chordslol

Issue №17 · chords·lol

Part of the free Guitar Chord Chart

Major and Minor Guitar Chord Chart

All 12 major and all 12 minor guitar chords on one page — 24 diagrams with finger positions, color-coded by root.

↓ Download the Major and Minor Guitar Chord Chart PDFFree, no email gate · single-ink, vector

License: free to share, free to teach with.

chords·lol

Charts

Major and Minor Guitar Chord Chart

All 12 major and all 12 minor guitar chords on one page — 24 diagrams with finger positions, color-coded by root.

Issue №17 · 17 of 19 in the series

chords.lol/charts/major-minor-guitar-chord-chart

About this issue

Why this chart.

Twenty-four chords. That is the whole sheet: every major triad and every minor triad, one for each of the twelve roots, drawn full size with finger numbers in the dots. It is the smallest chart on the site that can still honestly claim to be complete, because major and minor between them account for the overwhelming majority of chord symbols in popular music.

The reason to keep major and minor together on one page — rather than splitting them the way most chord books do — is that they are the same shape with one note moved. A major triad is root, major third, fifth. Drop that third by a single semitone and the chord turns minor. Printing C next to Cm, D next to Dm, and so on down the twelve roots makes that one-semitone relationship visible instead of theoretical, and it is the fastest way to stop treating minor chords as unrelated new shapes to memorise.

Spelling follows what players actually write on a chart. Sharp roots get sharp names where guitarists say them that way — F♯m, C♯m — and flat roots get flat names — B♭, E♭, A♭ — so the chord you find here is the chord you will read in a songbook. Enharmonic twins (F♯ and G♭ are the same six strings) are listed once under the name you are more likely to meet.

Each cell carries a colour band across the top keyed to the root, so the two chords sharing a root sit in the same band. Scanning for "everything in A" is a colour match rather than a name search, which matters when you are reading at arm's length from a music stand mid-song. Print it at Letter or A4, or take the left-handed variant if the mirrored fretboard is the one your brain reads.

How to use it

Find the root along the colour bands, then pick the major or minor cell in that band. Play the shape as drawn, then play its neighbour and listen to the single note that changed — that is the third, and it is the entire difference between the two moods. As a practice drill, work down the twelve roots playing major then minor on each; by the time you reach B you will have felt where every third lives on the neck.

From the editor: Issue №17 is one of 19 in the chords·lol library series. New issues are added monthly.

License: the PDF and its diagrams are CC-BY 4.0. Reproduce freely. Credit appreciated.

Print quality: sRGB, vector. Suitable for home laser, inkjet, and copy-shop reproduction.

Companion: see all 19 issues in the library.

Try it before you print it

The same chart, on screen, audio-enabled.

Open the full-size major and minor guitar chord chart preview in its own tab — it is the same page the PDF is printed from.

Download the major and minor guitar chord chart

3 files · free, ungated, no watermark

Common questions

  • What is the difference between a major and a minor chord?

    One note. Both chords stack a root, a third and a fifth; the major chord uses a major third (four semitones above the root) and the minor chord flattens it to a minor third (three semitones). C major is C-E-G, C minor is C-E♭-G. That single semitone is what people hear as bright versus sad.

  • Why are there 24 chords on this chart?

    Twelve roots — every note in the chromatic scale — times two qualities, major and minor. There is no thirteenth root: after B you are back at C an octave up. Twenty-four is the complete set of major and minor triads that exist.

  • Which should I learn first?

    The open-position ones: C, A, G, E and D major, then Am, Em and Dm. Those eight cover an enormous amount of music and need no barre. Once the changes between them are automatic, take on the sharp and flat roots, which mostly want a barre shape.

  • Are these open or barre shapes?

    Whichever voicing is the standard first choice for that chord. Roots that have a good open shape — C, D, E, G, A and their minors — are drawn open. Roots that do not, such as B♭, F♯ and E♭, are drawn as the usual movable barre form with the fret number beside the diagram. The dedicated open and barre charts split them apart if you want only one or the other.

Related chord charts

Closest first — same instrument, then the rest of the 19-issue library.