The BEST Guitars with Built in Tuner (Choosing the Right One for You!)

Music is a source of entertainment for people worldwide and helps us experience our emotions on a deeper level. It also helps the mind be creative, resulting in better brain functioning.

The guitar is one of the most iconic musical instruments musicians have used for centuries to create music. Today we will be focusing on the best guitars with built in tuner, both acoustic and electric.

The prospect of buying a guitar is exhilarating as it helps you research the types of guitars and the features that come with them.

One such feature is the built-in tuner you will find in most guitars in this modern day and age, and it helps the guitarist tune the guitar in a matter of seconds.

The tuner works because it already has a set of pre-installed reference pitches that the sound of the strings needs to match. Tuners assist musicians in setting the pitch of their guitars and improving their tunes.

Choosing a guitar can be quite the task as a person buys it intending to use it for a long time. As modern acoustic guitars come with built-in tuners, one should know the different types produced by various companies.

There are cheap guitars with built-in tuners and pricey ones too. The best way is to choose one with good quality and simple design, especially for beginners.

Why don’t high end guitars come with built in tuners?

Guitars can range from basic to premium prices depending on the quality of the material, strings, tuners, and other hardware. High-quality guitars usually do not come with built-in tuners because of their size.

Cheap acoustic guitars will go out of tune due to their low-quality gears. The gear will roll back, slide out of position, or skip while tuning. The tuning doesn’t last even an hour for some guitars when the gears are poorly made.

For high-quality acoustic guitars, tuners do not usually come inbuilt into the body because they can hamper the sound. Tuners are not tiny chips that can be inserted into the guitar and used.

They are bulky devices that take up considerable space, which can hinder the picking up of string vibration and the internal resonance of the guitar.

People who spend top dollar for their guitars prefer to have external tuners instead of built-in, which could obstruct the sound production.

They think that most guitars with built-in tuners chop the output to the amp when the tuner is engaged.

There is a high probability that most people who spend premium money on high-end guitars will know how to tune a guitar without the help of tuners.

However, even if they choose to use a tuner, they will use external tuners since they are much more reliable and produces better results.

People who play in concerts and shows will opt for external tuners because they are more accurate and do not mess with the internal build of the guitar. The internal construction and tensions of a guitar are vital components.

The vibration that occurs when you strum the strings should be in a natural flow. The presence of a built-in tuner in the guitar’s construction might give it an uneven build, leading to obstructions in the sound produced.

The tonal qualities might be lost when an incision is made on the guitar’s body while making space for a tuner. The result is such because the insertion of the tuner takes away maximum tension on that part of the guitar.

These are reasons why guitar players prefer to buy high-end guitars without tuners built into them. It is better to opt for external tuners since they produce better results in tuning the guitar.

Acoustic guitars with built in effects – The BEST Guitars with Built in Tuner

Acoustic guitars are a joy to have for all guitar players as they produce undistorted and clean sounds. Owning one of them is a must for those that are serious about their guitar-playing.

If you are looking for the best guitars with built in tuners, we have listed some of them for you.

Fender Squier SA-105CE Cutaway Electro Acoustic Guitar

The Fender Squier SA-105CE comes with a Fishman Isys-T Pickup System with an integrated tuner which helps you tune your guitar with ease. It gives accurate phase control and tone shaping.

It has all the classic guitar tones that allow the guitar player to achieve perfect tuning, thus creating excellent sounds.

Kadence Frontier 41 Semi Acoustic Guitar

The Kadence Frontier 41 is a semi-acoustic guitar that has excellent sound quality and is made from rosewood. It comes with a built-in tuner that helps you achieve easy tuning.

With the preamp, you can also control the volume, bass, mid, treble, etc. The Frontier 41 is one of the best semi-acoustic guitars to fulfil your musical desires.

Yamaha FX280 Natural Electro Acoustic Guitar

The Yamaha FX280 is one of the best guitars to buy if you are a beginner. It is easy to handle, lightweight, and has a very convenient built-in preamp.

The preamp has a tuning feature which helps tune the guitar for you with ease. You do not need to seek professional help while tuning the guitar./

Yamaha FSX315C Natural Acoustic Guitar

The Yamaha FSX315C is a medium-sized guitar which is excellent for people who play shows and concerts. It comes with a pre-installed Matt Electronics System 8 and pickup controls, including volume, tone, and tuner connections.

It is a little bit on the pricy side, but it will give you complete satisfaction with its clean, soothing sounds.

Ibanez PF15ECE

The Ibanez PF15ECE is an inexpensive acoustic guitar with excellent quality sound and tone. It has a built-in tuner that functions perfectly, tuning the strings to the correct pitch.

Inexpensive guitars can frustrate you with the constant need to keep tuning them. However, the PF15ECE is a great-sounding guitar, which, once adjusted, lasts for days.

Epiphone J-45 EC Studio AJ22OSCE Electro-Acoustic Guitar

The J-45 EC AJ22OSCE is one of Epiphone’s most famous guitars, bought by both young and old. It boasts of a great sound, body, and look. 

It comes with a Shadow’s new Performer Tuner that includes controls like treble, bass, and phase setting of the sound. The Epiphone J-45 guitar series is known for its high resonant sound and easy playability.

Fender SA105CE Electro Acoustic Guitar

The Fender SA105CE is an excellent guitar for beginners and a great product for its price. The tuner works wonderfully in noisy places and tunes the guitar perfectly, giving out a fantastic sound.

For people that are starting, this is an excellent guitar to purchase. The built-in tuner will produce clean sounds when plugged into an amplifier.

Ibanez AEG50N

The Ibanez AEG50N Acoustic guitar produces a balanced sound. Players can adjust sounds in the AEQ-TTS Preamp from strong tones to clean and bright sounds.

It also comes with a tuner that allows you to tune your guitar to a perfect pitch.

Taylor GS Mini-e Koa

The Taylor GS Mini-e Koa has one of the best preamps regarding electronics among acoustic guitars.

It has a built-in chromatic tuner that helps people who usually play live shows and concerts, making it convenient for them to tune their guitars.

It is a bit on the higher side of prices, but the electronics are what makes it all worth it. It helps produce a crisp and clear sound.

Ibanez AEWC400 Acoustic

Ibanez is one of the major companies worldwide that produces top-quality musical instruments. So, it is not a surprise to see their acoustic guitars’ good reviews from its customers.

The AED-SP2 preamp is an excellent addition to the preamp, making it convenient for musicians while playing live gigs.

Gibson Acoustic Songwriter Standard EC

The Gibson Acoustic Songwriter Standard EC has a classic look with modern electronics that provides remarkable tonal quality.

With a preamp that comes with a Grover Rotomatics built-in tuner, it provides an alternate option for musicians to tune their guitars.

Taylor Baby Taylor BTe-Koa

The Taylor Baby Taylor BTe-Koa is an excellent guitar for people with small stature. It is easy to maneuver, produces super-quality sound, and has a great feel.

Unlike other small-sized guitars, it is up there with the bigger ones in terms of sound quality. The built-in tuner works a great deal, especially for people that play gigs.

Takamine TSP178AC Thinline Acoustic-Electric Guitar

The Takamine Thinline acoustic guitar is a guitar with one of the slimmest bodies you will find out there. It has a curvy body that enhances the guitar’s look and is made for comfort.

It has a CT-3N preamp that Takamine also produces. It has a built-in tuner to help guitar players tune their guitars without needing an external tuner.

Taylor Academy 12e 

It is not easy to find cheap acoustic guitars that sound great, and the Taylor Academy 12e is precisely what that is.

A simple looking-guitar coupled with nothing fancy can be mistaken for an expensive guitar when you hear its powerful tone.

It also features the latest ES-B preamp with a built-in chromatic tuner and more controls.

Cordoba Fusion 12

The Cordoba Fusion 12 is a beautiful guitar with flame printed on the sides and the back. It is also a smaller guitar than the standard dreadnought size, making it much easier to play.

It has a tuner button that provides precise tuning. It will indicate whether you have hit the right tone as it is a very sensitive tuner.

Taylor Big Baby Taylor BBTe

Like in most Taylor acoustic guitars, the Taylor Big Baby Taylor BBTe has an ES-B Electronics preamp with a built-in digital chromatic tuner.

To use the tuner, you have to push a button, and you are good to go. It produces a powerful sound and is a great guitar to play when amplified.

Washburn Bella Tono Vite S9V

Washburn’s S9V body design allows guitar players to have a solid playing experience with its new body design. That doesn’t change the fact that the tone quality has reduced.

It has electronics built into the body with a preamp which comes with a tuner that helps guitarists make the tuning process more manageable.

Taylor Academy 10e

The Taylor Academy 10e is a semi-acoustic guitar available for a low price. However, its price does not reflect the features that it offers.

The 10e has an ES-B preamp that comes with a tuning feature. The preamp came unexpectedly to many people as they did not expect electronics installed in such a low-priced guitar.

Yamaha apxt2 3/4 

The Yamaha apxt2 3/4 is named as such because it is three-fourths of a regular-sized acoustic guitar. It comes with an Acoustic resonance Transducer preamp, making it an excellent choice if you are a beginner.

This guitar is easy to hold and play for people with smaller hands.

Taylor Academy 12e-N

Taylor Academy 12e-N received lots of praise for its simple playability for beginners. It has a small body with a great-sounding tone.

Adjust the tuning with the tuner in the ES-B preamp, which comes in-built on the guitar. It has a 12-fret neck that is similar to the classical guitar.

Washburn Festival EA15

The Washburn Festival EA15 is one of the best-selling acoustic guitars with a classic body that ended up being copied by many brands.

It is an iconic acoustic guitar and comes with quality Barcus-Berry Electronics. It has a tuner built-in to the body to help find the perfect tuning.

Washburn Comfort G15SCE-12 (12-String)

For people that want to go a step further and take on 12-string guitars, the Washburn Comfort G15SCE-12 is one of the most affordable ones on the market.

Washburn is known for their excellence in acoustic guitars, and this one is also no different.

The preamp has a tuner that helps achieve the perfect tone and produces vibrant sounds.

Epiphone EJ-200SCE

The Epiphone EJ-200SCe is more like a dreadnought but bigger in size. It produces louder sounds and comes with electronics built-in, as the name suggests.

Getting your hand on this guitar is excellent for its price range. It has the eSonic2 preamp with a built-in tuner and other sound controls.

Gretsch G5022CWFE Rancher Falcon

The Gretsch G5022CWFE Rancher Falcon is a large-sized guitar that may not be best suited if you are a beginner. It has a beautiful tone and adds some thickness to the sounds.

It has a tuner built-in on the preamp that comes on the guitar, making it more straightforward for you to adjust your tuning.

Washburn Comfort G55CE Koa

The Washburn Comfort G55CE offers a top-quality tone and comes at an affordable price. It is a very comfortable guitar, as the name suggests.

It comes with the Fishman Presys+ 501T preamp system, which has a built-in tuner and other sound controls.

Cordoba GK Studio Negra Nylon

As the name suggests, the Cordoba GK Studio Negra Nylong has nylon strings. It has a beautiful tone and an excellent finishing to its body. Users will love this guitar because of its comfort and its light weight.

It has a built-in tuner in the preamp that keeps the guitar in perfect tune. You will not be disappointed with this purchase.

Cordoba C5-CE Nylon

The Cordoba C5-CE Nylon is more like a Flamengo-style guitar than a classical guitar, and it is a good choice for beginners.

It produces a distinct low tone and has an onboard Fishman tuner that helps adjust the tuning without needing external or fret tuners.

Fender Tim Armstrong Hellcat

Fender has done an excellent job on their Tim Armstrong Hellcat acoustic guitar. It is a smaller guitar with a beautiful look to the body, and the fret is also adorned with fantastic artwork.

For the electronics, the Fishman preamp comes with a super tuner that is simple to use and tunes the guitar to perfection.

Taylor GS Mini-e

A rosewood guitar, the Taylor Mini-e is one of the popular ones among their mini range guitars. For its price range, it has a beautiful tone, is standard in size, and has good quality ES-B electronics built into the body.

It has a chromatic tuner built into the preamp, which enables you to keep the guitar in tune always.

Fender CD-140SCE Dreadnought Acoustic

Known for its fantastic craftsmanship, Fender’s CD-140SCE is a standard-sized guitar that many users have positively reviewed. It has a warm and clean tone and sounds much better when amplified.

The onboard tuner allows the user to keep his guitar in tune. It can last for days at a stretch if you tune your guitar once.

Best Acoustic Guitar with built in tuner

The best acoustic guitar with a built-in tuner from the list above would probably be the Taylor Academy 12e.

Our choice is the Taylor Academy 12e because it can be played by anyone, from beginners to experienced guitar players.

It is exceptionally comfortable for people with smaller hands, and the pricing is on the higher-end side of guitars, which justifies the hype around the Taylor Academy 12e.

The electronics on the 12e are also top-notch with the ES-B preamp system, which helps users keep their guitars in tune for long periods.

What is acoustic guitar with built in tuner?

A built-in tuner is a system that assists the user in tuning their guitar without requiring an external tuner.

It comes inbuilt in the preamp. Keep strumming the strings until the correct pitch is achieved, which will be shown on the preamp’s digital screen.

There are different types of tuners, but the one we are focusing on in this article is a built-in tuner.

Built-in tuners read the sound waves produced by the strings when we strum them. If there is a hint of a flat pitch, the tuner will pick it up and show it on the LED screen on the preamp.

Make sure you do not confuse built-in tuners with external tuners, also known as clip-on tuners.

External tuners are clipped on the head of the guitar whenever necessary. However, built-in tuners are installed in the body of the guitar instead.

The preamp not only comes with built-in tuners but also with sound controls that can adjust the treble, bass, and mid. Some come with advanced settings, which can help distort the sounds too.

How to use built-in guitar tuner

Most built-in tuners in guitars will come with standard tuning. In standard tuning, the first string should be in E chord, second in B, third in G, and continue till you reach the 6th string, which should also be in E chord.

Now that you know which string should be which chord turn on the built-in chromatic tuner by pressing the button on the preamp.

As you strum the strings one after the other, the tuner will show you how close you get to the desired pitch.

Conclusion

If you want a guitar with a good built-in tuner, you can look at our list and find your match. There are different types of guitars that cater to the needs of other users.

It is crucial to understand which type of guitar you need first and then look for the built-in tuner specifications. The best is to look for a chromatic tuner that can make the tuning last for an extended period.

Some built-in tuners require users to keep on retuning their guitars. So, check our list of the best guitars with built in tuner and choose the right one for yourselves.