Is It Ok To Keep The Capo On The Strings When Not Playing?

It would NOT be recommended to keep the capo on the guitar strings for many reasons: It can damage the strings, the capo, and the guitar itself. For each reason we will go into how to check for this, what does it do, and how to fix it.

DAMAGE TO THE STRINGS

One of the things that can happen to strings is that they can form bumps. Pressure on the strings overtime creates bumps where the strings touch the fret bar itself. There are two things that can cause this: normal wear and tear from playing with your fingers and the capo being put on too tightly.

How To Check For This: To check for bumps on your strings, lightly run for fingers along the strings. The bumps will occur on the string right over the frets.
What Does It Do: If the bumps are big enough or you have a lot of them, it will cause your guitar to sound out of tune. Even though your strings are in tune (when not using your fingers) when you go to use your fingers the note being played will be slightly out of tune.
How To Fix This:

Don’t Put the Capo On Too Tightly: Some capos allow you to adjust the amount of tension you can put on the strings. Keep the pressure down to a minimum. Have the least amount of pressure for the capo to work by adjust the pressure until there is no more buzzing on any of the strings. There are other capos where you can not adjust it, the manufacturer sets the amount of pressure. Just make sure you get a good capo that will not pushing unnecessarily too hard on the strings. I wrote a post on these different types of capos that will help you choose a capo that is best suited for you.
Don’t Keep The Capo On When Not Playing: The more often the pressure is on the strings, the faster the wear and tear happens. The bumps will appear sooner than later.

DAMAGE TO THE CAPO

Another thing that can happen if you keep the capo on the strings when not playing is the capo can get damaged. Grooves can appear in the padding of the capo.

How To Check For This: Run your fingers along the padding that is in contact with the strings.
What Does It Do: The capo becomes less effective over time because of these grooves. If the capo has the ability to adjust the tension, you will need to tighten it more. If the capo does not have the ability to set the tension, such as in spring/trigger capos, the grooves in the padding will make the capo push down less on the strings.
How To Fix This: I’m sure you can figure it out: don’t put leave the capo on when you don’t need it on. It’s not that you need to take the capo off the second that you don’t need it on. Say you have two guitars, you are playing live, and you need one guitar to have a capo on. Go ahead and keep the capo on for how ever long you need it. What I’m talking about is storing your guitar, in the case or leaving it on your guitar stand for days, with the capo on.

DAMAGE TO THE GUITAR

Through my experience and through a lot of research, I have found that keeping the capo on the strings can cause damage to the guitar itself.

How To Check For This: Visually inspect for the details listed in the next section of “What Does It Do”.
What Does It Do:

Fretboard: Damage can occur to the fretboard, especially with ones that are made of softer wood. The frets can be pushed into the wood more than how it was made. This will definitely cause intonation problems and frets that do not work.
Frets: Some people have claimed that, with the capo on for a prolonged period of time, rust appears at the points of contact where the strings are touching the frets.
Finish: Some people have claimed that finish on the back of the neck of the guitar gets damaged from the prolonged contact of the capo. This is most likely due to the type of material the padding is made of reacting with the finish.

How To Fix This: First things first is to not keep the capo on when not in use of course. If the damage has already occurred you can do the following.

Fretboard: You will need to take your guitar to a professional to get some work done on your guitar. They will most likely raise the frets back up.
Frets: A lot of times tarnish will appear where the strings come in contact with the fret bars. This does not mess with the functionality of the guitar, it’s more about how the guitar looks. Typically tarnish the precursor to rust. If your guitar gets to the point of rust appearing on the strings and/or frets, this is not so good. If the strings get rusty, all you would need to do is change them. If you are frets get rusty, you will need to take it to a professional to get new frets on your guitar.
Finish: If the finish is wearing off, you will need to take it to a professional to restore it.

WHERE TO KEEP THE CAPO

Where do you keep your capo when not in use? I have split this into two different ways of thinking about this: in the short term or the long term. Short term is before you put your guitar away when you are not playing. Long term would be if you know that you are not going to play for a while.

Short Term

On The Headstock

Pros: A quick and easy way to get it off your strings and having a place to put it is on the headstock of the guitar. You will have quick access to it for the next song that you need the capo for.
Cons: Though it is in the short term, keep in mind prolonged contact with the guitar may cause the finish of the guitar to be damaged.

On Music Stand

Pros: A plus is that it does not come in contact with any part of your guitar or strings. Just take the capo off when not in use and put it on a stand near by.
Cons: A minus is that you have to go get every time you want to use it. It’s not too big of a deal when playing.

Long Term

In The Guitar Case: There is usually a dedicated area, in a case or on a gig bag, for small things such as a capo.

Posted by Gregg Gascon

musician, singer/songwriter, & teacher