TC Electronic Tube Pilot Overdrive Pedal Reviews

I love this pedal. It simply delivers pure tone. Between the two easy to adjust knobs, I can perfectly dial in the amount of saturation to break-up I want, and at the volume I want it. The harmonics on the break-up are really rich and creamy. I like the super-saturated sound that is always on the verge of breaking and then breaks on loud notes or crunchy chords. This pedal delivers.
One important note- it does have a real tube in it, and I believe that tube receives power even when you are not using the pedal, so un plug your pedal when not using- it will prolong tube life and save energy.

this pedal give a fairly warm tube tone despite some online video reviews stating it is crispy and bright... I'm actually running it via a solid state amp with clean tone and it warms it up and provides a fat edgy range of tonal boost. I'm running it

Thank you! It is great!

I've been playing guitar since the early 90's. Just like many guitar players you go through many pedals over the years. I've played through a lot of different overdrive pedals...this one stands out! Don't let the 2 knobs fool ya cause you can dial in a clean boost to a gritty one & everything in between! I paired this up with a Boss DS-1W (Waza Craft) distortion pedal and it absolutely sings! I know many people who own a DS-1 and tap ON the Tube Pilot with it and you'll get searing tones! A very good range of sound all depending how you dial them up! For only $ this pedal is an absolute STUD!

I'm an old guy who plays now through a reissue Deluxe Reverb with a Les Paul Junior in my den. I never heard a solid state pedal that didn't hit me like fingers scratching on a chalk board. The clipping with his pedal may or may not be from the tube, which for all I know may or may not really play a significant part in the signal chain…but this thing really does not have that annoying solid state quality. What it does have is grainy breakup at low volume, exactly what I want. It is in the same ball park as my 5 watt Gibson amp cranked, except it does it a volumes that doesn't kill my ears.

Let it warm up.

Was skeptical about it honestly, but I love this pedal. It is definitely an overdrive and not a distortion, which is exactly what I wanted. But the tone is fantastic for the price. Quickly becoming my go-to overdrive pedal.

Beautiful tone out of this! Adds extra crunch to my rig. Just get it!

i mean Seriously,
how good of a 12AX7 are you expecting to get installed in yours, on average, at this price ?

try a name brand long plate, with gold pins or something.

I'm extremely impressed with the TC Electronics Tube Pilot. Almost as impressive as Sweetwater's customer experience which is and has been second to none for a good while now. Not amongst the Music gear / supply retailers, but amongst all retail and industrial companies I've ever seen. They really should write a book on customer care and retention as they continue writing it with each new business day anyway.

The tube pilot. Ahhhhh. It's everything I hoped and more. I expected some added preamp tube volume and crunch. I was very pleased to see it become the nudge a tired sounding power amp stage needed to reawaken it's tone. Well done TC. My only moderately negative sounding comment is driven by personal preference though can't hurt to discuss. I'm just not a fan of the input / output placement. It wouldn't be an issue if your board was loaded end to end with TC pedals only, but that's not realistic. I have their PolyTune3 which has the more common side placement. I know it's a nitpick to an otherwise home run pedal. Well done TC Electronics and the Sweetwater team.

I've been using this pedal for 6 years, in three different ways. One, on a cold-sounding amp, I ran it with no audible boost and just a little tube drive for some warmth in my tone, and kept it on almost all the time. Two, I've used it with mid-tube-drive as a drive pedal for solos, and it adds some lovely saturation and sustain. Three, with the tube drive up high and mid boost, it's a nice distortion with more edge than a fuzz but not as harsh as my FET distortion pedals.
It's not a transparent boost and not super flexible distortion pedal, but, at times, I've swapped out the Tube Pilot for a boost, a distortion, or a fuzz before, and wound up putting the Tube Pilot back. It's just a good-sounding boost/noise pedal.

i use this at low drive settings so i can play softly with a bit of dirt and dig into it to have it break. love this thing. sounds great, dont let the price fool you.


PSA: after plugging in power supply, it took a bit for the pedal to power up due to the actual tube inside to warm up. doesnt take too long tho ;)

I have one of these Tube pilots and once I figured out the sweet spot it has a permanent place on my board. I get great clean boost, I have found the pedal acts much like an amp set at the edge of break up. Its very touch sensitive. Responds well to the guitar volume control. I reccommend it.

For the price, I couldn't resist. I own several overdrives including a Tube Screamer, Rat, and an EHX Soul Food (which had been my favorite.) I really like the Tube Pilot a lot, and although I've only used it on a couple of club gigs, it feels and sounds great. The overdrive is very smooth at lower gain and gets nice and spongy around 12-1 o'clock. It sounds great with both single-coil and humbucking pickups.

I don't know how long the tube will last or how easy it will be to replace, but--for now--I really like this pedal and plan to keep it on my board. Some might not like that it doesn't have a tone knob, but it's not a problem if you have a good EQ pedal on your board.

Tube overdrive that has a real 12ax7 for the overdrive. The lack of a tone control is a plus since you get the pure uncolored sound of your guitar and amp. Highly recommended!

I bought this pedal at a really good price and I received it very quickly. But honestly, this review pertains mainly to Sweetwaters fantastic customer service. More specifically, Brads customer service. After I placed my order, perhaps 10-15 minutes after, I got a call. After informing me that he was Brad from Sweetwater and that they had received my order, he asked me how my wife was doing. You see, about 3 months ago my wife was involved in a car accident. The only reason Brad was/is aware of this is because about 3 months ago he had called me asking if I had any plans on purchasing any musical items over the summer and, if so, was there any way he could be of help in doing so.(I'm a "repeat" customer.) I was so stressed at the time that I basically told him that I probably wouldn't be buying any for quite some time because my wife was involved in a car accident. He expressed his condolences,(which to me was pretty cool in and of itself),and we ended our conversation. But to remember that after such a long time,(&/or even if he made a note of all that, to me at least, the fact that he even took that time and effort to do so is EXTREMELY cool in my book), is not only very cool it's touching in my opinion and REALLY meant a lot to me. Thank you Brad. Your actions were truly heartwarming!!! As long as you continue working at Sweetwater, they have a customer &/or supporter in me.

This is everything you could ever want in an overdrive. Awesome tone, simple to use, and great service from Josh Trumm at Sweetwater.

Nice looking pedal. There is a real tube under the chassis, looks easy enough to swap out. The stock tube sounds good, so it's staying for the time being. This was a gift and the person is using in front of a solid state Fedner with good results.
I'll update the review for in front of a tube amp when I borrow it.
As always, Gage provided the best customer service.

This is a nice little pedal. Gives a pretty wide range of overdrive and works great as a boost in tandem with my Boss DS-1 and SD-1 pedals. Plus, the price is definitely right.

Sounds great through my Fishman Solid-State amp!!! The Fishman is so clean and designed for acoustic guitars and vocals, so I was hoping to get a little tubesy overdrive from this TC Electronic Tube Pilot! And, after warming up the pedal/tube for 30 minutes or so, I plugged my Telecaster into the pedal input jack, and the output jack from the pedal into my Fishman amp and dialed up a little TubeDrive and voila! I got some snap, twang and growl! Exactly what I was looking for! Great for blues, country, rock...probably, warm up a microphone, too. I will try that next!

Now...it was not stated in Product Description or anywhere on the packaging, however, this pedal will NOT operate with an internal 9-volt battery! There is no 9-volt battery clip to install a battery. You will need an external power adapter to operate this pedal. I found this out after opening the very sturdy, metal enclosure to install a battery. I looked at the included User's guide and sure enough, this bit of information was stated once, and buried on page 2...Fortunately, I have a couple of adapters and was able to use the pedal, with great affect! Just a heads-up....The pedal is awesome! You just can NOT power it with a 9-volt battery.

Thank you, as always, to Nich and Lauren and everybody at Sweetwater for the best Customer Service and lightning fast shipping and follow up, after the sale!...The candy is always welcome, too! See you, soon!

I really like the tone of the pedal, but if you are looking for the breakup, this isn't your pedal. Even with the knob set all of the way down, it is still very 'crispy'. It sounds similar to a British tube amp to me.

The pedal itself is nice and well-made.

For the price I wanted to try out this pedal because it has a 12AX7 tube in it and try it in front of my older tube amps. My amp sounds similar to a tweed deluxe so it already has nice mid-rangy gain to it. The gain on this pedal is smooth at lower levels and almost like like fuzz on the higher end but not too 'tube-screamer mid ranngy" and the pedal touch sensitivity is pretty good. I do wish it had a few things. First, a tone control would be nice. Easy access to change the tube would be nice. There are some resistors right where you take out the tube that seem like they could break off really easily in trying a new tube unless extremely careful. I really want to try a lower gain tube like a 5751, 12AT7 or a 12AY7 as I have many laying around to experiment with a more usable gain for me that would surely be an improvement over the tube included. I think this pedal might draw a lot off a power supply with other pedals connected....so far, so good. I do have to say the soft engage of the foot switch is kind of annnoying because it seems to have a slight delay and doesn't engage immediately. This is my 3rd TC pedal. I have an older distortion/boost pedal of theirs that had the foot switch die on me. I also have the MojoMojo which is much dark than the tube pilot but has as a lot of flexibility comparatively. I hope the Mojo and the Tube Pilot last.

I like this pedal a lot. Originally, I was using it at flat boost with a little drive to add some warmth to my solid-state Marshall. After I replaced my amp with a tube amp, I now use it for solos to drive the amp a little harder with boost and add some warmth saturation when I hold a note with extra tube drive.
I'd most recommend it for someone who wants to add real tube warmth to their solid-state setup, but it's also a great dirty boost pedal too.

In the mid '70s I had a a single channel Mesa Boogie amp with a five-band graphic EQ built in. It had the best sounding "overdrive" sound I ever heard. Since then all of the Fuzz/Distortion/Overdrive pedals I've come across sound like crap. This one sounds less like crap and doesn't cost an arm and a leg. I'm happier than I might have been.

I tried it into tweed bassman
Sounds too bright. Would be better suited as treble boost in normal channel of AC30.

I got this pedal thinking I would become Eric Johnson, and I didn't. Sadly it didn't let me become "me" either.

I thought the commercials looked good, I liked the idea of "more" of the same thing you're putting into it but when it finally arrived and I put my guitar through it it made my Orange tube amp sound like a lizard on a frying pan. horrible fizz, I could have used it as a clean boost to boost my Nobels ODR Mini, it sounded great that way but I already own a nice boost pedal.

If you are looking for a clean dumble kind of boost look at Jetter. The Tube Pilot is a fizzy/fuzzy thing that does not play well with my tube amps and is unusable. I have not tried it in a solid state so I do not have that perspective. I am going to give it to my bass player but it is probably not going to work for him. Sweetwater is always great,I have been using them for years and they offered a return on it but it is not worth the trouble for a $ purchase. Disapointed in TC though, I love their tuners.

This is the worst, better to go bare naked than to use this fuzzy bum…