I have rather short fingers - what would be best for me - a wide or a narrow nut?

[Musima]

I know, I know - I should just try guitars with different widths and find out for myself - and until now my impression is that I might be better off with a narrow (perhaps 42-43-44 mm) - but I just wanted your impression, too.. - so, narrow or wide? (when I plan to be strumming along songs for the time being (it has been a while since I've had an acoustic and with me engulfed in writing my Masters' Thesis..I should probably keep it at that;)))

[DenverDave]

Probably conventional wisdom would say a narrower string spacing, but that is not always the case. I have very short fingers, but I prefer a slightly wider than normal spacing at the nut. As a default get a standard to narrower nut width, but play as many guitars as you can and sooner or later you will settle on what feels best to you...

[sdelsolray]

The length of your fingers does not tell the whole story. The length of your hand (from wrist to 1st knuckles) plays a role too. What fingerboard width will work best can partially depend on the styles of music you play. For example, wider is often better for fingersytle.

Also, scale length (the distance from the nut to the bridge) will play an important role. So keep that in mind too.

[Jon Chappell]

I have short fingers as well, and I've found that scale length is much more significant than fingerboard width. Fingerboard width is a matter of taste, with fingerpickers and classical players generally preferring wider string spacing, while flatpickers like the narrow widths that facilitate smooth string crossing. Shallow necks, like those found on Taylor guitars, tend to favor those of us with smaller hands, too. So I'd say width is third in the priority of scale length and neck depth.

[Terry Allan Hall]

I think it also should be considered how fat your fingers are...a lot of times, short fingers are "pudgy" fingers, too, thus narrower fingerboards can be a problem...I, for instance, have trouble playing cleanly on a Rickenbacher electric 12-string because of how narrow their fingerboards are.

[min7b5]

Originally posted by DenverDave Probably conventional wisdom would say a narrower string spacing, but that is not always the case. I have very short fingers, but I prefer a slightly wider than normal spacing at the nut...

 

 

I agree.

 

I have pretty long fingers, but as teacher I've had no shortage kids with full size guitars that do just great. There are more advantages to a wider board, I'm personally not a fan of narrower necks for anyone. As for scale, that's something you have to decide based on tone and what you're playing. I'm not a fan of short scale steel strings for tone, but maybe if you had really small hands and are drawn to big stretchy chords it would be usefull. But then again, if you play up the neck a lot, as I do, you might find it rather tight up high regardless of hand size...