tone-index.com

Home / Browse Instruments / PRS CE 24

PRS CE 24

Generic depiction of the instrument model, not the specific item offered on a linked platform.

Electric Guitar

PRS CE 24

PRS · CE 24

Price: 111 EUR – 3.440 EUR

Price history 04.09.2026 19.09.2026
Cheapest seen Most expensive seen

Availability: 9/10 (Common)

PRS's deliberate answer to its own Core lineup: the same mahogany-and-maple formula and 85/15 pickups as the set-neck Custom 24, built instead on a bolt-on neck to chase a snappier, more Fender-adjacent attack at a friendlier price. It traces back to the original 1988 CE, the first bolt-on-neck PRS ever built, positioned then as now as the brand's rock-and-roll workhorse rather than its flagship.

Where available? Go to the best price – 111 EUR About this instrument

About the PRS CE 24

The CE 24 keeps PRS's signature body recipe intact - a mahogany back roughly 31 mm thick under a 13 mm maple top, totaling about 44 mm of body depth - but swaps the Core line's set neck for a bolt-on construction using three-piece slab-sawn maple rather than a single quarter-sawn piece. That's a genuinely more economical use of readily available wood, built with a separate headstock piece and heel block rather than carved from one solid blank, and it was the first PRS bolt-on design to use this slab-sawn approach when the original CE launched in 1988.

To keep the price gap from the Core Custom 24 meaningful, PRS trims a few cosmetic details rather than core tone-shaping ones: the body skips the carved indentations under the control cavity and uses a less dramatic top carve than Core-series guitars. The pickups, though, aren't a cost-cutting compromise - USA-made, uncovered 85/15 humbuckers identical to the Core specification sit in the CE 24, engineered for clarity across an extended frequency range at both ends of the spectrum.

Where to buy

Some links below are affiliate links. We may earn a commission at no extra cost to you.

Source: https://reverb.com/item/95193493-paul-reed-smith-prs-ce-24-vintage-purple-excellent-condition-prs-ce-24-1994-purple

Sound character of the PRS CE 24

Pushed into amp grit, the CE 24 lands somewhere reviewers describe as power-Fender tone with noticeably more weight behind it - enough low-end heft to work for modern country as readily as classic rock. The 85/15 pickups' extended-frequency clarity combines with the bolt-on neck's snappier, more upper-midrange-forward attack to produce a sound that splits the difference between Stratocaster snap and Les Paul push rather than fully committing to either.

Bright Punchy Crisp Midrange-forward

What owners of the PRS CE 24 say

Owner discussion consistently frames the bolt-on-versus-set-neck question as a genuine but subtle tonal difference rather than a dramatic one - smaller in practice than swapping pickups or adjusting pickup height, according to forum consensus. Players who've compared the CE directly against set-neck Custom 22 and 24 models describe the CE as snappier and more Strat-like, with its coil-split mode landing tonally closer to a Silver Sky than to a Custom 22 from the same brand. Set-neck guitars are generally described as feeling a touch fuller and more connected, with notes blooming slightly more smoothly, but very few owners treat the bolt-on construction as a downside to tone or sustain.

Playability & handling of the PRS CE 24

The Pattern Thin neck carve, finished in satin nitrocellulose rather than gloss, is built for fast, low-friction playing - a deliberately slimmer profile than PRS's fuller Pattern or Pattern Vintage shapes. Reviewers note that despite the cost-saving measures elsewhere on the body, build quality and intonation hold up to full professional standard, so the savings genuinely come from cosmetic simplification rather than anything that affects how the instrument plays.

Recommended accessories & strings for the PRS CE 24

The 25-inch scale sits between Gibson's 24.75 inches and Fender's 25.5 inches, taking standard .010-.046 sets comfortably while giving a string feel that splits the difference between the two traditions. Players chasing the amp-pushed, power-Fender-with-more-weight tone reviewers describe will get there fastest through a straightforward overdrive or amp gain rather than heavy modulation, since the 85/15 pickups are voiced for clarity rather than scooped mids.

Technical data for the PRS CE 24

Type Solid-body electric guitar, double cutaway
Body Mahogany back (~31 mm) with maple top (~13 mm), total depth ~44 mm
Neck Bolt-on, three-piece slab-sawn maple
Neck carve Pattern Thin, satin nitrocellulose finish
Scale length 25 in.
Fingerboard Rosewood, 24 frets, 10 in. radius, bird inlays
Pickups 2x PRS 85/15 humbuckers, USA-made, uncovered
Controls Volume, tone with coil-split push-pull, 3-way blade switch (per PRS CE 24 standard wiring)
Body contouring Simplified vs. Core series (no carved control-cavity indentations, less pronounced top carve)
Price positioning Between PRS S2 and Core Custom 24
Origin Made in USA

Price history for the PRS CE 24

Cheapest seen: 111 EUR  ·  Most expensive seen: 3.440 EUR

3.440 EUR111 EUR 04.09.2026 14.09.202616.09.202617.09.2026 19.09.2026
Cheapest seen Most expensive seen

The history of the PRS CE 24

PRS itself only exists because Paul Reed Smith dropped out of college to build guitars by hand, landing early customers like Peter Frampton and Carlos Santana before officially founding the company in Annapolis, Maryland in 1985. Santana's endorsement took four attempts by Smith to secure after the two first connected around 1980, but once Santana genuinely loved the guitar he became the brand's defining long-term ambassador - and the bird fretboard inlays that are now a PRS signature trace back to a guitar Smith built specifically for Frampton, carried forward through the 1982 Sorcerer's Apprentice prototype that eventually led to the Custom 24.

The CE line entered that story in 1988 as PRS's first-ever bolt-on-neck guitar and, at the time, its cheapest model - a deliberate rock-and-roll workhorse positioned against the brand's more refined set-neck instruments. Production ran until 2009, then the CE disappeared from the US lineup entirely for nearly a decade before PRS brought it back in 2016, a gap long enough that its 2016-plus return reads less like a minor spec refresh and more like PRS deciding the bolt-on concept still had a place in a catalog that had grown considerably since 1988.

About PRS as a manufacturer

PRS occupies a deliberately middle position in the American guitar landscape - founded decades after Fender and Gibson, but built fast enough credibility through players like Santana that it's treated as a genuine third major brand rather than a boutique upstart. The CE line captures something true about that positioning: rather than copying Fender's bolt-on formula outright, PRS applied its own mahogany-maple body philosophy and 85/15 pickup voicing to a bolt-on neck, producing an instrument that sounds like neither a Stratocaster nor a Les Paul but something recognizably PRS's own synthesis of both traditions.

Notable players & recordings featuring the PRS CE 24

Carlos Santana remains PRS's single most historically important endorser, but his association runs through the brand's Custom-series and his own signature models rather than the CE line specifically - no CE-24-specific professional endorsement could be verified for this research, so that connection is presented as brand history rather than a claim about this particular model.

Related guides

  • Buying a Used Electric Guitar: What to Check View details
  • Do Tonewoods Matter on Electric Guitars? The Ongoing Debate View details
  • Vintage vs. Reissue: Is an Old Electric Guitar Worth It? View details

Similar instruments

PRS SE Hollowbody II Piezo 10+

PRS SE Hollowbody II Piezo

1.012 EUR – 2.440 EUR

PRS SE McCarty 594 Singlecut 10+

PRS SE McCarty 594 Singlecut

669 EUR – 2.171 EUR

PRS SE McCarty 594 10+

PRS SE McCarty 594

233 EUR – 2.171 EUR

PRS SE Swamp Ash Special 10+

PRS SE Swamp Ash Special

600 EUR – 1.547 EUR

PRS SE Custom 24 10+

PRS SE Custom 24

559 EUR – 1.454 EUR

PRS SE DGT (David Grissom Signature) 10+

PRS SE DGT (David Grissom Signature)

650 EUR – 1.299 EUR

PRS SE Silver Sky 10+

PRS SE Silver Sky

23 EUR – 1.756 EUR

PRS SE Custom 24-08 10+

PRS SE Custom 24-08

128 EUR – 1.389 EUR

← Back to all instruments