The smallest of the trumpet family. The most common of these are built to play in both Bb and A, with separate leadpipes for each key. The tubing in the Bb piccolo trumpet is exactly one-half the length of that in a standard Bb trumpet. Piccolo trumpets in G, F and even high C are also manufactured, but are rarer.

Many players use a smaller mouthpiece on the piccolo trumpet. Because of the smaller mouthpiece size, endurance is often limited and the sound production technique is different from that used on the Bb trumpet.

Almost all piccolo trumpets have 4 valves instead of the usual 3: the fourth valve takes the instrument down in pitch, usually by a fourth, to facilitate the playing of lower notes. Maurice Andre, Wynton Marsalis and Hakan Hardenberger are some of the more well-known piccolo trumpet players.