How to spot a fake Gibson guitar – practical advice to avoid getting scammed when buying a used guitar
Fake Gibson guitars have been in the news recently – as they are periodically when customs officials bust large hauls of counterfeit guitars coming into the USA from overseas. There’s always been a trickle of low-quality knock-off Gibson-style guitars coming into the US and European markets from Asia, usually China – earning them their pithy epithet ‘Chibson’ – but it feels like the situation has become more and more prevalent in recent years. The much publicised seizure of 3,000 fake instruments in one swoop by US customs last year was shocking in its scale – even if the claim that they were worth $18m was rather fanciful.
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Because many of the people buying fake guitars in 2024 know exactly what they’re getting – the issue is when these guitars end up on the second-hand market. You can already see it by spending about 30 seconds on the r/guitar subreddit – chances are within the first few posts you’ll find some poor soul asking if the bargain guitar they just bought is the real deal, or if they’ve been scammed with a fake.
For whatever reason – most likely due to the higher cost of entry compared to Fender’s various budget Mexico-made options – an awful lot of the fake guitars you see out there are fake Gibsons, especially fake Les Pauls. The problem is that these forgeries are getting better – and given that most of our selling now happens online one way or another, it’s harder to spot a fake from photos, and so it’s easy to see why more and more people are getting ripped off.
But it doesn’t have to be this way – I’m here to help you identify some of the most common signs of a fake Gibson Les Paul, so you can keep buying guitars with confidence. Let’s get stuck in.
Fake Gibson guitars during a press conference in Carson, CA, on November 26, 2024. Image: Jeff Gritchen/MediaNews Group/Orange County Register via Getty Images
Check out this Chibson
It’s hard to do this stuff without getting your hands on the ‘real’ thing, so I held my nose and tracked down a knock-off Les Paul. Perhaps because of the above, many of the Les Paul counterfeit guitars that are being sold online are Customs – those gloss black and white finishes can hide a lot – and the guitar I’m going to be examining is exactly that, with one wrinkle.
The guitar I’m looking at was spec’d with a transparent finish – while very much not what you’d expect for an authentic Gibson Les Paul Custom, this finish will make it easier to show some of the woodworking red flags that show this up as a counterfeit.
In my years as a guitar tech I’ve worked on countless Gibson guitars, and I’ve also visited Gibson’s factory in Nashville and learned a lot about how and why Gibson makes guitars the way they do. Hopefully these lessons will help me easily identify some red flags that you can apply when browsing your next dream LP.
Case Theory
One of the most obvious, but perhaps most easily overlooked things to note about a fake Gibson guitar is that by and large these guitars are sold without cases. Now, every single guitar that leaves the Gibson factory is shipped in some sort of case – usually a hard case, but occasionally for the more affordable models (like the Les Paul Modern Lite) they’ll ship in a Gibson-branded gigbag.
There are legit reasons for a guitar to not have its case with it of course, but if a guitar – especially if it’s a premium instrument like a Les Paul Standard or Custom – doesn’t come with a manufacturer’s case, that should probably put you on guard…
Scarf joint at the neck of a fake Gibson Les Paul. Image: Justin Beckner/Guitar.com
The Scarf Joint
One thing you see in a lot of counterfeit Les Pauls is a scarf joint at the neck of the guitar near the headstock – in layman’s terms this means that the neck and headstock are two separate pieces that are joined together.
This is a problem, because Gibson necks are carved out of a single piece of wood, and have no visible joint at the headstock. It costs more to do it this way, because you have to get a thicker piece of wood that doesn’t have knots. Of course, people behind counterfeit guitars aren’t troubled about making the best possible instrument and so they more often than not will use a scarf joint – this allows you to construct a neck that looks the same after it’s painted, but it is a dead giveaway that it is not a genuine Gibson.
One thing to note is that a scarf joint is different from a headstock repair – Gibson guitars are notorious for having fragile headstocks, and so repaired ones are pretty common (and if done well won’t do anything to compromise the sound and playability of the instrument). The easiest way to spot a headstock break versus a scarf joint is to look at the wood grain – if it all matches up and is going in the same direction, it’s probably a break repair.
Logo and diamond headstock inlay on a fake Gibson Les Paul. Image: Justin Beckner/Guitar.com
The Headstock Question
Like all quality guitar brands, the craftspeople at Gibson spend a lot of time on the small details – the sort of details that take time and expertise that someone producing counterfeit guitars will likely not have anywhere near as much care and attention. The headstock is one of the best places to look for any signs of inconsistency and roughness.
Despite it being the most important part of any fake guitar, the headstock logo is often a telltale sign that the guitar isn’t legit – as you can see from my example, the Gibson logo and the diamond headstock inlay are both slightly off kilter. When you’ve looked at as many Gibsons as I have you can spot it instantly, but if you’re struggling look for pictures of genuine Gibsons online and compare them as closely as possible – it can be tough to tell but often the discrepancies are there.
Binding mismatch on a fake Gibson Les Paul. Image: Justin Beckner/Guitar.com
In A Bind
The binding is another area where it can be a dead giveaway if the guitar you’re looking at is genuine or not – especially if the guitar has three-ply binding as this ‘Custom’ does. Again, the headstock is perhaps the easiest place to spot this – each layer on each corner of the binding should match up exactly – if there’s any inconsistency or non-matching layers, you have a problem. While the headstock is the easiest place to look for this, be sure to inspect the entire body for any sign of the binding not lining up properly.
Trussed Up
While we’re looking at the headstock, another common (if slightly baffling) sign that the guitar you’re looking at isn’t legit is the truss rod cover and the rod itself. An official Gibson truss rod cover will have two screws, while forgeries often have three.
Furthermore, if you remove the truss rod cover and examine the nut underneath – if you’re buying a guitar online, request photos of this from the seller. Gibson guitars have an acorn-shaped nut for adjustment (usually brass) while most fake guitars will have the more common hex-key adjustment option you’ll find on Fender or Epiphone guitars. If you see a hex key on a guitar purporting to be a Gibson, this is a dead giveaway.
Serial number on the back of the headstock of a fake Gibson Les Paul. Image: Justin Beckner/Guitar.com
Serial Killer
If you know anything about Gibson guitars, you’ll probably know that they have the serial numbers stamped on the back of the headstocks. The benefit of this is that you can always look up the serial number and it will tell you when it was made and what model/submodel it is. If the serial number comes back to a Les Paul Studio and you are looking at a Les Paul Custom, that is obviously a problem. In the case of the fake I have here, the serial number did not correspond to anything. This is obviously a massive red flag.
Furthermore, the serial number on a genuine Gibson should be somewhat hard to read because they stamp it into the wood before they finish it. Many fakes I have seen have the serial number stamped after the finish or even etched into the finish with a Dremel-type tool, making it very clean and easy to read. Along with the serial number, there should also be a “Made In U.S.A.” stamp. If that stuff is printed on the back and not stamped, that could also be a clue.
Missing fret nibs on a fake Gibson Les Paul. Image: Justin Beckner/Guitar.com
The Nib Of The Issue
Moving down the neck, the next thing I look for is the fret nibs. On a Gibson you’ll usually see the binding on the neck rises up to cover the end of the fret. This is a very small detail, but it’s those small details that make a genuine Gibson a quality product. If the guitar you are looking to buy is missing these fret nibs, that’s a good indication that something is wrong.
Knock-off ABR-1-style bridge with flathead screwdriver adjusters on the posts of a fake Gibson Les Paul. Image: Justin Beckner/Guitar.com
Flathead Sharks
Moving all the way down to the bridge of the guitar, copies will often have knock-off ABR-1-style bridges that have flathead screwdriver adjusters on the posts (note we’re talking about the bridge here, not the tailpiece – a real Gibson will have a large flat-head indentation to adjust the tailpiece).
Real Gibsons do not have flat-head screw adjustment on the bridge however – always thumbwheels, while some of the newer guitars will have a hex slot on top of the post
A real Gibson doesn’t have those – they have always used thumb wheels for this on top of the post.
Speaking of the tailpiece, the stopbar on a genuine Gibson has a countersink on both sides of the stopbar where you insert the string. This is so that you can either put the sting through the traditional way, or wrap your strings around the stopbar (Joe Bonamassa-style). Most fakes miss this detail.
Plastic insulated wires inside the wiring cavity of a fake Gibson Les Paul. Image: Justin Beckner/Guitar.com
Wiring Worries
Another useful way to tell if a guitar is genuine or not is to take a look inside the wiring cavity – this applies to not just Gibson guitars, and if the seller won’t let you take a look or provide photos, again it’s a red flag. Generally a quality US-made guitar should be neat, tidy and clean inside the cavity.
For Gibsons specifically, take a look at the wires – most cheap counterfeit guitars will have cheap plastic insulated wires, instead of the high-quality braided wiring you’d expect to see on a real Gibson.
Buyer Beware
There are some other ways you can check on the veracity of a Gibson guitar that involve, amongst other things, a blacklight, but I’d imagine that’s probably beyond the scope of what most buyers are likely to do.
With any luck the above advice can help you navigate the choppy waters of online guitar buying and ensure that you don’t get caught out by a counterfeit guitar!
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