Casio CT-S100 61 Keys Portable Keyboard with USB, 122 Tones, 60 Songs, Built-in Speakers, Soft Case, 16-hour Battery Life, Lightweight Design

How it compares

These are the two Casios worth weighing against the CT-S100. Prices are ours, as at 9 August 2026.

Buy the CT-S1 instead if the player has any intention of expressing themselves. The extra $170 buys touch-sensitive keys with three sensitivity levels, double the polyphony, Casio's AiX sound engine, a 40,000-note MIDI recorder, a 6.3 mm pedal jack and an optional Bluetooth adaptor. What you give up is the thing the CT-S100 is unusually good at: the CT-S1 has no auto-accompaniment rhythms at all, and its battery life is roughly three hours against sixteen. It is a better musical instrument and a worse party trick — but it is still 61 unweighted keys, so it is not a piano-lesson instrument either.

Buy the CDP-S110 instead if the words "piano lessons" have been said out loud in your house. It is 88 fully weighted keys with a real hammer action, a damper pedal in the box and 8 W a side of amplification, and it still runs on batteries. It costs $400 more and weighs three times as much. If the lessons are already booked, skip a step and buy this one.

Stay with the CT-S100 if nobody has committed to lessons yet, if it is going into a classroom or a campervan, if it needs to be carried by the person playing it, or if the auto-accompaniment is half the fun. Two hundred dollars of keyboard that gets played beats six hundred dollars of piano that does not. Just don't buy it as a lesson instrument — none of the three things graded tuition assumes are on it.

The detail

Keys and feel

Sixty-one standard-size keys, unweighted, shaped to look like a piano's. There is no hammer mechanism and, per Casio's published specification, no touch response — the volume comes from the volume control, not from your fingers. That is the defining limitation of this instrument and the reason it costs what it costs. For a child working out where middle C is, or an adult picking out chords, it is not a problem. For anyone learning dynamics, phrasing or pedalling, it is a wall.

The keyboard is 930 mm wide, 73 mm tall and 3.3 kg, with a moulded grip along the top edge and rounded corners — a small design decision that matters a lot if a seven-year-old is the one carrying it.

Sound and accompaniment

122 tones with 32-note maximum polyphony. Thirty-two is modest — fine for two-handed playing, but running an auto-accompaniment rhythm underneath while holding a sustained chord will start dropping the oldest notes. Reverb has four settings plus off, and that is the extent of the effects.

The 61 built-in rhythms are the CT-S100's genuine strength and the thing its more expensive sibling deliberately does without. Sixty built-in songs come with a part-off function that mutes the left hand, the right hand or both, so a learner can play one hand against the recording — a proper practice feature, not a gimmick.

The two 13 × 6 cm oval speakers are driven at 2.0 W a side, with an EQ that adjusts with the volume control so it does not go thin when you turn it down. It is loud enough for a bedroom or a small classroom, not a hall.

Portability and power

This is what you are actually paying for. Six AA alkalines give roughly 16 hours of continuous play — three times what the CT-S1 manages — and rechargeable NiMH cells give about 13. Casio supplies the AD-E95100L mains adaptor in the box for Australian stock, so you are not forced onto batteries. Auto power off kicks in after 30 idle minutes and can be disabled.

At 3.3 kg it sits on a kitchen table, a desk or a cheap X-frame stand. No legs, no pedals, nothing to assemble.

Connections

One stereo mini jack does double duty as headphones and line out. That is quietly a plus: ordinary 3.5 mm headphones plug straight in with no adapter, which is not true of Casio's console pianos. Plugging in mutes the speakers, which is the whole point at 8 pm on a school night.

A USB micro-B port handles MIDI to a computer or smart device. The cable is not supplied, and an iPad or recent iPhone needs a USB-C adapter as well. There is no Bluetooth and no way to add it — Casio's WU-BT10 wireless adaptor needs a USB Type-A host port, which this model does not have. There is no audio input either, so you cannot pipe a backing track through its speakers.

What you'll also need

• Six AA batteries if you want it portable out of the box. The mains adaptor is included; the batteries are not. Rechargeable NiMH cells pay for themselves fast on a keyboard that gets played daily.
• Headphones with a standard 3.5 mm plug. No adapter needed. Closed-back for quiet practice. → Headphones
• An X-frame keyboard stand and a bench if it is going to have a permanent home rather than living on a table. → Keyboard stands
• A USB A-to-micro-B cable if you want to connect to a computer or tablet — it is not in the box. → Casio PP16 Plug & Play cable pack
• A padded 61-key gig bag or case if it is going to travel. Nothing of the sort is in the box. → Keyboard bags & cases
• A beginner method book for a first-time player. → Piano & keyboard tuition books

Australian availability and delivery

Price: $197.95, down from $279.95 RRP (correct as at 9 August 2026 — check the live price above). $279.95 is also Casio Australia's own listed price for the CT-S100BK.

Stock: In stock at our Footscray showroom, 284–288 Ballarat Rd, Footscray VIC. Come and play it before you buy — with this model in particular, five minutes on the floor tells you more than any spec sheet, because the absence of touch response is something you notice under your hands long before you find it on a spec table.

Click & Collect: Free from Footscray.

Delivery: Orders are dispatched the next business day. Standard shipping is a $7 flat rate and free on orders over $150 — including the heavy cabinet pianos, where we absorb the freight deliberately rather than adding a bulky-item surcharge at checkout. Estimated delivery is 4–9 business days after dispatch. Express is $15, typically 1–3 business days. Orders over $30 are tracked and insured. Some rural or remote areas may incur additional charges or longer delivery times.

Warranty: Five-year conditional Casio Australia warranty on the instrument; one year on accessories including the power adaptor, pedals, stands and carry bags. Australian stock, official distributor.

Scarlett Music is an independent Australian retailer at 284–288 Ballarat Rd, Footscray VIC, trading since 1997, with a physical showroom and in-house technicians.

Related reading

• Casio digital pianos and keyboards: which one is yours?
• 61 keys or 88? How to choose
• Keyboard stands, benches & accessories
• Casio Casiotone CT-S1
• Casio CDP-S110
• Casio Privia PX-S1100