Taylor 214ce

Walnut is a domestically-sourced tonewood, and its tonal signature reflects that middle position in Taylor's wood lineup: brighter and more immediate than mahogany, without rosewood's longer sustain and stacked overtone complexity. On the 214ce, that means a strummed chord resolves quickly and cleanly rather than blooming and ringing — useful for a player who's cutting through a full band mix or simply wants a guitar that stays articulate at speed rather than washing out. The Grand Auditorium body reinforces that balance: it's Taylor's most versatile shape, neither dreadnought-deep nor parlor-small, so the walnut's brightness doesn't tip over into thin or brittle the way a smaller-bodied guitar in the same wood pairing might. C-Class Bracing, Taylor's traditional bracing pattern used throughout the 200 Series, is the platform underneath all of that — it isn't the patented V-Class geometry Taylor reserves for the 300 Series and up, and the 214ce isn't built to chase V-Class's specific sustain and intonation gains. What it's built for is a genuinely well-made, well-intonated Taylor at the most accessible price in the catalog.

Playing feel follows the same do-everything philosophy as the tone. The Grand Auditorium's 15-inch lower bout keeps the guitar comfortable in the lap for both seated fingerstyle work and standing strumming, and Taylor builds the neck with a standard nut width suited to a player moving between chord-heavy rhythm parts and single-note runs without the neck ever feeling cramped or overly wide. None of that changes across the 200 Series, which means a player who tries the 214ce and later moves up to the 214ce Plus or 224ce-K DLX is stepping into a familiar feel with a different tonewood underneath, not relearning the instrument from scratch.

The clearest comparison inside the 200 Series is the 214ce against its own sibling, the 214ce Plus. Both use the identical Grand Auditorium body and C-Class Bracing, so the $400 gap between them comes down entirely to back-and-sides wood: walnut here, Indian rosewood on the Plus. Where the 214ce stays bright and focused, the rosewood Plus opens into more overtone complexity and a deeper low end, at the cost of some of the 214ce's rhythmic clarity in a busy mix. A player choosing between the two is really choosing between two different tonal priorities on the same body and bracing platform, not paying more for a categorically better guitar — the 214ce is the right call for someone who wants Taylor's most balanced body shape voiced bright and direct rather than warm and complex, and for a first Taylor purchase, that clarity can make a strummed chord easier to hear and correct than a more harmonically busy rosewood voice would.

Every Taylor that leaves The Acoustic Shoppe completes the same full 23-point professional inspection our in-house techs run on every instrument we sell, regardless of price point or series tier — this is a pre-sale quality check, not a routine setup. At $999, the 214ce sits just under our $1,000 Dread-Not Guarantee threshold, so it doesn't carry the full guarantee package (the 30-day in-home trial, 1-year 90% trade-in credit, and free humidity monitoring kit reserved for instruments at $1,000 and up), but it still ships only after that complete inspection has cleared, and our team is glad to walk through what that inspection covers before you buy.

For the rest of the line, see our Taylor 200 Series collection, and for the complete range of Taylor models we carry, visit our Taylor Guitars collection.

The Acoustic Shoppe is an Authorized Taylor Premier Dealer and Gold Label Advantage Dealer. Every instrument ships after a full 23-point professional inspection by our in-house repair tech. As a nine-time consecutive NAMM Top 100 Dealer, we handle warranty concerns directly on your behalf.