Probably the first commercially that used an electromagnetic pickup was Rickenbacker with the Frying Pan guitar with horseshoe magnet pickup. Dobro and National instruments started becoming electrified even thought the demand was not that great. Around 1935 while working at Gibson, Walt Fuller started making the ES-150 Pickup (Charlie Christian as it is called) and using it on the ES-150 Guitar. At that time the same style pickup with different blades was used on the EH-Electric Hawaiian model lap steel guitars. Many other instruments were adapted with Rowe-DeArmond pickups and others used custom or modified pickups such as Les Paul experimenting with Low Impedance pickups to reduce unwanted noise especially when recording and doing live performances.

Many of the early pickups were bulky and heavy due mostly to the magnetic material available for making pickups. Early Alnico magnets and Cobalt Steels were used and could dampen the sustain in the body affecting the tone of the instrument.