🧠Cerebite

Online Guitar

A virtual guitar in standard tuning (E A D G B E) with two ways to play. In Chords, pick a chord, see its diagram and strum by swiping down or up across the strings. In Melody, press strings and frets on the fretboard one note at a time. Follow along lights up the next chord or note and waits for you.

Keyboard: Q–P, A S D choose a chord · Space or ↓ strum down · ↑ strum up

How to play

In Chords, tap a chord button and its diagram appears beside it. Strum by sliding a finger down across the six strings (thick string to thin) or up for an upstroke; you can also use the strum buttons. Strings marked ✕ are not part of the chord and stay silent. Choose Follow along and a song: the chord you need glows, and each strum with the right chord moves you on. In Melody, the next note lights up on the fretboard with its string and fret shown in the strip above; any position that gives the same pitch counts. On a phone the fretboard turns upright like a chord chart.

String names and standard tuning

A six-string guitar in standard tuning is tuned, from the thickest string to the thinnest, to E, A, D, G, B and E. Guitarists number the strings the other way round: the thin high E is string 1 and the thick low E is string 6. That is why the strip above the fretboard shows notes with a circled number and a fret, such as ②1 for the B string pressed at the first fret, which sounds C.

Each fret raises a string by one semitone, so twelve frets take it up a full octave; that is where the double dot sits on this fretboard, as on most real guitars. The neighbouring strings are a fourth apart except G to B, which is a third. That single irregular gap is what makes chord shapes move slightly when they cross the B string.

How to read a guitar chord chart

A chord diagram is a picture of the neck standing upright. The six vertical lines are the strings, low E on the left and high E on the right; the thick bar at the top is the nut, and each horizontal line below it is a fret. A filled dot means press that string just behind that fret. An open circle above a string means play it without pressing, and a cross means leave it out of the strum.

On a phone this page turns the fretboard the same way, so the chart and the board match exactly. Chord shapes are written low string to high string, and you will also see them as six characters, for example x32010 for C: string 6 muted, string 5 at the third fret, and so on.

Which chords to learn first

The usual beginner path starts with chords that need only two or three fingers and share shapes. This order works well with the songs on this page:

Strumming patterns

Start with one downstroke on every beat, which is exactly what Listen mode plays, and change chord on the first beat of the bar. Once that is steady, add upstrokes between the beats: down, down-up, up-down-up is a pattern that fits most songs in four. Keep the hand moving down and up all the time and simply miss the strings when a stroke is silent; that steady motion is what keeps the rhythm even.

Downstrokes hit the low strings first and sound fuller; upstrokes start from the thin strings and sound lighter, which is why this page plays them slightly softer. In 3/4 songs such as Happy Birthday, count three downstrokes per bar and accent the first.

How this differs from a real guitar

The sound is synthesised with the Karplus–Strong method, a short burst of noise fed around a tuned delay loop so that it rings and fades like a plucked string. It is convincing for practice but has no body resonance, string noise or bends. More importantly, a screen cannot teach the physical part: pressing strings cleanly, building fingertip calluses and moving fingers between shapes without looking.

What it does teach well is the map: which chord goes with which song, what each shape looks like, where notes sit on the neck and how changes fall on the beat. Learn a progression here, then play it slowly on a real guitar with the diagram open beside you.

More to try

🎹

Perfect Pitch Test

🎹

Online Piano

🎧

Relative Pitch Test

🔊

Tone Generator

🚩

Flag Quiz

🔀

15 Puzzle (sliding)

Frequently asked questions

Is this online guitar free, and do I need to install anything?
It is free and runs entirely in the browser with no download or sign-up. The sound is generated on your device with the Web Audio engine built into modern browsers, so it also works on phones and tablets. If you hear nothing, check that the phone is not on silent and press a chord or string once; browsers only allow sound after you interact with the page.
How many chords do I need to play songs?
Fewer than most people expect. Mary Had a Little Lamb uses two chords, Twinkle, Twinkle and Happy Birthday use three, and a huge number of folk and pop songs use the same three or four chords in one key. The thirteen chords on this page — C, G, D, A, E, Am, Em, Dm, F and the sevenths G7, D7, E7 and A7 — cover the common keys of C, G, D, A and A minor.
Why is the F chord shown with only four strings?
The full F chord is a barre chord: the first finger presses all six strings at the first fret, which is hard on a beginner's hand. The easy version (xx3211) plays only the top four strings and still contains every note of the chord, F, A and C. Use it first, and move to the barre shape (133211) once C, G and Am change smoothly.
How does Follow along work?
In Chords, the chord you need next glows yellow on its button and in the strip above. Choose it and strum once, by swiping across at least three strings or pressing a strum button, to move to the next change; strumming with the wrong chord counts as a mistake. In Melody, the next string and fret glow on the fretboard, and any position that produces the same note is accepted. Nothing moves on until you play, so you can take as long as you need, and you get a short summary with stars at the end.
Can I play it on a phone held upright?
Yes. In Chords the strings run across the screen with the thick string at the top, as when you look down at a guitar on your lap, so a downward swipe is a downstroke. In Melody the fretboard stands upright with the open strings at the top, exactly like a chord chart, and all twelve frets fit without scrolling sideways. On a wider screen the fretboard lies horizontally with string 1 at the top, as in guitar tablature.
Are the songs free to use?
Yes. Every song here is a traditional tune or a melody whose copyright has long expired: nursery tunes, Beethoven's Ode to Joy, Jingle Bells from 1857, Happy Birthday to You, whose melody is in the public domain, and the traditional American folk song House of the Rising Sun. Only the melodies and the standard accompaniment chords are used, with no lyrics and no recorded arrangements.