A fret is any of the thin strips of material, usually metal wire, inserted laterally at specific positions along the neck or fretboard of a stringed instrument. Frets usually extend across the full width of the neck. On some historical instruments and non-European instruments, frets are made of pieces of string tied around the neck.
The neck of a guitar showing the nut (in the background, coloured white) and first four frets
Frets tied on to the neck of a saz; note microtonal frets between semitones.
China. Pipa with frets, Middle Tang Dynasty era (618–907 A.D.), from the Yulin Caves, cave 15
France, Utrecht Psalter, c. 850. During the Carolingian Renaissance an Anglo Saxon artist drew an image of a cythara with frets.
The neck is the part of certain string instruments that projects from the main body and is the base of the fingerboard, where the fingers are placed to stop the strings at different pitches. Guitars, banjos, ukuleles, lutes, the violin family, and the mandolin family are examples of instruments which have necks. Necks are also an integral part of certain woodwind instruments, such as the saxophone.
Double truss rod neck, Rickenbacker guitar
Neck-through construction on Ibanez studio guitar
Neck joint with a four-screw plate on a Yamaha Pacifica 112 electric guitar