The bridge and saddle

The bridge is the part of a guitar that attaches the strings to the body of the guitar using bridge pins. The guitar saddle is the strip of hard material set into the bridge that lifts the strings off the top of the guitar face. There is one saddle for each of the six strings. The saddle sits at the opposite end of the nut and headstock.

Here is a detailed drawing of a bridge and saddle on a guitar.

The saddle controls the spacing of the strings.

The saddle may be made from ebony, ivory, cow bone, brass, corian (hard white plastic material) or plastic.

This drawing shows how the bridge pin holds the string into the bridge. A detailed cross section of the bridge pin.

To remember that the saddle and bridge go together recall the following image.

From this vantage point on the bridge we can now saddle up the six horses (six saddles).

There are six saddles on a standard bridge.