Free online guitar chord finder

How to read a guitar chord diagram

A chord diagram (or “chord box”) is a picture of the fretboard stood on its end. The six vertical lines are the strings — the thick line on the left is your low E (6th) string, and the thin line on the right is your high E (1st) string. The horizontal lines are the frets. The thick line across the top is the nut; when a shape sits higher up the neck, that top line is a normal fret and a label like 3fr tells you which fret the diagram starts on.

Above the strings you’ll see two markers. An ✕ means don’t play that string — mute it. An ○ means play it open, with no finger. A filled dot on a string tells you to press it down at that fret, and the number inside the dot is the finger to use: 1 index, 2 middle, 3 ring, 4 pinky. A bar drawn across several strings is a barre — one finger flattened to hold down every string at that fret.

The row of labels under the diagram names what each played string sounds. Switch it between note names (C, E, G…) and intervals (R, 3, 5, 7…) with the Intervals toggle. The interval view is the more useful one once you’re past your first chords: it shows the root (R), the third that makes the chord major or minor, the fifth, and any added colour notes.

One chord, many shapes

Here’s the thing beginners rarely get told: a C major chord isn’t one shape. It’s any set of notes that spells C–E–G, and there are dozens of places on the neck to grab them. This finder lays them out side by side — the familiar open C near the nut, an A-shaped barre around the 3rd fret, an E-shaped barre around the 8th. They’re the same chord, but each has its own feel, its own brightness, and its own convenience depending on what you played just before it.

Learning several voicings pays off in three ways. You can keep your hand in one region of the neck instead of leaping around. You can pick a voicing whose top note carries the melody you want. And you get variety of tone — an open chord rings, a barre chord up the neck is tighter and punchier.

Open chords vs movable shapes

Open chords use open strings and live in the first few frets. They’re the first chords most players learn because they ring out and are easy to hold. Movable (barre) shapes use no open strings, so you can slide the exact same fingering up or down to play any root. That’s why the finder shows the same shape at different frets: learn the shape once, and you’ve learned the chord in all twelve keys.

Getting the sound clean

• Press just behind the fret, not on top of it, and use your fingertips so you don’t deaden neighbouring strings.
• For barre chords, roll your index finger slightly onto its side — the bony edge holds strings down more evenly than the soft pad.
• Strum only the strings the diagram tells you to. If a string is marked ✕, let a fretting finger lean against it to keep it quiet.
• Play the chord one string at a time to find the buzz or the muted note, then fix that finger.

Use the ▶ button on any voicing to hear how it should sound, then match it. When two shapes are equally easy, let your ear choose.