I've been using GuitarTricks for years, so I have lots of experience with their lessons and have seen them develop their offering.
Most other GuitarTricks reviews just state the obvious, but I'll share things here that you won't read anywhere else, since I actually use the site.
I am a guitar player of 25+ years and a guitar teacher, so if you want to know my opinion, read on.
Disclosure: The reviews written on this site are carried out by professionals, who may receive compensation from the companies whose products get reviewed. We test each product thoroughly and recommend only what we believe to be the very best. We are independently owned and the opinions expressed here are our own.
Tom's take on GuitarTricks.com
Guitar Tricks is an online guitar learning platform with a wide range of lessons for guitarists of all levels. The lessons are well structured and presented clearly and concisely. The site also offers a good selection of song lessons, which is an excellent bonus for those who want to learn to play along with their favorite songs. Overall, Guitar Tricks is a sound option for those looking for online guitar lessons.
Pros
Cons
Best for:
Price:
Discounts:
Free trial:
out of 10
Guitar Tricks gives video guitar lessons for the rather inexpensive subscription cost of around $15 per month (using annual membership), which is not much considering that a private guitar teacher costs about $40-$50 by the hour in 2024. In fact, it is safe to say that GuitarTricks is better than most personal tutors.
They have over 15,000 video guitar lessons addressing just about all types of music, and in every difficulty level. Imagine what it would cost you to get that many lessons from a personal guitar teacher 🙂
Check out my video GuitarTricks review, then read all about the site afterward.
GuitarTricks for beginners, a.k.a. the Core Learning System
GuitarTricks created a so-called "Core Learning System", which is their set of lessons aimed at newbie guitarists. It's actually a full-fledged beginner guitar course, which can take a newbie to an early intermediate stage.
This is how it works:
- Everyone starts on the very left at Guitar Fundamentals 1, and continues to Fundamentals 2. These 2 mini-courses teach the basics everyone needs to know.
- Once you have mastered the Fundamental lesson sets, you can continue learning the specifics of blues, country, rock, or acoustic. Or all of them if you wish 🙂
- All the video lessons have supplemental tabs to download and some have jam tracks to practice along with.
The Core Learning System is a very well-thought-out set of lessons.
It is structured well, the individual lessons are to-the-point, and the material is good. It will take complete beginners and teach them everything from music theory, to chord charts, to power chords, to playing in various styles of music.
The course is for both electric and acoustic guitar students, as the basic techniques are the same for electric guitars and acoustic guitars as well.
GuitarTricks for experienced players
If you've been playing for a few years and are past the basics, you'll be able to advance your knowledge and skills with a barrage of lessons, covering everything from tone, to different genres, etc.
If you’re an advanced guitarist and want to take things to the next level, you’ll really like the “Artist Studies” section of GuitarTricks. This is a major part of the site focused on looking at and mastering how the most famous guitarists played, and also the things they do to be able to make their songs sound the way they did.
This is a fantastic element I found in the course of my assessment of GuitarTricks, because even more advanced players will get years' worth of videos.
In the Artist Studies section, you'll learn the guitar tricks and signature styles of famous guitarists such as:
- Django Reinhardt
- B.B. King
- AC/DC
- Kirk Hammet
- Albert King
- Chet Atkins
- and many more.
I've found that there aren't as many advanced lessons on GuitarTricks as some of the competition though, which I'll talk about later.
Styles covered at GuitarTricks
Besides the acoustic, blues, country, and rock beginner courses in the Core Learning System, GuitarTricks has thousands of videos covering other genres as well. Here is a list of the specific genres you'll be able to learn on their site.
Know, that some genres have a bunch of lessons and some only a few. For example, Surf and World have very few lessons, while the bigger categories like Blues have hundreds.
If you are an advanced player and want to dive into a smaller subgenre, GuitarTricks is not a great choice though. TrueFire is better for the advanced player, read my review on them here.
For example, I've been focusing a lot on funk nowadays, and while GuitarTricks has the basics, it doesn't have advanced lessons on the topic.
Song lessons gazillion
Unquestionably the best part of playing guitar is being able to play songs that you love. GuitarTricks has a huge catalog of song lessons, over 900 songs at the moment, which is twice as many as the closest competition. I have many song tutorials as well, but not nearly this much.
Their list of artists is also impressive, including: Jimi Hendrix, Eric Clapton, The Beatles, Santana, The Eagles, B.B. King, Stevie Ray Vaugh, Pantera, REM, Jimi Hendrix, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Van Halen, Lady Gaga, and lots more.
Useful extra features
Beside the library of video lessons and the supporting material, GuitarTricks also has extra features that guitar students can use to get better.
Feedback System
A new feature GuitarTricks has introduced is their personalized feedback system, where an instructor answers you directly if you need advice on your playing, how to get out of a rut, or anything else regarding your guitar journey.
Here is how it works:
- You record a video of yourself playing and your questions
- Upload it to YouTube as a private video
- Send it via the feedback form
- You get a private YouTube video reply from an instructor
Honestly, I haven't used this feature, but it is a great way of solving any of your guitar playing issues.
Best of all, this is included in the price of membership (in contrast, TrueFire charges $39 for a video exchange).
Online guitar tools
Guitar Tricks has a few online tools as well:
- Online guitar tuner: this is a reference tuner, so it doesn't pick up the sound of your guitar. I rather suggest you use TheGuitarLesson.com's online guitar tuner.
- Interactive scale and chord finders: which are useful and look nice.
- Metronome: which is always useful.
- Fretboard training game: the fretboard trainer will help you memorize the notes on the fretboard in a more enjoyable way.
- Jam station: which is a huge collection of jam tracks.
- Chord library: this handy tool can be accessed for free here.
Other than the Jam station, all the tools can be downloaded onto your PC. Here are a few images of the online tools:
These tools can be of great help when learning guitar, however, I still tend to use the tools built into the Guitar Pro software instead of any online tool.
Real screenshots
Here are some real screenshots I took inside my GuitarTricks.com account. This is what you will see as well.
My opinion after years using GuitarTricks.com
GuitarTricks is definitely a high-quality site, which has lessons for all levels of guitar players. The volume of lessons they have on their site is gigantic, and they add more regularly.
What I like about GuitarTricks:
- Good search and site structure, so that you can easily browse the 1000s of instructional videos, including popular song lessons.
- Videos are downloadable (except the song lessons), which I did not find while reviewing any other guitar learning site.
- The video player is good, it has an A-B looper and the ability to slow down (or speed up) the lesson.
- Affordable pricing compared to the number of courses on the site. Getting this many lessons from a private guitar teacher would cost a great deal of money, yet only $15 a month at GuitarTricks.
- Videos have a 3-angle view shot on HD cameras, so you always see what's going on in high-definition.
- 60-day money-back guarantee, so if you sign up but change your mind/don't have time/break your guitar, etc., you can just ask for a refund.
However, there are a few negative things I noticed:
- Since GuitarTricks was the first video guitar instruction site on the web, a very small number of the video clips are old, which means their video quality is not up to 2024 standards. They are actively working on replacing the older videos though, so they won't be there for long.
- Advanced players will find more lessons elsewhere, like Truefire.com.
- Some less popular genres are not represented at all.
Here is a sample video of a GuitarTricks.com lesson:
GuitarTricks is quite popular among beginner guitar players nowadays, have a look at what other people are saying about the site.
GuitarTricks Alternatives
Even though GuitarTricks is my #1 pick for beginner/intermediate players looking to improve their guitar playing, other sites out there are almost as good.
Here is a detailed article on the best online guitar lesson sites, but specifically, the best alternatives to GuitarTricks are:
- TrueFire.com
- TheGuitarLesson.com
Truefire.com
Truefire.com is an online guitar lesson website that offers a wide variety of lessons for guitarists of all levels. They offer better lessons for advanced guitarists than GuitarTricks, but their beginner lessons are not as good. Also, the site isn't quite as easy to navigate.
The quality of the video lessons on TrueFire is excellent, and the instructors are all professional guitarists. Some of them are world-renowned artists, such as Tommy Emmanuel.
The lessons are also very reasonably priced if you buy a yearly membership.
Here is my detailed review of Truefire.com >>
TheGuitarLesson.com
If you're a beginner looking to learn how to play the guitar, theguitarlesson.com is a great resource. Like GuitarTricks, the site offers a variety of lessons for both beginners and intermediate players, covering topics such as chords, strumming, and fingerpicking. The video lessons are well-explained and easy to follow thanks to on-screen animated tablature.
The course concentrates on learning songs to progress at the guitar, which is slightly different from GuitarTricks' take on beginner lessons.
TryTheGuitarLesson.com for free >>
Jamplay.com
Jamplay was also viewed as an alternative to GuitarTricks. They had thousands of lessons, useful online tools, etc.
In 2023, Jamplay's video lessons were integrated into Truefire, so Jamplay itself doesn't exist anymore.
However, I think Jamplay was not as good as GuitarTricks, since their courses were not as concise and to-the-point. Also, they didn't have as many popular song lessons as GuitarTricks or TheGuitarLesson.com
So, is GuitarTricks good for learning guitar?
Overall, GuitarTricks is a great site and I can honestly recommend it.
- It has great lessons for beginner/intermediate guitarists
- A catalog of song lessons like no other site
- Useful, concise video tutorials
- Well thought out courses
To save some money, make sure you have a look at this GuitarTricks discount, and their 14-day free trial period before signing up.
I have tried all the guitar learning sites and apps and guitar tricks is definitely the best. What you learn with them sticks. Months after I have learned something on GT I can still play it, it really is amazing. The teachers are truly great and what marvellous customer services they have! I can’t recommend GT enough.
I joined GuitarTricks.com almost a year, and little bit disappointed because with so many instructors there are only two persons teach with chapters/syllabus, and other instructors only giving tutorials without chapters/syllabus, and unfortunately we can’t choose other instructors to teach the lessons with syllabus.
Hi John,
I think you’re talking about that the Paths on their Core Learning System are taught by a single teacher? If so, my opinion is that this is a good thing! Other websites may have 10 teachers teaching their own version of the same basic guitar skills, but the result of that is the student jumping from one teacher to the next when things get a bit more difficult.
So right now, the large courses on GuitarTricks are:
– basic guitar fundamentals
– blues
– country
– rock
– acoustic.
Other than these, GuitarTricks has smaller courses, but these are split up into smaller chunks, giving them a syllabus.
I was so pleased to find this site! I have been wnting to start guitar for years, but I was hesitant because in-person lessons are out of my reach unfortunately. This site has some great reviews of different guitar instructional programs. I am definitely going to check guitartricks.com now.
Thanks for the comment Alberto, you are making a great choice in starting the guitar. You will get good lessons from GuitarTricks, practice a lot, and you’ll get better soon.
This website is the bee’s knees! I’m a total n00b when it comes to playing guitar, got a guitar for Christmas, but Guitartricks makes it so easy to follow along and learn. The instructors are top-notch, and the video quality is great. I’m starting to enjoy playing instead of struggling, can’t put a price on that. 10/10 would recommend!