Chromatic Tuner — Tune Any Note, Any Instrument

A chromatic tuner is a tuner that recognizes all 12 notes of the musical scale — C, C#/Db, D, D#/Eb, E, F, F#/Gb, G, G#/Ab, A, A#/Bb and B — across multiple octaves, rather than being limited to a fixed set of strings. It works with any instrument that produces a sustained, single pitch at a time.

An instrument-specific tuner, like a guitar or violin tuner, is built around a fixed set of strings and usually snaps to the nearest one of those. A chromatic tuner has no such limit — it identifies whichever of the 12 notes you actually played, in whichever octave, which makes it useful for alternate tunings, capoed instruments, and instruments with no dedicated tuner at all.

Press Start Tuning and allow microphone access, then play or sing one sustained note at a time. The tuner shows the nearest note, its octave, the frequency in hertz, and how many cents sharp or flat you are. Adjust your tuning peg, key or pitch until the needle centers and the display turns green.

Yes, completely free with no sign-up, no download and no limit on how long you can use it. It runs directly in your browser using the Web Audio API on desktop, tablet and mobile.

Yes. Because it detects any of the 12 chromatic notes in any octave, it works with guitar, bass, violin, viola, cello, ukulele, mandolin, banjo, piano, wind and brass instruments, and the voice — anything capable of a single sustained pitch.

A cent is one hundredth of a semitone, so there are 100 cents between any two adjacent notes. The cents reading shows exactly how far your pitch sits from the nearest note's true frequency. Most listeners cannot hear a difference smaller than about 5 to 10 cents.

Five of the twelve notes are commonly written two ways depending on the musical key — for example C# in a sharp key is the same pitch as Db in a flat key. This tuner shows both spellings together so the readout makes sense whichever notation your sheet music or teacher uses.

440 Hz is the standard concert pitch used by most schools, method books and recordings, and is the default here. You can adjust it from 430 to 450 Hz using the reference pitch slider to match an orchestra, a fixed-pitch instrument like a piano, or a specific recording.

This is usually caused by background noise, more than one note sounding at once, or a very short or breathy tone that gives the pitch detector little to lock onto. Play a single note with a full, sustained tone in a quiet room for the steadiest reading.

Yes, within the range most instruments and voices use. Extremely low notes need a longer sustain for the detector to find a stable pitch, and extremely high or quiet overtone-heavy notes can be harder to isolate — both are physical limits of any pitch detector, not unique to this tool.

No. Your microphone audio is analyzed frame by frame directly in your browser and is never recorded, saved or sent to a server. Closing or reloading the page clears everything immediately.

The In Tune indicator lights up when your pitch is within about 5 cents of the target note's exact frequency — close enough that the difference is effectively inaudible. Between 5 and 15 cents the meter shows you are close but could still be refined.

Yes. Any microphone your browser can access will work, including built-in laptop mics, USB microphones and headset mics. Make sure the correct input device is selected in your browser or operating system sound settings.

It always reports the specific octave of whatever note you play, from low bass notes up through high treble notes, and updates automatically as you move between octaves — there is nothing to switch or configure.