Fender serial numbers: United States, 1976 onward

Read the first character, then the digit behind it. E covers the 1980s, N the 1990s and Z the 2000s, and in each case the single digit that follows places the year inside that decade: N5 reads 1995, Z7 reads 2007. The DZ and CZ variants of the 2000s run (the American Deluxe and Classic lines) use the same digit. 1976 itself, the year the serial moved onto the headstock, has its own bare 76 prefix ahead of five digits.

The scheme then changed twice in quick succession. Late in 2009 Fender began using a bare 10 prefix, followed by a space and seven digits, and it is a genuinely odd one: only those seven digits ever reached Fender's database, and the 10 lived on the decal alone. That number named no country either, because the country of origin was printed separately on the headstock decal. From 2010 the prefix became US followed by eight digits, the first two of which are the year outright, so US12 reads 2012; the six behind them identify the individual instrument and carry nothing else. Our chart holds that scheme through US17, which is as far as Fender's own article documents it, so a higher pair matches nothing we carry.

The prefix is reliable. The digit behind it is looser, because Fender printed its number decals well ahead of time and did not always use them in step with the calendar: its own chart puts E0 against 1979, 1980 and 1981 alike. The usual drift is a year or two. One documented case went much further than that. A batch of N9 decals meant for 1999 was fitted to instruments built in 1990, so a few 1990 guitars carry a 1999 number, and an N9 serial reads 1999 either way. The decade is solid; the exact year inside it is looser, which is why every scheme on this page that reads a year out of the digits ships at probable confidence.

A V prefix marks the American Vintage reissue line, and Fender reused that same numbering across more than one reissue run, decades apart. For these, Fender points past the serial entirely: the date that settles the year is written on the heel of the neck, so reaching it means unbolting the neck. Nothing visible from the outside tells one reissue run from another, so a V number names the line and not the year, and the answer says that and sends you to the neck rather than offering a year it cannot stand behind.

An S followed by six digits is where a US number and a Japanese one can look identical. When the first of those six digits is 6, 7, 8 or 9 it reads as US: that digit is the year the number nominally marks, and the reading runs to 1981 rather than stopping at 1979, because Fender's own chart puts an S9 number against 1979, 1980 and 1981 alike. The same string is also a Japanese number, where the S is a series letter rather than a date, and the Japan page carries two spans for it: one Made in Japan, one Crafted in Japan. Nothing inside the number separates any of the three. The wording beside it does: a Japanese instrument names its country on the headstock, and a US instrument of this run usually carries no country marking at all.

Numbers on a pre-1976 instrument sit on the neck plate at the back of the body, or on the bridge plate of an early Telecaster or Esquire, and they were reused, issued out of sequence, or never recorded against a calendar year. Fender's guidance for that period is to read the date pencilled on the neck heel, the stamp in the neck pocket, and the potentiometer codes instead. The answer names the era and sends you to those checks.

From 1976 on, the serial is stamped on the headstock beneath the logo, above or beside the string trees. On some of the earliest S and E numbers it is on the neck plate at the back of the body instead, which is where a pre-1976 number would also be, so the position alone does not date the instrument.

• Mexico (Ensenada), 1990 onwardThe MN, MZ and MX prefixes from the Ensenada factory, 1990 to the present.
• Japan, Made in Japan and Crafted in JapanJV, SQ and the reused letters, and why the headstock wording settles the era.
• Every Fender era in one place The full brand hub, covering 1976–present.