Why your taps get averaged
Nobody taps perfectly. One tap a few hundredths of a second late would swing the number by ten BPM if we only looked at your last two taps. Averaging the last eight smooths out your hands and leaves the tempo of the song.
Free tap tempo counter
Tap along. Find the tempo.
Put a song on, tap the pad or the space bar on every beat, and read the tempo. It averages your last eight taps, so it settles down after a bar or two. Stop tapping for a moment and it starts fresh.
The space bar works too. Stop for a moment and it starts fresh.
How it works
- 1 Tap on the beatTap where you would clap or nod. Four taps are enough for a rough answer, and eight or more give a steady one.
- 2 Read the tempoThe big number is beats per minute, rounded. The small one shows a decimal so you can watch it settle.
- 3 Use itSend the tempo to the metronome to practise with it, or to the drum pattern generator to build a beat at the same speed.
Half time and double time
If the number looks twice or half what you expected, you are probably tapping every second beat, or twice per beat. Neither is wrong. A trap beat at 140 BPM feels like 70, and a drummer would happily count it either way.
What to do with a tempo
If you want to play along with a song, or make something that mixes well with it, its tempo is the first thing you need. Two tracks at the same BPM can be layered and their beats will stay lined up.
Questions people ask
How many taps do I need?
You get a reading from the second tap. It becomes trustworthy after about eight, which is two bars of most songs.
Why does the number keep changing?
Because your taps are human. Keep going for a few bars and it will settle to within a beat or so. Most recorded music sits on a whole number, so round to the nearest one.
Can I use the keyboard?
Yes. Tap the space bar, or any letter key, instead of the pad.
Can it work out the tempo from a file instead?
Yes, on a different page. The BPM and key finder measures the tempo and the key of an audio file on your device, without uploading it.
Ready for the rest of the song?
The studio has this and everything around it: instruments, recipe blocks, an arranger, and a co-producer that explains every change it makes. Free to start, private until you share.