How to Choose a Looper Pedal
Practically every electric guitar player can benefit from a looper pedal. Whether you're practicing, writing songs, or performing live, a looper can improve your creativity and productivity. Live looping has become increasingly popular thanks to artists like Ed Sheeran, but the best looper pedal for you depends on how you plan to use it. Some players need a simple practice tool, while others require advanced features for songwriting or live performance.
Choosing a Looper Pedal for Practice, Songwriting, or Performance
Many guitarists only use a looper for practice sessions, improvising over chords or capturing riff ideas to experiment with. For basic uses like these, it’s smarter to choose the most simple looper pedal that meets your needs — less features and a simpler interface means you can start looping faster. That’s not to say you can’t use a very basic looper pedal on stage too, if it fits your performance needs. Just consider that that if all you want is a functional looper, more features are just going to complicate things.
For songwriting sessions, you’ll definitely want a looper pedal that can save your loops for later recall — some looper pedals will only hold one loop in memory, and others will allow you to save them for future reference. You may also want to look for a looper pedal with built-in drum rhythms to add some life to your solo writing sessions.
If you plan to use your looper as a core component of your live performances, or if you want to use it creatively in the studio, you’ll probably want to look for a few key functions. The ability to easily save and recall loops is probably the most important, and the ability to sync with other devices via MIDI is essential too.
| Loop Save | Yes (SD card, internal memory) |
|---|---|
| Max. Loop Time | Unlimited |
| Playback Modes | 5 (Multi, Song, Sync, Band, Free) |
| MIDI | Yes |
| USB | Yes |
| Stereo/Mono | Stereo |
| XLR Mic Input | Yes |
| Drums/Rhythms | Yes |
| Other Effects | 26 stompbox FX |
| Loop Save | Yes (internal memory) |
|---|---|
| Max. Loop Time | 1.5 hours |
| Playback Modes | 2 (Loop, Reverse Loop) |
| MIDI | Yes |
| USB | Yes |
| Stereo/Mono | Stereo |
| XLR Mic Input | No |
| Drums/Rhythms | Yes |
| Other Effects | Reverb for rhythm tracks |
| Loop Save | No |
|---|---|
| Max. Loop Time | 10 minutes |
| Playback Modes | 1 |
| MIDI | No |
| USB | Yes |
| Stereo/Mono | Mono |
| XLR Mic Input | No |
| Drums/Rhythms | No |
| Other Effects | N/A |
Where to Place a Looper Pedal in Your Signal Chain
It entirely depends on whether you want your loop to be processed by other pedals or not. Every pedal after your looper pedal is going to effect the loop when you turn them on, but will not be recorded as part of the loop. Every pedal before the looper pedal will be recorded as part of the loop, but will not effect the loop as it plays.
Most players want to capture a loop and play over it, so it makes sense to place your looper at the end of your signal chain. This means you can create a loop with whatever pedals you want, and the sound of the loop won’t change as you turn on delays, modulation and other effects — only your guitar playing will be processed.
However, you can also use your looper pedal to “audition” other effects pedals too — capture a loop, run it into an effects pedal, and your hands are free to start turning knobs. If you’re experimenting with guitar sound design, placing the looper first in your signal chain may be the way to go.
How to Sync Your Looper Pedal with a Drum Machine or Other Gear
If you’ve ever tried to manually sync a looper pedal with a drum machine, you know it’s impossible. Look for a looper pedal with MIDI connections — most looper pedals will use 1/8-inch outputs that require adapter cables with 5-pin MIDI connectors, and if they’re not included with the pedal they are easily acquired online.
Syncing your looper pedal isn’t only for rhythm accompaniment like drum machines, you can sync a MIDI-equipped looper pedal to other MIDI gear like sequencers and synthesizers. The most common reason to sync a looper pedal via MIDI is to share tempo information, so that all devices are playing to the same tempo. But if you may be able to control some looper pedal functions from MIDI externally too — check your user manual for more information on what type of MIDI messages your loop station responds to.
| Loop Save | Yes (internal memory) |
|---|---|
| Max. Loop Time | Unlimited (up to 3 hours total) |
| Playback Modes | 2 (Parallel, Series) |
| MIDI | Yes |
| USB | Yes |
| Stereo/Mono | Stereo |
| XLR Mic Input | No |
| Drums/Rhythms | No |
| Other Effects | N/A |
How to Get Creative Beyond Basic Looping
Basic looper pedals allow you to capture a loop and then play over it. If you’re looking for more creative and experimental capabilities, look for a looper with different playback modes like half-speed playback for creating ambient soundscapes (which can also create pseudo-bass by dropping pitch down an octave). Reverse playback can be rewarding to play with too, especially when you add other effects like reverb and delay. You may also want to look for a looper pedal that supports longer loops (multiple minutes) for creating soundscapes, as some looper pedals only allow shorter loops (less than a minute).
| Loop Save | No |
|---|---|
| Max. Loop Time | 62 seconds |
| Playback Modes | 1 |
| MIDI | No |
| USB | No |
| Stereo/Mono | Mono |
| XLR Mic Input | No |
| Drums/Rhythms | No |
| Other Effects | Delay/Reverb (12 modes) |
| Loop Save | No |
|---|---|
| Max. Loop Time | 6 minutes |
| Playback Modes | 3 (Loop, Reverse, Time Stretch) |
| MIDI | No |
| USB | No |
| Stereo/Mono | Mono |
| XLR Mic Input | No |
| Drums/Rhythms | No |
| Other Effects | N/A |
Using a Looper Pedal with Vocals and Other Instruments
If you want to perform with live looping, you may want your vocals to get in on the action too. It’s important to remember that most looper pedals are intended for electric guitar, and aren’t designed for fuller-range signals like vocals, synthesizers and other sound sources. Look for a looper pedal with a dedicated XLR microphone input to capture vocals with clarity and detail. For synthesizers, look for a looper pedal with stereo inputs — otherwise, you’ll need to connect your synth with a mono connection, and disable any stereo panning effects or modulation you may be using.
| Loop Save | Yes (SD card) |
|---|---|
| Max. Loop Time | 230 seconds (per song part) |
| Playback Modes | 3 (Loop, Song, Alt Time) |
| MIDI | No |
| USB | Yes |
| Stereo/Mono | Mono |
| XLR Mic Input | No |
| Drums/Rhythms | Yes |
| Other Effects | Guitar FX (12 styles) |
| Loop Save | Yes (internal memory) |
|---|---|
| Max. Loop Time | 6 hours total across 99 save slots |
| Playback Modes | 1 |
| MIDI | Yes |
| USB | Yes |
| Stereo/Mono | Stereo |
| XLR Mic Input | No |
| Drums/Rhythms | Yes |
| Other Effects | Cabinet Simulation |
