BITE Guitars: Build your custom bass online

⭐ Premium custom basses, handcrafted in Vienna, Austria
⭐ Shipped to your doorstep worldwide
⭐ Average customer rating 4.9

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"I have a large high end bass collection and would stack my Bite bass up against my $10,000 basses, spectacular bass!"

-- Dave, USA

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"Easily exceeds what I have experienced on way higher priced brands."

-- Martin, Denmark

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"For years I thought I had a very good bass but then my BITE arrived and blew me away."

-- Davide, Italy

more reviews with pics - a gripping bedtime read

Top-rated by all major bass publications

"Significantly punchy tone"

"Can't find a single flaw" (text & video)

"Go crazy with your own designs" (video)

"Super powerful pickups, immaculate" (video)

"Intelligent modular design" (German)

more press - a stunning beach read

BITE custom basses deliver their punch day after day on major stages such as O2 London, MGM Grand Las Vegas, Qudos Sydney, Beijing Capital or Rock in Rio

JERRY MEEHAN, UK
Robbie Williams, Ed Sheeran, Rihanna, Dua Lipa, Rita Ora, Adele, 1D, Post Malone

"Superb, we all love it!"

Screenshot_20240605_050302_Instagram 14-20-0 60pz

JOHN GARRISON, UK
James Blunt, Lewis Capaldi, Christina Aguilera, Sting, Bryan Adams, Rod Stewart

"OMG!!! Our soundman loves it!"

MARTY O'BRIEN, USA
Grammy-winning credit
Celine Dion, Kelly Clarkson, Tommy Lee, Chris Cornell, Disturbed, Daughtry, Phil X

TONY NEWTON, USA
Motown legend

Stevie Wonder, Jackson 5, Marvin Gaye, Temptations, Aretha Franklin, Diana Ross

TIM BAILEY, USA
Ariana Grande, Big Sean, Tyrese, 2Chainz, Jamie Foxx, John Legend, Chris Brown

"Absolutely amazing!!!!!"

ULI SALM, Germany
World's No. 1 Bass Collector
Chuck Berry, Jerry Lee Lewis, Bill Haley, J. J. Cale

"You guys gained a new fan!"

Screenshot 2023-09-03 20.42.51 charles ak 907x648 mit

CHARLES BERTHOUD,
UK/USA, 2.1M

"Solid, very well-made, gonna last a long time."

Screenshot 2023-09-03 20.35.20 ellen 952x680 mit

ELLEN ALAVERDYAN, USA
12-year-old bass prodigy, 1.4M

"Sounds amazing, the neck is very comfortable!"

more stages, studios & bedrooms

Why does everyone LOVE their BITE custom basses?
16 reasons, pick yours

The BITE Sound

high voltage 255-60-0 255-120-0 bolt 256x256

1) HIGH-VOLTAGE BASS POWER: Record-breaking 1000 millivolts of clear passive output cut through the mud. You think amplification can compensate poor pickup output? Think again.

All BITE basses carry original passive BITE 1000mV pickups. They generate an unprecedented 1000 millivolts of high output and articulate bass power. Let's put that in perspective: comparable industry average is 300mV, while passive 'hot' and active pickups average 700mV. What's the point of passive high output?

What is high output? Pickup output is defined as the voltage generated by string oscillation in the magnetic field of a pickup, it is measured in millivolts. Bass builders and pickup manufacturers mostly do not advertise their output for the simple reason that average output is nothing to write home about. What they often do advertise instead is DCR (direct current resistance) which is a pretty meaningless parameter as it ignores pickup magnets. Two pickups can have identical DCR readings but wildly different outputs and sounds.

**1020 millivolts of pickup output (E string, 41Hz, true RMS at 250ms after string release)**

Bass frequencies by nature have a hard time against the higher frequencies, the voice, the guitar, the snare. If your bass doesn't make it through the mix, no matter how hard you play, it's because all the other frequencies drown out your bass. Turning up the amp often makes things worse as it also amplifies unwanted noise creeping in along the signal chain, further blurring your sound. Also active pickup design generates artefacts distorting your original bass signal.

Instead of relying on amplification, it is way more effective to start at the beginning of the signal chain with a passive high-output pickup. The stronger and better defined your original pickup signal, the less amplification you will need, and the less noise and mud will blur your sound.

A common problem of conventional 'hot' pickups is lack of clarity and a muddy sound, which is the result of too many pickup coil windings. Other manufacturers resort to unusually large pole pieces to keep the number of windings low, but they lose the traditional single and split coil sound along the way. BITE mastered this problem through extensive pickup research and development.

**BITE 1000mV pickups: split and single coils with standard dimensions and 5mm pole pieces for a super-strong but traditional bass sound**

**BITE humbucker: standard dimensions and 5mm pole pieces, powerful but not muddy**

**BITE E string consistently above conventional premium bass**

**BITE A string consistently above conventional premium bass**

**BITE D string consistently above conventional premium bass**

**BITE G string consistently above conventional premium bass**

Frequency profile comparisons: BITE 1000mV in orange vs. comparative premium bass brand in blue, both pickups are single coils in neck position. The first peak in each chart is the fundamental frequency (E-A-D-G), followed by the mid and other harmonics. The charts show that a) the BITE signal is consistently and on all strings stronger than, i.e. above the comparison bass and b) the BITE tone is well-balanced with strong mids. People generally find our pickups pleasant and balanced to listen to, not dull but also not pointed, just articulate and powerful.

And why passive? A passive bass has no on-board battery, and that's the traditional bass design. An active bass has a battery for preamplification which intensifies but also alters the audio signal, whereas a passive bass has a natural and undistorted signal which is only generated by string vibration: pure, bassy, no preamp, no delay, no doctoring of your sound.

What's unique about the BITE 1000mV sound? We achieve 1000 millivolts of output without any preamp, purely passive, and without large-diameter pole pieces. Normally, high output is achieved at the expense of definition, this means powerful pickups usually sound muddy. At BITE you're getting a super-powerful but still well-defined natural bass tone that will cut through the mix with little amplification. This pickup performance is unique.

What's a 1000-millivolt sound like? It's not that your house will come crashing down, it's not three times as loud as your average 300mV bass but it's noticeably more assertive. We liken our sound to a roaring motorbike where you can feel the power thundering out of the tailpipe: chunky, crunchy, punchy, that's the BITE understanding of bass fun. For sound samples, you best head over to our youtube channel where you'll find tons of videos of all our different BITE pickups (single coils, split coils, humbuckers) in all sorts of recording setups, played by many different artists.

Conventioal pickup manufacturers advertize DCR, if at all, not mV, why? DCR (direct current resistance) ignores the pickup magnets. Two pickups can have identical DCR readings but vastly different output and sound. By contrast, pickup output, expressed in mV, is very informative but an average output is nothing to write home about.

The BITE 1000 millivolts of articulate bass power with a traditional single and split coil sound are unique in the bass world. You need less amplification, your tone remains noisefree and clear, and an easy stroke will bite right through the mix. Learn more about BITE 1000mV pickups:

BITE 1000 MV PICKUPS EXPLAINED

STIFFNESS MATTERS: A TECHNICAL EXPLANATION

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Michael, USA (click for full review)

"It cuts through the mix so well and has a better tone than any other bass I own."

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Gerhard, Germany (click for full review)

"Stunningly beautiful, broad sound spectrum, cuts through the band mix, incredible output level, needs no booster, no compressor."

2) ATTACK: Always wanted to strike faster than your shadow? Immediate pickup response is decisive for precise timing and a tight groove.

Attack is decisive for a bass's function in the rhythm section. Attack is the time span from releasing the string to peak output, it is measured in milliseconds. Typically you want your attack short, a steep curve, a sharp spike. You need that immediate response for precise timing. A weak pickup and weak structural stiffness will give you a wishy-washy curve, and there goes your attack.

Pickup design is not all in BITE sound design, there's more to it. Firstly, BITE basses have special passive circuit components and, secondly, we pay explicit attention to structural stiffness.

Structural stiffness is decisive for a bass's string vibration behavior which affects output, attack and sustain. And what matters in stiffness? Forget about the body, it's the neck, duh! 2 times as long and only a fraction of the body's cross section.

At BITE we use only the hardest of all established neck woods, North American hard maple (acer saccharum), and we instal only dual-action double truss rods to guarantee maximum neck stability and stiffness. But we go even further: The weakest spot of any bass guitar is the headstock heel, that's where the neck transitions into the headstock. A thin, weak headstock heel is bad news. This is why BITE necks are 30% more voluminous at the headstock heel than the common standard, we call this the BITE reinforced headstock heel.

**BITE's reinforced headstock heel for extra output, attack, sustain and tuning stability**

The combination of BITEs 1000 millivolts of articulate pickup power, requiring decidedly less blurring amplification, plus our fortified structural stiffness guarantee all the attack you'll ever need.

BITE 1000 MV PICKUPS EXPLAINED

STIFFNESS MATTERS: A TECHNICAL EXPLANATION

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Reto, Switzerland (click for full review)

"The pickups with flatwounds deliver a warm tone but still with plenty of attack."

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Jerry, USA (click for full review)

"I feel like it really cuts through the mix onstage and that I can finally be heard."

3) SUSTAIN: Click to check the comparative time graph of BITE's resonance duration. Take your time, so does your BITE bass.

Sustain is how long a note will last until it dies out. This time span is usually measured in seconds. You want your sustain as long as possible, you want long resonance. If your bass lacks a powerful output and structural stiffness, your notes will die off fast.

**Sustain comparison: BITE (orange) significantly longer on all strings**

Sustain recorded and visualized. Orange bars: BITE 1000mV Jawbone. Blue bars: comparative premium bass brand. Passive single coil (J) pickups in neck position, recordings cut when the signal dropped to -50 dBFS. The BITE sustain is significantly longer on all strings, the D string tops at 26 seconds.

BITEs 1000 millivolts of pickup power plus the fortified structural stiffness ensure sustain on a whole new level.

Tight neck-body coupling is another pillar of BITE sustain

BITE 1000 MV PICKUPS EXPLAINED

STIFFNESS MATTERS: A TECHNICAL EXPLANATION

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Al, UK (click for full review)

"That sustain would still be ringing tomorrow if I let it."

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Michel, Canada (click for full review)

"It is a lightweight 3.2 KG bass that is very resonant. The setup is perfect. Not a single dead spot anywhere on the neck either."

4) NO NOISE, NO NUISANCE: What have airplanes and life support in common with BITE noiseless basses?

Electromagnetic radiation interferes permanently from all sides with your bass playing. That mess of cables on stage, the neon tube in your rehearsal room, the notebook on your desk. Or, here in Vienna it often is the overhead lines of the electric tramway, Vienna is full of it, good luck if your rehearsal basement is in a tramway street. All of this can cause disturbing noise.

What can you do? You can try your luck with installing a so-called notch filter in your signal chain, it removes a narrow band of frequencies but this will amputate your sound.

The real reason why your bass captures noise very often is simply poor shielding and grounding. Shielding means that your conductive parts need a protective barrier that catches unwanted signals. Grounding means diverting these interferences to the ground where they can do no harm. This is the 101 of electric bass building, all the more surprising that poor shielding and grounding is still quite common in factory basses.

There's a simple way of measuring the quality of your shielding and grounding, a continuity check with a multimeter. The lower the resistance, measured in ohms, the better. The most common shielding variant is graphite paint in the electric cavities. Resistance typically ranges from 200 ohms to 2 kilo-ohms. Will it surprise you when noise from such a bass drives you mad? No, it won't, these are poor readings.

A typical BITE reading will show a single or lower double digit resistance. We use a high-performance shielding paint that was developed for airplanes and life support equipment in hospitals, it is way more conductive than conventional graphite paint.

Let's look at the grounding.Shielding and grounding always go hand in hand. The best shielding is useless if it isn't properly connected to the ground. Are the strings connected to the ground? The shielding paint? The control plate or pickguard cover? On a BITE bass you can be sure of that, every one of our basses is checked against 83 quality items before we release it for dispatch. Shielding and grounding are indispensable for us.

**Spot the BITE bass: 245 ohms from pickup cavity to output jack, not bad for a factory bass with graphite shield**

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Casey, Canada (click for full review)

"The highest reading was 24 ohms, not kohms but ohms! No wonder there is not the faintest noise to be heard from this bass."

The BITE Easy

5) NO PAIN, NO STRAIN: A relaxed stroke is enough on a BITE bass. Playing without strain is good news for your hands, your timing and your soul.

If your bass is weak, meaning your pickups generate only an average amount of voltage, you will be tempted to play hard to make your bass heard and felt, and this will strain your plucking hand. On a BITE bass, a soft and easy stroke is enough to unleash all the bass power you want.

**A soft stroke is enough on a BITE bass**

We can hear you going, hell, why would I need a powerful bass, I got my amp, duh! Breaking news: amplification often makes things worse, as it also amplifies all the unwanted noise that creeps in along the signal chain: residual bass hum, cables, pedals, DI, mixer, speakers. As a result, your original signal loses definition and clarity, and you often end up with a loud but muddy bass, like a throbbing headache.

Such a poorly defined bass is easily drowned out by those pesky high frequencies in the mix: the voice, the guitar, the snare. The stronger and better defined your original pickup signal, the less amplification you will need, and the less noise and mud will blur your sound.

And what's with the fretting hand? Here the strain comes primarily from high string action, that's the leeway underneath the strings, the distance between strings and frets. We measure it in tenths of millimeters when we set up a bass before dispatching it. The higher your action, the more tiresome your playing.

If high action is the reason for strain, why doesn't everybody just lower the strings? Strings can be lowered easily by lowering the bridge saddles or - not so easily - by reducing neck relief at the truss rod (you better let this do your local guitar shop). But the lower you go with your strings, the sooner you will encounter fret buzz: your strings rattling against fret tips. Fret buzz happens when some fret tips are higher than others, when they're not precisely on the same level.

BITE has a double levelling process: first, we level the fretboard, then we install the frets and finally we level the frets. This requires luthier skills, most factory basses are not levelled. This double levelling process makes sure that your strings can oscillate buzzfree in a comfortable and strainless low-action setup.

Bottom line: a soft stroke is enough on a BITE bass. No need for playing hard, no strain in your plucking nor fretting hand. Mind you, playing effortless does not mean playing emotionless! You can still bassface all you want and act out every single tone. In fact, the less effort your playing requires, the more fun the facing and acting.

A bit of strainless groovin'

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Martin, Denmark (click for full review)

"It is a very easily played instrument. Effortlessly, with no strain on your hands, you can get clear harmonics, thumpy lows, growling snaring snaps or loads of slappe-di-plucke-di-slap."

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Blair, USA (click for full review)

"It is just so all-around easy to play."

6) GENTLE ON YOUR FINGERTIPS: How a BITE bass spares you sore fingertips on both your fretting and plucking hand.

On the fretting hand, the culprits for hurting fingertips are sharp fret ends. A BITE bass goes easy on your fingertips, our fret ends are smoothly rounded and undercut. This means we manually remove the fret roots, called 'tangs', which often protrude on fretboard egdes of factory basses. As a result, your slides are a smooth pleasure.

Home 14 — **Fret ends rounded and polished, fret tangs removed**

On the plucking hand, it is once more insufficient pickup output which makes players overdo it. No need on a BITE bass, a soft stroke is enough to generate all the bass power you want.

Rough strings make it worse on both hands. By default we install D’Addario® EXL170 strings, the smoothest roundwounds in widescale testing. If you prefer flatwounds, our standard is LaBella Deep Talkin' for the genuine fat Motown sound.

However, we're also happy to install any other strings you prefer, you can select them from the world's largest string assortment at Thomann on our website. We will individually file your nut slot and set up your bass according to your string choice.

THOMANN STRING ASSORTMENT

BITE 1000 MV PICKUPS EXPLAINED

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Paul, USA (click for full review)

"It feels balanced in my hands, and is so smooth to play. I’ve seen some comments from others that it plays like butter. I have to agree. It’s so smooth and easy. Of the 4 other bass guitars I have (...) it is my favorite. I have been gigging with it exclusively."

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Adrian, Australia (click for full review)

"The fret work is really good and I’m always surprised how little attention some manufacturers pay to fret edges and tangs."

7) PLUG & PLAY: We're happy to spend hours quality checking and setting up your bass so you can plug & play it straight out of the box.

Trying to set up a bass can be a traumatizing experience. At first you're proud of the perfect intonation you've reached by shifting your bridge saddles back and forth a while. (Intonation is the accuracy of pitch across the fretboard)

Next, you try to get your string action a bit lower for comfortable fretting. You do this with the setscrews in the bridge saddles and maybe by tweaking the truss rod. (If you do this by yourself, do it in eighth turns or let your local guitar repair shop do it.) But as soon as you slightly change your string action you're getting fret buzz and your fine intonation will also be gone to make things worse.

**Messing up your hard gotten by intonation: action**

Trying to balance intonation, neck relief, action and fret buzz resembles a whack-a-mole. If you change one paramenter, another parameter is bound to rear its ugly head and you will end up shouting at your bass. Ultimately, many just give up and play with high action or fret buzz or a sloppy intonation or any combination of these.

**Setup whack-a-mole: mockery without end**

That's why at BITE we take extra time to set up your bass precisely, this can take us up to an hour or sometimes even longer. We let your bass rest for 72 hours and repeat the setup as often as it takes so you can plug & play it straight of the box.

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G.S., USA (click for full review)

"Zero fret buzz right out of the gate! Thanks so much for the ride!"

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Jeff, USA (click for full review)

"Right out of the box (after a long trip from Vienna to Denver) playability was excellent, intonation spot on."

8) TUNING STABILITY: Why your BITE bass needs no retuning when others do. This is not only about machine heads.

What's the use of a perfect setup, if it doesn't last? Tuning instability can be the result of low-quality tuners or other adverse factors: If your neck is made of weak wood, has a weak truss rod or a small cross-section at its weakest spot, the headstock heel. Your setup will lack autonomy and stability, you will need to retune your bass several times during your show, whenever temperature and humidity change.

Our tuners have not caused a single complaint in all the years. We install a compact design made of lightweight fine zinc alloy. Its die-cast precision gear has a 1:17 gear ratio and sits well-protected inside a closed casing, where it is lifetime-lubricated. You can individually adjust the ease of rotation by an adjustment screw at the tip of the tuner button, as some prefer easy turning with little resistance, others prefer to feel more resistance.

**Compact machine heads with closed casing and cloverleaf buttons (Hipshot D-tuner in gold pictured), roasted hard maple neck**

Our neck construction is all about fortified structural stiffness: We use only North American hard maple (acer saccharum), the hardest of established neck wood species, we install a dual-action double truss rod which provides a stable neck relief, independent of temperature and humidity, and have a special cross section at the neck's thinnest spot, the transition from neck to headstock, where our cross section is 30% more voluminous than standard routings. For more technical details, there's a link below.

STIFFNESS MATTERS: A TECHNICAL EXPLANATION

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Adrian, Australia (click for full review)

"The neck has been very stable – given it's travelled to Australia and with our crazy weather from hot to very humid and wet and now approaching colder months – there has been no fret shrinkage or neck movement."

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Marc, UK (click for full review)

"That bass is in tune no matter how I play."

We're luthiers, not factory workers

9) ZERO BS: There's no BS in, well, BITE basses. How we can pull off 10k$ build quality at 2k$ prices. About luthier quality and BITE prices.

BITE is a boutique manufacturer in Vienna, Austria. We build each bass individually. Our luthiers completed the 4-year full-time HTBLA luthier school in Hallstatt in Upper Austria where it's all about skills and attention to detail.

We source from trusted quality suppliers: wood, paint, pickup wire, hardware, just everything. We use CNC routing where it makes sense but much of the painting, sanding, fretwork, polishing etc. is pure handwork where skills and experience count.

Setting up your bass can take us over an hour, we let your bass rest for 72 hours and repeat setup as often as it takes, so you can play your BITE bass straight of the box. Our rigorous quality check has 83 items that we check and tick off one by one.

**Selected and summarized BITE QC items**

If our QC turns up something we're not happy with, the bass goes back on our workbench. Sometimes we redo a whole body or neck from scratch until we're satisfied. Once your bass has passed QC, we clean it, make a series of professional photos, wrap and box it, and dispatch it via insured express delivery to your doorstep worldwide. We'll also send you the photos and the tracking link.

Bass building in Austria means high precision, a high quality standard but, alas, also high cost. A good share of our clients are experienced bass collectors who rank our build and sound quality in the 5k-10k €/$ price range in comparison to other brands. Check out the reviews.

You will understand that we cannot compete with Asian factory prices but how do we manage to keep our prices still affordable? We just don't factor in any BS. If you look at our sales arguments, you'll find that we try to see it from your perspective. What are your benefits? Fact-based, science-based, measurable. No BS about the sound of wood species, no exclusive this, no 'custom edition' that.

For those interested in how to distinguish quality basses from Asian factory instruments disguised as premium ones, there's a more extensive excursion down below.

Bottom line: Your BITE bass goes easy on your wallet, it will cost you a fraction of its true value.

**Hallstatt, see why we call our blue Lake Hallstatt Blue?**

HTBLA LUTHIER SCHOOL, HALLSTATT

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Dave, USA (click for full review)

"I just wanted to tell you how much I love the bass you built for me, I have a fairly large high end bass collection and I would stack my Bite bass up against my $10,000 basses, spectacular bass!"

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David, Spain (click for full review)

"Best custom bass you can get for the money, period."

10) WHAT'S YOUR PERFECT BASS WEIGHT? We can CNC-plan your targeted bass weight through individual honeycomb chambering. No more random bass weights.

A heavy bass can be tiresome. What is considered heavy? The industry average of P or J-type basses made of alder, the most common body wood, is a sturdy 4kg/8.8lbs. Add a humbucker or two, heavy tuners and replace alder with ash, and your bass can easily exceed 4,5kg/10lbs. Good luck for your 3-hour rehearsal!

Then again, if a bass is too light, say ard. 3kg/6.6lbs for a 34"er, you may have to hold up the neck against gravity. This is called neck dive, playing with neck dive is no fun either.

BITE necks are made of North American hard maple, that's the heaviest and densest neck wood, and our necks have a double dual-action steel rod inside. Hard maple plus a double truss rod, that’s what a powerful bass needs for all its attack, sustain and tuning stability, but that's what also adds weight to the neck.

So what's the ideal bass weight? This is very much a matter of personal preference. Some really love it heavy while others don't mind a bit of neck dive. The golden mean is probably somewhere ard. 3,4kg/7.5lbs, as light as it gets but without neck dive.

If you are going for a certain ideal bass weight, our computerized planning tool allows us to plan your bass weight in advance through individual honeycomb chambering. We also use light compact tuners and our bodies are downsized and weight-reduced. We may use lightweight alder-paulownia composites or chambered alder. The composites have an alder tone block in the middle and superlight paulownia wood at the wings while the chambered bodies have an internal honeycomb structure for weight reduction.

**Mid-section alder tone block, wings paulownia lightweight**

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Max, Austria (click for full review)

"The bass is pure pleasure, it feels lightweight, so even after three hours of rehearsal my shoulder doesn't hurt."

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Greg, USA (click for full review)

"I am so impressed in every way! It is absolutely gorgeous AND sounds amazing! The neck is perfect and I love the light weight and balance of it!! Truly an extraordinary instrument! I will be playing it constantly, I’m instantly in love with it!"

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Hannes, Austria (click for full review)

"Best powerful pickups on the market, outstanding tone, ergonomic (lightweight, no neck dive), great value for money, sustainable product. No regrets. Love my Bite Punch"

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Carsten, Germany (click for full review)

"When strapped, this bass is just a dream, well-balanced and I am confident I will easily stand through lengthy rehearsals and gigs with it."

11) ARTWORK: Digital 360° print, lasering, textile wrapping or hand-painting by our Oscar movie artist, we do it all. Hell, one of our basses even made it into Vienna's Museum of Fine Arts.

Your bass deserves more than sunburst? Our extensive artwork know-how offers you an endless sea of design possibilities.

Digital artwork: We can apply pretty much any custom design in high-resolution photo quality. We offer digital print, lasering and textile wrapping. We can embellish body, pickguard, pickups and necks, often seamlessly across all levels. The underlying surfaces can be of any available color, not just white. Some techniques work only on the top surface, while others can be applied all around your bass in 360 degrees.

Hand-painted by artist: We work with several amazing artists, our go-to photorealistic painter is a scenic painter who has worked on Oscar and Palme d'Or movies.

Hand-painted by yourself: You always wanted to picasso your own bass? It's all easier than you think. We'll send you your body (without any hardware) primed and clearcoated or colored as agreed, you do your artistry on top, send it back to us, we seal it with clearcoat to protect your artwork and proceed with the build.

If you have some vague design idea but don't quite know where to start, talk to us.

**BITE artwork bass at Vienna Museum of Fine Arts**

THE BITE OLD MASTER BASS AT VIENNA MUSEUM OF FINE ARTS

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Max, Austria (click for full review)

"The bass is pure pleasure, it feels lightweight, so even after three hours of rehearsal my shoulder doesn't hurt."

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Greg, USA (click for full review)

12) SUSTAINABILITY: We leave the tropical wood in the rainforest, use non-tropical substitutes and ship with carbon offset.

BITE manufactures without the use of tropical wood unless you have some specific wood requirements, in which case we are happy to procure from FSC certified sources. We also care about carbon neutrality. Your BITE bass travels quite a distance until it reaches you. Wherever possible we ship carbon neutral or contribute to adequate carbon compensation.

About Us 7

For our dark fretboards we mostly use roasted black locust (robinia pseudoacacia) from the Vienna Woods as an ideal rosewood substitute (hard, beautiful red-brownish and machinable). We've been using it since 2019 and never had a single manufacturing problem or customer complaint.

**Austrian roasted black locust, matching rosewood in beauty and feel, surpassing it by a mile in sustainability**

Alternatively we also install roasted hard maple fretboards upon client request, mostly in beautiful flamed or birdseye variations. Also roasted hard maple necks are quite a popular choice we are happy to make.

The BITE Red Carpet

13) COMPETENCE, NOT CAJOLERY: Not exactly sure what bass you want? Hate annoying salesman types? Throw a bass question at us and see what happens.

What's the worst customer service experiences you've been through? Patronizing douchebags? Hard selling jerks? Promising everything under the sun but the minute they got your money, couldn't remember your name?

No need to put up with any of that at BITE, we hate it as much as you do, so lean back and enjoy the custom experience. First and foremost, it's fast and friendly communication throughout the building process to make sure we build the bass exactly how you want it.

When we dispatch your bass, you will receive a notification with professional photos and tracking link. We ship worldwide via insured UPS or other major express parcel service. This means we bear the risk of damage or loss until safe delivery at your doorstep. Just so you know, in all the years of sending basses around the world to destinations as far away as New Zealand, we haven't had a single case of damage or loss.

Our special shipping options include the convenience options 'greenlighting' (we seek your OK before dispatch) and 'hold for pickup' (we send your bass to a parcel shop near you). And shipping is generally fast, depending on your location. For example New York usually takes two days, we dispatch on Monday, you get your bass on Wednesday.

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Joe, USA (click for full review)

"These basses are outstanding in every aspect. My bass arrived in 2 days from Austria, it was set up perfectly and plays and sounds amazing! I am officially a Bite fanboy and their customer service during the sale was excellent!"

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Mr. T., Norway (click for full review)

"Great experience overall. The configurator is brilliant and the ordering process easy. Friendly and service-minded, fast delivery, “bullet-proof” packaging. The instrument is flawless, beautiful and very smooth (comfortable with great playability). The Bite pickups are outstanding – very powerful. Highly recommended!"

14) PAY 30% DEPOSIT ONLY: Pay 100% upfront or as little as 30% deposit, your call. What's the difference?

If start you with a deposit (minimum 30%), we'll send you pics or a little video showing you the materials/first parts of your bass. Then we'll stop the process until we have received 100% of the purchase price for the cost-intensive production stages. That way you have some reassurance at first and you also can control the timing of the build process, it will be geared to your financial capabilities.

We're of course happy to send you pics or a little videos from our worbench also in case of 100% upfront payment.

15) BIRTH WATCHING: Watch your bass dream turn reality. We'll update you with pics & vids from the workbench.

16) 14-DAYS RETURN POLICY: Return your individually built configurator bass and get your money back. No questions asked. No kidding either.

Enough said, show me the basses

confi 2 1680x842 black back 1474x842 1.75

Build & order your 20-fret Punch or Jawbone custom bass in 3 minutes online. 1 billion bass configurations at your fingertips. Prices from 1700 €/$

Build & order your 24-fret Evening Star premium bass online. 4/5 strings, right/lefthanded, 27", 34", 35".
Prices from 2400 €/$

Thousands of additional choices:
5-string, 2734 sound options, shorties, lefties, lightweight, hand-painted and digital artwork ...

Subscribe to our newsletter and win a custom engraved neck plate.
We engrave your text, logo, etc. Our plates fit all standard 4-screw basses & guitars. Mount it on your instrument, give it to a loved one or keep it for good luck. You can also buy your custom engraved neck plate here.

BITE PERKS

In case of questions just select Risk-Free Dummy Order at checkout. No payment data, no commitment, no hustling (we're not selling cars nor insurances) we'll get back to you.
Return policy: Build your bass in our configurator, cancel your purchase up to 14 days after delivery, no questions asked. Yes, return an individually built custom bass. This is unheard of.
Greenlighting: We seek your OK before dispatch.
Hold for pickup: We send your bass to a parcel shop near you for pickup.
Making-of: We send you pics and videos from our workbench to keep you informed of the manufacturing progress.

But wait, there's more!

More easy BITE solutions

A weak bass will mess up your timing, a powerful one will steady it

If you put too much effort into your strokes as you feel not heard enough, your timing can easily get messy. Some bassists want to force it eagerly, they strike a bit early. Others have a more restrained playing style, their suppressed urge to be heard and felt results in a tendency to strike late. Either way, what messes up their timing is the excess amount of effort.

The BITE remedy once more is 1000 millivolts of well-defined bass power plus our fortified structural stiffness. No need to play hard, a soft stroke will get you through the mix, and your timing will be just fine.

BITE 1000 MV PICKUPS EXPLAINED

STIFFNESS MATTERS: A TECHNICAL EXPLANATION

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Larry, USA (click for full review)

"My bass playing went up 5 notches with that bass, all easy and precise, like the parking brake got suddenly released! How exactly do you guys do this?"

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Elio, Italy (click for full review)

"This bass has an impressive output, which really helps me playing lighter. It also helps with effects, like envelope filters, overdrives and flangers."

Downsized body shapes for easy handling

Bulky body shapes in electric bass building go all the way back to its origins. BITE bodies are downsized to make them light and handy. We took away some wood in the waists, slimmed down the horns and we also took some fat off the butt, the so-called lower bout. The overall smaller frame lets our Punch and Jawbone basses rest snugly against your body, especially when seated.

The BITE premium 24-fret Evening Star model was designed ergonomically from scratch.

PUNCH & JAWBONE CONFIGURATOR

EVENING STAR BUILDER

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Ludwig, Germany (click for full review)

"Incredible Sound, good handling, beautiful design, high quality materials."

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Julien, Canada (click for full review)

"The bass is home and it is superb! From finish to sound, it’s exactly what I was looking for. The fretboard is fast and easy and the light body is very well balanced. My bandmates were really impressed by the bass too! Thank you for everything, it was a pleasure doing business with you and please give my warm regards to your whole team!"

Don't rush to buy a 5-string bass just for a few 5-string songs - BITE has a better solution!

There’s a couple of songs you’ve been meaning to play for ages, but they require you to buy a 5-string bass? Maybe Stevie Wonder’s Superstition or anything else reaching down to Eb, D or even Db?

Don't rush to the bass store just yet. No need to fork out for a second bass if one alone can do the job. Your 4-string BITE Effortless Bass carries an optional Hipshot® D-Tuner, also called drop D-tuner or bass extender. What is it good for? By flipping the lever at the backside of your headstock, your E-string will become a D-string, you can simply extend your bass range down by a whole note (or even one and a half depending on your note lengths - the string gets floppier the more you tune it down).

If, on the other hand, you don’t need the D-Tuner activated, it won’t disturb you and your EADG tuning, you’ll never notice it’s there.

**Hipshot D-Tuner with cloverleaf buttons, now you see it ...**

Hipshot D-Tuner 1 — **Hipshot D-Tuner with Y buttons**

BITE Backstage

About customer ratings

Hundreds of bassists play BITE around the world, literally from Austria all the way to Australia. Many of them rate our basses and customer service, we average 4.9 out of 5 stars, 95% of all ratings are full 5-star ratings. We are extremely thankful for such an exceptional level of client recognition and regard it as a mandate to continue our path. You'll find the customer reviews linked below.

OVER 150 CUSTOMER RATINGS

Repeat offenders: There's no stopping them

Many of our clients have returned to order a second or third bass from us, you'll find some of them in our reviews. There are so many bass brands out there to choose from, good brands, cheaper brands than BITE. Nobody in their right mind would order another bass from the same relatively new brand that we are, if they were not 100% satisfied the first time round. Some of our repeat customers have ordered up to seven basses, but our record client is the world's #1 bass collector, Uli Salm from Germany, with 16 BITE basses under his belt!

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Martin, Denmark (click for full review)

"I can’t stop playing both basses. They are highly addictive."

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Dan, USA (click for full review)

"I love my BITE bass and play it daily. I’ve played several shows with it and have been extremely satisfied with the way it plays/sounds/performs. I plan on getting a 5-string bass and am very much considering a second BITE bass."

Who's the world's #1 bass collector and how many BITEs does he own?

Uli Salm is the world's no. 1 bass collector, his collection includes almost a 1000 basses, that's the Guinness Book certified World Record. Uli has ordered a whopping 16 BITE basses within not even 2 years, one after another. BITE has not disappointed the world's no.1 bass collector, who knows a thing or two about basses, for 16 consecutive times. On top of that, Uli doesn't just collect basses, he plays them on stage.

Uli Salm with Rolling Stones bassist Darryl Jones and BITE Flower Power 24 Punch bass designed by 2 x Grammy winner and legendary "5th German Beatle" Klaus Voormann

Uli is a noted rock bassist in Germany, been on stage with Chuck Berry, Jerry Lee Lewis and many others. Now here's a man who has almost a thousand basses to choose from, wonderful basses, legendary basses, all the brands you can dream of and what does he play? More often than not he picks a BITE for his own shows!

When you're in Hamburg, Germany, make sure you visit Uli's legendary bar & restaurant called Zwick, that's in the Reeperbahn nightlife district. Zwick is completely bass themed, this place is like a bass museum, you'll get to see about 100 basses of his collection on display, and with a bit of luck, you can see Uli himself with his band Rudolf Rock live on stage on a Friday or Saturday night.

ZWICK HAMBURG

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Uli Salm, Germany (click for full review)

"Look, sound, feel, just everything is absolutely awesome!!!"

How much does a BITE artist make?

We currently list over 30 BITE artists on our website: Grammy artists, bassists of world stars, Youtubers and Instagramers with millions of followers and clicks. BITE does not pay them, we cannot afford, we're a small firm. Anyone playing BITE does so because they want to. We may discount a bass here and there for selected artists, or remunerate some freelance work, but we have no budget for paying a monthly retainer just for showing our bass like other brands do. Our basses are costly to build, we live on a narrow margin.

We manufacture our basses in Vienna, at high European production cost, we have no unskilled workers, but real guitar builders. This profession is called luthiery and it is a regulated trade in Austria, you can't just go and open your guitar making business, there's a 4-year full time professional education for it. On such a level, there's no way you can manufacture on the cheap.

Caught red-handed playing BITE on the sly

Every artist playing BITE does so simply because they love the sound and feel of playing a BITE, not because we pay them a hefty retainer. Do we get squeezed out by other brands who pay artists to play their basses exclusively? Yes, we do, but here's the funny part: some continue to play BITE secretely. In the videos they wave their other brand into the camera, but the audio - which in most cases is recorded separately from the video - is recorded on a BITE.

We mostly sell direct, this means we know our clients. There are a few really big names, A-listers in the bass world, who have their own signature basses with big long-standing brands but they use BITEs in the studio for their recordings. We obviously cannot expect them to promote our brand, we understand and respect that.

Exposed: What really happened backstage in Krems and Zürich

We've had two backstage handovers in the past. What's that? If we make a bass for a noted player touring with a big star, we take the opportunity to directly hand over the bass when they have a tour stop nearby, it's typically backstage a few hours before the show. We have no idea what will happen. Someone might politely say thank-you and our bass will disappear in some corner.

Here's how it played out with John Garrison, bassist with James Blunt. On a world tour which took them from the O2 in London (20k) to Qudos in Sydney (21k), they had a tour stop in nearby Krems in Lower Austria. Our team went there, handed over the bass to John. The band did their sound check, John first on his regular bass that he'd been playing for years, then he swapped it against the BITE, just out of curiosity. You could see his eyebrows going up in disbelief. He switched back to his regular bass and then again back to the BITE. And their jaws dropped. John, their sound engineer and James, they all gave our bass whole-hearted thumbs-up and John performed that very night on our bass and continues to do so all the way around the world.

The year before, we handed over a bass to Jerry Meehan in Zurich, Switzerland, where he was on a tour stop with Robbie Williams. It was exactly the same story. Will they just ignore our bass? No idea. - Turns out they loved it so much that it performed on that stage that same night.

Just so you get an idea of what this really means. Imagine you have a show touring the big stages of the world, 20k venues. Everything is precisely rehearsed, the sound, the light, there's so much money at stake, no room for error. And then, just on a whim, let's have that new bass on stage tonight. Without rehearsals, without building up trust in this new instrument. How does it perform, is it reliable at all? None of that, we want that bass on stage tonight!

Bottom line. To us at BITE. this is the ultimate proof that our 1000 millivolt sound and our build quality rank among the best in the world, and bass professionals on the highest level appreciate the effortless playing experience on a stressful world tour. They notice that when on a BITE, something is different, the sound is more articulate, attack and sustain are there, everything feels easier, effortless and precise playing with 1000 millivolts of passive bass power at your belly.

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John Garrison, UK (click for full review)

"OMG…!!! The bass is awesome, the best bass tone I’ve ever had! I absolutely love it. And so does our soundman. Everyone just blown away. You can hear the love that’s been put into this bass!"

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Jerry Meehan, UK (click for full review)

"Superb, we all love it!"

Don't overpay for bogus quality, know the 3 bass categories

A) The straightforward budget class from the Asian factory, not pretending to be anything else

Yay! Basses for 100$, what could go wrong! Pricing is a way of communication. At the low end, you know the bass will come out of a factory in a low-wage country. Nothing wrong with that, it makes music easily accessible but your expectations will be realistic. For that kind of money, production has to be cheap, too.

You shouldn't be surprised if the pickups sound so-so, if the hardware has thin chrome plating, maybe sooner or later there can be rusty spots. Frets will most likely not be leveled, this takes time and skills, so you'll probably need to play with higher string action to avoid fret buzz. Frets can be lose too, this is fun, you have a persistent buzz at a certain frequency but you'll never find out where it comes from. Fret ends may be sharp, since rounding and polishing them is also a time-consuming task.

Machine heads can have loose tolerances, maybe they cannot hold their tuning very long. Nut material can be cheap, so your strings keep grinding their slots lower and lower until they touch the first fret and you have to replace the nut.

All sorts of funny things will not surprise you, this is not a luthier build, the basses are assembled by factory workers who have to box and palletize so and so many basses per hour. There's nobody who takes an hour for a precise setup, the bass will maybe not be set up at all. And there's nobody who has two hours for an extensive quality check, ticking off dozens of quality criteria.

That bass is probably not gonna last a lifetime and has a few aches and pains but for that kind of money you won't be overly concerned, it's all straightforward.

B) The bogus class, coming out of the same factory but pretending to be a premium build

How to cheat bass buyers. To make a low-cost factory bass look like the valuable premium thing, the brand is going to throw all sorts of dust into your eyes. Signature this, vintage that, custom, roadworn and probably some mumbo-jumbo about the tone wood. In reality they'll order a whole shipping container of identical basses from the same OEM factory where they also order the 100$ model.

So what can they do to cheat you? There are so many corners to cut. Neck wood can be cheap soft maple instead of costly hard maple, which will leave you with poor attack and sustain, and you'll never know what the real deal can sound like. Finishes can have a cheap clearcoat, your bass will collect another scratch every day. Electronics can have sloppy shielding and grounding, you'll have a noise problem. Your band will make fun of you: Hey, here comes our bassist, buzzing Bernie.

What else? Necks can be crooked, fret buzz without end, it's gonna be buzzing Bernie all over. Fret egdes can be sharp, your fingertips will know first. Pickups can be weak and faint, your audience will never know there's a bass on stage. Solder joints can be sloppy and break, you'll be left on stage toneless. And so on.

It's all about so-called asymmetric information, that's a concept in economics that has been worth a few Nobel prizes. The seller of an item has an information advantage towards the buyer. The car dealer knows the hidden defects in his cars, the insurance agent knows what the small print really means, it's easy for them to cheat you. But fear not, the next tab (C) is gonna give you some easy ways out.

C) How to spot the real premium class, worth every penny

If you are convinced of a brand because they have been here forever, because they have an XYZ signature bass or vintage model, because every child knows it's a good brand, then there's nothing wrong with it, you'll probably be happy with your bass.

If - on the other hand - you want more substance in your purchase decisions, here are 4 easy ways to sort out serious quality builds from not-so ones.

1) Common sense. Do their selling points make any sense at all? Is it general talk about outstanding tone wood and superb sound, or are there solid facts, is there substance, science to back at all up?

2) Transparency. Do they give you insights into their production? At BITE we send our customers making-of pics and videos during the build, so they can watch their dream bass become reality. We try to give you as many insights as possible, down to the latin names of our woods.

3) Reviews. Check the manufacturer or dealer sites for customer reviews. Are there reviews at all and if yes do they sound credible? Are they specific or do they sound like marketing lingo? Are there individual pictures of the reviewed basses, maybe customer photos, videos, social media links?

4) Benefits. Are you buying into a brand image or are you specifically getting what YOU want from a bass? It's probably not gonna be 'outstanding wood' and 'superb sound' but something specific. In basses, it comes down to a few crucial things: sound, feel, look, convenience, risk:

Sound. What kind of sound makes you happy? Powerful or delicate? Beefy or twangy? The BITE Youtube channel gives you scores of videos featuring all of our 1000mV pickups (single coils, spilt coils and humbuckers), different artists with different recording setups. Then there's always attack and sustain. Do the basses you're looking at have a credible solution and track record on attack and sustain?

Feel. This is for instance about weight - at BITE we offer lightweight woods and chambering for weight reduction. It's also about body shapes - all BITE models have downsized bodies for snug handling. It's about strain in your hands - does this bass require hard playing or can you just strike it easy and still make it through the mix? Are the frets and fretboards levelled so you can play with low action? It's about sore fingertips, again, does the bass have enough power and are the fret ends sharp or smooth? Is the back of the neck sticky high-gloss finished or satinized speed finished? Does the back surface have annoying grainy inclusions? Does the bass have enough structural stiffness so you can feel the vibrations in your guts even unplugged?

Look. At BITE you can configure not thousands, not millions, but billions of individual bass models. 3 body shapes to start with, 2 headstock shapes, 16 million body colors, figured tops, light, vintage and roasted necks, dozens of pickguard colors, no-pickguard builds, individual pickup colors, hardware colors, hell, you can have each screw in a different color, up to handpainted and digital artwork, textile wrapping, lasering, individual inlays, the sky is the limit.

Convenience. How is the order process, how is communication, what's their attitude towards clients? If we want to spend money on anything, a pair of glasses or whatever, the seller's attitude is what seriously matters to us. If the guy starts getting pushy, trying to pull some hard selling BS on us, we're out of there in a second. Can't stand it. You can make a very easy distinction here: do they respect their clients, yes or no? If they don't respect you, walk away because if there are problems, you know it's gonna be nasty. Check our reviews to find out how we interact with our clients. At BITE we try to give you a convenient experience at every possible corner.

Risk. A bass might be a substantial expense for you, you wanna make sure it's a solid investment that will bring you joy for a long time. What's the reliability of the brand, do they have a track record of big shows that allow no mistakes? What about the durability? Anything about defects popping up in the reviews? Any return policy?

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Chris, Germany (click for full review)

"I play bass since 1985 und I’ve had quite a number of instruments in my hands since then. The Bite is the best that could have happened to me."

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NDB, USA (click for full review)

"I am super-picky about fit and finish and other details, and I could not find any issues with this instrument."