Sweat dripped from Ed Sheeran’s face onto his guitar as he stood on a simple circular stage, all alone, in an ever-so-casual black tee and jeans in front of over 80,000 people at Sofi Stadium on Saturday.

The red-headed star made one of the final stops on his “Mathematics” North American Tour in Inglewood after playing a more intimate show featuring his latest album, “Subtract,” at the Shrine Auditorium on Friday.

And it was certainly nothing like the shows of the stadium’s recent notable headliners, Taylor Swift and Beyoncé. It wasn’t different because it didn’t share the packed crowds or stunning visuals of his peers, but because it was just him, his guitar and a simple contraption that is responsible for a truly outstanding live music experience.

Sheeran has been performing with a loop pedal station at all of his live shows since the start of his career 18 years ago. He explained to the crowd that the equipment allows him to record vocal and instrumental lines that he can repeat on a loop, so as he’s creating sounds, he layers the music and performs without any backing tracks.

He demonstrated the loop pedal system after explaining it, with his classic boyish charm and slight awkwardness, noting that everything the audience heard Saturday was live and could never be recreated in the same way.

The setlist spanned his lengthy career and his various mathematical-based album titles, hence the tour’s name, and tracks like “Give Me Love,” “Sing” and “Shape of You” made it clear how Sheeran’s loop pedal performances are unlike any other. To listen to a simple line of three notes start on its own and build to a chorus we all know and love is astounding.

The loop pedal system, which is about the size of a keyboard, is just plain impressive. Fans watched as the singer darted from one mic to another and futzed with the pedals in his neon-colored sneakers (a signature Sheeran look), all while executing flawless vocals and switching gears from guitar lines to instrumental lines.

Beyond his sheer skills and raw performance style, Sheeran is known for his quirks and self-deprecating humor, both of which were on full display at this performance. Even with a crowd of about 81,000 that broke SoFi’s one-day ticket record, Sheeran made the show feel as intimate as the prior day’s at the Shrine.

“When I close my eyes in this song, I imagine being 18 and playing it to no one in London, and then I open my eyes and I see 81,000 people in Inglewood here tonight,” he said before introducing his first career hit, “The A-Team,” a song that he said “no one liked” when he first wrote it. He also cheekily invited the crowd to sing along if they knew the words.

Despite not having the support of a band for the majority of the two-hour set, Sheeran kept the experience interactive, asking attendees to sing backup and even to harmonize.

“My name is Ed Sheeran and I will be your vocal coach tonight,” he quipped before splitting the stadium in half and instructing fans to sing either a low or high line as he sang the melody.

He kept the humor alive in the stories he shared while he caught his breath in between songs and in his introductions, noting at one point before singing mega-hit “Photograph” that if anyone didn’t know the lyrics to this one, they were at the wrong concert.

True to his persona since he skyrocketed to fame over a decade ago, Sheeran struck a balance between charming and odd. He shared vulnerable stories and profusely thanked the audience for being there, but also sat on the floor as he sang at times and awkwardly darted across the rotating circular stage.

After chugging through back-to-back radio sensations like “Galway Girl,” “Thinking Out Loud” and “Love Yourself,” Sheeran changed into an L.A. Rams jersey emblazoned with his upcoming album title and release date and performed one of his final songs of the night. He played the frenetic and surprising “You Need Me, I Don’t Need You,” an early career rap song with killer rhymes and an unexpected air of confidence that he hadn’t yet displayed.

He followed this wild anthem with the sheepish confession that he “wasn’t sure if anyone was going to turn up” to Sofi that night, and that he had so much fun with all 81,000 in attendance.

Even as a four-time Grammy winner with several record-breaking shows at some of the biggest venues in the world, Sheeran still thinks of himself as a singer-songwriter.

“What I love is being on stage and being in the studio,” he said. “I love making music, I love being on stage. I don’t know anything else. It’s the thing that I love most.”