How to Tune a Guitar With Your Phone: The Free Tuner Guide
Your phone's microphone can hear exactly which note a string plays. Here is how phone tuners work, what standard tuning is, and how to tune in a couple of minutes.
An out-of-tune guitar makes even the right chords sound wrong, and it is the most common reason beginners think they are playing badly. You don't need a clip-on tuner or a trained ear to fix it. Your phone's microphone can detect the exact pitch of each string, and a free tuner app turns that into a simple needle: too low, too high, or just right. This page explains how it works and what you need to know before you start; the second page walks you through tuning step by step.
GuitarTuna: Tune & Play Guitar
Yousician Ltd.
- Rating
- 4.5
- Price
- Free
- Platform
- Android
How a phone tuner hears your guitar
Every string vibrates at a particular speed, measured in hertz (vibrations per second). When you pluck the thickest string of a guitar in standard tuning, it should vibrate at about 82 times per second, which is the note E. A tuner app listens through the microphone, measures that speed, works out the nearest note, and shows how far you are above or below it.
Because the measurement is precise, a phone tuner is usually far more accurate than tuning by ear, especially for beginners. The main things that confuse it are background noise and plucking more than one string at a time.
Standard tuning in one line
Most songs use standard tuning. From the thickest string to the thinnest, the notes are:
| String (thickest to thinnest) | Note | Approx. frequency |
|---|---|---|
| 6th | E | 82 Hz |
| 5th | A | 110 Hz |
| 4th | D | 147 Hz |
| 3rd | G | 196 Hz |
| 2nd | B | 247 Hz |
| 1st | E | 330 Hz |
A popular way to remember it is "Eddie Ate Dynamite, Good Bye Eddie". Once your guitar matches these six notes, chord charts and online lessons will sound the way they should.
Auto mode or manual mode?
Most tuner apps offer an automatic mode that detects which string you are playing and a manual mode where you pick the string first. Auto mode is fastest when the guitar is only slightly out of tune. Manual mode is better when a string is badly off, because the app might otherwise think you are aiming for a different note.
Before you start
- Find a quiet spot. Fans, TVs and conversations can make the needle jump.
- Hold the phone near the guitar's sound hole (for an acoustic) or close to the amp (for an electric).
- Pluck one string at a time and let it ring. Mute the other strings with your palm if needed.
- New strings stretch for a few days, so expect to retune more often at first.