12 fret vs 14 fret.. which one do you prefer? Why?

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I came across a mention of preference for a 12 fret neck (the next joins the body at the 12th fret) vs a 14 fret neck.
Which fret the neck joins the body from what I can tell impacts where the bridge is located for a given body size and how easily the higher frets are accessible.
I have been wondering what are the trade offs people have in their minds and why the preference of one over the other? I can see why some one would prefer 14 fret as it makes higher frets more accessible without a cutaway. Also, most super tenor/concert/sopranos have to make the neck join the body at a higher fret to keep the location of the bridge at the sweet spot for a given body and bracing design...
Thoughts?
 
On guitars I prefer 12-frets and nothing larger than a 000

On ukes, I have no strong preference
 
I'm good with a "12-fret joiner", as I hardly ever have occasion to play past the 7th fret (I pretty much use the ukulele to accompany myself singing), and it just seems simpler and more compact that way.
 
I'm a strummer/would be singer. A twelve fret soprano is all I need. (So why do I have two dozen of 'em?!) I sometimes venture as high as the tenth fret, but beyond that is terra incognita. If access is needed to the dusty end of the fret board, a strong argument can be made for joining at the fourteenth fret, or even higher. This requires consideration of how it will affect the position of the bridge, but that is easily arranged at the design stage.

John Colter
 
I've rarely found a song that sent me past the 12th fret, so I'm fine with it for playability. For me, it's more aesthetics. A concert with less than 14 frets to the body can sometimes look a little stubby to me.
 
I have a tenor with 12 frets to the body and a tenor with 15. For my playstyle I rarely venture far enough up the neck for this to make a difference with regards to room at the higher frets, though I can attest that the 15th fret join allows easy access to several additional frets.

If I focus on the differences, it is fairly obvious that the ukulele with 15 frets to the body feels larger. My left arm is angled noticeably farther out from my body when fingering open position chords on the 15 fret join.

In everyday practice, if I'm not consciously focusing on the differences, it is a complete nonfactor. I never really notice the difference, and the experience is so familiar that I can switch between them without any appreciable impediment.
 
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I have a 12 fret tenor. Lack of frets was what I liked the least about it when I first considered purchasing it. But it plays beautifully and has a unique and wonderful sound. I think the neck was intentionally kept short to enhance the sound, but I'm not sure.

I think the new KoAloha tenors reduced the number of frets to the neck from 15 to 14 to place the bridge in a way to optimize their sound.

I don't know why else makers would use fewer frets, except to improve sound. Several others have mentioned not needing more than 12 frets, but I wonder if someone could explain why 12 frets would ever be preferable to 14.
 
I'm good with 12 frets: more room to vary the right hand position for color changes and 12 frets joiners seem to be a wee bit more responsive to vibrato. Besides, it's really blinky beyond the 12th fret, so I rarely use any notes beyond the 15th, albeit I don't mind having a 19th fret to mark out the high E harmonic.
 
I too prefer twelve frets to the body and I also suspect that fourteen is more about show and marketing than anything much else (bigger is almost always perceived as better).

My own playing, which is typically on a Soprano, covers both strumming to sing along to and finger picking of tunes. Most but not quite all of what I need is covered by the first seven frets and after that one increasingly runs up against the limitations of what a plucked instrument can do with a short string. Obviously string length remaining at any particular number fret varies with scale length and larger instrument body’s can make best use of what little input a short string can give. Build quality is also a factor, in terms of extracting everything possible from a general design. However, as above by an expert player and teacher, there’s a point at which things get plinky and hence there’s little merit in having an excessive number of frets because such designs can but struggle to produce the tone, pitch and volume wanted.

The twelve fret to neck gives a more compact size (which I find helpful), and it adheres to the traditional design which doubtless settled on twelve frets to the neck for reasons that still have merit today. The fourteen fret to neck design provides additional fretboard space to allow easier access to notes that are virtually never used by ‘normal’ players - so basically it’s salesman’s gimmick and ‘just in-case’ solution to a problem that ‘normal’ folk don’t actually have.
 
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Neither. 13 frets to the body seems to be optimal. That’s what Bill Collings used. I’ve got a couple ukes with 13 fret necks.
 
For me, body joint at the 14th fret always—and I really appreciate a cutaway as well. Just cosmetic? Hardly.

I would have to agree. To call 14 frets to the body a salesman’s gimmick, you’d have to say the same about cutaways, and neither are true. They are both useful to those that like to travel way up the neck. I play mostly fingerstyle, and frequently hit the 15th fret. Can I get there on a 12 fret to body instrument? Yes. Is it comfortable? Not remotely, especially if I’m chording something. There are trad-offs for sure, and to each there own. The good thing is we have choices.
 
When getting a uke the motto was: the simpler the better. So my uke has 12 frets, one octave will do, the frets don't even continue on the body.

Nice though to see your replies with the motivations for more frets, understand it better now.
 
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I like playing a few classical pieces on the uke and invariably they go beyond 12the fret specially if one wants to keep the original scale.
Having a boat paddle shape, or cutaway or higher fret join one gets on super size scales has been quite nice. I have ukes that only go to 12 frets and some that go way higher and I don’t see any difference in the quality of sound. The quality of sound is more often a function of the builder than the choice of which fret. The uke can built differently to accommodate a higher fret join. My recent cripple creek soprano, is a boat paddle shape with the join at 14th fret and it rings up the neck such that I do not regret going high up the neck.
 
Man....I wish I knew. My baritone uke has 14. The newly created Washburn Rover "tenor guitar", 15. And my old classical Yamaha has 12.
Probably doesn't make much difference to a total nube like myself. More of a concern is having a wide string spacing.
 
For playing fingerstyle, there is another qualifier... high or low G. There are some pieces that require enough range that going to and past the 12th fret might be necessary while playing tuned to high G.

There are 2 octaves from open 3rd string C to 15th fret 1st string C. While adding a low G doesn’t ensure that you will never go above the 12th fret, there were times when having those few extra low notes would have helped.

John
 
as a singer/strummer, I prefer the 12 or 13 (Koaloha Concert) to the body rendition.
I even have a short-neck Concert with 10 frets to the body.

I just don't play many songs beyond the 7th fret so fewer frets are OK for me :)
Your Mileage May Vary (YMMV) of course.

Anyway, that's my 2 cents :)

keep uke'in', however many frets your instrument(s) have!
 
All my ukes have, by design and intention, 19 frets. I do this because I mostly play in the key of E and the 19th fret, A string, is an E so that my highest note is a root note. I also do it to organize my fretboard by the side-dots on the 3rd, 5th, 7th, 10th, 12th, 15th, 17th, and 19th frets. Why are those frets important? They are the notes of the pentatonic scale, the cornerstone of the American musical experience. I am not a singer whatsoever, so I definitely use all my fretboard. For example, I have recently been obsessed with the Phrygian dominant scale. So I begin my playing at the 11th fret and noodle my way up to the 19th for improvisation. However in the matter of chords and the extended neck, I find that although the spirit is willing, the flesh is weak. As a general rule, I wouldn't even think of chords beyond the 15th fret. It just doesn't work for me. There are exceptions. For instance the m7b5 chord with the root on the A string is playable all the way to the end with my skills. And straight barres like the major and minor triads as well as the minor 7 barre work everywhere.
 
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