Can a pickup die out overtime?

[verbotenco]

How long before a pickup would fail and require total replacement? Can the magnet age and drop dead eventually on natural cause?

[Ed Hunter]

highly unlikely! look at P.A.F's from 1957 still going strong. sure a magnet can age but to just die out? not likely

[CTN]

Magnets do age, but I don't think they naturally "die out" unless you age them for like...a hundred+ years, at the least.

As for the coils, it depends on the conditions the guitar is exposed to.

Lots of humid salty air for example can be very corrosive and can eat into the coils and short them out over time. Likewise, probably not a good idea to spill liquids into the pickups especially if they're acidic, like soft drinks or alcohol.

If you take care of your guitar and your pickups, it will last a lifetime, and indeed there are guitars kickin around which date back to the birth of electric guitars that still work fine.