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Looking for the best overdrive pedal for electric guitar?
An overdrive pedal can be a great addition to your electric guitar pedal board. Overdrive effects can have a great influence on your sound. Having either an overdrive or distortion pedal is an essential part of every serious guitar player’s board.
While overdrive pedals are very similar to distortion pedals and fuzz pedals, they aren’t quite the same. They have big differences in their overall sound.
The crunch and gain of a distortion pedal offer a much different tone that has a much more aggressive feel to it, whereas an overdrive pedal offers a warm richness which emulates the sounds of an overdriven tube amp.
Both pedals can offer a lot of versatile to your sound as a guitarist, and both have their uses.
If you’re looking for an excellent overdrive pedal, then keep reading. This list will give you an overview of the very best overdrive pedals on the market, perfect for your guitar playing needs.
1. Fulltone OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Drive Overdrive Pedal)
It’s hard to get much better than the Fulltone OCD pedal if you’re looking to bring that amazing overdrive sound into your guitar playing. The pedal offers an excellent tone with a lot of versatility.
Guitarists all over highly recommend the pedal and for good reason. The pedal has a reasonable price tag and some functionality that can’t be beaten.
The OCD pedal features knobs for volume, drive, and tone as well, so you have plenty of options for versatility and a fine-tuned sound.
The pedal also features true bypass wiring and has two switchable modes. A small toggle switch is located at the top of the pedal and allows users to select between LP (Low Peak) mode and HP (High Peak) mode.
The HP Mode allows for an aggressive and full overdrive sound, while the low peak mode offers a more subdued overdriven tone.
Overall, this pedal is a great choice if you’re looking for an aggressive sound, excellent functionality, and an excellent price tag.
2. Electro-Harmonix Soul Food Overdrive Pedal
The Electro-Harmonix Soul Food Overdrive Pedal is a boost/overdrive pedal that has some great features and an amazing sound.
One feature that is unique to this pedal is the addition of the boosted power rails. The boosted power rails provide a higher voltage to the circuit, helping to boost to output and deliver a boomier bass sound when using a high gain setting.
This pedal is a great option if you want to achieve an excellent sounding clean boost or you want to turn up the gain and get a crunchy and smooth sounding overdrive.
Overall, the Soul Food Overdrive Pedal is truly an excellent choice if you’re looking for a great and high-quality pedal to add into the mix, perfect experimenting with new sounds.
3. Ibanez TS9 Tube Screamer Overdrive Pedal
The Ibanez TS9 Tube Screamer is also an excellent option for an overdrive solution. The pedal has existed in different incarnations since the 1970s and has become something of an icon among guitarists and musicians.
The pedal offers a boost which has a vintage tube sound and what it does, it does well.
The TS9 is not nearly as versatile as the Fulltone OCD pedal, for example, but does a pack a pretty strong punch. It’s not a modern pedal with high-gain, but the pedal offers more of a vintage sound.
The pedal follows your playing well and offers a lot of extra strength and sound that perfectly matches your style and dynamics.
The sound isn’t too gritty but offers a pretty clean overdrive sound that can blend well with many genres, no matter what you choose to play.
4. Joyo JF-02 Vintage Overdrive Pedal
Found at a much lower price than many other options, the Joyo Vintage Overdrive Pedal has a really great sound that will surprise you. It is very comparable in features to the Fulltone OCD pedal listed above and offers a good bit of flexibility in your sound.
The pedal has a basic and simple easy to use interface that gets the job done well. The sound is a really great and rich tone that is reminiscent of classic rock sounds. The pedal lends itself well to punk and rock styles.
The pedal features 3 control knobs to mess with including gain, level, and tone. There is also a high/low switch, and luckily there is a true bypass pedal as well that is good for such a cheap pedal.
The pedal can be powered by a 9V battery or an AC adapter.
Overall, this is a great choice for a great overdrive sound for your guitar and it comes at a pretty cheap price compared to other pedals.
5. Fulltone Full-Drive 2 MOSFET Overdrive Pedal
If you’re looking for a large and full-featured overdrive pedal, the Fulltone Full-Drive 2 MOSFET really takes the cake. This double-pedal has a robust set of features that make for an incredibly versatile product and offers some amazing sounds.
The pedal is quite large and uses this space well, offering plenty of knobs and switches to create different sounds. Many sounds and tones are available and the pedal allows for plenty of experimentation.
The pedal features three different gain stages. Using the Standard-Mosfet switch, you can also use a “Boost” to incorporate a clean or dirty gain into the pedal’s signal.
With its huge range of dirty and clean sounds and its flexible tone control options, you can achieve nearly any type of overdrive and distorted sound that you might need.
It can take a bit of a learning curve and experimentation to figure out how to work all of the features. However, if you’re looking for a fully-featured overdrive pedal that has a great quality sound, the Fulltone Full-Drive 2 is just what you’re looking for.
6. Boss BD-2 Blues Driver
Another pedal that is relatively cheaper priced, the Boss BD-2 is a great option for an overdrive pedal. The tone is a bit on the milder side and is meant to be an overdrive, whereas this pedal isn’t as aggressive as distortion tones on some other pedals.
The pedal features high-quality Boss construction and a more than adequate amount of features. You can really achieve some interesting sounds from the pedal.
The pedal is simple to use and features volume, gain and tone knobs that allow you to gain some great versatility in your guitar’s sound.
With the gain knob all the way down, the Blues Driver offers a very clean boost.
Some people may be dissatisfied with the quality of the pedals’ tone, however, as it can have a bit of an abrasive sound compared to other pedals.
Overall, the Blues Driver is a great and versatile pedal that is incredibly durable and is great if you’re looking for a more inexpensive pedal.
7. TC Electronic MojoMojo Overdrive Pedal
The TC Electronic MojoMojo Overdrive Pedal is a high-quality overdrive pedal that has some excellent features. The pedal is also very sturdy and offers some great controls for tone. It also has a sleek and attractive design and excellent build quality.
The pedal functions as a true bypass pedal and has a single input along with one output jack. The MojoMojo pedal also features four knobs and voicing switch. A large on/off switch and a LED that shows the pedal’s status is also included.
It’s a bit uncommon for a pedal of this price range to have such a range of features, but it makes for a great addition to the pedal to help you control the pedal and offers a lot of versatility.
The four knobs include level, bass, treble, and drive. The voicing switch helps to provide a strong boost to the mid-range.
The quality of the sound is also pretty impressive and features a strong low-end. Overall, this pedal makes for a great choice for any serious guitar player.
Final Thoughts
If you’re looking to add a high-quality and versatile overdrive pedal to your arsenal, you simply can’t go wrong with any of the options above.
Depending on your budget needs, you may choose to go with the full-featured Fulltone Full-Drive 2. Or you may choose to go with a more inexpensive pedal such as the Joyo JF-02.
Whatever pedal you decide on, an overdrive pedal can add a strong addition to your overall sound. An overdrive pedal can open up excellent new possibilities for your guitar playing.
Looking for more great pedals to add to your playing? Check out our recent review of the best guitar looper pedals and check the site often. More reviews are coming soon!
Hi, I’m Harrison! I created this website to help musicians navigate the ins and outs of their craft and to help them choose new instruments and gear to add to their collection. I have 15 years of experience as a guitarist and singer and have also played many other instruments throughout the years including the bass guitar, piano, banjo, mandolin, and harmonica.