The fretboard is the "star" of the guitar; it is the instrument's most glamorous part and where much of your work as a guitarist will be done. The fretboard is broken up into many different sections, with each section being separated by thin metal bars called “frets”. The function of these frets is to make notes sound in tune. There are other stringed instruments, such as the violin, that do not have frets. This means that the violinist has to put their finger in just the right place on the string to get the right note. If the violinists’ finger moves even a fraction of an inch the note they are playing will be out of tune.

To make talking/thinking about the frets easier we use numbers to denote different frets. We start with the fret closest to the head of the guitar and call it the first fret. The next metal bar down the neck will be the second fret. If no string is pressed down we say the string is open.

An important note should be made that is not obvious to the beginner. While the frets themselves are the actual metal bars our fingers rarely press down on the frets themselves. The best placement of the finger is directly ‘behind’ the fret. So to play the first fret we actually want to be touching the string in the area next to the first fret closer to the head of the guitar.

Position markers

If you look at a guitar fretboard you’ll notice that there are markings, usually circles but often more ornate shapes, at different locations going up the neck. These are called position markers (or sometimes fret markers) and serve to orient the guitarist’s fretting hand (the hand pressing down the strings). The most important position markers are located at the third, fifth, seventh, ninth, and twelfth frets. Some guitars such as classical guitars (a type of acoustic) do not have position markers.