Top Keyboard Brands that make excellent Music keyboards and Digital Pianos

Top music keyboard and digital piano brands that make excellent keyboard instruments.

Musical keyboard instruments have become popular over the years as they provide easy access to hundreds of high quality sounds, rhythms and features, making them quite popular with beginners as well as experienced musicians.

As most of the keyboard instruments have turned digital, the features available on electronic keyboards and digital pianos are now similar (expect the number of keys and key action).

While several new brands have emerged in the last few years, especially in the entry-level segment, certain names like Yamaha, Casio, Roland have been there for ages.

Many of these well-established brands started of making electronic keyboards (the more portable ones) and over the years have expanded their product portfolio to include higher-end keyboards as well as digital pianos.

So, for example, Yamaha always made excellent arranger keyboards for beginners and intermediate level players.

Later (as they started facing competition from Casio for the entry-level keyboards), Yamaha started expanding their line of arranger keyboards to include high-end arranger workstations which had excellent backing rhythms and instrument sounds.

Yamaha also started increasing its range of digital pianos, and it started making them better (the P-series, ARIUS, and more). In fact, Yamaha has now emerged as a top brand for musical instruments and today makes guitars and orchestra instruments as well.

Similarly, Casio started off as a maker of electronic keyboards, and for a long time, it focused on making portable electronic keyboards.

Casio was always known for providing value for money, it offered more features for cheaper prices, however, the overall sound quality (of the samples as well as the speakers) were not that great.

But in order to keep pace with competition (especially from Yamaha), Casio had to upgrade its line of electronic keyboards, especially in terms of sound quality.

Casio also introduced several portable digital pianos, which was missing earlier from its portfolio. With the PRIVIA series of digital pianos, Casio was able to make a mark for itself in the digital piano category.

Casio today has a wide range of keyboard instruments, that includes portable music keyboards as well as digital pianos.

However, in the entry-level portable music keyboard category (for beginners), several new brands have emerged in recent years.

You will find several entry-level keyboards from music keyboard brands such as RockJam, Starfavor, Plixio, Donner, Jikada, and many others.

While these brands do make beginner keyboards and offer good value as many of them are quite cheap, the overall sound quality tend to be okay on these keyboards, and many of them also do not offer touch-sensitive keys and cannot be connected to the computer.

For keyboard instruments with better sounds and features and more durable products, you will have to consider the more trusted brands like Yamaha, Casio, Roland, Korg.

These brands offer a range of keyboard instruments that vary in features, capabilities and even size, and are designed to suit the specific playing needs of different players. You get models that are designed for beginners, while others are apt for professional keyboard players.

Other brands like Roland and Korg have several high-end pro keyboards in their keyboard portfolio. They also offer a wide-range of digital pianos (portable as well as home pianos).

Roland now offers a few portable keyboards as well (such as the Go series) , although the selection is limited.

Related: Comprehensive guide on buying Piano & Keyboards

Electronic Keyboard Brands

Most popular models are from Yamaha and Casio, though there are a few other brands, such as Hamzer, that are making their presence felt. But Yamaha and Casio continue to dominate this segment; they make a very wide range of portable keyboards, even in the less than 200 dollar range.

Read: Casio vs Yamaha.

In addition, brands like ‘The One’ and RockJam are also growing in popularity.

Digital Piano Brands

When it comes to buying a digital piano, you get pianos with basic set of sounds and weighted keys, and some may even have built-in styles. Here, in addition to Yamaha, Casio, Roland and Korg, you still have a few more options.

Some of the popular names that manufacture Digital Pianos are Yamaha, Roland, Korg, Casio, The One, Kurzweil, Kawai, Nord and a few others. Each of these has its own fan following and have a huge user base.

Here are the popular digital piano brands, that are used by beginners and that you will find in most homes:

• Casio Digital Pianos, Yamaha Digital Pianos, Korg Digital Pianos, Williams Digital Pianos, Roland Digital Pianos
• Roland, Kawai, Nord, Kurzweil make great digital stage pianos that are used by musicians on stage as well as in the studio

Some of the names like Kurzweil, Kawai are not so well known to the general public, whereas brands such as Nord cater only to pro musicians.

Brands such as Yamaha, Roland, and Casio make a wide range of keyboard instruments and they also make (except Casio) a lot of music and recording related equipment, which explains their popularity.

Yamaha, Roland, and Korg have the biggest share of the Digital pianos market, more or less in that order, and then you have the rest of the brands. Out of these, Yamaha is the biggest manufacturer and has over 100 years of experience in making acoustic pianos. So definitely, their experience comes in handy. Yamaha, Roland and Korg also make some good keyboards and synthesizers so even that experience has been used to incorporate some amazing musical styles and effects in some of their digital piano models.

You can even have a look at Casio’s Privia range of Digital Pianos for a cost effective option.

 

 

Here’s a summary of their strengths:

• Roland: Probably the best Piano Touch that you can get on digital pianos
• Yamaha: Brand Reliability, good support
• Casio: Affordable
• The One: Fairly recent company that makes digital piano with good learning features.
• Nord: Pricey, for the Pros

Again, exactly stating which is the best brand or model is very difficult as almost all of these brands have a huge range of models, some of which, are very popular.

Keyboard and Synth Brands

While there is no keyboard brand which you can call as the best brand, certain brands are more popular with keyboard players of certian skills.

For example, brands such as Casio, Yamaha, RockJam, Hamzer, The One, are more popular with learners, whereas brands such as Yamaha, Roland, Korg, Nord are popular with experienced players or those looking for a more refined product.

Then there are brands such as Akai, M-Audio, Novation which make more of music production equipment, including keyboard controllers.

In general, here are the popular brands.

Schoenhut . Casio . Yamaha . Korg . Roland . Williams . Nord . Moog . Akai . M-Audio

Read:

Read: Popular Acoustic & digital Piano brands