The 7 Most Common Beginner Mistakes on Guitar

Most people who learn how to play guitar start with a few bad ideas already in place. Colin Daniel has taught over 5,000 students one on one across 40 years, and he has seen the same beginner guitar mistakes over and over.

Watch his short lesson above, then read the list below. The surprise is that most of these have nothing to do with which finger goes where. They’re about mindset, habits, and setup.

1. Expecting too much, too soon

Colin’s first rule is to be patient with yourself. You won’t learn a song after one easy lesson, and that’s normal. If you’re starting later in life, plan for it to take longer than it would for a teenager. What you put in is what you get out.

2. Sitting the wrong way

Sit on a fairly firm chair, not the edge of your bed or a soft couch. You want your back straight and the fretboard easy to reach. If you’re reaching down a long way, or resting your elbow on your leg, something needs to change.

Colin raises his right foot on the ring of his stool so the guitar sits up where his wrist doesn’t have to fight. Standing works the same way. Keep the guitar about as high as it sits when you’re seated. Most good players wear it higher than you’d guess.

Why bother? A strained wrist and forearm can lead to tendonitis or even carpal tunnel. After 40 years and 8 to 10 hours of playing a day, Colin says he’s never had the problem. Sitting well is a big reason. If you’re an older beginner, it matters even more.

3. Playing a guitar that fights you

A poorly shaped, poorly sized, or poorly set up guitar makes everything harder. A Flying V, for example, is miserable to play sitting down. The other big one is action, which is just the height of the strings above the fretboard. Set too high, it can decide which chords you can play cleanly.

Colin covers action and intonation in his buying guides for acoustic and electric guitars on YouTube. If a chord still sounds off after you’ve tuned, the guitar may be out of adjustment, not you.

4. Practicing on and off

Steady beats intense. Colin once turned down a student who planned to take one lesson and then disappear for three weeks. His point: one lesson followed by a long gap does almost nothing. You need to commit to about an hour a day, even if results come slowly.

That hour doesn’t have to be one block. Keep your guitar on a stand or wall hook where you can grab it, and play 10 minutes here and 15 minutes there. The goal is to book as much playing time as you can.

5. Not listening to how you sound

This one trips up almost everyone. Record yourself on your phone or computer and play it back. Ask honestly if that sounds like a good guitar sound. A recording device is one of the best teachers you can have when you can’t get to a lesson every week.

Two habits to listen for:

• Hitting the bass strings too hard. Strum a C chord and the low E can boom while the higher strings get lost. Aim for every string in the chord to be heard evenly. On an electric with distortion, it turns to noise fast.
• Pressing too hard. Squeeze a C chord as hard as you can and it goes sharp. Use just enough pressure to get the chord clear. The difference is easy to hear once you know to listen for it.

If you want your chords to ring clean, our page on beginner guitar chords is a good place to practice.

6. Playing out of tune

Tune every time you pick up the guitar. If you’ve set it down for more than half an hour, check it again. A guitar is a piece of wood and it moves. If you never hear it in tune, you’ll never know what it’s supposed to sound like. Not sure how? Here’s how to use a guitar tuner.

7. Skipping the theory

A lot of beginners just want to learn a song. That makes you a tape recorder: you can repeat what your teacher showed you, and nothing more. A little theory lets you figure songs out yourself.

Colin says theory doesn’t have to mean reading notation or tab. It’s the mechanics of the fretboard. A great first step is learning the notes on your guitar, starting with tones and semitones on the fretboard.

Bonus: acoustic or electric doesn’t matter

An acoustic isn’t easier to learn on than an electric, and it’s not better for a beginner either. Start on whatever plays the music you love. Colin once had a student show up with a cheap acoustic who wanted to play Stevie Ray Vaughan. Nearly all of Stevie’s music is electric, so he told her to get a Strat.

Your next step

Pick one mistake from this list and fix it this week. Sitting better and tuning up first cost nothing and pay off right away. If you’d like a clear path with Colin guiding you, check out Colin’s beginner guitar course.

Which of these did you catch yourself doing? Tell us in the comments below.