The Best Electric Guitar Strings

Have you ever played guitar and thought these guitar strings suck? I remember having this feeling in college. I was playing guitar 3 to 4 hours a day, and I had to change my strings every week. It was annoying. I decided to get a coated string that would maintain the tone of the strings longer. I switched to Elixir Nanoweb strings because they were the best choice for me. This article will help you find the best electric guitar strings for you. In order to do that, we need to learn about gauge, style, and brand. Understanding how they work will help you narrow your search.

1. The Gauge 

2. The Style 

3. The Brand 

The Gauge 

The string gauge measures the thickness of the guitar string. The thicker the gauge, the harder it is to play. But they sound thicker. If you love playing metal riffs in drop C, you’ll want strings in the 12/50 range. 12 is the measurement for the high e string. 50 is the measurement for the low e string. (12 is actually .012 inches, but they simplify it for our benefit). If you're wanting to play country chickin’ pickin’ licks, a gauge like 9-42s work great. Bending is much easier on lighter gauge strings. 

Certain guitars work better for certain string gauges. Strats and Teles come stock with 9/42. Dual Humbucker guitars typically come with string gauges in the 10/46 range. This is common practice and does not cover every guitar.  

You can change what string gauges you put on the guitar, but it may require a truss rod adjustment. 

The Style

There are many different styles of guitar strings available. There are strings with nickel winding, cobalt winding, or steel winding. There are flatwound strings and round-wound strings. It is also important to consider coated strings vs uncoated strings. The options seem endless. But we can help narrow them down.  

Coated Vs Uncoated

Coated strings have a slightly darker sound at first. This happens because there is more mass on the string. However, the coating maintains the tone for a longer period of time. After a couple of weeks, the coated string has a brighter sound than non-coated strings. If you want a brighter sound overall, non-coated strings are better. If you want strings that maintain their tone longer, coated strings are way better. Elixir Strings, Stringjoy Orbiters, and Ernie Ball Coated series are popular coated strings.

Flat-Wound vs Round-Wound 

Flat-wound strings are used in very specific settings. Jazz guitar players love them because they are super dark. This lets them get that iconic muted jazz tone. Most other guitar styles avoid flat-wound strings. Unless you wanna play jazz, round-wound strings will probably work better for you.

Winding Material 

The windings of strings are what have the most variation. There are cobalt windings, nickel-plated steel, pure nickel, and stainless-steel windings. Stainless-steel wound strings are bright. They also resist rust and debris without coating. Pure nickel wound strings are dark. They were used in the 50s and 60s. People use them to try to recreate tones made in those eras. Nickel-plated steel strikes the balance between pure nickel and stainless-steel. Nickel-plated steel is the most common winding in the industry now. Cobalt strings were made popular by Ernie Ball. John Petrucci says they sound “studio mastered” because of the way they shape the tone. 

The Brand

There are many different string manufacturers, and it is hard to narrow down which one works best for you. We will cover our four favorite ones, so you can choose. 

D’Addario

These strings are arguably the most used strings in the world. Here’s why. A lot of string makers actually use D’Addario strings and slap their name on them. Fender uses D’Addario strings as well as Elixir. This shows how much the music industry trusts these strings. D’Addario is for the player who wants a reliable string without bells and whistles. 

Click here to shop D'Addario strings.

Elixir

As we said before, Elixir uses D’Addario strings, but they don’t just slap a label on the strings. D'addario ships them the strings, then Elixir applies their coating. In fact, Elixir invented coated strings. Elixir has the world’s most popular coated strings because they invented it. Elixir Strings are for players who want their strings to maintain their tone for a long time. If you wanna learn more about Elixir, check out this link.

Click here to shop Elixir strings.

Ernie Ball

Ernie Ball strings are for the player who wants to stay on budget. They have the cheapest options here, and they may be the most popular. The Ernie Ball Super Slinkys have the highest number of units sold. In the last 3 years, we have sold nearly 500 Super Slinky string sets. The second highest selling string at Roxy Music are the Regular Slinkys also by Ernie Ball.

Ernie Ball also has the most variations of strings available. You can get just about any string gauge with any material you can imagine. Check their website to see if what you want is available. It probably is.

Click here to shop Ernie Ball strings.

Stringjoy

Stringjoy has become one of our favorite string brands. Stringjoy strings are for players who want a string that has been nurtured it's entire life. They have some of the best quality control measures in the industry. Every wrapped string is wrapped at least 7000 times. They use high-carbon steel cores that are vacuum sealed to maintain the life of the string. Stringjoy strings are awesome. Click this link to learn more about them.

Click here to shop Stringjoy strings.

These options can help you narrow your search for the sound you want. The string's gauge, style, and brand will help you find your perfect match. But you have to try them out to find the one you want. Click this link to shop our full selection of electric guitar strings. Then pick three sets to try. Order all three and decide which one is your favorite.