Free drum pattern generator

A drum pattern generator you can actually play.

Pick a style or press Surprise me. Click any step to change it, press Play to hear it loop, and read why the pattern works. Every beat here has its own link, so you can send it to a friend or come back to it.

Tempo Swing

Fourth lane Click a step: on, soft, off.

Why this works

How it works

1 Start from a styleEach style is a real pattern from a real kind of music: the four kicks of house, the lazy kick of boom bap, the late snare of half time. Pick one and it fills the grid.
2 Press Surprise meIt picks a style and then changes a few hits, the way a drummer would. The result is written into the page address, so the same link always plays the same beat.
3 Make it yoursClick a step to turn it on, click again for a softer hit, and once more to clear it. Change the tempo and the swing. Nothing here can sound wrong, only different.
4 Keep itDownload the loop as a WAV, or open it in the studio to add a bassline, chords and the rest of a song.

How to read a drum grid

The grid is one bar of music cut into sixteen equal steps. The bar has four beats, so every fourth step is a beat: steps 1, 5, 9 and 13. The kick drum usually marks where the beats are, the snare usually answers on beats two and four, and the hi-hat fills the space between them. That is most of the drum patterns you have ever heard.

Why soft hits matter

A beat where every hit is the same volume sounds like a machine. Drummers play some hits hard and some barely at all, and the quiet ones, called ghost notes, are what make a rhythm feel like it is breathing. Click a lit step a second time to make it soft and listen to what changes.

What Euclidean rhythms are

Take a number of hits and spread them as evenly as you can across a number of steps. Three hits across eight steps gives the tresillo, the rhythm under reggaeton and half of pop music. Five across eight gives the cinquillo from Cuba. A simple piece of arithmetic turns out to describe rhythms from all over the world. Choose Euclidean above and move the sliders to find them.

What swing does

Swing delays every second step a little, so a stiff pattern starts to bounce. A little swing is the difference between a drum machine and a hip-hop record. Try boom bap with the swing at zero, then bring it back up.

Questions people ask

Is this drum pattern generator free?

Yes. It runs in your browser, there is no account to make, and the WAV you download is yours to use in your own music.

Can I use the patterns in my own songs?

Yes. A drum pattern is a rhythm, not a recording, and the ones here are common patterns that belong to everybody. The drum sounds are ours and you are welcome to use the loops you download.

How do I get the pattern into my own music software?

Download the WAV and drag it into any music program as an audio loop at the tempo shown. Or open it in the studio here, which keeps it as editable steps rather than a recording.

What tempo should my beat be?

Roughly: boom bap sits around 85 to 95 BPM, house around 120 to 128, trap is written at 130 to 150 but feels half that speed, and drum and bass runs at 165 to 175. Each style here sets a typical tempo for you.

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.

Make a little noise