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Parts of the Electric Guitar

In this guitar lesson, we discuss the parts of the Electric guitar. I show you each and every part of a Fender Stratocaster, and I discuss what each part does. It is important to know what the parts of your guitar are called so that you can communicate properly with other guitar players.

We discuss the head, tuners, neck, and fretboard of the guitar more in-depth in the Parts of the Acoustic Guitar lesson.

The electric guitar body is different from an acoustic because it is just one slab of wood without all the individual components. An acoustic has a top, back, sides, and bracing, but an electric guitar just has a body.

The bridge of an electric guitar has adjustable saddles, and on this Stratocaster, there is a tremolo block, springs, and a tremolo claw.

The electronics consist of guitar pickups which pick up the vibrations of the strings and use electromagnetic fields to convert the sound into AC electricity. This goes through wires to the volume and tone controls, and then out to the output jack.

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The Parts of an Acoustic Guitar

In this lesson we discuss the parts of an acoustic guitar. When you are starting out it’s good to learn what everything is called so that you can talk about your guitar with other guitar players or know what to search for if you want to look something up online.

From top to bottom, we have the headstock. This is where your guitar’s logo will be, and this is where the strings connect to the tuners.

The tuners are how you add or release tension to your strings when you tune your guitar.

The guitar nut has slots to keep the strings in place, and it also determines the height of the strings at the top end of the neck.

The neck has a metal rod inside of it called a truss rod and the top part of the neck where the frets are at is called the fingerboard. The thicker part of the neck that connects to the body is called the heel.

The body has a back, sides, and a top or soundboard. The soundboard of an acoustic guitar determines the tone. The soundhole projects the sound outward, and the decorative circle around it is called the rosette.

The bridge on your acoustic guitar is where the strings connect to the body. They are held in with bridge pins and the go across the saddle, which determines string height at the body end of the guitar.

There is bracing on the inside to add stability and there is usually a strap button at the bottom end of the acoustic guitar’s body.