What is the radius of your guitar’s fingerboard? 

If this question is giving you flashbacks to high school math class, don’t worry. We’ll walk you through it. 

Most guitar and bass fingerboards are not completely flat – they have a slight convex curvature.

The back of the guitar neck is even more rounded usually, making for a comfortable grip. 

 

Measuring the Radius of Your Fretboard

As you probably remember from math class, the ‘radius’ is the distance from the center to the circumference (or edge) of a circle. To find the radius of a fingerboard, picture the fingerboard at the top of the circle and determine the arc from one edge to the other. 

You can use a guitar under string radius gauge to determine the radius of your guitar’s fingerboard. If you don’t have one, you can simply use a piece of string. 

To do this, find the fretboard’s centerpoint by measuring the distance between the nut and the 12th fret. 

 

Then, place the string on the centerpoint, holding it down on the first and last fret. Measure the distance between the string and the 7th fret. This is the radius of the fretboard. 

The smaller the measurement of the radius, the greater the curvature of the fingerboard. 

 

The Why Behind Fretboard Designs

Fretboard radius is usually measured in inches, and the most common sizes on the market are 9.5”, 7.25” and 12”. Some go as high as 17” or 20”. The larger the radius the more “flat” the fretboard will feel. Smaller, more curved radius gives the guitar a comfortable grip and lets your finger curve naturally when playing bar chords. Vintage instruments such as vintage era Fender guitars use a radius as small as 7.5” which creates a classic comfort and feel that many players greatly appreciate today. Larger radius necks keep the feel of the neck more flat, which makes niceley for sweeping through arpeggios and scales across the strings. Many high performance, modern guitars use larger fretboard radius. However, the feel of the neck can be a little less comfortable for playing bar chords or having a relaxed grip on the neck.

Some guitars even use a compound-radius fretboard. This means that the fretboard radius will gradually change from a lower (more curved) to a higher (flatter) radius as you go from the nut to the heel of the neck.

There’s no hard-and-fast rules about which fingerboard radius is right for particular genres or playing style, however, the rounder fingerboards are usually well-suited for barre chords and flatter fingerboard radii gives a more even playing surface, ideal for string bending and sweeping.

 

The Bridge

You might not have realized it, but since the fretboard is curved, the strings don’t actually sit at the same height. Your strings are positioned at equal height above the fretboard, which means the string saddles need to match the curvature of your neck. The string saddles on many guitars have adjustable heights, which allow you to fix the action and ensure the strings match the curvature of the neck. If your guitar neck was perfectly flat (no radius), then the strings would sit at the same height, but there are no guitars with flat necks (that we know of!)

Electric guitars come in many different shapes and sizes. Like their acoustic counterparts, the size and shape of an electric guitar can impact their sound and playability.

Here are some of the most common varieties of electric guitar bodies:

Type of body:

Each type of guitar can have a variety of shapes and styles. Most guitars fall under either solid body, semi-hollow body, or hollow body. 

Solid body: Solid body guitars have no internal chambers – sound is generated solely from the pickups. Solid body guitars are also made out of a solid piece of wood. As a result, they’re usually fairly heavy. 

Solid body guitars were introduced in the 1950s. They offer more sustain than their hollow-body counterparts, and are less impacted by feedback. 

Here are some of the best-known solid body guitars: 

Stratocaster

Designed by Fender, the Stratocaster features a double-cutaway design with one side extended into a “horn”, which provides balance. The double cutaway allows the player better access to the guitar’s highest frets. Though this is the shape most people picture when they think “electric guitar”, it was a revolutionary design when it was first introduced in the mid-1950s. 

Telecaster

Also designed by Fender, Telecaster was the world’s first commercially successful mass-produced electric guitar. Also known as “Tele”, it was originally called “Broadcaster”. The telecaster design features a flat asymmetric single-cutaway body. 

Les Paul

Gibson Les Paul Tribute

The Les Paul was designed by Gibson in 1952. Les Paul guitars are generally made of mahogany with a maple top and feature a single cutaway. 

 

Gibson SG 

Gibson SG Standard Tribute

The SG Standard is Gibson’s best selling model of all time. It has a contoured design with a double cutaway to make the upper frets more accessible. 

“Superstrat”

With deeper cutaways, longer fretboards, and overall pointier bodies, guitar variations known as “Superstrats” became popular with rock stars in the 1980s. 

Semi-hollow body

Semi-hollow body guitars have chambers cut into the wood which makes them lighter and gives them a slightly warmer tone. Semi-hollow body guitars work well across many genres of music. 

 

The best known of semi-hollow body guitars is: 

Gibson ES-335

The Gibson ES-335 was the first semi-hollow guitar on the market. It features two bouts that are hollow and two violin-style f-holes cut over the hollow chambers. Its best-known user was the King of Blues, B.B. King. 

Hollow body

The original electric guitar, Rickenbacker’s Electro-A22, was a hollow body guitar. Hollow body guitars were favored by big band and jazz musicians in the 1930s – however, their hollow bodies created a lot of feedback when they were played at higher volumes. 

Gibson ES-150

The Gibson ES-150 was the world’s first commercially successful Spanish-style electric guitar. ES stands for “electric Spanish”. 

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