A charango is ten strings in five courses on a body the size of a forearm, with one course tuned an octave above itself. Almost every gear question the instrument raises — what to buy, what to string it with, what to adjust — comes back to one of those three facts, so these pages start there rather than with a shopping list.
They are explainers, not a catalog. No prices, no brands, no reviews: this site has never handled the instrument you are about to buy and will not pretend otherwise. What it can tell you is what to look at, in what order, and what each thing changes about the sound of a full stroke.
Where to start
If you do not own one, start with your first charango — the body material and the nut decide more than anything visible in a photograph. If you own one and it sounds ordinary rather than bright, read strings, because a broken octave string is the usual answer. If it sounds right but fights you, setup is the page.