How do you decide on what pickups to buy? (2024)

i usually stick with what's in the guitar but i tried all kinds of stuff with my tele. it was all word of mouth from local players, and/or forum talk that lit the flame, but ultimately, trial & error was the deciding factor. this was before the better produced demos that we have these days; most of the clips years ago were terrible. much more improved sonics available to influence and inform the fact gatherers.

Lots and lots...and LOTS of trial and error!

clips, clips, more clips, and forum experience generally. if you listen to enough clips you can get a general overview of what to expect. now, there is certainly a giant heap of gambling considering recording and equipment variables, but you can get a gist of what to expect. i try and find clips of people with similar equipment at the least. once i tag one that i think i might like, i scour the net for people with experience with the builder. if thats on the up and up, the only thing left to do is leap and hope you like whats on the other end. overall, ive been pretty satisfied with my decisions, but if not, getting out of pups isnt the worst thing in the world.

Trial & error. For one thing it's so subjective. Years ago I worked in a big guitar store and I tried about every pup that was available back then. Dimarzio, duncan, Bill Lawrence, Gibsons, Fenders. The funny thing is lots of times I wound up back on the pup that came in the guitar in the first place. That happened with lots of different guitars. My co workers and I passed the time trying out pups and discussing the results. I found Gibson pups to be very high quality. I also really liked Dimarzios. This was circa 1990 btw. Bottom line is you never know what you are going to get. But you usually know right away if it's a keeper or not.

I love Dimarzios, always have. There has never been a tone I wanted I couldn't find with one of their pickups.

thanks guys great feedback

Bare Knuckle Pickups. Great site w specs, suggestion by style/guitar type, and a wide spectrum of sound clips for each pup in both clean/driven modes in playing styles related to that pup.

I like Fender Custom Shop pickups for single coils. Better than the Duncan's I've tried. Unless your going for say Antiquities. I'd get the Fat 50's or Custom 69 set.

when I decided I wanted to upgrade my guitars with some new pickups, I kind of had a vague idea of what I wanted (high output, passive, low noise, rich tonal output and definition), so I checked out a TON of video demos, and did lots and lots of online research - read reviews, checked out endorsem*nts from different guitarists that I loved and respected, scoured different websites of various pickups companies... over the course of several months, I narrowed down different brands one by one, until I eventually came to the conclusion that the newer Lace humbuckers were the ones for me. I made my choices (Drop & Gains, and Dirty Heshers), and I don't regret the ones I picked at all.

Honestly after you've research every website, review and demo video it comes down to trial and error. Some pickups work for people and others not so much. I had to go through a couple of winders to find the right humbuckers for me. Buy some, sell them if they aren't doing anything for you.

Research as much as possible to narrow it down, then try a whole bunch and keep the winner. Some guitars I've found what I was looking for after trying only two or three sets. Others....well, let's just say I've had almost a dozen different pups in my SG (which has effectively turned into my testbed for buckers) and seven or eight different sets in one of my Strats.

I like dimarzios also. My latest guitar, epi G400, I replaced all the stock pups by listening to all the clips on their site and then considered how I would like each of the 3 to be voiced. I feel like their website really helped me and I would recommend anyone check it out even if you are not down w dimarzios. There is a bunch of useful info there. Probably the main suggestion was to put higher power pups in bridge and relatively lower powered pup in he bridge.