Music is the most beautiful thing the world has. The piano is the most used instrument that produces a characteristic sound of the instrument.
The typical hammer hitting three strings and playing a wonderful polyphony that would become music. However, nowadays there are pianos that do not use that hammer mechanism, but they work electrically, with a pre-recorded acoustic piano.
One of the greatest things that digital pianos have is that they do not need any tuning. Therefore, if you own an acoustic piano you will spend a lot of money tuning it, while if you have a digital one, you will not spend any money on that. Also, acoustic pianos will need some maintenance over the years since the hammers and strings are going to lose sound quality. Then, digital pianos are cheaper in some way, but how do I choose the one I need?
First, let’s concentrate on your needs. Are you planning to buy a piano that you will use for many years? Are you just trying if playing piano is for you? All this may change your decision on which piano to buy. If you have already decided on buying a digital piano, then you will need help in choosing the right one for you and your needs.
First of all, you must know the things that you want your piano to have. Talking about how many keys the piano should have, you have to know if you are going to have that instrument for some months or for many years. If you are going to buy a short-term piano, then you could consider buying a 49 or 61 keys piano, which are usually comfortable for beginners, since their repertoire does not demand more than that amount of keys. However, if your goal is to own that piano for several years, you might want to buy a full 88 keys piano, since acoustic pianos also have that amount of keys.
In addition, you must have in clear what your repertoire will be. If you are going to use a piano only to play popular songs with basic chords, then a 49 keys piano is good, but if playing a larger repertoire, you must buy an 88 keys one. That goes together with the pedals. Normally, 49 and 61 keys pianos only support the sustain pedal, which is the most often used by professional pianists. When your objectives are high and you want your piano to last many years, make sure to buy an 88 keys piano that contains the 3 pedals, so when you are no longer a beginner but an intermediate or advanced player, then you can use everything that a full-tone acoustic piano has.
Also, related to the repertoire, you must take into account the polyphony that your piano must have. We are referring to polyphony when talking about how many keys you want to make sound at the same time. You might be thinking that with a 10 keys polyphony (since we do not have more than 10 fingers) is good, but no. You have to take into account the pedaling. When playing your pieces, you will probably use some sustain pedal, so then if you want your piano to keep all the sound, you must make sure that your instrument has a decent amount of polyphony. It is often recommended to afford at least a 128 keys polyphony piano, since if it is less than that, you will not be able to play every piece of the piano repertoire.