The Best Guitar Strings in Canada

The most famous electric guitar strings in the world, played by hundreds of rock stars and hundreds of thousands of guitarists worldwide. Ernie Ball’s Slinky strings were first produced in 1962, and since have been a staple of musicians everywhere since – from Paul McCartney to Slash, and many different guitarists in-between. Best of all, Ernie Ball Slinkys are available at 99% of music stores.

Ernie Ball’s slinky guitar strings are constructed from a signature combination of a tin-plated high-carbon steel core and a nickel-plated steel wrap wire. This combination provides some excellent qualities to these strings, with impressive durability and a versatile sound, while being respectably inexpensive. Across the different gauges, these strings can generally provide strong clarity and solid midrange.

Ernie Ball’s Slinky Electric Guitar string line offer a wide range of strings in a variety of permutation of gauges. With 17 different gauges are available, ranging from the 8–38 gauge Extra Slinky to their 12-62 gauge Massive Slinky, with different variations on gauges for guitarists in between, with even 7- and 8- string options.

One last thing. The packaging – an iconic design that is recognizable across the world – is also equipped with Ernie Ball’s Element Shield Packaging, which keeps the strings feeling and sounding fresh, even if they have been sitting inside the packaging for a while.

Elixir is a younger company, formed in 1995, who have got where they are in the musical world thanks to their innovation. Elixir were one of the first companies to add a microscopically thin polymer coating onto the strings to prolong the lifespan. Elixir has since carved out a niche for people who want a longer lifespan from their strings.

Constructed with a nickel-plated steel wrap wire, these Elixir strings offer a strong electric guitar sound nickel and steel typically provide. Where these strings start to differ from their competitors is the Optiweb coating, which prolongs the lifespan of these strings by preventing skin cells, oil, and dust collecting in the strings, and by extension, preventing rust and corrosion. While traditionalist guitarists sometime show an aversion to the sound or feel of coated strings, the thinness of the Optiweb coating makes it less noticeable than Elixir’s other types of string coating, resulting in a crisp, natural tone and feel.

Elixir offers many different gauges with their Optiweb coating, including five different sets of gauges for 6-string, four sets for 7-string, and one set for 8-string, ensuring there is a gauge for most kinds of guitarists.

In the business of guitar strings, no other company can give Ernie Ball a true run for their money other than D’addario. With a wide selection of strings of varying gauge and materials, if you want a specific combination or to try something totally new, D’addario has a set of strings for you.

The XL line encompasses a large portion of D’addario’s electric guitar strings, with different lines utilizing different materials and constructions, and each line having a selection of gauges so you can pick your favourite.

Among them, there are typical XL Nickel wound strings, XL Pure Nickel for vintage flavour, XL coated nickel which improves the life on nickel wound strings, XL flatwood Chromes for low-end smoothness, and XL Half rounds which have a flatter surface for improved feel and bright tones with less finger noise.  Each of these strings start out the same, made from high-carbon steel wire, ensuring consistent tone, intonation, and durability across the entire line.

D’addario offers gauges ranging from super light to heavy, with options for all kinds of playing. One shout to D’addario I also have to mention is D’addario offers strings for the Bass VI, a unique baritone guitar / bass hybrid that is uncommon and overall hard to find strings for, that this writer also happens to own.

We thought we would also mention this set of strings from D’addario for their absolute performance and longevity. Taking D’addario’s popular nickel-plated steel strings and adding a thin, hydrophobic coating to improve lifespan turns out to be a winning combination.

We had lots of positive things to say about the nickel-plated steel D’addario XL strings, and these take those same design principles and coat them to improve their longevity. Many other coated strings save money by only coating the wound strings, but with the D’addario XT series, every string is coated, so each string sees a boost in longevity and durability, protecting the strings from breaking or corrosion. These strings also have strong tuning stability, maintaining their tuning better throughout playing and non-playing.

For their nickel-plated XT strings, D’addario offers a small but comprehensive selection of gauges, ranging from light to medium gauges, and offering a 7-string pack as well. However, we should note that D’addario offers strings for a wide selection of instruments with their XT line, including acoustic, classical, and bass guitars, and more niche instruments like mandolin and banjo strings.

These strings have strong features in terms of sound, durability, and longevity. However, some users feel the coating is noticeable, feeling slippery against your fingers. Coated strings are not for everyone, as some feel they negatively impact tone and feel of your guitar, but others find them an excellent way to change your strings less.

For users who like to down tune their strings for heavy playing, these strings from Dunlop strings are designed for deep tones without muddiness and floppy strings.

The construction of these strings show that Dunlop has heavier genres in mind, with a construction designed to take lower tunings well. With a “unique” core wire wrapped with a nickel-plated steel, this string is designed to maintain a tight low-end, with a well-balanced midrange and top-end. With a thicker core and heavier strings, you also do get more strength, preventing breaking.

There are many different gauges available, usually within the range of medium and heavy gauges. There are 7-string sets for Dunlop Heavy Core strings, unfortunately 8-string sets are only offered with Dunlop’s Performance+ series.

If you wonder what guitarists like Paul McCartney and John Mayer string their acoustic guitars with, look no further than Ernie Ball’s Earthwood Phosphor Bronze acoustic guitar strings.

Made from Phosphor Bronze, these strings provide the classic warmth of Bronze string, while being overall more balanced high and low end frequencies. Like most Ernie Ball strings, the core of these strings are made with tin-plated, hexagonal shaped steel core wire, which are then wrapped with an alloy consisting of 92% copper, along with tin and phosphorus (where the “Phosphor Bronze” name comes from). The overall character of the tone is mellow, with ringing sustain and strong clarity.

The Ernie Ball Earthwood Phosphor Bronze strings come in 5 different sizes, ranging from the lighter side 10-50, to thicker gauges up to 13-56, and everything in between.

Element Shield Packaging maintain the life of these strings, so they feel and sound as good as they did when they come off the assembly line.

Just like Elixir’s electric strings, their acoustic strings provide strong durability and reliability due to their signature coating, while still sounding great.

These strings utilize Elixir’s Nanoweb coating, which at a microscopic level, protects your strings from skin, dust, and oils, preventing rust or erosion, and keeping these strings feeling fresh for longer. The Nanoweb coating attempts to mimic the feel and sound of uncoated strings. The coating improves other factors too, like reducing string squeak, and being easier on your fingers.

These acoustic guitar strings are Brass, or 80/20 Bronze, providing a bright, lively tone that many acoustic guitarists love.

Elixir offers an impressive range of strings, in all sorts of gauges. Elixir offers 6 different acoustic six-string sets, ranging from Extra Light (10 – 47) to Medium (13 to 53). Additionally, Elixir offers strings for Baritone acoustic, Baritone 8-string acoustic, and 12-string acoustic for more niche guitars.

Dean Markley’s Blue Steel strings have likely the second most grabbing packaging of any guitar string, and the packaging looks as cool as these strings are.

Made from a steel core, and wrapped with a wrap wire consisting of 92% Copper and 8% Zinc, these strings seem like pretty typical acoustic guitar strings, however there is one striking difference, as Dean Markley do one thing that other guitar companies do not do.

Late in the manufacturing process, they freeze their strings using liquid nitrogen to cool them to a chilling -195 degrees Celsius, which the company states tighten the molecules of the strings, minimizing the microscopic gaps where gunk can hide, and corrosion can begin.  This process is also claimed to boost tone, sustain, and durability. While cryogenics have a scientific basis in strengthening certain materials, claim about improving tone will need further testament from musicians and/or scientists before we are really sold.

Overall, these strings are solid, and they do offer strong sound and do last longer than uncoated strings (but coated strings still take the cake for longevity). If you are curious, these strings are worth your time and are not very expensive, but their marketing does rely on a relatively understudied gimmick with some high claims.

D’addario have made appearances throughout this list, so it should be no surprise they boast one of the strongest nylon string sets for classical guitars. The Pro-Arté strings are one of the higher rated strings for classical guitars

These nylon strings are designed for the best qualities for fingerstyle and classical styles of guitar playing. The bass strings are wound with silver-plated copper, which add a warmth to the bass frequencies, while the treble strings are very precisely intonated to ensure strong tone and tuning.

Using advanced techniques in both polymer extrusion and laser measurement ensure the nylon used it perfect for playing. The wound strings utilize semi-polishing, which flattens the typical grooves seen on wound guitar strings, minimizing string noise so these strings are ideal for miking up your guitar for performance or recording.

The D’addario Pro- Arté offers several different variants with different tensions and components used. Tension is different than gauge, but is influenced by the thickness of the string, as well as scale length and pitch. High tension strings can be louder, while medium and light tension strings vibrate have a clearer sound generally.

While Nylon is a strong selection for classical guitar strings, it is not the only choice for strong performance. These strings incorporate, silver-plated copper wrapping around a nylon string for the wound bass strings, as well as Fluorocarbon strings for the treble strings.

The fluorocarbon fibre strings provide more top end than nylon counterparts, while the bass sets are stiff, both providing more volume than typical classical guitar. These strings also provide minimalized hand noises.

These strings feature high tension, which some players might find these a little harsh, but these have more volume.