How Do Guitar Pickups Work?
Ever asked yourself "how do electric guitar pickups work?" Knowing how your instrument works is a great way to make sure you get the best beginner electric guitar, as well as make the right choices when it comes to other essential kit like the best beginner guitar amp.
Knowing how guitar pickups work can also help you to understand why the different types of guitar sound the way they do, as well as the difference between single coil pickups and 'humbuckers'.
It might sound like there's a lot to learn, but once you know the basics of how an electric guitar makes sound, it's much easier to spot the difference between types of pickup and how they can influence the playing sound of different styles of electric guitar music.
In this electric guitar pickups guide, I'll give you some of the basic science before going into more detail about how pickups affect the sound an electric guitar makes.
What are guitar pickups?
Guitar pickups are electromagnetic inducers. The science behind them is quite complicated, but it's also quite easy to understand the general principle.
A pickup consists of a row of small magnets - one for each string on the guitar - with one or more coils of wire wrapped around it. The pickup is positioned so that each magnet is directly below a guitar string.
When the string is plucked, it vibrates within the magnetic field of the magnet. This creates an electric current in the coil, by a process known as electromagnetic induction and a formula called Faraday's Law.
This tiny electric current is sent along a cable to the amplifier, which 'amplifies' the signal many times over, to produce the desired output volume.
Regardless of variables like the number of coils, this is how guitar pickups work. It's interesting to note that the process of how an electric guitar makes sound is fundamentally the same as an acoustic guitar:
On an acoustic guitar, the vibration of the strings passes into the hollow body of the guitar, which acts as a built-in amplifier.
On an electric guitar, the amplifier is a separate box and the pickup transmits the signal, but the sound you hear is essentially still an amplified version of the strings' vibration.
Types of guitar pickups
Now we have the general science of electric guitar pickups explained, let's look at the different types of guitar pickups in common usage.
Single coil pickups
As the name suggests, single coil pickups have one coil of wire wrapped around the magnets. The explanation above is a good basic description of how single coil pickups work.
Because the coil can be affected by nearby magnetic fields and electrical appliances, single coil pickups are prone to a degree of background noise, which can be made even more noticeable by the amplifier - something humbucker pickups are designed to prevent.
Humbucker pickups
There's a little more to consider in terms of how humbucker pickups work. Their name comes from 'bucking' (i.e. reducing) the 'hum' of background interference. To do this, they have two rows of magnets with the poles of the second row inverted.
Each row has its own coil, and the coils are usually connected in series. Much of the background noise from the two coils cancels out, leaving a clearer sound from the guitar itself, while the output from the strings is increased by summing the two signals.
Tone
Different types of guitar pickups can influence the tone of the sound produced. Here are just some examples of how this occurs.
High vs low output
Low output guitar pickups are usually single coil and produce a clean, crisp sound, which can be amplified significantly without much distortion.
High output pickups, on the other hand, can quite easily overdrive an amp, creating a 'dirtier' sound popular in genres such as rock music. Traditionally, high output guitar pickups were double coil, but more recently single coil pickups have played a larger part in the high output market.
Alnico vs Ceramic magnets
Alnico is a blend of aluminium, nickel and cobalt and takes its name from the chemical symbols of the three (which also happens to be each element's first two letters, in this case). There are several different types of Alnico pickups:
Alnico 3 has weak magnetism, producing a gentle output
Alnico 2 is slightly stronger, enabling easier overdrive
Alnico 5 has high output and is good for many genres of music
Alnico 8 has the strongest output, used mainly for metal and rock
Ceramic pickups produce a much brighter sound and can help the electric guitar to be heard in a noisy performance, for example in heavy metal and hard rock where it must compete for the audience's attention.
Pickup selector switch
It's common for electric guitars to have more than one row of pickups, e.g. on the bridge and neck of the guitar, and sometimes with a third middle pickup as well. The pickup selector switch on the guitar's body allows the player to choose which pickups are active.
3-way switch on Fender Telecaster/Les Paul guitars
With two pickups (e.g. on the neck and bridge) there are three possible combinations:
Neck only
Neck and bridge
Bridge only
Les Paul guitars and the Fender Telecaster typically use a 3-way switch with two pickups. Each pickup can have its own tone and volume, and switching between the three options can quickly alter the sound of the guitar.
5-way switch on Fender Stratocaster
With three pickups (e.g. neck, middle and bridge) there are a total of five options you can switch between:
Neck only
Neck and middle
Middle only
Middle and bridge
Bridge only
This is a typical setup on the Fender Stratocaster using single coil pickups, and makes for a very versatile instrument just by switching between the different pickup combinations during a performance.
Popular guitar pickups brands
Different types of electric guitar are known for using certain guitar pickups brands. Here are five of the most popular brands of electric guitar pickups over the decades.
Seymour Duncan
Associated with classic Les Paul and Stratocaster guitars, Seymour Duncan guitar pickups helped rock music to shape the 1980s and 90s.
DiMarzio
DiMarzio's most famous customer is probably Kurt Cobain of Nirvana fame, whose angsty rock was powered by the DiMarzio Super Distortion pickup. The brand actually has a very broad catalogue, allowing guitarists to get some unique sounds from their strings.
Fender
Fender guitar pickups help ensure you get an authentic sound from your Fender electric guitar. With the introduction of Fender Pure Vintage pickups, you can recreate that sound without paying out for a decades-old Fender pickup on the second-hand market.
Gibson
Gibson - makers of the Les Paul - made their own pickups in-house. This has some specific benefits, for example the Gibson P-94R single coil pickup is built with a humbucker-sized casing, allowing it to retrofit on to a Gibson guitar with no adaptation needed.
EMG
EMG's active humbucker pickups were popular in the 1980s among hard rock and thrash metal performers. The brand is known for pickups that produce punch, clarity, pure tone and plenty of gain.
FAQs
Why are there 3 pickups on a guitar?
Knowing how electric guitar pickups work is halfway to answering this question. Because the signal from the pickup is amplified externally from the guitar (as opposed to in an internal chamber like on an acoustic guitar) it's possible to alter the volume and tone of the output.
Guitars with two or three pickups give you multiple outputs. You can adjust each pickup independently - effectively putting three different guitars in your hands at once. Using a 5-way selector switch to combine the pickups in pairs, your guitar becomes even more versatile still.
Which is better single coil or humbucker?
It depends on the genre of music and a few other considerations about the sound you want to get from your guitar. Generally single coil pickups are fine for beginners - they're less complicated and if something goes wrong, they can be easier and cheaper to repair.
If you're having problems with your electric guitar pickups, read my guide to guitar repairs in Leeds and West Yorkshire to get them fixed properly. You can also contact me directly if you have any questions about the right type of pickup for the type of music you want to play.
Read more blogs about guitars, music, and learning.
