Best Guitars for Metal: 5 That aren’t Cheap or Gimmicky

To do metal right, you need two things:

First, you need a particular type of guitar and gear.

Second, you need an aggressive playing style that employs said gear.

In this article, I'm going to work on the guitar portion of the metal equation.

Not just any guitar can make metal work and sound like it should. The genre demands a certain intensity, fullness and punch that you can't get from a Fender Stratocaster or jazzy hollow body.

It just doesn't work.

If you want to get into the metal style, and you want your guitar to cooperate, the selection must be made carefully.

Your search should be limited to the guitars that sound metal and handle the metal tone properly, producing heavy power chords, long-winded sustain and a nice chime on the high end. It's a sound that you can only get with certain instruments.

Further, these guitars should also be classy. You shouldn't have to get a guitar in some bizarre, contorted shape just to say, "Look, I can play metal!"

Instead, I'll direct you to guitars that, in my experience, are perfectly adept at handling the heavier metal tones while not having to rely on gimmicky "metal" designs to simply look the part.

These are the best guitars for metal that are both heavy-hitting and genuinely classy.

About Budgeting

It’s important to establish ahead of time what you want to spend; a guitar budget, if you will.

That budget should take the following factors into consideration.

• Your interest and experience with the guitar
• A price range you consider to be affordable
• The role you want your new guitar to fill

The first two items are fairly self-explanatory. The third is using the word "role" to describe whether the guitar will be your primary option for gigging, song writing, a backup or just something to fiddle around with when you’re bored.

All three of these factors should come together to get your final budget, which will essentially be a low and high of what you want to spend.

For example: $500 to $1000.

Simple enough.

It’s smart to set these numbers up ahead of time since it helps you eliminate a lot of guitars that are either too high in price or too low in quality.

We’ll cover a pretty wide range of cost but, keep in mind, this isn’t necessarily a low-budget list.

Those looking for more affordable pricing can consult the following section where I've listed four guitars that are well under the $1000 mark and excellent options for any metal player.

Economy Models: PRS, Ibanez & Epiphone

Economy models are lines of guitars made as a cheaper alternative to an otherwise expensive lineup. While companies do have to cut quality to get prices lower, many of these guitars are surprisingly well-built and competitive in terms of tone and functionality.

In a lot of cases they can serve as excellent backup guitars or as a second tuning guitar to travel with.

In particular, these three are good enough to serve as a backup or as your primary instrument, either in the studio or on the road:

1. PRS "Floyd" SE Custom 24
2. Epiphone Les Paul Custom
3. Ibanez S67QM

I like both PRS SEs for metal because of the Floyd Rose tremolo systems on each and the EMG pickups in the Torero. 

The Epiphone Les Paul custom is a close mimic of the Gibson version that's played by a number of notable metal guitarists including, Tool's Adam Jones, A Perfect Circle's Billy Howerdel and many others.

The Ibanez S67QM is a step down from the S5570 that we highlight in the first spot below, though it boasts many similar features and is built for the same type of fast metal playing.

All four hover between the $600 and $800 mark.

Read more: Best Epiphone Les Pauls

Non-Economy Models: Ibanez, PRS, Gibson & DBZ

These guitars spare no expense, and are a significant upgrade over their economy counterparts, in terms of parts, tone and overall quality.

Specifically, improvements are often seen in the tonewoods and pickups used. PRS also has a far more distinct and aesthetically-pleasing carved top on their expensive guitar lines, which you'll immediately notice in the Custom 24.

Upgrades in the pickups will often come from a reputable third-party manufacturer like Seymour Duncan or Dimarzio, which is a significant contributor to both cost and sound quality.

PRS and Gibson usually make their own pickups which, in most cases, are every bit as good as the brand names you'll see. For a guitar that's metal-friendly, look for the upper-tier of the Gibson and PRS in-house designs or the third-party offerings from one of the following companies:

• Seymour Duncan
• Dimarzio
• EMG

You'll spend extra for nicer pickups but, you'll get a lot more quality and value for the money. For those who are trying to track down the ideal metal guitar, buying high is the way to go if you can handle the bigger budget.

In many cases, it's worth the additional investment.

Ibanez

When it comes to price range Ibanez is pretty comprehensive, offering everything from $100 starter packages to four figure signature instruments (Joe Satriani and Steve Vai are big fans).

They’re also ideal guitars for the modern rock sound and playing style, catering to speed, thick tone and often including a Floyd Rose-style tremolo system.

For metal players, I like the RG Series Prestige models.

In particular, the 652 is one of my favorites.

1. Ibanez Prestige Electric Guitars

The Prestige series from Ibanez has every quality I would hope for in a great metal guitar. First, the thing just looks completely hardcore and classy, with a slim body design, Lo-Pro Edge bridge and tremolo system (a Floyd Rose mimic) and a three-part (HSH) pickup arrangement.

It's perfectly designed for the hard rock speedster with a super thin neck that's only 17mm thick at the first fret position. This makes the neck feel very flat and easy to play, with only a slightly rounded back.

The body itself is also surprisingly thin, making the entire guitar fairly lightweight.

This can also increase functionality for those who have smaller hands or who use their thumb to play the lower strings.

Any metal guitarist who is more of a lead player will stand to benefit the most, though the RG models can handle rhythm work just as smoothly. Keep in mind you're paying for some lead features, like the five-way switch, extra middle pickup and wizard neck.

I'd also recommend this one to studio or session guitarists, since the versatility of the pickup system gives you a lot of different tones to choose from.

It's just really easy to play with a lot of touch and care, perfect for recordings that have to be spot on.

Features and Specs

The wizard neck is a Maple and Walnut combo, while the body of the guitar is a fairly lightweight Mahogany. 

With such a detailed pickup configuration the tone of this guitar can fit a lot of different molds. Though for the metal player, I think you'll be surprised at how thick and heavy it sounds, considering the thinness of the body and neck.

On high gain levels, it's truly a metal machine giving you thick low-end power chords and lengthy sustain on the higher frets and harmonics.

The tuning system locks in two places (at the bottom of the fretboard near the headstock) and then allows you to fine tune via the bridge.

Other perks worth mentioning are an included hardshell case and a simple volume/tone system to compliment the five-way selector.

It's one of my absolute favorite lead metal guitars. 

2. Ibanez APEX30 Munky Signature Series 7-string

I'm a big fan of Korn and have always loved the signature guitars Ibanez puts out for Brian Welch and James Shaffer.

Shaffer worked with Ibanez and Dimarzio to design the APEX20, APEX200, and now the APEX30, all of which contain the Dimarzio Blaze pickups. The APEX20 and 200 had a single coil at the neck position, though the APEX30 employs a dual humbucker configuration.

For the metal guitarist in me, one of the most attractive aspects of the APEX200 is simply aesthetic.

With a red, black and gray color scheme, the thing just looks like hard metal.

A blank fretboard and lightly-colored headstock look great as well.

The APEX20 is the more affordable version of the APEX200 but, if you watch Korn's live performances, you'll note that Shaffer actually uses both guitars.

It's a nearly identical-looking design, though with a black and silver color scheme that swaps in black pickups instead of the red ones used in the 200.

Both guitars play really heavy and are ideal metal instruments, giving you the power of Dimarzio pickups and the metal style that Korn embodies. They're functional, capable guitars and not at all gimmicky fan fare.

Features

The APEX200 is built with an Alder body and Lo-Pro trem bridge, features that are both absent in the 20.

For the APEX20 you downgrade to a Basswood body and a standard Gibraltar bridge. Though it's still what I would consider a higher end guitar, especially after seeing that Shaffer still uses it on stage.

Paul Reed Smith

If you’re not going to go with the SEs, the real-deal American-made models from PRS are some of the nicest guitars money can buy. You'll get the high end PRS pickup designs and a beautiful carving on the top of the guitars, both features that are scaled down on the SE models.

They're the guitar of choice for a number of popular metal guitarists, including Staind's Mike Mushok, Miles Kennedy of Alter Bridge, Black Stone Cherry's Chris Robertson, Mark Holcomb of Periphery and many others.

If you want to combine classy design with heavy guitar playing, PRS is a nearly perfect balance.

I like PRS for the metal player who also wants a guitar that will allow them to dabble in other genres and styles. The versatility and functionality of the PRS lines are so good that they can handle just about any style of music.

One of my favorite recommendations to metal players is the Floyd Custom 24.

3. PRS Floyd Custom 24

Gibson or Epiphone Les Pauls

The Gibson Les Paul is considered a staple of the classic rock genre, despite the fact that it has found its way into nearly every type of music, metal and modern hard rock included.

You’ll find the Les Paul conducive to loud power chords, having been utilized by popular rockers like Billy Howerdel, Adam Jones, Billy Corgan, Tom Morello and Slash, just to name a few.

The humbucker design of the Les Paul produces a heavy tone with a thick resonance that's friendly to low power chords and high-register solos alike.

Most will also come with a variation of Gibson’s BurstBuster pickup, which provides a “meatier” tone.

I like the Les Paul Studio because of its friendly price point.

For metal aesthetics, I'd recommend the black and silver color scheme.

Let's take a closer look.

4. Gibson Les Paul Studio

This is one of the few Gibson models that you can get around the $1000 mark.

They release a new version every year, so used models from a few years back can come down pretty cheap.

Like the PRS lines, the Gibson Les Pauls are adaptable to a wide range of music though are particularly adept at handling heavy metal tones and modern rock. The Studio comes with coil-tapped 490R and 498T pickups that provide a thick sound with the extra sustain and chime that you need for both rhythm and lead metal playing.

5. Epiphone Les Paul Custom

What about B.C. Rich?

I don't have anything against B.C. Rich guitars and I understand that they're a curious omission from a "best metal guitars" list.

While I wouldn't say they don't have any good guitars, I personally have very little experience with them, so I want to avoid recommending something to you that I'm not familiar with.

At the same time, I've always found them a bit gimmicky.

I think a good metal guitar should be able to handle the sound and tone of heavy music without having to embellish the style and look of metal.

In my opinion, B.C. Rich relies more on the metal look than they do on tone and quality.

That's why I like guitars like the PRS Custom 24 and Gibson LP Studio. They can handle metal with the best of them but they don't have to look overtly dark or brooding to do it.

They just sound great.

No fluff.

So while I can't really speak to the value and quality of B.C. Rich guitars, they're just not my first stop.

How important is the seventh string?

When you go to buy a metal-friendly guitar, the 7-string option should never be a deal breaker.

The seventh string, when you have it, is a tool and not a necessity. Players that use them do so based on a stylistic or mechanical preference and not because it's absolutely necessary for metal.

For example, Mark Holcomb plays metal like crazy on his 6-string PRS.

So if a 7-string guitar is something you want to pursue, it'll certainly fit the metal mold. At the same time, it's not a hard requirement.

Conclusion

If you have questions or thoughts about our best guitars for metal list, feel free to email me directly or get in touch via the comments section below.

I'm always happy to talk guitars.