NOTE: This is Part One of a two-part blog post. Go To Part Two.

We get enough questions about Gibson pole spacing versus Fender pole spacing that it’s worthwhile writing about here in the Lollar blog.

The best way to proceed is to review the most common questions.

But first, we’ll start with some basics…..like, what do you mean by Gibson spacing and Fender spacing?

That terminology is actually referring to the physical spacing between the pole pieces. This roughly corresponds to the distance between the strings themselves, but not entirely. (More on that point later). In general terms, the spacing between pole pieces is slightly wider on Fender style pickups, and slightly narrower on Gibson style pickups. The overall difference – when you measure from the centers of the 2 outside pole pieces – is roughly 2 to 3 millimeters. In other words, if you measure from the center of the high E pole piece to the center of the Low E pole piece, a Gibson spaced pickup will measure right around 50 millimeters. A pickup with Fender spacing will measure between 52 and 53 millimeters, depending on the pickup.