Drumhead Types, Coated vs Clear and Single vs Two-Ply
Coated heads sound warmer and softer, clear heads brighter with more attack; a single-ply head rings longer, while two plies add durability and cut overtones.
By Andrian ChengContributing writer.
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The short answer
A drumhead is chosen on two things: its surface (coated or clear) and its thickness (one ply or two). Coated heads sound warmer and softer; clear heads sound brighter, with more attack. A single-ply head is open and resonant; a two-ply head is tougher, with more projection. Remo's lineup shows all four combinations in two model families, so it makes a handy map.
Coated vs clear drum heads
| Remo head | Build | How Remo describes it |
|---|---|---|
| Ambassador Coated | 1 ply, 10 mil, coated | Warm, open tone with bright attack and controlled sustain |
| Ambassador Clear | 1 ply, 10 mil, clear | Open, bright and resonant, with plenty of attack |
| Emperor Coated | 2 plies of 7 mil, coated | Warm and open, with more durability and projection; soft feel, subtle attack |
| Emperor Clear | 2 plies of 7 mil, clear | Attack, projection and more durability |
A mil is a thousandth of an inch, so a 10-mil head is 0.010 inches thick.
The coating is a thin textured layer on top of the film. In Remo's descriptions, coated heads lean warm, while clear heads lean bright, with more attack. Remo calls its Ambassador Coated the most popular drumhead in the world and suggests it for tom, bass drum and snare batter heads.
Single-ply vs two-ply drum heads
A single-ply head is one sheet of film; Remo's 10-mil Ambassador is the classic example, described as open and resonant. A two-ply head stacks two thinner films (two 7-mil plies on the Emperor). Remo describes its two-ply heads with words like durability and projection, and the coated Emperor with a softer feel and subtler attack. Remo says the clear Emperor is most popular with hard rock, funk and R&B drummers, styles that hit hard.
Some heads go further to control ring. Remo's Powerstroke 77 adds a 7-mil inlay ring to reduce overtones, plus a 5-mil dot in the middle for durability.
Batter heads are the side you hit; resonant heads are the bottom side. Remo calls the single-ply Ambassador Clear the industry standard resonant head for toms.
How often to change drum heads
There is no fixed schedule; it depends on how hard and how often you play. Signs that a head is done: dents you can see, a coating worn through where you hit most, a dull sound that tuning will not fix, or a head that will not stay in tune. Batter heads wear out long before resonant heads, which are not struck.
Measure the drum's diameter across the shell before you buy; drumheads are sold by size in inches.
Drumheads on Wiki Shopping
Wiki Shopping lists 127 drumheads in musical instruments. Of those on a size page, 14-inch heads lead with 24. By type, 46 are tom heads and 16 are snare heads; by brand, Evans has 55 and Remo 23.
How we count
Size, type and brand are read from each store listing and grouped into filter pages. We counted those pages in a read-only query of our page data on October 26, 2026. Heads without a stated size are left out of the size chart. The counts change as listings are added or removed.