest to the tuning pegs and has six grooves for the strings to sit in.

Nuts come in different widths. Guitars with wider nuts have the strings spaced farther apart, and the opposite is true for guitars with thinner nuts. The two most common nut widths are 1.69” and 1.75”. Younger musicians, or those of you with smaller hands, may prefer something even thinner (though they won’t necessarily need it!). Note that classical guitar usually have a wider nut with of about 2".

String Type

There are two main types of acoustic guitars: steel string and nylon string. Steel strings, which are steel plated with a bronze alloy, are harder to press down. Younger children (generally under 7), often find it difficult to push these strings down. This is the most familiar configuration, and widely used in majority of music styles.

Nylon strings are obviously made from nylon, a material that give them a different sound and makes them significantly easier to push down than steel strings. This is the most common choice for students who want to learn classical guitar music, but is in no way limited to that, especially popular artists like Jason Mraz using them. Younger players find these strings much easier to press down.

Body Type

Acoustic guitars come in a variety of body shapes and sizes, and the general idea is that bigger bodied guitars have more volume and bottom end, making them sound fuller. Smaller bodied guitars lack low end, which emphasizes the mid and high frequencies, which works great with fingerstyle playing and other similar styles. Big bodied guitars like the dreadnought can be too big for smaller players, so guitars with compact bodies will be more ideal.

Here we’ve ordered the most commonly found body styles in order of biggest to smallest:

• Jumbo
• Dreadnought
• Slope-Shoulder Dreadnought
• Grand Orchestra
• 000
• Classical
• 00
• Parlor

What is the Best Guitar for Short Fingers?

Most of the guitars featured here have 1.69" nut width, which is a standard specification used by many guitar manufacturers, and is known to be good enough even for young players. Still we have to mention that at 1.67", the Takamine GY11ME has the narrowest nut width in this list, although it only wins by a tiny fraction.
 

Guitars with narrow nut widths and flat fingerboard radius are easier for those with short fingers, 3/4 size guitars and parlor guitars usually fall into this category, but not always. Classical guitars (and nylon string guitars in general) usually have wide nut widths at around 2", which may make fretting some chords harder for those with short fingers. But this does not mean that classical guitars are impossible, because while it may be hard at first, the wider string spacing opens up the fretting hand better, improving stretching ability and strength. This is the reason why I've taught many young guitarists on classical guitars, and why some other guitar teachers do the same.

Acoustic-Electric Guitars

The simple addition of a compact piezo pickup and preamp system can turn your acoustic guitar into a stage ready instrument, and these days, there are many that come with pickups right out of the box. This is the reason why we added a section that features the best beginner acoustic-electric guitars, so you can take your starter guitar with you on stage. Acoustic-electric guitars are highly recommend for fast learners and serious students, so they won't have to buy another guitar for their performances when amplification is needed.

What To Expect During Your First Few Weeks of Playing the Guitar

The first month of playing the guitar is going to be the hardest. The reason for this is that when you start playing you don’t have any calluses, so playing your guitar for more than 15 or 20 minutes at a stretch is going to hurt the tips of your fingers. Though if you stick with it, by the time you’ve been playing for three or four months you’ll have a few good calluses built up.

Your main concern should be overplaying. We know it’s tempting, especially when you first get your guitar, to play for long periods of time. However, if you do this before you’ve built up the proper musculature you can actually cause permanent damage to your body. So when you’re just starting, take a 15 minute break for every 30 minutes you play. You can extend these times when you’ve been playing for a longer period of time, though make an effort to not exceed two hours in one sitting.

Tips on Practicing

Everyone learns differently, so it’s hard to suggest a one-size-fits-all approach to practicing the guitar. With that being said, the most important thing to remember is that learning the guitar is a process. No one is awesome at playing an instrument when they first start. In fact, most musicians struggle for a while before they really start learning. So even though it may be difficult, just keep working at it.

Also, if you’re not going to invest in guitar lessons most musicians have a pretty good experience with Hal Leonard books. The company also publishes books on different styles for more advanced musicians. There’s also a ton of great YouTuber’s creating lessons. Literally all you have to do to find them is type “Beginner Guitar Lessons” in YouTube’s search bar and you’ll find what you need to get started.

Advanced Topics

We didn't want to include a lot of additional information which could be confusing for beginners and which isn't necessary for anyone just starting out. However, if you'd like to read more advanced information about things such as Tonewoods, Scale Lengths or Acoustic-Electric Guitars, then please read Tips for Acoustic Guitar Buyers.

Further Advice

If after reading this guide you still have some questions about buying your first guitar, please feel free to post questions in the comments section below and we'll help you out.