7-String Guitar tuner – Standard B
B-E-A-D-G-B-E · Standard
Press “Start tuner” – the browser will ask for microphone access. Sound is analysed on this device and never uploaded.
This free online tuner listens through your microphone and shows how close each string of your 7-String Guitar is to Standard B tuning (B-E-A-D-G-B-E). Play a string, watch the needle, and turn the peg until the meter glows green. If you prefer tuning by ear, tap any string card to hear its reference tone.
About Standard B tuning
Standard B is the reference tuning for the 7-String Guitar – the pitch the instrument normally ships at, and the starting point every other tuning on this page is measured from.
Played open, the strings sound B-E-A-D-G-B-E – from B1 at the bottom to E4 at the top, a span of 2 octaves and 5 semitones. Step by step across the neck the intervals are a fourth, a fourth, a fourth, a fourth, a major third, a fourth, and that is what decides how chord shapes fall under the hand.
Standard B is the seven-string tuning: ordinary guitar tuning with an extra low B underneath. Everything you already play stays exactly where it was, and the seventh string extends the range down a fourth rather than changing the instrument.
That is the whole appeal. Steve Vai's work with Ibanez put the seven-string in rock, and a generation of metal players kept it there because it offers Drop-A weight without the slack, badly intonated strings that a six-string needs to reach the same notes.
History
7-String Guitar
The seven-string guitar has two separate histories. The first is Russian: at the turn of the 19th century the harpist and composer Andrei Sychra (1773–1850) championed a seven-string guitar tuned to an open G major chord, published a method and a large body of music for it, and made it the domestic instrument of Russia for more than a century – the guitar of the Gypsy romance and, later, of Bulat Okudzhava and Vladimir Vysotsky. In Brazil, a seven-string with a low C or B became the bass voice of choro, a role defined by Dino 7 Cordas from the 1950s.
The second history is American and electric. The jazz guitarist George Van Eps worked with Epiphone around 1940 on a seven-string with an extra low A, and players such as Bucky Pizzarelli and Lenny Breau followed. In 1990 Ibanez and Steve Vai released the Universe, the first mass-produced solid-body seven-string with a low B; a few years later Korn made it the sound of nu metal, and Meshuggah pushed it into the territory that became djent.
Where the Standard B tuning comes from
B-E-A-D-G-B-E simply adds a low B under standard tuning. George Van Eps's jazz seven-string of around 1940 used a low A; the low B became standard with the Ibanez Universe, designed with Steve Vai in 1990. Korn made it the sound of nu metal in the mid-1990s, and it has been the default for seven-string guitars ever since.
Other 7-String Guitar tunings
Chords for this tuning
How do I tune my 7-String Guitar to Standard B?
Allow microphone access, pluck a string, and the tuner will detect it automatically. The needle shows whether the string is flat or sharp – adjust until the reading is within ±5 cents (B-E-A-D-G-B-E).
Which notes are used in Standard B tuning?
Standard B tuning for 7-String Guitar uses the notes B-E-A-D-G-B-E, listed from the lowest string to the highest.
Can I tune without a microphone?
Yes. Every string card plays a reference tone – tap it and match your string to the sound by ear.