Single coils have one magnetic transducer wound with copper wire that electromagnetically converts the vibration of the strings to an electric signal, hence the name ‘single coil’. While the mini-humbucker is versatile, it’s mostly likely to be found in a jazz musicians hands.Strat with a Humbucker in the Bridge Position The P-90 fell out of favor for a long time, but has found a new home in the punk genres. Players like Hendrix, Mark Knopfler and John Mayer all prefer single coils. Single coils are much more commonly found in lighter rock, indie, folk and blues music. Slash, Angus Young and Kirk Hammett are all well known humbucker players. Thanks to the tendency to cancel hum and sound better at high gain and distortion settings, humbuckers are often found in jazz, hard rock and metal. For this reason, it can be hard to get a clean sound from them when either gain or volume is turned up significantly. The P-90 pickup and the mini-humbucker tend to fall in between.ĭue to their construction, single coil pickups tend to catch a lot more in interference than humbuckers do. Humbuckers on the other hand have a smoother sound that is commonly referred too as thick and warm, but also punchy and aggressive.
#Strat single coil vs humbucker full#
Single coil pickups are often described as bright and crisp, or full and broad. The physical differences lead to big differences in the tonal output of each. When looking for other differences in the great single coil vs P90 vs humbucker debate, you need to look at the the active electronics that are used, the magnet, and the type of wire, and how each effects the sound the pickup produces! This allows the mini to pick up a shorter length of vibrations, producing a clearer tone, more high-end content, but less output than the original.ĭifferences between Single Coil vs P90 vs Humbucker PickupĪfter reading this far you should have realized that the first difference between these pickups is size and shape. Originallly, it was Epiphone’s effort to create their own look and feel to the electric guitar, just like Gibson and Fender had done.Īs you would have guessed, the mini-humbucker is a quite a bit smaller than the original. The mini-humbucker, although these days found mostly on Gibson guitars, was invented by Epiphone before they were acquired by Gibson in the late 1950s. What are mini-humbuckers? Glad you asked… On his Fender style guitars, he preferred mini-humbuckers like the Seymour Duncan Hot Rails. Kurt Cobain used Seymour Duncan JB humbuckers on many of his guitars that were big enough to fit them. Thus, the name gets its origins from Les Paul, who was a master technician and designer, brought the humbucker to fruition. Just as Fender popularized the single coil, Gibson guitar company brought the humbucker to the main stream and it is synonymous with the famous Les Paul line. The two magnetic “bobbins” also make the humbucker twice as wide as a single coil pickup. Humbuckers are typically a lot more complicated than single coils and have many more parts that make up the complete pickup assembly. We have a great guide to the difference between neck and bridge pickups to help you understand pickups even more! This article focuses on the different types of pickups you’ll find on an electric guitar, but location of these pickups matters too. Unlike an acoustic guitar, which generates sound from the hollow body, solid body electric guitars need electricity and amplification to produce sound! Pickups are an important part of this process. There would be no electricity passing through the strings of the guitar. Without pickups, electric guitars would not be able to produce any sound. The pickups on a guitar are typically made up of a magnet, coil of wire, and magnets. The pickups of guitars are responsible for generating electrical signals that are transmitted to the amplifier, which then produces sound.