How To Tune Your Ukulele

A ukulele that is out of tune sounds bad no matter how well you play it. That is worth knowing early, because most people who give up in the first week are not bad at the ukulele. They are playing an instrument that sounds wrong and they do not know why.

Tuning takes about thirty seconds once you know how. Here is every way to do it, starting with the fastest.

Why will it not stay in tune?

If your ukulele is new, this is normal and it is not broken.

Ukulele strings are nylon, and new nylon stretches. It will keep creeping flat for the first week or two while the strings settle. You can hurry it along by gently pulling each string away from the body a few times and then retuning, but mostly it just needs playing and patience.

Acoustic guitars with nylon strings do exactly the same thing.

What notes am I tuning to?

G, C, E and A, from the string closest to your face down to the one closest to the floor.

The usual way to remember it is Good Children Eat Apples. If you would rather, Get Crazy Every Afternoon works just as well. You only need it for a fortnight or so before it sticks.

Using a clip-on tuner

A clip-on tuner clamps to the headstock and reads the vibration of the wood rather than the sound in the room. That is the one real advantage it has over your phone: it still works when there is noise around you.

Clip it on, pluck a string, and turn the peg until the tuner goes green. Work through A, then E, then C, then G. Buy a chromatic tuner, or one that says on the box that it handles ukuleles.

Using a phone app

Phone apps come in two kinds. Most listen through the microphone and tell you whether you are sharp or flat, the same as a clip-on tuner. Some simply play the correct note and leave you to match it by ear.

The second kind is slower, and it is better for you. Training your ear to hear when two notes match is the most useful thing you can build early on, and it is what lets you work songs out for yourself later.

Tuning by ear

If you have nothing but the ukulele, you can tune it to itself. It will not be at concert pitch, so it is no good for playing with other people, but it will sound right on its own.

Use the C string as your reference:

1. Play the C string at the 4th fret. Tune the E string to match it.
2. Play the E string at the 3rd fret. Tune the G string to match it.
3. For the A string, play the E string at the 5th fret, or the G string at the 2nd.

Strum a chord. If it sounds right, it is.

Tuning to a piano

If there is a piano or a keyboard in the house, match each string to its note on the keys. Middle C is your C string, and you can work outwards from there.