How to Read Guitar Tabs

Before we get into the nitty-gritty of reading tabs, one thing to keep in mind is that understanding guitar tabs and what they mean, and even being able to follow along and play the notes you see in the tabs, won't necessarily mean that what you play and hear will sound like what you expect.

This is because playing the guitar isn't just pushing buttons or plucking strings. You need to understand pacing and tempo and learn how to move seamlessly from one note or chord to the next.

Otherwise it's just going to sound like a bunch of random notes, albeit a little bit more melodic.

What I'd recommend for a new player, or even an intermediate player, is to follow along with some online tutorials IN ADDITION to learning about tabs.

It's not hard if you find the right website. When I was starting out, the site I found most helpful was something called Jamorama. (Click on the link to check 'em out.)

I HIGHLY recommend you take a look at this site. I guarantee you'll find that playing the guitar is a heck of a lot more fun when you actually know what you're doing, and Ben from Jamorama is one of the best teachers online.

Click here to give him a try and let me know what you think.

And Now Onto How to Read Tabs

Guitar tab sort of looks like sheet music. Guitar tabs will have six horizontal lines while sheet music will have five.

In tab, the lines are the guitar strings. The bottom tab line is the thickest string and the top tab line is the skinniest string. Like this:

E--------------------------Skinniest string
B-------------------------
G-------------------------
D-------------------------
A-------------------------
E-------------------------Fattest string

You will see numerals on the lines. The numerals tell you what fret to play on a particular string. A "1" would be the first fret; a "2" would be the second fret, etc...

A "0" tells you that the string is played with no fingers on the neck. This is called "open". "X" tells you not to even play that string.

Let's look at how to play a "E" on the lowest (fattest) string.. The "E"is open (no fingers, no frets), the "F" is on the first fret and the "G" is on the third fret.
The tab would look like this:

E-------------------------
B-------------------------
G-------------------------
D-------------------------
A-------------------------
E----0--------------------

I must apologize. Do you know what a fret is? I should make sure before we go any further.

One hand holds the pick, the other holds the neck, or fret board. This is the hand you use to "finger" notes. Look at the neck. Notice those bars on the neck? Those are the frets and the first one is at the opposite end of the guitar from the pick hand, which is furthest from your head.

In the example I just gave you (above), you would simply pick the string open, with no fingers on the neck.

You just played your first note on the guitar! Wasn't that easy? I told you it was!

Now that you have seen how single notes appear in guitar tab, let's look at chords in tab.
A chord is made up of no less than three notes played simultaneously.

The tab will look the same except that now the numerals will be "stacked" on top of each other.
Here is what a "G" chord looks like in tab.

E------3------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
B------0------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
G------0------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
D------0------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
A------2------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
E------3-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

In this exercise, strum the chord only once. You will strum once each time you see the chord tabbed.
This tab tells you to strum the chord four times.

E------3-----3------3------3---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
B------0-----0------0------0---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
G------0-----0------0------0---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
D------0-----0------0------0---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
A------2-----2------2------2---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
E------ 3-----3------3------3---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Guitar tabs are an easy way to learn guitar quickly. The one thing about tab is that it doesn't give you any rhythm, timing or note durations.

Tabs aren't intended to take the place of standard sheet music, but only to reference where a note or chord is played on the instrument. Use sheet music and tab together to learn songs. This is an unbeatable combination.