Pitch Test — how fine is your musical ear?

How fine is your ear?

Use headphones in a quiet room. Press Start: each round plays two notes; choose the higher one, and replay as often as you like. The cards let you hear the differences at your own pace.

How pitch discrimination works

Pitch differences are measured in cents: a semitone is 100 cents, an octave 1200. Most people can tell two notes apart when they differ by about 10 to 25 cents; trained musicians and piano tuners often hear 2 to 5 cents around 440 Hz.

This test is a simple staircase: a semitone first, then half that, and so on, until you choose wrong. It is quick rather than precise, and scores change with attention, volume and the hour, so try it a few times. The ability can be trained: listening and playing make the ear finer.

Facts that often get mixed up

Telling two notes apart is not perfect pitch: absolute pitch, naming a note without a reference, is rare, often put at about 1 in 10,000 people in Western countries.
True tone deafness (amusia) is rare too, a few per cent of people; many who think they are tone deaf have simply not trained their singing.
The finest differences are heard in the middle of the range; for very low and very high notes the ear gets coarser.
Two notes played together are easier to compare than one after the other, because close notes beat against each other.

Difference	At 440 Hz	Who usually hears it
100 cents (a semitone)	440 vs 466 Hz	Almost everyone
25 cents	440 vs 446.4 Hz	Most people
10 cents	440 vs 442.5 Hz	A good ear
5 cents	440 vs 441.3 Hz	Trained musicians
2 cents	440 vs 440.5 Hz	Piano tuners, on a good day

How small a pitch difference can humans hear?

Around 440 Hz most people hear differences of about 10 to 25 cents, a tenth to a quarter of a semitone; trained musicians often hear 2 to 5 cents.

Does this test show perfect pitch?

No. It tests comparing two notes. Perfect pitch is naming a note without hearing any reference, which is much rarer.

Can I improve my pitch?

Yes: practice comparing notes, singing and playing an instrument make the ear finer over weeks and months.

Mixes

Pick what you need. One tap to start, change anything and save it as your own.

Focus timer

Work in waves.

The Pomodoro rhythm: focus with calm sound in your ears, then take a real break. A soft bell marks every change, so you never watch the clock. Every fourth break is a long one.

25:00Focus · 1 of 4

Silence during breaks

Sound while you work

Breathe

Slow your breathing down.

Follow the circle and the sound: it rises as you breathe in and falls as you breathe out. Choose a rhythm, or set your own, and pick what plays underneath.

Ready

Sound while you breathe

Noise generator

Any color of noise, from deep brown to bright violet — and everything in between.

Brown noise

Noise volume

Spectrum · 20 Hz – 20 kHz

Sound science

The colors of noise

Same randomness, different tilt. Each color shifts energy between low and high pitches — here is what that sounds like.

White

0 dB / octave

Equal energy at every frequency. Because we hear in octaves, it sounds bright and hissy — the classic "TV static".

Pink

−3 dB / octave

Equal energy in every octave, so it sounds even to the ear. Steady rain, rustling leaves. A favorite for focus.

Brown

−6 dB / octave

Deep and warm, like a distant waterfall or a plane cabin. Masks voices and traffic without any hiss.

Grey

Equal-loudness curve

Shaped around how our hearing works, so every pitch seems equally loud. Balanced and soft.

Blue

+3 dB / octave

The mirror of pink: more treble than bass. Airy, crisp, like a light spray.

Violet

+6 dB / octave

Mostly treble, like hissing water. Sometimes used to mask high-pitched ringing.

Calm

Gentle tones to settle into: singing bowls, a slow warm drone, wind chimes tuned so every note fits.

Frequencies

Famous tones on pages of their own: hear them side by side, with honest facts.

Sound phenomena

How sound bends, shifts, rings and fools the ear, and why space is silent: hear it for yourself.

Nature

Rooms & travel

Animals & countryside

A purring cat, whales and dolphins, a nightingale in the dark, cowbells on a summer pasture. Wonderful in stereo.

For babies

Womb sounds are what a baby heard for nine months: a deep rush of blood flow, and the heartbeat.

Hearing and speaker tests

Check your ears, headphones and speakers, each test on a page of its own with a live picture.

Ear Age · 60 seconds

Test your ears.

Our ears lose the highest pitches first, and it starts early. Find the highest tone you can still hear and see the typical age for it.

Headphones on, quiet room
Set a comfortable volume on the 1 kHz tone
Don't turn it up when a tone disappears — that's the point

20,000Hz

Can you still hear it?

Hearing age test →

More ear tests

Check your headphones, find the deepest bass your setup can play, or play any pitch you like.

Headphones check

Left & right

Each ear should get its own side. It matters for 8D, binaural beats and every stereo sound here.

Headphones on, then tap a side.

Bass test

How low can you go?

Deep tones from 200 Hz down to 20 Hz, the bottom of human hearing. Mostly it tests your speakers or headphones.

Tone generator

Any pitch, 20 Hz – 20 kHz

Hz

Tone volume

Start quiet: high tones and square waves get tiring fast.

Take it to bed

An app without the app store.

Add Ears & Waves to your home screen and it opens like any app — full screen, with its own icon. Everything it needs is saved on your device, so it keeps playing on a plane, in a tent or with Wi-Fi off.

Preparing offline mode…

Works offlineNo streaming. Sound is computed on your device, forever.
Screen offKeeps playing with the phone locked. The timer fades it out gently.
PrivateNo account, no ads, no cookies. Your mixes stay on your device.

Pitch test.