This is our review of the Yamaha F335 Acoustic Guitar.
Guitar players always look for the next instrument to add to their collections, and Yamaha is almost always willing to produce guitars to fit those bills.
Yamaha’s F335 presents an affordable option for guitarists, and while it’s not the most advanced instrument on the market, it does what it’s supposed to do. It allows you to make music. Maybe not with a studio-quality sound, but not everyone needs that, right?
Let’s take a few minutes to look at what makes this guitar sound and feel the way it does, why you might like it, and how well the Yamaha F335 Acoustic Guitar would work for you.
Yamaha F335 Acoustic Guitar Overview
The F335 sports a dreadnought body. Typically, this means something of a sizable axe, but this particular guitar has a narrower neck than many of its peers. If for no other reason, that makes it a bit easier to play, especially for players with smaller hands.
Its spruce top is durable, however its meranti sides feel a little less so. Technically, meranti is a hardwood, but it’s arguably the softest and most malleable. That’s not the best thing in the world for building an instrument that tends to take a bit of a pounding from time to time.
Newer players will find things to love about the F335 — namely, its price and its durability. That spruce top doesn’t give up too many dings along the way. But since the guitar lives in a lower price range than some others, you also don’t need to worry much about finding a nick in your instrument.
However, its low-cost construction isn’t without its quirks. Although sonically superior to many other budget guitars out there, you won’t get a massive sound of this guitar compared to the more expensive ones. And the action — by many more accounts than just mine — is really high. Some (like me) might even call it ridiculously high.
Again, for what this guitar is, it’s pretty damn good. Is it something you’ll find Tommy Emmanuel playing “Mombasa” on? Not at all. But you’re probably not Tommy Emmanuel. Your search for a durable, affordable guitar may very well end with this particular instrument.
The Build
The guitar’s spruce top is solid, which we’ve established already. It’s also a stunner! Since the body is several different pieces glued together, there are virtually no wood blemishes. The guitar is available in natural, black, and a brown starburst finish, and the pickguard looks nice and offers protection from gouges when you get a little too into it.
The sound on this guitar isn’t huge, as expected, but for its price tag it’s well above average with a fuller and richer tone than most of its peers. Chording on this instrument sounds nice, but when you get into plucking individual notes, some can get lost because the guitar doesn’t project sound quite as well as others. But for personal use, it works great.
The rosewood fretboard works well, as it should — we all know that rosewood fretboards are reliable, even if some of us prefer other materials. The meranti sides is the only thing about this build I didn’t like. They just don’t make for a solid-feeling guitar, even though I know the spruce top is tough as nails.
The Neck
I have mixed feelings about how narrow the neck is. The majority of my guitar work gets done on guitars with slightly wider necks than this model. And if you’re into classical guitars,well, then you know they have much wider necks than standard acoustics, and the F335’s neck is narrow even by acoustic guitar standards. This makes a big difference.
There aren’t many uncomfortable or even difficult stretches, which is fantastic. And I’m not even that used to classical guitars, with fretboards that are football-field wide. However, as an experienced player, I occasionally felt somewhat hemmed in by the neck’s width.
Of course, this is personal for each player, as some just prefer a wider necks. At any rate, this guitar’s neck width (or lack thereof) is worth noting.
The Action
This guitar’s action (the distance between the bottom of your string and the top of the fret) is sky-high. That’s great for playing slide guitar. But if you’re learning, high action can be a real buzzkill because it requires more significant effort to push the strings down far enough and hard enough to get a sound and to get a sound without any accompanying fret buzz.
This can be a bit discouraging to new players, and it can annoy experienced players too. When the action is too high, there are remedies — you can adjust the truss rod, or you can lower the action yourself or have a guitar shop tech do it for you.
Going the DIY route means picking up a string action ruler and perhaps going deeper into your guitar than you’re comfortable going. There’s no shame in taking your guitar to a tech. Either way, the F335 almost requires you take one of these steps since the action is just too high, even right out of the box.
Our Verdict
The Yamaha F335 Acoustic Guitar brings durability and affordability to you, and it sounds surprisingly good considering the price tag. Yamaha has made quality instruments for more than half a century, and the F335 just proves that even budget instruments can be well built.
While this isn’t the most incredible guitar ever made, Yamaha has made the F335 well for what it is — an affordable guitar that can take something of a licking and keep performing. Beginners and intermediate-level guitarists will get good use out of it once they’ve adjusted the action (or had it done).
So in short, playing a Yamaha F335 Acoustic Guitar can be a rewarding experience due to the comfortable neck and rich sound (provided the string height is adjusted), and help you begin to improve your knowledge and ability. Picking one up today is a terrific first step toward mastering a satisfying and expressive instrument.
