How to change the pitch of audio
- Drop your audio file into the box or choose it. Several files at once work too.
- Drag the Pitch slider. Each step is one semitone, so +2 raises a song by a whole tone and −12 drops it a full octave. Use Fine to move it by cents, hundredths of a semitone.
- Compare the Original and Result players, then download. Move the slider again and the result updates.
Semitones, tones and octaves
A semitone is the smallest step in Western music: the distance between two neighbouring keys on a piano. Each semitone changes the frequency by about 6%, and 12 of them double it, which is one octave.
| Semitones | Musical name | Example |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Half step | E to F |
| 2 | Whole step | C to D |
| 5 | Perfect fourth | C to F |
| 7 | Perfect fifth | C to G |
| 12 | Octave | C to the next C |
To change the pitch while keeping the length, the tool first stretches or squeezes the audio in time without touching the pitch, using short overlapping slices of about 46 milliseconds. It then plays that result faster or slower to bring it back to the original length, which moves every note by the amount you chose.
When people transpose audio
- Singing in a comfortable key: a backing track that sits too high for your voice often works after dropping it 2 or 3 semitones.
- Playing along with a detuned record: plenty of rock and blues recordings use guitars tuned down half a step. Raise them by 1 semitone and you can play along in standard tuning.
- Practising with a band recording: move a rehearsal recording into the key your group actually performs it in.
- Hearing a bass line: shifting a track up 12 semitones makes low notes easier to pick out on laptop speakers, without changing the timing.
To also adjust the tempo, use change audio speed. Your audio is processed by your browser and never uploaded.