What are the parts of a guitar?

Although it's not totally necessary to learn the parts of the guitar when you learning, there is no harm in it either. Perhaps knowing the parts of your guitar in detail would help you get more engaged with the instrument. This post will go over all of the parts of a guitar, if your guitar is an electric guitar.

The Body

The body of the guitar is the part that has the most weight. This is the body of a Fender Telecaster:

Photo by Dave Wirth. All Rights Reserved.

Pickups

Every electric guitar has pickups on it's body. What are pickups? In the most basic sense, they are small magnets and coils that sense vibrations in a string when plucked or strummed. This vibration is "picked up" and transferred via a guitar cable to an amp, and "amplified." Pickups can come as either humbuckers,

or single coils.

Pickup switches

If an electric guitar has more than one pickup, you'll be able to switch between the pickups easily. This switch is located very close to the volume and tone knobs on a Fender Telecaster:

On a Telecaster, I have the choice between three different pickup selections. The first selects the bridge pickup (a generally brighter and pluckier sound):

This opposite position goes to the neck pickup (a generally warmer and more tasty sound):

The middle position gets a combination of sounds from the two pickups:

Volume knob

Most electric guitars have a volume knob, and it does what you think it does: It simply adjusts the volume:

Tone knob

Tone knobs give you a bit more control over the sound coming directly from your guitar, like how defined you want your guitar's tone to be:

Jazz guitarists often turn this down so it can be a little more mellow, while lead country players leave this most, if not all, the way up.

Pick guard

Some guitarists use their picks like weapons to strike at the guitar strings. The first thing to get hit is the pick guard, and it's there as a safety measure. It's usually located just underneath the strings:

This Gibson L4 has a pickguard that isn't directly beneith the strings:

Strap holders, or strap nooks

The nooks that you find on the body of the guitar are used to put a strap on the guitar:

Bridge

The bridge holds the ball-end of the strings to the body of the electric guitar:

The Neck

The neck is the other part of the guitar. It's the part where the frets are:

Frets and fretboard

The metal bumps below the strings are called frets:

The board where all of the frets are is called the fretboard:

Nut

The nut is the 1-3mm wide plastic piece that separates the strings between the fretboard and the headstock. The nut holds the strings exactly in place so they don't carelessly swivel around:

Headstock

The headstock is where the tuning pegs are:

Tuning pegs

The tuning pegs are what you use to tune the guitar. As long as the strings are threaded tightly into the pegs, you can easily use them to tune your guitar: