How to read a Chord Chart and Guitar Tab

The Chord Chart

A chord chart or diagram is a representation of which fingers you place on each string and each fret on the neck of the guitar in order to play a chord.  The chord is a harmonic set of notes which when played together sound as one-note.  The chord chart is the easiest way to learn how to play a chord.

A Chord Chart consists of the following:

• Chord Name. The name of the Chord is usually identified at the top, such as B Major Chord.  There are other ways to determine the name of the chord (which will be a future discussion), but most chord charts have the name of the chord on top.  The Chord below is the C Chord, which is one of the most widely used “open chords” played on the guitar.
• Frets. The vertical lines across the guitar neck.
• The fret positions on the neck of the guitar.  This is the space between two Frets. Below you see the numbering of 3, 5 and 7.  These are the Fret positions on the neck of the guitar and help identify what key a guitar player is playing in. For more practice, you can start with our A Major Scale Guitar Patterns page, and practice reading the fret positions for the various fingering patterns.
• Chord Finger Placements.  The chord finger placements indicate which finger is placed on the specific string and fret on the fretboard of the guitar.  The number for each finger is shown below for a right-handed guitar player. The fingering is the same for a left-handed player.
• Strings.  Six horizontal lines represent the guitar strings; the thickest strings are to the left.  For standard tuning, this represents the low E string on the left to the high E string on the right. For more details, check out our full page on Guitar String Notes.
• String Muting.  Where you see the X and O above the open strings, this indicates whether you play the string, or you mute the string.    For some chords, specific strings are muted when you strum the guitar.  Do not worry too much about this aspect of learning the chords.  Your strumming coordination will improve the more you play.

This diagram explains further how to read a chord chart.
Guitar Tab

We will briefly discuss guitar tablature here.  Using guitar tabs is a common way to read and write music for the guitar.   Below represents a simple guitar tablature.  For each chord, there is the chord chart, the individual notes, and the tablature.

1. Chord Chart – This matches what was discussed above. The Chord Chart shows the chords, C, D, and G.
2. The notes show the individual notes that are played with the chord.  These notes are stacked, so they are played together.
3. Guitar Tab. This represents the strings and the frets that are played for the chord. The horizontal lines represent the guitar strings, with the highest (thinnest) guitar string on the top.  The numbers represent the frets on the fretboard.

The guitar is played as follows:

And this represented by the chord chart as follows:

Here is how the above notation sounds:

You are now on your way to playing chords on the guitar!