Effects Pedals: What order do they go in?

Basic guidelines to link your chain of effects pedals will minimize noise and hiss while making each effect work to its potential. Start here:

• First, plug your guitar into dynamic effects such as a compressor and limiter to give the rest of the effects a smooth, even signal.
• If you want the equalizer to have the greatest effect, it should follow the compressor. Equalizers can be used at a variety of stages depending on what effect you want to equalize. They can be helpful at the end of the chain to adjust your overall sound or in the middle to enhance a particular effect, such as a distortion pedal.
• Next in line are your distortions, overdrive, fuzz boxes, etc., because you want to put high-gain devices on a clean signal, not a processed one.
• Next, add your "time" effects such as chorus, flanger, phase shifter, tremolo, and pitch shift effects such as octave, etc. The order doesn't matter that much.
• Place delay and reverb effects last in the chain (closest to the input of your amplifier). This way you can have the chorus or flanging effects on repeats, and you can hear your active effects in the decaying reverb. Also, if a reverb or delay effect gets "processed" through distortion or time effects, they tend to get muddy and undefined.

• "Tone" devices such as wah can be placed before or after distortion pedals depending on your desired effect. It is common to place the wah first in the chain. That way, whatever is going on after the wah will be affected by the tonal variations it produces. It can produce some very cool and intense effects when placed last, as well.

But don't live by the "rules!" Experiment and build your own sound! You can't break anything, so plug it in and see how it sounds. Even if you have two or three pedals, spend some time playing around with their placement until you find what sounds good to your ears. Some of the most accomplished players have found unique and interesting sounds by breaking the rules.