How To Choose A Guitar Pick For Acoustic & Electric Guitars in 2023

by Acoustik Attak November 10, 2022

A pick is an essential tool in any guitarist’s arsenal. While some guitarists prefer strumming and plucking with their fingers alone, using a pick offers several advantages worth considering. Most notably, guitar picks improve playing speed and accuracy, as well as your sound and tonal delivery.

That said, using a pick will bring you one step closer to mastering your craft. This makes your selection one of the most important choices you can make as a guitarist.

While pick selection is a personal preference, some picks are better suited for certain techniques — so you’ll want to make sure you choose the best one for your playing style. This can be a tricky decision because there are so many available pick options on the market.

Here, we will look at some of the best guitar picks for both acoustic and electric guitars and how using these picks can benefit your playing. We’ll cover:

The Difference Between Acoustic & Electric Guitars

The first step to choosing the right pick is to determine what type of guitar you have: acoustic or electric. Understanding the difference between the two can help you decide which guitar pick is best for your needs.

Below are some of the most considerable differences between electric and acoustic guitars:

Sound production: The most obvious difference between acoustic and electric guitars is the way they produce sound. Acoustic guitars use the resonance of the soundboard and body to amplify the sound produced by the strings. By contrast, electric guitars use pickups and an amplifier to intensify the sound produced by the strings.

Amplification: Electric guitars require an amplifier to produce sound at a level suitable for performance. Acoustic guitars, on the other hand, can be played without amplification and still produce a performance-worthy sound.

Size and shape: Acoustic guitars are generally larger and have a hollow body, which is necessary for sound resonance. Electric guitars are smaller and have a solid body, which allows for greater ease of movement and handling.

String type: Acoustic guitars typically have steel strings while electric guitars can have either steel or nylon strings. Steel strings produce a brights, more percussive sound while nylon strings produce a warmer, more mellow sound.

Playing style: The playing style for each type of guitar can vary greatly. Acoustic guitars are commonly used for fingerpicking, strumming, and playing chords while electric guitars are often used for playing lead lines, solos, and power chords.

Picks for Different Playing Styles

There are dozens of different picks to choose from, but there are two basic types to consider: thick and thin.

Thick picks have more mass than thin ones, so they have less give and flexibility. They also have sharper edges, which makes them better at picking attack. That said, the ideal thickness of your pick will depend on how hard you hit the strings and whether you’re strumming or picking individual notes.

Strumming

Strumming is simply striking multiple strings at once, usually with your fingers or a pick.

This technique is most commonly used to play chords and rhythm patterns in styles such as folk, country, and pop music. Despite this popularity, many guitarists do not know how to do it properly.

The good news is that strumming patterns are easy to learn once you understand that they’re just combinations of up-and-down strokes that you play as you alternate between different chords.

You can do this in different ways, like moving up and down the fretboard, but most beginner guitarists focus on perfecting their downstrokes when they’re just getting started.

Picking

Picking is a technique used to play individual notes on the guitar, rather than strumming chords. This technique may not be as relaxed and mellow as strumming, but using a pick to pluck individual strings will produce a distinct percussive sound.

The Best Guitar Picks for Acoustic Guitar

The best picks for acoustic strumming are thin, yet durable; comfortable to hold, and easy to play with. Most importantly, the ideal pick is one that is flexible enough to bend the strings without breaking them. The flex allows the pick to glide effortlessly across the strings, producing a smooth and percussive sound on every strike.

attak guitar pick Flexible picks also produce clean notes that are rich and bright in tone, making them perfect for strumming chords. If you’re a rhythm guitarist looking for a pick for strumming, the Attak Pick from Acoustik Attak is an excellent choice. This textured pick delivers a percussive “double-striking” effect that harmonically enhances mid-range frequencies and smoothes out individual string volumes on open chords.

The result?

A crisp, clear, and beautiful delivery of every chord, every time.

The Best Guitar Picks for Electric Guitar

Electric guitars respond more dynamically to picking techniques — and while thin picks are great for strumming, they’re too flexible to maintain enough control for accurate delivery of individual notes.

With this in mind, you’ll want a stiffer pick with more mass so that it bites into the strings with each stroke. The thicker material allows for more string contact and better control over volume and tone. This creates a sharper attack and louder sound from each note you play. Additionally, thicker picks give you more control over your playing style and help you create a signature sound.

Stronger, thicker, and heavier picks are better for electric guitarists who want to play heavy power chords. However, even if you prefer fingerstyle songs with less distortion in them, this type will still be useful because they tend not to fall out as much during strumming motions like palm muting or raking across multiple strings with one stroke motion.

That said, here are two top-tier options for your consideration:

stealth pick First on the list is the Stealth Pick. This pick is every solo shredder’s dream: its pointed tip allows for unmatched precision in speed picking, alternate picking, and sweep picking. While this pick delivers a clearer tone, its ergonomic design is what sets the Stealth apart. The center of the pick is concave with raised bumps, which lock the thumb into place and prevent slippage.

blade pick The next pick is the Blade Pick. This pick creates a compressed sound when playing individual notes and creates a plucking feeling rather than a picking feeling. This allows distortion and overdrive effects to stand out with more clarity while also reducing the muddiness of excess string resonance in the lower-frequency range.

Choosing the Best Guitar Pick for You

Every guitarist needs a pick (or several) in order to perfect their skill and master the craft. That said, guitar picks come in all shapes and sizes — and finding the right one will depend largely on your playing style.

Thicker picks are great for creating deep and resonant sounds, playing fast licks, and shredding solos with a precise attack. On the other hand, thin picks produce bright and distinct tones, making them best-suited for strumming chords or rhythms with less attack power.

Regardless of your playing preference — from electric guitarists looking for a strong pick for powerful plucking or acoustic guitarists who prefer pliable picks for bright tones and crisp delivery — Acoustik Attak’s selection will meet all of your musical needs. Explore our selection of guitar picks for acoustic and electric guitars online to find the perfect fit for your playing style!