The Fender Elite Stratocaster was made in the USA from 1983 to 1984. It was the basic model in the innovative Elite series and had various new features compared to the standard Stratocaster at the time including:

• Biflex truss rod adjustment (installed from the rear - with skunk stripe on neck) with a neck angle adjuster located in the neck plate
• Slightly wider nut width and flatter 12 inch fretboard radius
• Ezy-Glyder point contact string retainers and high ratio, low backlash machine heads with specially lubricated tuning gears
• Security lock strap buttons
• Heavy duty cast bridge assembly with 'drop-in' string loading, Freeflyte tremolo system with tension adjustable from the top and snap-in Torq-Master tremolo arm. There was no backplate or recess in the back of the body for tremolo springs.
• Alnico II single coil pickups without protruding poles, noise-cancelling pickup system with a dummy coil between the lead and the middle pickups and active electronics with a special preamp circuit including MDX (mid-range) and TBX (high-range) controls. There was a small backplate near the edge covering the 9-volt battery for the active circuitry.
• three separate pickup push-on-off selector switches, an edge-mounted jack output and control knobs with a serrated rubber insert