A portable guitar amp is nice as it’s handy and great for street musicians and those who are traveling a lot.
There are tons of guitar amps on the market that offers great portability.
In fact, the numbers have increased given the fact that guitarists and musicians alike are a lot more mobile today than yesterday.
So, if you are in the quest for your first portable guitar amp or looking to replace your old amp, you’ve come to the right place.
Our musicians on-board spent so much time picking the best music gear in town.
And, in this article, we feature the best portable guitar amps this 2024.
We reviewed the best 10 products and from there, we get our recommendations.
In addition, if you are looking for help to find the right one for you, we include our best practices and a few tips. So sit back and read on!
Contents
10 Best Portable Guitar Amps 2024
- VOX MINI3 G2 Modeling Amp
- Roland Micro Cube GX Guitar Combo Amp
- Roland CUBE Street Amplifier
- Yamaha THR10C Mini Guitar Amplifier
- Peavey Nano Vypyr Guitar Amplifier
- Roland AC33 Acoustic Chorus Amp
- Line 6 Micro Spider Guitar Amplifier
- ZT Amplifiers Lunchbox Junior
- Fender Champion 20 Guitar Amplifier
- Boss Katana-Mini Guitar Amplifier
Runner Up | Editor's Choice | Also Great |
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VOX MINI3 G2 Modeling Amp
Offers 11 amp models from high-gain to clean tones, VOX MINI3 G2 Battery Powered Modeling Amp, supports a wide variety of instruments. It can be used with AC power source or six AA batteries, this gives you at least 10 hours of continuous entertainment and fun.
Features the maker’s proprietary “Bassilator” circuit, you’ll achieve heavy sound with ultra-low frequencies.
Comes with compact construction and design, it’s portable and always ready for home studio and even for outdoor use. It has enhanced quality effects like compressor, chorus, flanger, delay, reverb, and tremolo. Enjoy jamming with your MP3 player through the amps AUX input jack.
- Tiny amp with an exceptionally loud sound
- Has fantastic effects with good tremolo
- Can be used up to 10 hours with six AA batteries
- A little expensive than its competitors
- Tuner is not that useful
- Doesn’t support multiple lines
Roland Micro Cube GX Guitar Combo Amp
Roland Micro Cube GX Guitar Combo Amp is a portable and compact DSP guitar amp. It’s a 3W amp with a five-inch speaker that can either be battery-operated or AC-powered. Offered with a carry strapi-CUBE LINK jack that provides a simple interface with iPhone, iPod or iPod touch.
It’s packed with eight COSM guitar amp models including JC-120 and a special mic preamp. Additionally, it has eight DSP effects with chorus, tremolo, phaser, flanger and more. It has a separate delay or reverb function with a built-in tuner and has a headphone output and stereo auxiliary.
- Lightweight amp with incredible sound quality
- Crisp output with no hiss or feedback
- Low tones have good clarity character
- Some FX settings may produce noise
- Craftsmanship seems poor and cheap
- Craftsmanship seems poor and cheap Low-quality sounds when used outdoors
Roland CUBE Street Amplifier
The compact and lightweight Roland CUBE Street Amplifier is something you need for your next street gigging and rehearsals. Featuring two high-performance 6.5-inch neodymium speakers, this amp is capable of high-volume output and great sound quality.
Battery-operated using six alkaline AA batteries that offer 15 hours of continuous use.
It has a dual-channel architecture with guitar/instrument and mic/line inputs, eight COSM amps, six digital effects, two-band EQ, delay/reverb and a built-in chromatic tuner.
The COSM amp model allows you to choose from six famous effects to get Roland’s sound quality. With the dual-channel and the XRL/1/4-inch mic input, singing and playing guitar with this amplifier is exciting.
- Affordable amp with lots of features on-board
- Rugged and portable design
- Perfect for any situation
- Straightforward
- Well-separated knobs and controls for easy operation
- Effects are limited
- Especially for professional players
- Not the loudest
- But definitely perfect for practice
Yamaha THR10C Mini Guitar Amplifier
It’s time to get serious with music production with Yamaha THR10C Mini Guitar Amplifier. It embraces Yamaha’s high-standard craftsmanship and advanced core technologies for making this personal amp deliver great sound fidelity.
Integrates with the Cubase AI recording software and some common apps, it has five class amp models with bass, acoustic and flat models that are present in the THR10X model.
Featuring Yamaha’s signature VCM technology, you can make great effects processing quickly. Add a bit of personal taste to the guitar tone or pickups. With the mono phone and stereo phone input, along with the AUX IN and USB, you’re getting enough versatility when it comes to connectivity.
- Controls are easily tweaked producing great sounds
- Perfect for home use
- Gives full and deep lows
- A great guitar amp for playing blues
- Country and classic rock
- No ability to change channels
- Can be better in terms of quality and playability
Peavey Nano Vypyr Guitar Amplifier
An ultimate travel guitar amp, the Peavey Nano Vypyr Battery Operated Guitar Amplifier is packed with 11 amp models and 36 effects combinations. It’s both AC-powered and battery-powered, along with the tones and technology of the award-winning Vypyr series.
Also, featuring global bass, mid, treble and gain controls for you to adjust the tones of the 11 exclusive analog amp models.
Its preamp section has the company’s patented TransTube technology, while the power section with the lightweight class-D amp. With the built-in DSP, you’ll get to enjoy on-board effects like chorus, compression, flanger, octave, reverb, delay and more.
The effects control knob helps you dial in the effect at one, while the expression pedal (optional) provides users real-time control over all the 36 effects combinations.
- Gives versatility and great tone quality
- Has more effects that you can use simultaneously
- Peavey has better distortion options
- Effects might add too much noise
- Toggle switch seems of cheap quality
Roland AC33 Acoustic Chorus Amp
Whether you go camping or out to the streets for gigs, you can never go wrong with Roland Battery-Powered Acoustic Chorus Amp (AC33). It can take on whatever music production and wherever it may be because it runs on either AC power or eight AA batteries (accepts rechargeable ones, as well).
Portable, yet powerful, so you may be, you can enjoy, deep and rich stereo sound through its 30 watts (15W+15W) twin speakers.
It has dual-channel configuration (guitar and mic/line channels) with custom-tailored effects (reverb, chorus, and ambience), anti-feedback and a Phrase Looper.
Made with beautiful rosewood-look cabinets, it offers a stage-ready look and gorgeous black finish. It’s also a perfect addition to your living room or studio, as well as a perfect match to any guitar.
- Lightweight and portable with a line out for personal monitor
- Easy to set up
- Gives a great sound when used in one setting
- Chorus effect is usable
- Especially with acoustic guitars
- Clarity and volume of the amp are quite inconsistent (setting-dependent)
- Loop effects only 15 seconds and not foot-switchable
- Good unit
- But the build seems fragile
Line 6 Micro Spider Guitar Amplifier
The Micro Spider amp models, specifically the Line 6 Micro Spider Guitar Amplifier, offer a wide tonal range like those of their popular predecessors. It’s battery-powered and fully-loaded with features and functionalities that you’ll never regret.
Comes with 12-inch Celestion speaker and integrated with its very own chromatic tuner.
In addition, it has two-inch tweeter that is great for full-range audio playback, plus 36 user-programmable presets. Perfect for home or vacation or playing guitar in the back of the tour bus. This portable guitar amp is always ready to give you its brilliant tones and vocals wherever you may be.
- Produce great sound with the Celestion speaker
- Definitely a great practice amp offered at a fairly low price
- Versatile in accommodating your style
- Mellow
- Classical or heavy metal
- The headphone jack output has some hissing sound when used
- Vibrations of the amp when the gain-type switch is used
- Need to read the manual before you can understand the controls
ZT Amplifiers Lunchbox Junior
A portable 12V guitar amp is enough to power your weekend vacation or your small-town gigging performances. In this aspect, ZT Amplifiers Lunchbox Junior is a perfect choice, especially with its ultra-power 5-inch speaker.
Since it can be wall-powered or battery-powered using ZT Battery Pack or Car Adapter cable, you’ll be able to bring it anywhere you go.
Even without an outlet, you can still get up to 117dB of rich and superior sounds, which make it a powerful and reliable portable guitar amp. It comes with a 1/8-inch headphone output, 1/8-inch AUX in and switchable 115V/230V.
With a wide range of features and controls, you’ll be able to have warm and mellow output to pure overdrive, which can get really loud.
- Delivers tube-like warmth
- Best portable and battery-powered amplifier you can rely on
- Can turn the knobs all the way up without any noise or feedback
- No reverb
- Has an ambience knob
- Which isn’t that great
- Doesn’t have individual control for low
- Mid and high
Fender Champion 20 Guitar Amplifier
Since 1946, Fender has been a leader when it comes to musical instrument manufacturing. So, you are assured of the quality and craftsmanship of its guitars, controllers, and amplifiers.
Speaking of amplifiers, there are a few Fender products that are trusted by musicians, and that is the Fender Champion 20 Guitar Amplifier.
You can easily shape and color your music with its EQ controls (bass + treble), dial-in lush effects (reverb, chorus, vibratome, and delay) and a knob for you to choose different tones from the 17 amp models with any genre of music.
Plug in your MP3 to the AUX IN and start jamming with your favorite band through its 1/8-inch headphone output. This 20-watt guitar amp is ideal for practice, especially in rock, blues, country, metal, and jazz.
- Great sounding amp with amazing loud sound quality
- Has headphones and AUX connections
- Affordable amp with very simple controls
- Doesn’t have foot-switchable option to change from clean to tweed
- Voice and effects are operated digitally
- Not continuously
- Shuts down with a loud and disturbing ‘pop’ sound
Boss Katana-Mini Guitar Amplifier
Hailed by guitarists everywhere in the world, Boss Katana-Mini Battery Powered Guitar Amplifier is one reliable guitar amp you can use this 2019.
Offering outstanding sound quality, this features three amp styles (brown, crunch, and clean), multi-stage analog gain circuit, analog EQ and tape-style delay. It’s compact and travel-ready, so you can bring it to your next gig or your next concert.
The multi-gain stage of this equipment drives three classic sound settings, so you can achieve that satisfying tone, interactive feel, and distortion that can be easily controlled by the pickup strength and input volume.
The three-band analog tone stack provides natural sound through the bass, mid and treble controls. Cool tape-style delay of this amp allows you to experience subtle reverb and warm ambience.
- Produce great sounds
- Very organic
- Amp is touch-responsive with surprising harmonics
- With AUX in
- So you can play videos and stream music
- Some preferred reverb than a decent delay
- Has terrible buzzing sound after a few times of use
- Has some gain
- But still
- Not enough
- Say some users
HOW TO CHOOSE THE BEST PORTABLE GUITAR AMP – A BUYING GUIDE
Portability of a thing usually depends on the ‘final say’ of the one who’ll be using it. Even though the manufacturer claims that their guitar amp is portable, but if the user finds it bigger or heavier for its application, he/she won’t choose it as a portable amp.
We list our best practices of finding the best portable guitar amps in 2019, that might help you find yours, as well.
Check the power source
Roland is very concise about checking the power source of the portable amp before buying. Some amps are offered with rechargeable batteries or you’ll need to buy AA batteries to power your guitar amp. Know this crucial information.
You don’t want to carry luggage that won’t work or stop working because the batteries are dead.
Size/Portability
Does it matter? Of course! You are looking for a handy guitar amp that you can use on vacation, camping, street gigging, practicing in the park, weekend gigs in bars and so on. Are you willing to add extra weight on top of your guitar baggage?
Digital effects, EQ and More
Amps are offered with a lot of useful stuff on-board. Check for built-in digital effects, Looper, EQ and a few more things mentioned by The Hub.
Usually, the more they are, the pricier the amp gets, but, the better your music production be. But, it’s better to check it first than be surprised by how lacking or how overwhelming your guitar amp is.
And, just to remind you, you’re looking for a portable amp, you don’t want to be short of effects on the road, right?
Try before you buy
This is probably the measurement that most beginning musicians failed to do. Spec sheets and reviews may lie, but your hands-on experience won’t.
If you aren’t confident picking one, have a professional guitarist to grab one for you — at least you can bother him whenever your amp isn’t that great.
This YouTube video gives you more information on how to pinpoint the best portable guitar amp for you, especially on your gigs.
EDITOR’s CHOICE
Most people are always looking for portable things since, in this day and age, people are mobile and seem to keep on traveling.
So, if you are a musician who is frequently on gigs or who travel a lot, a portable guitar amp is perfect for you.
Of the 10 that we know are top-notch when it comes to portability, we found two of the best — ZT Amplifiers Lunchbox Junior and Roland CUBE Street Amplifier.
Both are compact and lightweight, perfect for street gigging and rehearsals. They’re also the same when it comes to features and controls, especially with its battery option.
One offers longer uptime compared to the other. And though, one is a little expensive, it also offers longer usage time — that is the Roland CUBE Street Amplifier.
With great connectivity and portability along with 15 hours of jamming using batteries, surely this one is always ready to take on gigs and rigs anytime, anywhere.
