How To Tune A Guitar Using An Electronic Tuner

When just one guitar string plays a little too high or too low the whole guitar can sound dreadful. Unfortunately, guitars, even expensive ones, fall out of tune quite easily. In fact, a professional is lucky to keep their guitar in tune for just a half of a dozen songs in a row while performing.
Learning how to TIME FORCE Multi Digital Delay your guitar is one of those absolutely essential skills that every guitarist absolutely, positively must acquire. It is equal in importance to learning how to play chords or read tabs.
Tuning With An Electronic Tuner
An electronic or electric tuner is often a small, light weight, inexpensive device that listens to a plucked open string, compares it to an internal reference data base, then provides a visual indicator if the note is sharp or flat. As you loosen or tighten the string it gives you constant feedback until the string is in tune.
These wonderful devices should definitely be a part of any tool chest because many people have greater visual than auditory JOYO JT-06. These tools can be especially helpful if you have not yet developed an ear for sensing small differences between pitches.
The down side is that there is always a small but sometimes significant margin of error. Sometimes a string that is in tune according to the device may actually be out of tune relative to the other strings.
To offset this margin of error, slowly strum chords across the entire neck of the guitar and fine tune each string by what sounds good. Be careful not to strum only one or two chords and just one end of the neck. This will sometimes produce out of tune notes at the other end of the neck. Find a compromise tuning that best fits them all, (or at least the chords of the songs you intend to play).
Electronic Guitar Tuners By Function
Electric tuners can be categorized by how they sense sound. Here are the main categories:
Sensing Sound vibrations in the air through a small built in microphone. Often this type has a socket for directly plugging in an electric guitar. The least expensive models are usually battery operated and offer just standard tuning options. This can be a good starter combination for beginners.
Sensing vibrations by touching the guitar. This type is useful in a noisy environment since it is deaf to sounds in the air. However, I have found that these JOYO JMT-9006B can be a bit slow to produce a read out. They are also not effective when used with a solid body electric guitar.
Direct plug-in style for electric guitars or acoustic guitars with amplification pick ups. Some models have input and output sockets so that you can leave them plugged in and still use the amplifier. Some variations are designed to act like an effects foot switch for easy operation during a concert. This type of tuner is useful for quick and convenient tuning in a noisy environment.
Sensing by light waves bouncing off the vibrating string. This type is called a strobe tuner. It is often thought to be the most accurate and also the most expensive. This is used most often by advanced players or professionals.
Common Options Available For Electronic Tuners
Price Range: Expect to pay $10 to $50 USD for most beginner electronic tuners and $100 to $1000 for the professional strobe models. Fortunately, much can be accomplished with tuners in the $10-50 range.
Chromatic Tuning: allows you to tune to any note in the chromatic scale and not just the six standard open string notes. This is especially helpful if a string is so far out of tune that you do not know where to begin.
This feature is absolutely essential for songs that were written for alternate tunings. Jimi Hendrix, Stevie Ray Vaughn, the Beatles and the Rolling Stones are a just a few of the many artists that have used alternate tunings.
Combination Tuners: some tuners are available with metronomes, bass tuners or even chord charts built in. The down side is that if you break it you also loose the use of the other devices.
Power Options: some tuners operate on batteries only and some offer AC/DC adapters as an alternate power source. Many battery only versions do not require much power which results in a surprising long battery life.
The battery only versions are often compact for stuffing into your guitar cases.
Recommendation For Beginners: buy a small, inexpensive (under $50), battery operated chromatic tuner that has a built in microphone for tuning acoustic guitars and an input for direct plugging electrics. Also, consider buying a model that contains a metronome.
Tuning a guitar requires compromise and personal choice.
It is important to understand that tuning a guitar is always a matter of compromise and personal choice. Try not to get stuck trying to tune the guitar perfectly according to the blinking lights of an electronic tuner but, instead use the tuner as a rough guide then focus on finding the best artistic compromise based on your hearing for the songs you intend to play.