Before you begin
Connect your guitar or microphone
- Connect your guitar to an audio interface and turn on its instrument input, or prepare your microphone.
- Allow microphone access when Stringlight asks.
- Select the correct audio device. Focusrite inputs are preferred automatically when detected.
- Play clean single notes and raise the interface gain until light strokes register without clipping.
On the Tuner page, expand Audio setup assistant and press Check my input. Stay quiet and mute the strings for three seconds, then pluck a string. The assistant shows the active input, channel meters, detected note, and Low, Medium, or High background input level. These are digital signal estimates, not calibrated room-noise measurements.
Use Restart check to measure again and Stop listening to stop the input. Open the tips for gain and microphone advice. Closing the assistant does not stop an already-listening tuner. No audio is recorded or uploaded by this check.
If permission was denied, allow microphone access in the browser's site settings and try again. Use the HTTPS website or installed app; close software that may hold the interface exclusively. In practice tools, the input indicator shows the listening device and can toggle listening where offered. For single-note exercises, mute unused strings; for chord exercises, strum the requested chord.
Tune accurately
Choose an input and press Start listening. Pluck one string, then follow the meter: tune up when flat, tune down when sharp, and stop when the centre shows In tune. Select a string bubble to lock detection to that string. Double-click the 440 Hz reference to type a different concert pitch.
Build steady timing
Set BPM with the slider, minus and plus controls, tap tempo, or by double-clicking the tempo number. Choose a time signature, subdivision, first-beat accent, volume, and click sound—including drum and cymbal options—then press Start. The beat lights show your place in the bar.
Know every note
Click any fret bubble to hear its note. Change note length and volume for study. Game hides the answers and asks you to find random notes; select string labels to control which strings appear in questions. Learn unlocks notes level by level with timed twenty-question lessons and audio-input recognition.
Game: all strings start enabled. Tap a string label to include or exclude it. Tap Open to switch to open-string questions; tap it again to enable all strings. Find the requested note on the named string by tapping a fret or playing your guitar. Correct answers earn points and confetti; wrong answers are red and reduce the score. Replay the target with the replay icon. Ending and restarting resets the game score; your personal best is saved.
Learn: edit the level indicator to choose a lesson. Begin with open strings, then unlock natural and accidental notes string by string. Each question allows 30 seconds; a timeout reveals and plays the answer for four seconds before another question. Complete 20 correct answers to advance. The note-length choice from normal mode is retained. On mobile, the fretboard is vertical, with string 6 on the left.
Shape real harmony
Common mode provides familiar open and barre chords. Select a chord to see the correct frets, open strings, muted strings, and broad dim barre indicators, and to hear it. Advanced major and minor chords use practical movable E-shape or A-shape barres; other chord types use compact generated voicings. In Common mode, start the listening game to hear and identify a requested chord using your guitar.
In Advanced, choose one of the 12 root buttons and a chord type from the dropdown. An × means do not play that string; a barre spans strings fretted together. The root buttons also play the selected chord.
Game: listen to the requested common chord and strum it within 20 seconds. Use replay to hear it again or Skip to move on. When time runs out, the shape appears dimmed; strum it correctly to continue without earning a point. Correct answers and score milestones trigger celebrations.
Turn patterns into music
Filter scales by music style, Common, Rare, or Exotic category; choose a root, scale, practical vertical or diagonal position, and playback direction. Play patterns up, down, or both ways. Learn mode listens automatically and tracks flawless repetitions toward 100. Game mode awards points note by note while asking increasingly challenging common scales.
Explore: Full shows every matching note and disables Play scale. Choose Vertical or Diagonal to follow a playable pattern on the fretboard. Press Play scale to begin, press again to pause, and double-click to stop and reset. The next press resumes a paused sequence.
Learn: follow the selected order on your guitar. Notes start dim, correct notes become bright, and wrong notes appear red. A complete correct run earns confetti. Repetition counts are stored separately for each root and scale type, with a full-screen celebration at 100.
Game: choose a music style, common scale, Vertical or Horizontal pattern, and playback order. Each question has 30 seconds. Correct notes earn individual points with no negative marks; after timeout, the dimmed answer lets you finish without further points for that question. Titles and milestone celebrations mark progress toward 1,000 points.
Understand keys
Tap anywhere in a circle segment to select its key: major keys occupy the outer ring and relative minors the inner ring. The selected segment and related chord family are highlighted, with Roman numerals showing chord degrees. Choose from Lydian, Major / Ionian, Mixolydian, Dorian, Natural Minor / Aeolian, Phrygian, and Locrian to explore the selected tonic in that mode.
Press the centre to begin progression practice, then strum each requested chord in order. Patterns include I–IV–V–I, I–V–vi–IV, and ii–V–I, with suitable combinations for other modes. Replay the progression or request another; selecting a different segment during practice creates a pattern for that tonic. Press the centre again to end. Keyboard users can Tab to a segment and press Enter or Space.
Shape your electric guitar sound
Select a classic-style preset, then shape it with the six-band equalizer and 18 stompboxes. Filter by dynamics/drive, filter/EQ, modulation or ambience/time; filtering does not disable active pedals. Drag knobs or use arrow keys, and press each footswitch to engage or bypass it. Choose Clean, Crunch, High gain, Bass or Direct input amp voicing and an optional generated cabinet response. These are original algorithms, not exact branded models.
Connect wired headphones, disable interface direct monitoring, choose your input and channel, confirm your isolated listening setup and press Start monitoring. Start with low output volume. Mute silences live audio and loop playback; Bypass effects compares the dry live signal. Monitoring stops when you leave the page or background the app. Your tone settings save locally, but monitoring never starts automatically. Browser latency varies.
Click an active starting-point preset again to bypass it, then again to restore it. Amp voicing changes update the amp knobs. Reset to clean returns the sound controls to their clean starting point. The compact Plug in & play panel includes channel selection, output volume, input level, and expandable audio tips.
Layer an idea
- Use wired headphones and start monitoring in Pedals.
- Press Record on an empty loop; recording waits for your first guitar sound. Finish the phrase within 4 minutes.
- Use the Record from slider under a waveform to choose where the next take starts. Recording joins at the next pass of that position and ends at the loop end, unless stopped earlier. A start point after zero preserves earlier audio; zero replaces the track.
- Adjust each track's Level, Mute, and Loop controls. Open Edit for copy, paste, trim, and delete. Undo restores the last recording or edit.
- Choose Export mix WAV to save one cycle with track levels and mutes applied.
Recordings stay in tab memory: export before refreshing, updating, or closing. Leaving the page cancels an unfinished take but keeps finished tracks in the current tab. This is a phrase looper, not a multi-clip timeline editor.
Keep and share your tone
- Enter a Setup name near the top of Pedals.
- Choose Export settings and keep the JSON file, or send it to a friend.
- Choose Import settings on another visit or device and select that file.
- Check the local audio device, input channel, headphones, and output level before starting monitoring.
The file includes EQ bands, amp and cabinet, all effect knobs and switches, output level, channel choice, bypass/mute state, and the three-track mixer settings. Device-specific microphone IDs and recorded audio are not included. Export loop audio separately. Import validates the file, stops monitoring, and keeps existing finished loop recordings; it never starts the microphone automatically.
Create a reliable groove
Pattern Library provides beginner, pop and rock, folk and country, funk and reggae, ballad and soul, and odd-meter grooves. Click a pattern box, then choose a chord or stroke control to edit it; click the selected box again to deselect it. Song Practice creates an accompaniment of 1–10,000 arrows for singing. Add one arrow at a time or add complete quarter-note, eighth-note, triplet, and sixteenth-note beat groups; mixed subdivisions keep their own timing during playback. Select any song arrow to insert a new arrow before or after it, or delete that position without disturbing the remaining chord and instrument order. Long songs are divided into editable 100-arrow pages that automatically follow playback. Name the song, optionally copy a library groove, assign chords and strokes, and loop playback while you sing. Export arrangements as JSON and import them later. Double-click a box to reset only it; Clear all resets the whole active arrangement.
Use Downstroke, Upstroke, Muted stroke, Accent, or Rest to change the selected arrow. Add an instrument sound alongside a chord, or use it without a chord: choices include kick, snare, tom, cymbal, bass, maracas, bells, tambourine, and xylophone. Enter tempo with the keyboard, adjust volume, and use the rhythm groups to create a steady accompaniment for vocal rehearsal. Within each song page, arrows wrap onto additional rows on small screens.
See your practice journey
Open Practice progress in the footer for your player profile: eight illustrated ranks, an XP bar, suggested exercises, saved records, and a balanced 20-minute routine. XP comes from lesson-answer bests, game personal bests, saved scale runs, and completed progressions. Expand the scoring guide for exact weights and rank thresholds. Selecting a higher lesson alone does not earn XP. Ranks reflect app activity, not a professional skill assessment. Lessons resume through Learn; games start fresh while retaining their best scores.
Choose Export progress summary to keep a JSON record. This is a summary export, not an importable restore file. Progress is local to this browser and device, with no account or cross-device sync. Clearing site data removes it; if storage is unavailable, progress is kept only for the current visit.
Practise wherever you are
Install, use offline, and update
- Open Stringlight online and select Install app in the footer. Check for Offline ready in its details.
- Follow the installation prompt where supported. On iPhone or iPad, use Safari's Share menu and Add to Home Screen. Other browsers may offer Install app or Add to Home Screen in their menu.
- If installation is unavailable, use the same browser offline once its download is ready. Microphone permission and compatible audio hardware are still needed for listening.
- Available updates also appear in the Install app details. Before choosing Update app, finish practice and export unsaved arrangements and loop recordings. Close other Stringlight tabs, then update and reload.
Installing is optional and does not create a cloud backup. On phones and tablets, controls rearrange for touch and fretboards become vertical with the low E string on the left. Browser support and audio latency vary; wired headphones are especially important for live pedals.
