The advantages of a headless guitar

In this article, we’ll take a closer look at what could be considered to be the benefits of the headless guitar, especially headless guitars from .strandberg*.

But before we start, it’s important to state that we are biased toward headless guitars, and we tend to view them as “better” than traditional electric guitars (otherwise, we would not build them).

That being said, what we view as advantages, you might view as disadvantages. Playing guitar is highly subjective, and what you enjoy, someone else might not like as much. It’s always best to try out any guitar that you are interested in in a shop, to get to know the feel and the sound of the instrument.

Here are the main advantages of headless guitars (coming from a team that spends all our waking time building them, so you know … we’re kind of biased ;))

Headless guitars often have a more balanced center of gravity
Patented Endurneck profile (.strandberg* exclusive)
Multi-scale headless guitars can be easier to play
An ergonomic lightweight body can improve playability

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Are headless guitars comfortable and ergonomic?

That would highly depend on who you ask, as it is tied to personal preference. That being said, headless guitars tend to switch the center of gravity (due the lack of a headstock) which in turn evens out the balance a bit. And that feels better, to most people.

At .strandberg* we highly value ergonomics and use it as a base for all our designs. This led to the patented Endurneck™ profile. By utilizing flat surfaces rather than a round profile, it provides a more restful grip for the thumb, which leads to easier chord playing at the far end of the neck, as well as easier soloing and fret access when you use the end of the neck.

Our pursuit of ergonomics has also led to several iterations of the versatile Boden body shape. By removing the head, it’s way easier to build a light body, since the balance won’t be an issue. If you add a lightweight body to a guitar with a heavy headstock, the balance gets thrown off. That won’t happen if you remove the head.

But, weight is not everything. The design itself matters too. A traditional body design with light weight is good for ergonomics, but a .strandberg* body design coupled with light weight is even better.

Do headless guitars go out of tune?

Headless guitars don’t go out of tune any more than traditional electric guitars. Headless guitars tend to stay in tune longer. Why? Well, when you remove the headstock, you also remove some lengths of string. So headless guitars have a “little less amount” of strings that otherwise could bend and stretch, and contribute to the guitar going out of tune.

If you haven’t used headless guitars before, tuning, string changes, and the setup process may seem a little daunting at first. But you will soon find that maintenance work on a .strandberg* guitar is quite intuitive and easy to perform once you get a hang of it.

Check out our support documentation here

What’s the point of having a headless guitar?

We covered this theme in a separate magazine blog post but we’ll go through the basics here as well. Simply stated, the point of having a headless guitar is to create music. Besides that, here is a list of reasons for having a headless guitar:

Reduce the risks of guitar related injuries or pain problems
Increase the chance of playing for a longer period of time
Increase the chances of standing out (since they look quite different)
Being able to travel lighter (since most headless guitars are more portable than traditional electric guitars)

But the most important reason to having a headless guitar is to own and play an instrument that you enjoy. Which of course goes for traditional guitars too, if that is your preference. We could probably write a book about why we enjoy headless guitars, but if they’re not for you then that’s fine too.

We strongly believe that when it comes to creating music and playing guitar, nothing is more important than each and everyone’s personal preference.

Some like guitars with flames, some like headless guitars, some like flying V guitars and some like multi-neck guitars. And isn’t that beautiful?

Thanks for reading, and to really get to know headless guitars and .strandberg* guitars, drop by a guitar shop that sell our guitars and try them out. That will bring you more knowledge than reading, we promise.