Should I Learn Acoustic Guitar or Electric Guitar First?

By far the most important factor is to understand how you learn and what your tastes are.

I always recommend my students to make a Spotify playlist of EVERY song they would ever want to learn, doesn’t matter how hard a song is, put it on the list.

If your tastes then lean more acoustic or electric, then purchase a guitar based on those tastes. Not only that your list gives you a clear path of what to learn to play and you will be excited about it.

This Spotify playlist will also give you a good sense of how good you will get, until you hear a NEW, EXCITING, and MORE CHALLENGING style of music that will inspire you to keep playing MORE!

Now, for the “brief” pros and cons of each…

Acoustic Guitar

Acoustics are typically bigger instruments, but you can always find a small body shape.

The strings are also typically harder to press down, but you can always lower the action and get a thinner gauge string that’s easier on your hands and fingers.

Acoustics are also lower maintenance to just pick up and play.

So if you know you don’t want to deal with extra setting up, or not dealing with technology while you play, acoustic might be ideal for you.

(I find this to be true to for my students that work in the tech field, after work, they have had their fill of screens and tech, so having a more “natural/old school” hobby is a relief for them.

You also don’t need quite as many accessories. Getting a Capo will be the best accessory to purchase (not including tuners, picks, etc…)

Electric Guitar

As for electrics, they are smaller in body shape, although heavier (6–9 pounds on average)

The strings are easier to play as well due to electric strings being thinner.

However, you will need to be open to learning a bit on the tech side with the amplifier.

The upside to that is digital amps (Positive Grid and Line 6 being my favorite companies) have VERY small to large amplifier options. (And you can use headphones to keep it quiet if you are in an apartment)

Digital Amps have cloud sharing for other players making amp tones of famous songs that will get you closer to sounding like the recordings of your favorite songs. It’s as simple as a search for the song you are learning and downloading from the cloud to the amp.

This is VERY IMPORTANT and often over-looked because when we go into learning guitar as beginners, we want to sound like the music we love.

So when you are playing on an amp with only one or maybe two sounds. It can be discouraging quickly because of the disconnect that makes to what you WANT and EXPECT to hear. (This is often true for beginners wanting to learn Hard Rock or Metal right away.)

Also, don’t cheap out on the guitar cable, they wear down quickly with repeated plugging in and out.

The best bang for your buck in quality would be a HOSA cable if you want to keep it on a tight budget or D’Addario American Pro cables if you want to spoil yourself with a high quality cable but not spend $100 on overpriced Mogami cables.

Additional thoughts:

Playing guitar is a GLAMOROUS Hobby, you absolutely should buy an instrument you find attractive and beautiful. (As well as an instrument that is comfortable to hold.)

When you see your instrument that you are attracted to, you will want to play it more.

And leave it out in the open, in a stand, or a safe place that you walk by often and can easily grab. You will play it MORE!

Over time you will probably want to have one of each (acoustic and electric).

If you are an acoustic player wanting to go electric. A Fender Telecaster is a good option as they don’t have too many bells and whistles on them.

If you are an electric player going acoustic. A Taylor (The low-end 100 series are AWESOME guitars) will be the easiest to play for an electric player due to how they are designed and built.

TL;DR

• Know what music you like, how you learn, and if you prefer low maintenance or low tech options

• Get a sexy instrument

• Leave it out so you play it more

Keep Playing,

AJ 💪🏽🎸