Fat necks vs. slim necks: Is there a real difference?

To the question, absolutely (IMO). I find thin neck fatiguing. Most of my builds have sizable necks and my feeling is they're more stable and those particular guitars sound best. Could be the mass of wood? That said my absolute favorite guitar has an Allparts neck from probably 20 years ago. It has some heft, but not the 1 inch baseball bat neck that I have on a few others. Probably .90 to 1.0 with a very slight vee. I tried replicating it with a Warmoth Boatneck and ended up disliking that profile, so I sanded it down to lessen the vee. I've had some issues with the full 1 inch necks in recent months. Aging hands, whatcha gonna do?

To summarize, I think more wood means better stability and more acoustic resonance. Like anything else of this nature, its all subective/personal preference and the flakey opinion of a musician.

I have guitars with bigger necks, slim 60's style necks and some really thin fast necks. The bigger necks sound better and feel better, your hand is not so clenched and in my opinion a richer sound even when played unplugged.

It really depends on what you want to use it for. If you're a shredder, then the Ibanez "super wizard" profile fits the bill.


On a Gibson, I like the Les Paul thin taper '60s (whatever the hell it's called).


And on a Stratocaster, a V shape profile is pretty awesome.


On a Telecaster, the D shape seems to be more appropriate.


You should probably just buy a bunch more guitars.

I like thicker C-shaped necks, but not baseball bats. I have an SG with a "slim taper" neck and it makes my hand cramp when playing barre chords in the lower positions, just not enough support for my hand.

I’ve had all kinds of neck profiles over the years, and mostly was able to acclimate to them. As long as they’re not one extreme or the other, it’s probably going to be OK.

I had a Les Paul with a huge neck a while back. I was having some thumb issues at the time which it seemed to aggravate, so I sold it. Unfortunately, I never replaced it, so I’m Les Paul-less.

Yeah, my hands aren't any catcher's mitts. I'd say meaty palms and average, even short by proportion fingers. Its just preference and kind of a dislike for real skinny necks, like my Epi 335 Pro. I used to have an ES-333 that had an annoying [ squared edge profile. Production-wise, I think my favorite neck in my collection is my 2010 50's LP Tribute. Not quite the VOS 50's LPs, but substantial.

I'm still maintain it's a matter of what type of music you're going to play.


For the record, I have rather large hands, but still prefer a slimmer taper neck.


.02

It definitely makes a difference.

First, thicker is more stable. Truss rods can only do so much, and they often do very little in the area between the 5th/6th fret and where it meets the body, which is why you see that S curve/dog tongue thing pretty often. If I'm refretting a guitar with a skinny neck, that dip there can be really, really deep and need a lot of sanding, especially on acoustics. On chunkier ones, I usually don't have to do as much.

They do sound different. The neck is going to have its own resonance, and if it vibrates too much, it can cancel out certain frequencies and alter the tone. This is most obvious with basses when you get hot spots and dead spots. Guitars have it too, you just don't experience the notes totally dropping out in a band mix because it is such a profoundly different instrument musically. You don't need to have a baseball bat to get those tones, though. Lots of necks of classic vintage pedigree are rather slender in the open position and a few frets up but have more meat as you move down the neck. Since your thumb usually rotates down towards the floor at that point people rarely notice the extra chunk when they're playing, so it is a win/win. Personally, when I get a guitar in my hands and I find that I really like how it sounds or that it stands out from a sea of near identical guitars, I find that it also has a chunkier neck. The change in tone may not necessarily be empirically the best for everyone's ears, but it usually is for mine. As the neck gets thicker you're increasing the inertia, and also moving its resonant frequency up. There seems to be a point of diminishing returns, and possibly a point where the tone gets worse instead of better.

I personally like how they feel. I share the "hand fatigue" thing and will get weird cramps, especially with rhythm playing. A ridiculously chunky neck will feel strange, but I really don't find that thinner necks are "faster". On a few occasions I've set up a few guitars in front of me and tried going back and forth with scales or exercises that are familiar to me, and I can't find any difference. The only thing I can think of is that a neck that is very flat on the back forces you to drop your thumb lower on the neck which increases reach, relaxes the wrist, and might make some people play a bit faster. Most "fast" necks are very flat. Interestingly, classical guitar necks are huge, but the backs are also very flat, and you need a lot of reach and a relaxed wrist to play those well, so it could ultimately just be a matter of coaxing out certain technique.

For a while I was taking measurements of necks that I really liked, both for sound and feel. I found that almost universally they ended up just under the full one inch by the time you got close to the body, and the first fret thickness was around .800"-.850", which is chunkier than the average modern guitar, but certainly not a boat neck or fat neck - those are generally an inch up and down the whole thing. If I was building, I'd follow that pretty closely on acoustics and electrics.

Last observation: people often misdiagnose a neck profile they don't like as too big because it is uncomfortable. Often I've found that there are lumps or hard edges that they're hitting that come from hasty shaping at the factory, rather than there just being too much mass.

This^

I want a wide neck if I have a choice - the "wider nut and fretboard" of the "High Performance" Les Pauls are as if I had them custom-done for my particular physiology Same string spacing as normal, but more meat on either side of the Es.

It answers thirty years of questions I didn't know or think to ask!

My hands are massive - the only thing they're sensitive to is nut width.

The older Korean Samick-factory stuff I'd get what I call importitis, the forearm would cramp up like I was trying to free climb Everest. I get it with any Tele as well for some reason I've ever played so it's a combo of neck/body/how it hangs/holds as well I suspect.