5 Best Digital Grand Pianos – REVIEW | $5000 – $17000 | Jan 2024

01 Jan 5 Best Digital Grand Pianos – REVIEW | $5000 – $17000 | Jan 2024

5 Best Digital Grand Pianos for 2024 – Review

5 Best Digital Grand Pianos – REVIEW | $5000 to $17,000 | Jan 2024 | Yamaha N3X, Roland GP9, Yamaha CLP-765GP, Kawai DG30, and Yamaha CLP-795GP.

When we do reviews, they are the real thing. We don’t regurgitate other content from other web sites or make things up.

We know what we are talking about. I personally play these pianos for many hours (most people don’t do that and have little or no access to these pianos) and we also analyze all the specs carefully to put out reviews and content that you can trust and will help you make the right buying decision.

After more than 40 years playing on acoustic and digital pianos and advising people on what piano will best fit their needs and budget, when it comes to digital grand pianos we are the experts. Currently when it comes to the main digital grand pianos out there, Yamaha has 4 of them, Roland has 3 of them, Kawai has 1, Orla has 2 digital grand piano models, and Dexibell digital piano company from Italy just came out with a new one called the H10G micro grand.

Beyond all that, there are (what we call) the “PSO” digital grand pianos. PSO means “piano shaped object” because there are certain brands of much lower quality digital grand pianos that may have nice looking cabinets but they just don’t qualify at all in terms of actually playing like a piano.

In other words they look good on the outside but they are not good on the inside. Those pianos have key actions that are noisy, clunky, and don’t have good key action movement, the piano sound is tinny and without expression with very uneven tone from one note to the next, and other playability issues.

In our opinion you should always stick to the top name digital piano brands that people know and trust and that will reliable and enjoyable to play

Yamaha N3X AvantGrand “hybrid” digital piano

Yamaha N3X AvantGrand hybrid digital grand piano

$17,799 store discount price

This model is an updated version of the original model than came out a number of years ago. The N3X has a new piano sound chip in it along with upgraded features and functions. The N3X is called a “hybrid” digital piano because it has an actual Yamaha acoustic key action with all moving parts like a real grand piano and is the only digital grand piano on our list to have such an action.

Regular acoustic baby grand pianos measure on average about 5′ deep. The N3X grand piano key action has been slightly modified to fit in its smaller 4′ deep custom cabinet and it really does feel and behave like a real acoustic grand piano and that’s the #1 thing that people look for in a piano…how realistic is the key action?

How does it feel when you press down the key and play across the keyboard? Those are the questions piano shoppers ask and the Yamaha N3X passes the “stress test” when it comes to giving you the sense that you are playing a real acoustic grand piano.

As far as piano sound goes, the stereo piano sound chip in this model has 2 distinct grand piano tones…one of them from a 9′ Japanese Yamaha concert grand and the other one from a real 9′ European (Viennese) Bosendorfer concert grand.

The 2 acoustic piano sounds are recorded (sampled) directly from these large concert grand pianos and the N3X has a huge internal speaker system inside of it to project that concert sound out of the piano in a way where the sound moves around you like it would on a regular grand piano.

The pedals work very well although not exactly like an acoustic grand because of the physical nature of having actual strings and dampers in a real piano whereas you don’t have those parts in a digital piano because that’s the who;e idea…there are no strings and no actual felt hammers touching strings.

Everything is done by optical sensors with simulated hammers moving and the sensors are analyzing movement and velocity, etc in “real-time.” The result of all that technology is a satisfying digital grand piano playing experience that many people really seem to love.

Roland GP9 digital grand piano

Roland GP9 digital grand piano – Review

$11,000 store discount price

This top-of-the-line Roland digital grand piano measures 5′ deep in cabinet depth from front to back which makes it not only the same size as a real acoustic baby grand, but it’s also the largest of all newer top name brand digital baby grand pianos out there today.

When it comes to the key action and the physical keys, acoustic grand piano keys are much longer in total key length (20″ long white keys in an acoustic grand vs 11″ long keys in the Roland GP609) as compared to a real acoustic grand piano. Many brands of digital grand pianos have shorter keys, mainly because they are digital pianos and built in a different way.

However, the new GP9 has much better balanced keys with a more responsive key action than in previous models. So there have been noticeable improvements in this new model that people will really enjoy, and I liked playing it very much.

The piano sound in the GP9 comes from a sound technology called “physical modeling” because the sound is “modeled” using mathematical algorithms in the virtual world instead of actually sampling (recording) it from a real acoustic grand piano like a Steinway or Bosendorfer grand piano.

The GP609 has all kinds of very cool functions and features besides just being a piano and it is obviously has a very beautiful looking cabinet too.

It looks great, has big volume, and it does have some very cool “bells & whistles.  I recommend it if you are looking for a larger cabinet size and want the latest technology in digital pianos.

Roland GP609 – 5′ digital grand piano

This Roland GP609 five foot deep digital grand piano model has just been discontinued. It had been selling for $11,000 plus tax. The current internet closeout price is $8999 while they last. This model is very close in ability and looks as compared to the new GP9 model.

They are the same size and in a few ways I like the GP609 more than the new GP9. The GP9 does a have a few new things that are pretty cool, but at $8999 the GP609 is a great value in my opinion and you should jump at that price while there is still availability  if you want a larger size digital grand piano like this one.

It’s really quite beautiful to look at and have in anybody’s home. It looks great in its polished ebony cabinet with its polished wood interior. This model comes with a matching bench and a Roland 10 year factory warranty! Wow…10 years is a long time. There are a huge variety of features on this model and it is enjoyable to play as a piano along with its Bluetooth wireless streaming.

Don’t pass up this opportunity to get a new 5′ digital grand piano by the famous Roland company at this closeout price. There is no other top brand that has a digital grand piano in this size at this quality and with so many usable and enjoyable features.

Yamaha CLP-795GP digital grand piano

Yamaha CLP-795GP digital baby grand

$8199 internet discount price

This model comes in a beautiful polished black or polished snow white (slightly higher price), measures 4′ deep, and is Yamaha’s top-of-the-line digital baby grand in the “Clavinova” series of pianos.

This model came out out in late October or November 2021 but really hasn’t been available to to severe product shortages. It and has wooden white keys that are longer than the keys in the less expensive regular Clavinova models.

This extra key length gives the key action movement better balance from front to back of the keys as well as a more responsive key action with the additional of counter-weights in the key actions. In other words, this key action plays very nicely although it is a bit firmer than other digital pianos actions, but many people like it that way.

The interior soundboard area of the piano has a beautifully finished polished wood-tone color which is a proprietary design from Yamaha that is on no other digital grand piano that we know of.

The internal audio speaker system in this model has a total of 300 watts going through 6 power amplifiers which puts that sound through 6 individual speakers and 2 new transducers so the sound system in this model is very powerful and projects a big piano sound with clarity and also the feeling of omni-directional sound like you get in a real acoustic grand piano.

The stereo piano sound chip inside has 2 different grand pianos in including a Yamaha 9′ CFX concert grand and a 9′ Bosendorfer concert grand and these brand new stereo sound samples that are improved over the previous model CLP-695.

Also there are over 500 hundred instrument sounds in the CLP-795GP along with the ability to play General MIDI 16-track song files which helps with learning some of your favorite songs and just having fun listening and singing along.

We do recommend this model if it fits your musical needs and falls within your budget. Just so you know, Yamaha makes an upright style version of the CLP-795GP and that model is called the CLP-785 and it’s a bit less money too.

Orla 500 Grand polished ebony digital grand piano

Orla 500 Grand digital grand piano

$5499 store price

This 4′ deep digital grand piano is unique and very popular and that’s why it’s in this top 5 best digital grand piano list. One of the reasons people like it very much is that it’s in the larger 4′ deep cabinet and has an attractive wood soundboard interior and comes in either polished ebony, polished white, or polished red with a matching duet size bench.

The Orla company is a well known digital piano company from Italy and has been designing digital pianos for many decades that have also been popular over the years. So they are definitely not a “start-up” piano company and they have a US warehouse in Florida.

The 500 Grand has a 160 watt internal speaker system which makes the piano sound beautiful and it also has Bluetooth audio wireless music streaming capability as well. With hundreds of high definition instruments tones, interactive accompaniments, 16-track General MIDI recorder-player system, and a number of other very cool features, the Orla 500 Grand comes highly recommended and people throughout the USA are enjoying it very much.

Yamaha CLP-765GP digital grand piano

Yamaha CLP-765GP Digital grand piano  Review

$5999 discount price

This 39″ deep mini grand piano model has been out for a relatively short time and it already is the most popular digital baby grand in the world.

It’s basically a smaller, slightly stripped down version of the higher priced CLP-795GP with the Yamaha plastic key action (vs wood keys) that also has the normal length keys as compered to the CLP-795GP longer wooden keys.

The key action is a bit lighter than the CLP-795GP band it plays nicely and has a very good stereo piano sound chip in it. The piano is available in polished ebony and for more money is available in polished white with matching bench.

The CLP-765GP has a very impressive 184 watt, 4 amplifier, 4 speaker internal sound system that really produces impressive “live tone” and the piano offers a total of 38 instrument sounds. It has a couple of different player-recorder features including 16-track MIDI a 1-track audio recording.

The CLP-765GP also offers Bluetooth wireless audio streaming (which sounds great through its hi fidelity speaker system wirelessly streamed from your personal device) among some other cool features such as its more minimalistic looking user control panel that is off to the left side of the keyboard.

Overall this elegant digital mini baby grand piano does have a very impressive appearance and sounds great filling up nearly any size room. The interior of the piano soundboard area is all black as opposed to the natural wood-tone in a few of the other models, but the black color does look good and is elegant as well.

Kawai DG30 digital grand piano

Kawai DG30 microgrand

$6149 internet discount price

This newer model is the smallest “micro-size” digital grand piano in the Top 5 models. The DG30 is 34″ in depth so it’s still on the smaller size just 2″ deeper than the Orla Grand 120. It is a reasonable price in my opinion for a Kawai digital piano with a mini grand shape. The Kawai DG30 just recently came out into the marketplace.

It is not only very attractive for its smaller size but the proprietary Kawai stereo sound chip, Kawai fast-action piano weighted keyboard, and responsive pedaling add a noticeably more authentic playing experience to the model than you expect from this smaller size piano and as compared to other name brand digital grand pianos.

It’s really amazing when you play it and the only thing holding it back from being even better than its smaller size would suggest is its internal speaker system.

The speaker system output is 40 watts going into 2 amplifiers and 4 speakers which actually sounds pretty nice for being on the lower side of power output. I have played this model many times and the overall sound is fairly big and resonate for it’s smaller size cabinet.

However, if you compare that to the newer Yamaha CLP-765GP mini grand which is 3’9″ deep and sells for $5999, that piano sound system is 184 watts going into 4 amplifiers and 4 speakers…so quite a bit of difference there. However, you can also add an external sound system to the DG30 (if you feel you need it) that could put it on a more even playing field with the Yamaha.

If you want to know more and are looking for even lower discount prices, be sure to contact us before doing anything.

IMPORTANT DIGITAL GRAND PIANO UPDATE!

We recently found out that a top name brand US distributor warehouse is offering an unadvertised instant rebate off the advertised internet discount price on their best digital grand piano while supplies last.  

The unadvertised instant rebate is an additional $1500 off. And you may even be able to get it with NO SALES TAX added on, depending on where you live.

We are not allowed to disclose in writing which brand and model has this rebate (they would be very unhappy with us if we did) but what we can say is this instant $1500 rebate is on 2 of the following brands and models:

– Yamaha CVP-809GP*, Yamaha CLP-795GP*, Roland GP609*, Roland GP9*, or Kawai DG30*. You must call or email us if you want to know which piano has this huge $1500 instant rebate.

You will not find this grand piano offer on-line or in local stores. We can help you get it direct with the distributor warehouse as long as this model is still available. If you are interested in finding out more info then please let us know ASAP.

Lower price than Amazon or Internet