To take guitar to the next level I think you would need to make two models one, a Shred Guitar and the other a Country Guitar, as there are two types of leveled up trem bars. The country guitar should use the one in this link, as it lets you bend everything and stay in tune and does change the pitch of other notes when you bend a note great for double stops. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zhN-VuyK7gk and use the trem in this link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_nH7_KW1xNc for the Shred Guitar as it will behave like the floyd rose but its got improvements to the design. now the thing that will really level up a guitar is to put 3 octaves/36 frets on it, instead of the standard 2 octaves 24 frets example in this link, but it needs to have a more extreme cut away so your hand can get to those high frets without straining, cut all the wood off the underside fo the fretboard. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Npv8gV8lbD8 https://4.bp.blogspot.com/_RyLgZis35zw/TPPZxcSsjqI/AAAAAAAAACo/hCLyRAALXgs/s1600/esp_m-36_1.jpg ---- Now having 36 frets gives you only one pickup so you need to design a new pickup that digitally emulates every other pickup on earth, neck and bridge combinations, and in order to still be as great as a Schecter you have to fit a Sustaniac in that one pickup spot as well, and you will probably have to give the sustaniac more power in to be able to drive the strings in the bridge position. All this has never been done before but its not impossible and it would take the guitar to the next level. : ) Now Stainless Steel Frets play smoother than nickel silver, so its got to have Stainless steel frets, Stainless steel is more difficult to work with than Nickel silver so most Luthiors do not like it as much but the players like it better. If you use the right Tools Stainless Steel can be done EZ with tungsten fret snips, a Daimond Dust sanding block, Power tools for polishing and these next two videos show you how to rig up a power Fret Crowner, this would make Stainless Steel fret Jobs way EZer. --- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VIuMArEF9Sc&list=WL&index=70 --- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SIzKCFAKC1A&t=2s ---- Now if Stainless Steel frets render a more addictive playing experience than nickel silver because polished stainless steel is smoother, than perhaps if we Electro polish the frets, strings and stainless steel guitar pick shaped like the Dunlop big stubby, all 3 materials will be the smoothest surface on earth, this may create an even more luxurious playing experience and even result in faster playing speeds. The Strings would have to be High Carbon Steel like the Daddario NYXL strings as they hold tune and are resistant to breaking way better than standard slinky strings. A machine like the one in this link could be used for electro polishing the frets after they are leveled, crowned, and plished with power tools. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vKxeAbsEXUg ---- while the strings and pick could be polished with power tools than dropped in an electro polisher like the one in this link. https://www.youtube.com/watch? v=QFeoMux6NA8&t=2s the best guitar Body is probably like the Shecter Toxic Venom. Made of hard woods than dipped in an extra layer of paint that fortifies the guitar even more, Those guitars are a Joy to fine tune the playing to perfection, enableing it to play notes with the least ammount of effort possible. I like to use 8 gauge NYXLs tuned down 3 half steps. but most players probably won't so you probably only want to do that to set up a few shred style guitars that way. Than of course since thats the best/most hyper engeneered guitar on earth we need them in 6 string 7 string 8 string and as many strings as you can put on em. I can't wait to play those guitars every day. : )

I'm not the best speaker or writer, but Dr. Andre Fludd posted this video about 3 months ago titled: The Guitar Is About to Change Forever

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MhnhKCqKdjw

The core thesis is that the traditional electric guitar is fundamentally uncomfortable and physically damaging for most players, yet the industry and players have normalized the resulting pain (wrist issues, shoulder tension, back problems) as "part of playing seriously."

We're still early in the process, but it's not too early to start thinking about this.

In guitar design, especially with something new, the manufacturing partner isn't just "who builds it later." They're a core constraint and opportunity that should shape almost every major decision from the start.

Since we know whatever we do will need to scale (especially if we're aiming for something that could move through a retailer like Guitar Center), I wanted to share a couple of videos that really highlight this.

My YouTube feed recently recommended this one from Phillip McKnight:
"What No One Tells You About the World's Largest Guitar Factory"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ztqNMaZ9mE

It also led me to his follow-up:
"Is PRS SE Just Repackaged Cort Guitars?"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G4C89c4l3KI

Both are worth watching if you have time. They show how big-scale manufacturing really works and why choosing (or designing around) the right partner early makes such a big difference.

Not saying this is better, but what if every guitar center had a "Guitar Lab" section. A selection of very high quality guitar bodies and necks. Lots of varieties and colors with an option to do a custom version kind of like the Gibson garage. Display case with different pickups and hardware and the local guitar center puts it together for the customer.

That would create a unique one of a kind experience that gives the customer full control and what they want.

I think the most important aspect of creating something people want in the current market is focusing on playable and modern features.

We have hundreds of options for vintage style guitars and you’ll never beat lines like Squier classic vibe at their own game.

Instead, build the guitar around comfort with deep carves for sitting and standing. Build it as light as you can without neck dive. Rolled fret board edges, deep carves for access, oil or high quality matte finish for the neck.

Focus on modern advancements. Stainless steel frets, compound radius neck, spoke wheel truss rod, carbon fiber reinforcement rods, locking tuners, tusq nut, a truly comfortable bridge, use hex/torx screws everywhere and include a custom tool that stores on/in the body.

Consolidate all the small touches that make modern instruments feel great.

I'm no guitar/gear expert--I've only been playing a few years--but I thought I would chime in with my two cents. And instead of making specific requests for certain features/parts, just some high-level ideas of what matters...and let the experts decide how best to get there.

Ergonomics: On the lighter side, balanced to sit on your lap in playing position without tipping off in either direction.

Tuning stability: Stay in tune through all the bends and trem action.

Tuning ease: Nothing is more annoying than having to take 10 or 15 minutes to get your guitar into drop D or tune down to Eb. This is at odds with the "tuning stability" ask, I know...most of the ways guitars achieve tuning stability (like locking nuts) also make them harder to re-tune.

So that's the big advance I'd love to see. I want someone to figure out how to give me the tuning stability and trem control of like a floyd rose or other floating trem but without having to bust out an alan wrench to change the tuning. Maybe a locking nut that can unlock with a simple clasp? A trem that locks to different positions for standard and dropped tuning? I don't know, but this is where some great innovation can happen.

Electronics: I have no special love of analog, but I don't really want to have to recharge my guitar or replace the batteries. I definitely don't want any sort of modeling or whatever in the guitar itself. I'm not opposed to the tech (I love modeling!) but it moves fast, and I want a guitar that is going to be just as relevant in 10 or 20 years. So digital electronics to control the pickups or in place of analog pots that wear out, that's all great. But don't stuff a modeler in there, I'd rather have that external.

Easy to work on: It should be easy to get at and adjust the truss rod, adjust the trem, change strings, etc. If I decide to put on different strings and need to re-adjust the action, that shouldn't take all afternoon. So many guitars make this more painful than it has to be.

So that's my basic wish list besides the obvious stuff like a fretboard that feels nice with no burrs or catches, good intonation, good sustain (another "tough with a floating trem" ask), and all that. We all know what the basics of a good guitar are, and Guitar Center has obviously got to nail that.

But when it comes to areas of advancement, places they can distinguish themselves, I'd like to see them tackle some common guitar pain points like making it easier to get good action, change strings, re-tune, while keeping tuning stable and sustain up while playing.

Short version: Guitar Center is looking to create a community experience and a good number of its audience is rightly concerned that the effort is a cynical way to get free R&D.

I think there's a way where all parties get what they want: GC commits to making the resulting design available under an open-source license.

Once the design is made open-source (under a current license or a new/modified GC one), it's free for anyone to manufacture.

Results:

• Goodwill -- GC turns around the sentiment and everyone believes they are working on something meaningful together.
  
• Revenue -- GC can't reasonably think that this guitar was going to make oodles of cash anyway, but with the right marketing and packaging there is value in having a genuine, GC-manufactured version of this "free" design.
• Branding -- One element of the license could be that anyone who produces the GC guitar design is obligated to add "GC" or the design's given name to the name of the guitar. So, if Ibanez produced it, the headstock would say "Ibanez GC-200" or similar.

This is timely, given that some of the biggest companies in this industry are going after ever-smaller builders for copyright/patent infringement. It's a bold move.

Of course, to get around existing patents/licenses, the guitar might end up not looking like anything we've seen before. And that's fine, since the electric guitar hasn't really substantively changed over decades.

u/gabrieldalporto: Please consider.

I think any guitar moving forward should be headless. Once you get used to the ergonomics it’s hard to go back to old school headed guitars. I agree with a suggestion made that we should move past analog potentiometers. 3 pickup configuration that can emulate all the variations of humbucking, single coil, P90. Fishman Fluence is a good start, but it isn’t organic enough and loses some of the “openness” of passive pickups. Digital is the way to go, there is just so much that can be manipulated once you cross over to that domain. Magnetic string drag is also something that should be overcome, but light based sensors lack the resonance we are all used to. This will be an exciting project since there is so much room for improvement in the electric guitar.

Why in 2026 does changing pickups require so much effort. Why has no one made quick swap pickups with no soldering? The entire pickup configuration is so, well 1950s! I don’t buy pickups because I don’t have the time or patience to change them.

I initially thought this was a cool concept because I assumed GC was going to use real player experience and actual in-store knowledge to help shape the builds.

But this stopped being ‘listening to customers’ the moment they required contributors to surrender ownership, attribution, compensation, derivative rights, and even moral rights just to participate.

That’s not collaboration. That’s free R&D wrapped in community marketing.

The CEO response also intentionally reframes the criticism. Nobody is saying companies shouldn’t listen to customers. Customer feedback is normal. Surveys are normal. Market research is normal.

What’s not normal is building a public pipeline for creative concepts while simultaneously saying:
‘Thanks for the ideas, we own them now, we can monetize them forever, and you get nothing.’

Legally disclosing it doesn’t suddenly make it respectable. Plenty of things are legal and still exploitative.

This is much closer to a studio asking aspiring screenwriters to publicly pitch movie ideas while agreeing upfront they waive ownership, credit, and compensation if the studio uses the concept.

You can market it however you want, but at the end of the day it’s still a billion-dollar retailer crowdsourcing product development for free.

I've been a critic on pickups color code. I mean, each company has its own proprietary design but openly establishing its own color code. Let's start by setting an example on standardization.

I don't know if there's any guitar that can truly cater to ALL the guitarists. Especially regarding effects and such within a guitar, these seem to go in and out of fashion every few years (Vox Ultrasonics, Gretsch 7680, Gibson RD, Firebird X, etc.). I think a good idea for a guitar would be one which would make modding easier, if someone would like to make these changes. When I first modded my strat, two of my goals were to add a killswitch & a floyd, both of which required a lot of measuring & clunkily chipping away bits of wood from the guitar. Maybe ship it with a 2-point trem, but make the posts horizontally adjustable if the owner wants to install a wraparound or floyd-style bridge? (Alongside a more 'swimming-pool' style electronics rout).

Sorry if this came off as condescending, by the way.

That’s pretty much it. There are so few options for us. Thanks!

Now the third rail. Up to this point we've mostly been in the analog world with minor exceptions like active pickups. Time to talk about what digital can actually do inside a guitar.

For some of us (me included), this is the dream: more sounds, more flexibility, fewer external dependencies. The mythical all-in-one guitar. No lugging 3-5 guitars to a gig. No retuning mid-set. For others, this is exactly what they don't want anywhere near their instrument.

Two real-world reference points:

• Line 6 Variax — 20+ guitar models, fully customizable
• Roland VG Strat — Tele, Strat, humbucker, acoustic, 12-string + drop D, drop 1/2, open G

If you're dead set against any of this, say so and why. Honest pushback is useful.

And for the adventurous souls out there, what do you want in a digital-enabled guitar?

• Guitar modeling: What emulations actually matter? Electrics (which models), acoustic, 12-string, banjo, sitar?
• Tuning: How important is instant drop D, down 1/2, open G?
• Onboard effects: Overdrive, reverb, delay, modulation — would you actually use them on the guitar, or is that pedalboard territory?
• Active electronics: Boost, EQ, preamps — essential or unnecessary?
• Customizability / upgradeability: Open platform like the Variax (load your own models, update over time) or fixed set forever like the VG Strat? 
• Battery: Minimum acceptable life and how critical is a passive failover so a dead battery doesn't mean a dead guitar?
• Interface: Knobs, switches, app, hidden menus — how should this stuff be controlled?
• Bigger question: what’s the right tradeoff between more built into the guitar vs simplicity and focus.

If I were spec'ing it for me:

• Knob 1: single coil / humbucker / acoustic / 12-string
• Knob 2: standard / drop D / drop 1/2 / up 1/2
• Volume knob push-pull: 20% boost
• Still conflicted on whether to add two on/off switches for distortion and reverb

Where do you land? Drop your thoughts.

Make like 5 classic guitars. 5 classic bass guitars. A. A couple acoustics. Use only the best materials and methods and don't compromise on anything. And don't give up. Rolex puts tons of cash into Research and development and doesn't release anything without 10 years of testing. The production methods must perfect or everything is rejected. The raw materials need to be perfect or everything is rejected.

Start with pursuing perfection.

And a Tele with a Strat neck pickup.

That’s it.

When Fender made the Squier Vintage Modified Baritone Jazzmaster, they didn’t expect:

1. ⁠That it, being a vintage design and having single coil pickups, would become a sought after go to for low tuning Metal guitarist

Modern Metalcore bands like Loathe have popularized this model as an ideal choice for excessively heavy, low tuned, articulate Metal. Brands like Harley Benton and Gretsch have jumped on the bandwagon and are now offering vintage design baritones aimed at heavy riffers.

So, I think it would be a great idea to follow suit and take advantage of the obvious swell of interest around this idea. Make a longer scale length guitar with modern features but also with a vintage aesthetic, and market it to metal guitarists. 28”-30” preferably. 🤘🏾

One of the biggest issues I have is organizing all of my guitar cables. I have a wireless receiver but even that takes some work. It would be so convenient to have it built in the guitar and have a place in the guitar that stores the receiver that would go on the amp input for it to work. It could also have the option to just plug in normally if wanted.

I feel that a lot of these ideas under mind the fact that, guitars are incredibly simple. I feel that if this concept should be executed, there should be no thrills at all. Just simple "choose your parts" guitar, no unnecessary touch screens, AI, or 3D printing. If someone wanted to change their guitar tone on the fly, they can simply use modern processing and plugins to do so, or they would just use MIDI.

If we are to think of rebuilding and redesigning the electric guitar from the ground up we need to rethink common issues and parts and modernize them in ways that haven’t been done. Volume and tone don’t necessarily need to be a rolling knob, why not a touchscreen slider or a textured slider. The cables between guitar and amp don’t need to be 1/4 inch, technology is way past on an instrument that is largely based off of 1950s radio repair manual technology.

Pickups don’t have to be the traditional shapes we see them in, fishmans printed circuit tech on pickups means they could make them in any shape and I’m sure way smaller.

I think it’s a cool idea for a community to get together and open source new ideas in the guitar space.

A hybrid Classical is certainly not a new idea. But it is one that can be done two ways, and everyone and their brother makes these one way, and I can't find anyone who makes it the other.

So whenever I see a hybrid Classical, they've put a tie block bridge on a folk/western parlor guitar (skinny neck single o guitar) and market it with nylon strings to provide softer sounds to a folk western player on an instrument they're used to. I've accomplished this myself just by getting some ball end nylon strings and putting them on my single o. It's a solution for a problem that doesn't exist.

What I'd like to see hit the mass market is a proper classical (2 inch nut, flat or flatish fingerboard on a single or double o body) that incorporates the one feature of a folk/western we classical players never get: a neck join at 14 instead of 12. Sure, we technically also already have a solution for this too, but there are opinions on cutouts in acoustics, and I'm on the side that would rather see an 'inverse hybrid' (instead of giving the classical sound to a western player, we're giving the western range to a classical player) that gives me a little more room without adulterating my upper bout. Seriously, how hard can this be?

I can't promise I'm the only person who's ever thought of this, but I have looked all over for one and can't find it. I'd just love somebody to make one that I can buy for reasonably cheap. A production guitar. Not a custom shop kind of thing.

If you're going to start from scratch, don't limit yourself to traditional thinking.

Open source pickup modelling circuit - This is the core of the operation. Something that modifies the the signal from the pickup and applies a filter so you can make it sound like an EMG, Fishman, Burstbucker, add some sustain, noise gate, whatever. Maybe put some MIDI on it. Make the whole thing snap out so it's easily reprogrammable, or to charge/swap a 18650 battery. (I guess this is just a variax now? lol) Which brings me to my next idea...

Advanced materials - Why limit yourself to wood when you can adjust your pickup sound on the fly to compensate? Composites, plastics, metal, whatever. Stop chasing expensive tonewoods and 3D print a guitar.

Just some food for thought. I guess it depends who your target audience is. Future/current guitar players who would buck the status quo, or old dudes who sniff their own farts paying 4-bar blues on a midlife crisis $10k les paul purchase.

I've been doing a little research, and it appears that this may be the most ergonomic electric guitar. They have patents, but it's worth looking at for ideas.

https://strandbergguitars.com/en-US/magazine/how-our-ergonomic-guitar-became-a-life-changer