A perfectly played song on an out-of-tune guitar sounds worse than a clumsy song on a tuned one. The ear forgives bad timing and missed notes — it never forgives pitch.
In ~6 minutes you'll be able to:
- Tune all six strings with a clip-on tuner
- Tune by ear with the 5th-fret method — no tuner required
- Pick the right alternate tuning when a song calls for one
You'll need: nothing. Just a guitar.
Every chord chart assumes EADGBE
From the lowest, thickest string to the highest, thinnest:
- 6th string: E (lowest)
- 5th string: A
- 4th string: D
- 3rd string: G
- 2nd string: B
- 1st string: E (highest)
The mnemonic: Eddie Ate Dynamite Good Bye Eddie.
Every chord chart, every YouTube lesson, every tab on the internet assumes EADGBE unless it says otherwise.
The ten-dollar clip-on is foolproof
A clip-on tuner reads vibration straight through the headstock, so it works in a noisy room, on a stage, next to a drummer.
- Clip it to the headstock and turn it on.
- Pluck a string firmly. The tuner shows the note it hears.
- Reads flat (below the target)? Tighten the peg slowly while plucking.
- Reads sharp (above)? Loosen it.
- Stop when the needle centers or the display goes green.
Try this: two passes, always
Tune all six strings, then tune all six again. Tightening one string pulls the neck slightly and detunes the neighbors you already fixed. The second pass is the difference between close and right.
Phone apps listen through the microphone, so they need a quiet room. A clip-on costs less than a coffee and never struggles.
Buy the clip-on.
No tuner? The guitar can tune itself
You won't always have a tuner. You will always have your ears.
The 5th-fret method matches each string to its neighbor, so the guitar lands in tune with itself — even if the whole instrument sits a hair off concert pitch. You need one trustworthy reference note to start: a piano, a tuning fork, a YouTube tone.
- Fret the low E string at the 5th fret. That note is A. Tune the open A string to match it.
- Fret the A string at the 5th fret. That's D. Tune the open D string to match.
- Fret the D string at the 5th fret. That's G. Tune the open G string to match.
- Fret the G string at the 4th fret — not the 5th. That's B. Tune the open B string to match.
- Fret the B string at the 5th fret. That's E. Tune the open high E to match.
Why does the G string break the pattern? Five of the six string pairs are tuned a perfect 4th apart — a gap of five half-steps, the opening leap of Here Comes the Bride.
The G–B pair is a major 3rd — four half-steps.
Smaller gap, one fret lower. Play both and the exception stops being memorization: your ear hears the tighter gap before your brain finishes counting.
Why the one exception exists
Tuning in straight 4ths would land the high E a half-step sharp, wrecking octave shapes and chord fingerings. The compromise — five 4ths, one major 3rd — is why chords fall under your fingers at all.
Guitars drift even when nobody touches them
A guitar in tune at 9am can be flat by 9:15.
The string didn't move. The world around it did.
| Cause | What happens | The fix |
|---|---|---|
| Humidity | The neck swells or shrinks, changing string tension | Retune whenever the guitar changes rooms |
| Temperature | Warming strings expand and go flat — stage lights, your hands | Let it acclimate, then tune |
| New strings | Fresh strings stretch for a day or two | Tune, play five minutes, retune, repeat |
| Worn parts | Old strings, a binding nut, or a slipping peg won't hold pitch | New strings first; then a $40 setup |
If your tuning feels unstable, it usually is. Replace the strings before you blame your hands.
Alternate tunings are deliberate, not decorative
Most guitarists never leave standard. The ones who do leave for a specific sound.
| Tuning | Strings | Use it for |
|---|---|---|
| Drop D | D-A-D-G-B-E | Heavy rock, grunge, easy power chords |
| Drop C | C-G-C-F-A-D | Modern metal, heavier riffs |
| Drop B | B-F#-B-E-G#-C# | Djent, deathcore, low-end carnage |
| Open G | D-G-D-G-B-D | Slide guitar, country blues, Stones rock |
| Open D | D-A-D-F#-A-D | Slide guitar in D-flavored keys |
| DADGAD | D-A-D-G-A-D | Celtic fingerstyle, modal folk, drones |
Drop D lowers only the low E to D — turn the peg until its 7th fret matches the open A. Power chords on the bottom three strings collapse into one barred finger, and D chords gain a deep open bass. Killing in the Name and Everlong live here. Five seconds of retuning, instant weight.
The rest, one line each:
- Drop C / Drop B — drop D pushed lower for metal mass (System of a Down in C, djent in B); buy heavier strings or it all feels like rubber bands.
- Open G — the open strings form a G chord, so a slide can barre a chord at any fret: Brown Sugar, Robert Johnson, Keith Richards' entire vocabulary.
- Open D — the same trick centered on D; Joni Mitchell built a chunk of her catalog here.
- DADGAD — no 3rd anywhere, so it's neither major nor minor: the floating, droning home of Celtic fingerstyle and Black Mountain Side.
My guitar won't stay in tune. What do I check first?
Replace the strings — old strings lose elasticity and won't hold pitch no matter what you do. Still drifting? Tune up past the target and back down so a binding nut releases the string, and tighten the small screw on the back of any slipping peg. If none of that works, a $40 setup from a guitar tech will.
How often should I retune?
At the start of every session, with a quick re-check fifteen minutes in — strings settle slightly flat as they warm up. Recording or performing? Tune before every take or set. And never trust yesterday's tuning: overnight humidity alone will have moved it.
Why does my tuner jump between two notes?
You're plucking too softly, or the tuner is picking up neighboring strings ringing in sympathy. Pluck one string firmly and rest your palm across the others.
The open strings are in tune, but chords sound sour. Why?
That's intonation — the string drifts sharp as you fret up the neck; a tech fixes it at the saddle. A milder quirk is built into every guitar: the G–B major 3rd makes some open shapes waver, so some players tune the B a few cents flat. Ignore that until standard tuning feels automatic.
Do new strings really go out of tune faster?
Yes. Fresh strings stretch through their first day and go flat after every song. Tune, play ten minutes, retune, repeat — by day two they hold. It's physics, not a defect.
- How to Read a Chord Chart — what the dots mean, now that they'll sound right
- Beginner Guitar Tutorial — the first month, mapped
- Strumming Patterns — what a tuned guitar is for
Tuning takes sixty seconds, costs nothing, and the first chord after it rings fuller than anything you played yesterday. EADGBE, two passes, every session.
This is the default. Live here.