How to use the tap tempo tool
- Play the song you want to measure, from any app, speaker or instrument.
- Tap the BPM on every beat, with any key or the big pad. The kick and snare drums are easiest to follow.
- Keep going until it says Steady. A first reading appears after your second tap, but it usually takes 16 to 32 taps for a steady one.
- Stop tapping. The result freezes 3 seconds after your last tap and goes into the results list for this tab.
- Press ÷2 or ×2 if you tapped half or double the tempo you wanted.
- Check it by ear: open Metronome check and press Play click to hear the tempo over the song.
Press Esc or Reset to start again.
How this BPM counter works
Tempo is counted in beats per minute: BPM = 60,000 ÷ the gap between beats in milliseconds. Taps 500 ms apart are 120 BPM, and taps 600 ms apart are 100 BPM.
This tempo tapper measures every gap and shows two numbers. Average uses all your clean taps since you started, so it gets more accurate the longer you tap. Recent uses only the last 8 gaps (4 or 12 in Settings), so it follows a song that speeds up or slows down.
Nobody taps perfectly. A missed beat leaves a gap about twice as long, and an extra tap leaves one about half as long. The tool sets those taps aside and shows how many it ignored. The ± range shows how much your average could still move: it shrinks as you keep tapping, and the label turns to Steady at ±0.5 BPM.
A constant delay doesn’t matter for a tempo tap. If every tap is 30 ms late, the gaps between them stay the same, so a slow screen or a Bluetooth keyboard won’t change the result. That’s why tap for tempo works on any phone or computer.
Reading your BPM
| What you see | What it means | What to do |
|---|---|---|
| “Keep tapping”, ± above 2 | Too few or uneven taps | Tap 8 to 16 more beats on the kick or snare |
| “Steady”, ± 0.5 or less | Your taps agree closely | Use it, then confirm it with the metronome |
| Recent differs from Average by more than 2 BPM | The tempo drifts, as live music often does | Use Recent for the current section |
| Ignored taps keep climbing | Many missed or extra taps | Press Esc and start again |
| The result is twice what you expected | You tapped eighth notes | Press ÷2 |
Check your result with the tap metronome
Open Metronome check and press Play click. The click starts at the tempo you tapped, at a low volume, with an accent on beat 1. Play it over the song for a few bars.
If the clicks drift ahead of the song, the tempo is too fast: lower it with −0.1 or −1. If they fall behind, raise it with +0.1 or +1. When the clicks stay locked to the drums for 8 bars or more, you have the right BPM. If you keep tapping while the click plays, Use current BPM sets the click to your new average.
Tap tempo in 3/4 and 6/8
In 3/4 (a waltz), tap every beat as you would in 4/4, and set the meter to 3/4 so the beat dots count to three.
Most 6/8 music is felt as two big pulses per bar, each a dotted quarter note. Tap those, set the meter to 6/8 and keep “I tapped” on dotted quarters. If you tap all six eighth notes instead, choose Eighth notes. Either way, the tool shows the dotted-quarter, quarter-note and eighth-note tempos: eighth notes at 180 BPM are dotted quarters at 60 BPM, and most DAWs want the quarter-note tempo, 90 BPM.
Tap tempo on delay pedals and in your DAW
Delay pedals: BPM to milliseconds
A delay pedal’s tap tempo sets the time between repeats. To set it by hand, use the Delay times panel. At 120 BPM:
| Note value | Delay |
|---|---|
| Quarter note | 500 ms |
| Dotted eighth | 375 ms |
| Eighth note | 250 ms |
| Eighth-note triplet | 166.7 ms |
| Sixteenth note | 125 ms |
The dotted eighth is the classic rhythmic delay used in a lot of rock and worship guitar parts.
Using the BPM in your DAW
Press Copy BPM, then type the number into your DAW’s tempo field: the tempo display in Logic Pro’s control bar, the tempo in GarageBand’s LCD, the tempo box in FL Studio’s toolbar, or the tempo in Pro Tools’ transport. Round to a whole number unless the song was recorded to a click at a fractional tempo.
When tapping isn’t enough
Tapping works for any music you can hear, including vinyl and live bands. It’s also a good check on automatic BPM detectors, which sometimes lock onto half or double the tempo. If you have the song as a file, the BPM finder measures it for you in a few seconds. If you’re about to play along, tune first with the online tuner.