Cheap Electric Guitars: What to Look For

If an electric guitar is on your wish list, but you can’t afford that new American Standard Stratocaster, or Studio Les Paul, then you’ve probably been looking at some of the budget musical instruments, like maybe the Epiphone line which does make higher end models, but is much like the budget Gibson, or maybe Squire which is the budget Fender line. Both those lines actually contain some good solid instruments, and while less expensive than the “pro lines” still might be out of the range of some people. So maybe you’re looking for an even cheaper guitar, like around the $100 range or under. There are usually two types of people who buy those cheap electric guitars, beginners who can’t afford a more expensive instrument (or parents who don’t want to spend big money if their kid isn’t going to be serious about it). The other type is the experienced player or pro, who needs a “beater” guitar or likes to tinker with their guitars. I fall into the second group, I teach guitar to kids whose parents don’t have a ton of money, and I like to tinker, so I’ll sometimes buy some cheap gear just to check it out and see if it’s worth recommending , and have something to play around with. I’ve already done a guitar buying guide, so I won’t do that in detail again, but I will give a quick recap, and mention some things you can do to make a cheap guitar better, as well specific places where makers will cut corners.

Let’s go from the head of the guitar to the body taking a look at where corners might have been cut.

• Since staying in tune is the biggest priority, a good manufacturer won’t cut corners with the tuners. There are plenty of cheap tuners out there that will do the job. I’ve noticed that the Squire’s tuners look cheaper than the Epiphones, but they stay in tune so that’s good. I haven’t got any experience with the Fender Starcaster line (except the drum sets), that’s Fender’s line they sell in big box stores.
• The neck is a big part of a guitars playability, so that’s at least got to be decent, there are other places to trim a few bucks off, without sacrificing playability. Most cheap guitars have a cheap plastic nut, and the slots are usually cut too shallow. It takes some tweaking to get a guitars action really low, and they takes time and human input which costs money. Likewise dressing the frets, is another labor intensive operation that’s usually a rush job on budget electric guitars. Run your hand along the edge of the neck and see if the frets have been filed smooth, I’ve found they aren’t in some of the cheap guitars from big box stores, especially the electrics. The truss rod usually isn’t adjusted optimally on factory set ups either.
• The body is a good place to save some money. It can be glued up from multiple pieces of wood, or made out of plywood. If done well neither of those are such a bad thing, wood does have an impact on the sound, and lots of people will tell you plywood bodies won’t sound good. They will sound different but “good” is subjective, and reviews are always mixed on whether or not a plywood guitar will sound good. Google “plywood guitar” and you’ll hear a lot of people saying they have plywood guitars that sound good, that they like a lot. Finish is another place corners are cut on cheap electrics, you might see some finish runs and drips, which doesn’t affect the playability of the guitar one bit. You probably won’t find binding on a cheap guitar, it’s another one of those more labor intensive processes. Most of the cheaper guitars tend to be Strat styles, which are a great economical design. Leo Fender designed the neck to be cut from one piece of wood, the body is rounded and needs no binding, there’s a pickguard so you can rout everything in one pass, with no need for a back control cavity. It’s a great economical design, and it’s no surprise why it’s held up so well.
• The bridge is usually fine on most cheap guitars, as long as it’s metal and adjustable for height and intonation (up-down, forward-back), it will probably work just fine.
• Pickups are usually not the best on cheaper guitars, but if they’ve been potted (dipped in wax so they don’t squeal) then they’ll usually be serviceable. Pickups are basically just wire wrapped around a poles connected to a magnet. So even cheap ones can sound good, although not like a Seymour Duncan.

If you get one of these cheap, sub $100 guitars for the most part you can expect to do some work on it if you want it to be a really good player. Most are playable right out of the box, just not excellent. For a beginner who wouldn’t notice, or cheap kids guitar, they’d certainly be fine, but with a little tweaking they’d be a lot better.

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