Chromatic tuner

Every note the chromatic tuner names, in the four octaves where most instruments play. Equal temperament, A4 = 440 Hz; middle C is C4.

Chromatic means all twelve notes of the octave: C, C♯, D, D♯, E, F, F♯, G, G♯, A, A♯ and B. A guitar or violin tuner listens only for the notes of its open strings; a chromatic tuner names whichever of the twelve is nearest to what it hears, in any octave, from the lowest A of a piano (A0, 27.5 Hz) to its top C (C8, about 4,186 Hz).

That makes it the tuner for everything without fixed strings: flute, clarinet, saxophone, trumpet, trombone and the voice, and for string instruments in tunings no preset covers. The price is that you must know the note you want. Tune a guitar string to D when it should be E, and a chromatic tuner will still call it in tune.

In Concert mode the note name includes the octave, so E2 and E4 are never confused. When you tune a string instrument here, check the letter and the octave first, and only then the needle.

Warm up before you tune. The air inside a wind instrument warms as you play, and its pitch rises with it, so a trumpet or flute tuned in the first cold minute will be sharp ten minutes later. Play a long note at a comfortable volume with your normal embouchure, and look at where the needle rests, not where it starts.

Bands usually tune to concert B♭ or concert F, orchestras to A. A single note in tune does not guarantee the whole range, so check a few notes across the instrument. Then move the part your instrument uses for tuning:

• Trumpet, trombone, horn and tuba: the main tuning slide. Pull it out to go lower, push it in to go higher.
• Clarinet: the barrel. Pull it out slightly to lower the pitch.
• Saxophone: the mouthpiece on the neck cork. Push it further on to raise the pitch, pull it back to lower it.
• Flute: the headjoint. Pull it out to lower the pitch, push it in to raise it.

Many wind instruments are transposing: the note on the page is not the note that sounds. When a B♭ trumpet plays a written C, the sound is a concert B♭. The key chips on the tuner do this conversion for you, so you see the note as it appears in your part, and the chip you choose is remembered in this browser.

• Voice: sing a steady vowel such as ah and hold it. The tuner shows the note you are singing and how close you are, which helps with finding a starting note or checking long tones.
• Transposed names show the letter only, without the octave: a tenor sax sounds an octave lower than a soprano sax although both are in B♭, so the octave depends on the instrument.
• Piano: the tuner can tell you whether a note is sharp or flat, but pianos are tuned with stretched octaves and a tuning hammer. That is a job for a piano technician.
• Reference pitch: if your group tunes to 442 Hz, or you play along with a recording that sits between two notes, move A4 in the settings anywhere from 415 to 466 Hz.