Even if you are the best guitarist in the world, your guitar playing will still sound bad if your guitar isn't in tune. So, below you'll find a free guitar tuner which I've created to help you tune your guitar with ease.

Just move your mouse over each string to hear the correct pitch...

*Tip - You can Bookmark this page so you can return
to it each time you need to tune your guitar

Instructions on how to use the free online guitar tuner
The free online guitar tuner is pretty self explanatory. Move your mouse over a string and turn the machine heads on your guitar that correspond to that string until the pitch of your guitar matches the pitch of the guitar tuner.

It makes good practice to begin with the 6th string (i.e the thickest string) as this is usually the easiest string to tune. There's every chance that it may actually be in tune already as the 6th string doesn't tend to go out of tune as much as the others (and when it does it's usually not too far out of pitch). However, make sure you check EVERY string on your guitar using the free online guitar tuner because just because your 6th string is in tune, that doesn't mean that all the others will be in tune too!

Basic Guitar Tuning Info
Tuning a guitar is not difficult, but you must have some point of reference, and by that I mean a sound that will help you pitch each string.

In the free guitar tuner above you'll see the strings are displayed just as they are on your guitar. They are (from top to bottom on the picture):

E (known as the 6th string - the thickest string) A (known as the 5th string) D (known as the 4th string) G (known as the 3rd string) B (known as the 2nd string) E (known as the 1st string - the thinnest string)

These strings and the notes they are pitched to are known as the Standard Guitar Tuning Method and as the name suggests, is the tuning that 99% of gutarists in the world tune their guitar to. There are some other guitar tuning methods for very specialized types of guitars and guitar music, but as you are very unlikely to ever come across these alternative tuning methods, let's stick to the standard method of tuning for the purposes of this online guitar tuning tutorial.

It's important that you tune your guitar EVERY time you pick it up to play it, even if you only tuned it a few days before or a few hours before. The strings of a guitar are very sensitive even though guitars themselves are pretty robust instruments - slight changes in air temperature by moving it from one room to another is enough to knock the tuning out. Even if you leave your guitar in the same room for a few hours, it can still go out of tune as the temperature in the room changes, even when you don't feel any temparature change yourself. Bookmark this page though and you'll never need to worry.

If you're new to playing guitar it may take a bit of practice until you get the tuning exactly right but even newbie guitar players should be able to tune their guitar in a couple of minutes. Once you've got the hang of it though you will be able to tune your guitar using the free online guitar tuner in half a minute or less. Remeber that your ears are your greatest friend when it comes to tuning your guitar so listen carefully as you tune each string and don't move on to the next string until you're completely happy that the previous string is exactly in tune.

You will come across occasions when one of the previous strings you tuned goes out of pitch by the time you get to the last string! It's not uncommon for guitars to suffer from this problem and, to be fair, it's usually not the guitars problem - it's usually down to nothing more than just the air or atmosphere in the room changing and/or your hands moving the guitar around as you manipulate it to tune the other strings. Generally less expensive guitars suffer more from this problem but don't think for one minute it's only cheap guitars that can go out of tune. I have a VERY expensive Hofner guitar and it likes to drift out of tune quite easily. It's just a fact of the guitar players life unfortunately!

Advanced Guitar Players
Some guitarists like to tune their guitar using a reference pitch from another instrument (like a piano). There are other guitarists who, while playing live onstage, will tune their instrument by asking another guitarist onstage to "give him an E" (musician-speak for "play me your sixth string so I can hear its pitch").

While both these methods of tuning your guitar are fine for professionals who are well-skilled in tuning their instrument (often from years of experience), it's not a good way for a new guitar player to tune up.

A piano WILL give you a correct note, but the timbre and tone of a piano player pressing a bottom E note is different enough from the timbre and tone of a guitar string to make it difficult to pitch properly.

Similarly, asking another guitarist to "give you an E" presents its own problems...for example, how do you know the guitar you're "getting the E" from is completely in tune?

*Sidenote - I remember supplying backing tracks to a live band many years ago. The band consisted of 3 guitars (bass, rhythm and lead) and a drummer. The guitarists hadn't tuned their instruments using an exact pitch reference for weeks - instead, they had "tuned up off each other" each night. So, all their guitars were in tune with each other...but none were actually in the correct key! Guitarists, as a general rule of thumb, tend to tune "up" rather than tune "down" when they're guessing pitch. This meant that during the previous 5 or 6 gigs the guys hadn't used any reference for their tuning (except each other), so their guitars were out of tune by almost 2 semi-tones. Of course they had no idea their guitars were not pitched correctly because EVERY guitar in the band was out by the same two semitones so it all sounded in tune...that was until the backing track kicked in playing keyboard, brass and string parts which had been played in the exact correct pitch...

Another thing you may often see professional guitarists do is tune up from one single string. This can be quick and effective, although it does take some practice and a fair bit of experience.

The way to tune up from one string is as follows:

- Use the free online guitar tuner to tune your sixth string (E, the thickest string).

- Place your finger on the first fret of the sixth string and count up the fret board until you reach the note of A (it's 5 frets up). Now you have an A that is in perfect tune (you know it's in perfect tune because you are actually playing that A on the sixth string which you previously tuned correctly).

- Now pluck the sixth string while tuning the open fifth string until it sounds the same pitch as the sixth string that you're holding on the 5th fret.

Congratulations...you've now tuned your fifth string from your sixth string.

Do the same with the other strings (i.e tune the 4th from the 5th, the 3rd from the 4th, the 2nd from the 3rd, the 1st from the 2nd).

You should now have your guitar in perfect tune.

One word of warning though. All it takes is one string slightly out of pitch and ALL the subsequent strings will be out of pitch too. That's one of the pitfalls of tuning off other strings, so just bear this in mind. I personally don't recommend tuning your guitar in this way for this very reason.

But if you want to do it this way, then here are the string/fret combinations you'll need:

6th string: tune it using the free online guitar tuner as a reference pitch - 6th string: 5th fret gives you an A - 5th string: 5th fret gives you a D - 4th string: 5th fret gives you a G - 3rd string: 4th fret gives you a B - 2nd string: 5th fret gives you an E

*Tip - When you've completed tuning this way, check
you've done it correctly by playing your 6th string
and 1st string alternately. They should both be
the same note (E)

Conclusion
Tuning your guitar is easy with the free online guitar tuner. Don't think for one minute that it's only beginners who use this tool. No matter whether you are a beginner or a seasoned professional guitar player, your instrument absolutely MUST be in tune or you won't sound good.

Thankfully our free online guitar tuner is just the tool you need to ensure your guitar is in perfect pitch ALL the time.

Bookmark this page, add it to your favourites, or even just remember the URL (website address). The free online guitar tuner is something you'll use over and over again...

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