What Do Recent Guitar Gear Sales Trends Tell Us About the 2023 Market?

With another year behind us, the famous marketplace Reverb shared a few new reports detailing some of the most interesting guitar gear sales trends of 2023. One of their recent official statements on the website focused on pedals and amps, sharing the best-selling units in different categories. But looking at these lists, we can’t help but ask — is the guitar gear market evolving? Or are we just buying the same stuff over and over again? We decided to look into these reports and find out.

Best-Selling Pedals of 2023 on Reverb

As you may know, Reverb sells both new and used stuff. They’re huge. A lot of people buy stuff through them, but they’re not the definitive indicator of overall trends in the market. However, what’s happening on Reverb can still, in a way, tell us where things are headed.

• As far as pedals go, they created a few lists. These are:
• Best-selling new-condition pedals of 2023
• Overall best-selling pedals of 2023
• Best-selling new-condition pedals of 2023

What we’re the most interested in are the overall best-selling pedals of 2023, as they (obviously) show the overall trends and what people want to buy across the board. And the top spot here was taken by the good old Boss DS-1 Distortion. Behind it, we have Boss BD-2 Blues Driver, and the third spot goes to Robert Keeley’s Keeley Compressor Plus.

Nonetheless, Boss still dominates the top 20 list with five out of 20 entries. There are a few other things worthy of discussion, and Reverb singled out Hologram Electronics Microcosm as an interesting example. This relatively new pedal topped the list last year, and now it’s back down to the 10th spot where it was at the end of 2021.

What we can see here, however, is that a more experimental pedal like Hologram Electronics Microcosm can see brief jumps in individual years while classics, like Boss’s “boring” old DS-1 and BD-2, are still selling the most. Here’s the list of the top 20 best-selling pedals overall on Reverb:

1. Boss DS-1
2. Boss BD-2
3. Keeley Compressor Plus
4. Line 6 HX Stomp
5. Boss TU-3
6. Strymon Cloudburst
7. MXR M169 Carbon Copy
8. ProCo Rat 2
9. DigiTech Drop
10. Hologram Electronics Microcosm
11. Strymon Iridium
12. Boss SD-1
13. Greer Lightspeed Organic Overdrive
14. Strymon Big Sky Reverb
15. Ibanez TS9 Tube Screamer
16. Dunlop GCB95 Cry Baby
17. TC Electronic Ditto Looper
18. JHS Morning Glory V4
19. UAFX Dream ’65 Reverb Amplifier
20. Boss GE-7

Best-Selling Amps of 2023 on Reverb

With guitar amplifiers, it seems that Fender dominates the list with six out of 20 entries. These are mostly affordable amps, but there’s also stuff like the Blues Junior III. We can also see five Orange amps, two Yamaha amps, three boss amps, and a PRS Mark Tremonti signature head.

On the top, however, we have Positive Grid Spark 40. This is your usual modern flat-response modeling platform that works with the apps. In other words, it’s a specialized PA that works with guitars, basses, and acoustic-electric guitars.

For the most part, we have practice amps that can be used as affordable gigging and rehearsal amps. There are a few tube-driven pieces on there, but it seems that people are mostly focusing on bedroom jamming and affordable multi-purpose alternatives.

On the other hand, the amp that we see on the top could be the one that people wanted to get rid of the most, while other people just purchased it. At the same time, the trend seems to be on point — relatively cheaper and multi-functional amps take the cake, while some people prefer to purchase not-so-expensive tube-driven amps. For more context, check out the full top 20 list:

1. Positive Grid Spark 40
2. Boss Katana-50 MkII
3. Yamaha THR30II-WL
4. Orange Micro Dark
5. Fender Rumble 40 V3
6. Fender Tone Master Deluxe Reverb
7. Kemper Amps Profiler Stage
8. Boss KTN-MINI Katana Mini
9. Boss Katana-100 MkII
10. Orange Terror Stamp
11. Yamaha THR10II
12. Orange Super Crush 100
13. Orange MT20 Micro Terror
14. PRS MT 15 Mark Tremonti
15. Fender Rumble 100 V3
16. Fender Blues Junior III
17. Marshall Studio Vintage SV20H MKII
18. Orange Crush CR35RT
19. Fender Rumble 25 V3
20. Fender Mustang LT25

Photo: Gord Schindell (Vintage Guitar Amps (246103055))