# Fretlist > Personal song library for all musicians — chord sheets, practice, and gigs in one place. Full product overview: https://fretlist.com/llms.txt ## What is Fretlist? Fretlist is a personal song library for musicians. It's where you keep your chord sheets — the songs you're learning, the covers you practise at home, and the setlists you take on stage. Everything in one place, on any device, with no scattered notes, lost PDFs, or forgotten Word files. Most musicians store their chord sheets everywhere: iA Writer, Notion, Apple Notes, random PDFs from tabs websites, handwritten scraps in a guitar case. Fretlist replaces that chaos with a clean, organized library that's always with you. It's not just for gigging musicians. Most Fretlist users are people who play at home: learning songs, building a repertoire, practising covers they love. The gig support — setlists, Play Mode, offline at the venue — is there when you need it. The daily value is simpler: one place for all your songs. Fretlist is a modern alternative to legacy chord sheet apps like OnSong, SongbookPro, and BandHelper — built as a clean, focused web experience rather than a utility from 2009. ## Key Features - **Chord Sheet Management**: Store lyrics with chords in multiple formats: chords above lyrics, inline [G]chord notation, guitar tab, and ChordPro - **ChordPro Support**: Native ChordPro import and export. Directives like {title:}, {artist:}, {key:}, {capo:}, {define:}, and {instrument:} are all supported. The editor has two modes — Chords over Lyrics and ChordPro — switching between them converts the content live in either direction. This makes Fretlist a free, browser-based ChordPro converter: paste a song from Ultimate Guitar, click the ChordPro tab, export as .cho. - **Frets — Visual Chord Diagrams**: Fingering grids for guitar, ukulele, mandolin, and banjo. Capo-aware. Hundreds of built-in voicings. Tap any chord to pick a different voicing. Hover previews on chord names. Section-aware in Play Mode. - **Live Transposition**: Transpose any song to a different key instantly. Capo support — chord names show what you finger at the capo position. Transposition and capo preferences are saved per song to your account and synced across all your devices. - **Setlist Organization**: Multiple sets per setlist, drag-and-drop reordering, set timing, venue/date info. - **Play Mode**: Full-screen performance view with auto-scroll, adjustable font size, swipe navigation, Bluetooth page-turner support, and screen wake lock. - **Offline Support**: Full offline PWA — songs and setlists sync to your device for use on stage without internet. - **Import Anything**: PDF, Word, ChordPro (.pro, .chopro, .crd, .cho), OnSong (.onsong), SongbookPro (.sbpbackup), plain text. AI-powered parsing detects chord lines and extracts metadata. - **Export Formats**: PDF, Word (DOCX), ChordPro (.cho), plain text, JSON, ZIP. - **Folders**: Organize songs into named folders. Move songs individually (drag-and-drop or the ... menu) or in bulk using the bulk toolbar. Import directly into a folder. Searching flattens the view so results from all folders appear together. - **Sharing**: Share songs or setlists via public link, WhatsApp, or email. Recipients can import directly into their own library. - **Dark/Light Mode**, **Print-Friendly**, multiple instruments supported. ## Who is it for? Fretlist is for musicians at every level: - **Musicians learning songs** who want chord sheets and diagrams in one place as they build their repertoire - **Home practitioners** who play every day and want their songs organized, not scattered across notes apps and PDFs - **Singer-songwriters** managing a growing catalog of originals and covers - **Guitar and ukulele players** building a library of songs they know, are learning, and want to remember - **Worship teams** who update setlists weekly and need the whole team on the same version - **Cover bands** keeping a large repertoire organized - **Gigging musicians** who need reliable chord sheets and setlists on stage ## Platform Support Works in any modern browser on any device — iPhone, iPad, Android, Mac, Windows, Linux, Chromebook. Install as a PWA for an app-like experience. No download, no platform fees. ## Common Questions **Is Fretlist free?** Yes. The free plan has every feature, up to 50 songs and 3 setlists. Until 1 November everything is free and unlimited. No credit card required. **I'm learning guitar — is Fretlist useful for me?** Yes. Most Fretlist users are home practitioners, not gigging musicians. Store chord sheets for songs you're learning, see diagrams in the sheet, transpose to your key. The library becomes valuable fast. **I don't gig — is it still worth using?** Yes. Fretlist is a personal song library first. The setlist and stage features are there when you need them, but plenty of users never use them. **Does it work on Android?** Yes. Fretlist is a web app. This is the main reason musicians switch from OnSong (iOS-only). **Does it work offline?** Yes. Install as a PWA and your songs/setlists are available without internet — at a gig, or just in a room with poor signal. **Can I import from OnSong?** Yes — export as .onsong folder, import into Fretlist. Guide: https://fretlist.com/docs/import-from-onsong **Can I import from SongbookPro?** Yes — export a .sbpbackup file. Songs, metadata, and setlists all migrate. Guide: https://fretlist.com/docs/import-from-songbookpro **Can I import from Ultimate Guitar?** Yes — copy and paste the chord sheet, Fretlist detects the format. Guide: https://fretlist.com/docs/import-from-ultimate-guitar **Does it support ChordPro?** Yes. It imports and exports ChordPro and renders the common directives: sections, {define:} chord shapes, {chorus} repeats, grids, tab blocks and comments. Directives it does not display, like {tempo:}, stay in the song exactly as written. The editor also switches live between chords above lyrics and ChordPro, making Fretlist a free in-browser ChordPro converter. **Can I use a Bluetooth page turner?** Yes — arrow keys, Page Up/Down, and space bar all work in Play Mode out of the box. **Can I share chord sheets with my band?** Yes — public link sharing, bandmates can view and import. **Does it have chord diagrams?** Yes — the Frets feature. Guitar, ukulele, mandolin, banjo. Section-aware in Play Mode. **Can I transpose songs?** Yes — instant transposition, capo support, chord diagrams shift with it. **How do I build a setlist?** Choose New Setlist from the + menu, add songs with Add Song(s), drag them into order, and add sets (set 2, encore) with Add Set. Each set can have a target duration, and each song row can have its own note and its own key for that setlist. Play Setlist opens the whole set in Play Mode. Guide: https://fretlist.com/docs/setlists **Can a setlist play a song in a different key?** Yes. Click a song row's key badge on the setlist and step the key with - and +, for that setlist only; the song keeps its own key. Play Mode, prints and shared links use the setlist's key (in a band workspace, a member's own key still wins on their own chart). Guide: https://fretlist.com/docs/setlists **In a band, how do keys work?** Three layers: the song's stored key, the set key (the key a setlist plays it in, set on the setlist row by leaders and members), and your own key (the + and - on a song, for everyone, also from a setlist). Your own key wins over the set key, and a "Transpose -2" badge shows how far your chart is from the band. Guide: https://fretlist.com/docs/band-workspace **My chart is in a different key than the band. Why?** You chose your own key for that song, and your own key wins in every setlist. Press reset on the song to follow the band's key again. A keyboard player can use this on purpose: keep the original chords and set the badge's difference on the keyboard's own transpose. **Is there auto-scroll?** Yes — in Play Mode, adjustable speed. **Can I print chord sheets?** Yes — clean print layout, chord diagrams included. ## Pricing Every feature is in every plan. Play Mode, offline, print, export, sharing and chord diagrams are not paid extras. Capacity is the only difference. - **Free** (€0): 50 songs and 3 setlists. No card, no time limit. Every feature. - **Pro** (€24/year or €3/month): no limit on songs or setlists. - **Bands** (€58/year or €7/month, for the whole band): one shared library for up to 15 people, personal capo/instrument/transpose per member, and Pro included for the leader. Open by request until 1 November, then to everyone. Extra bands are half price. - Early Access: everything is free until 1 November. Everyone who signed up before then and upgrades by 1 December keeps half price for life on every plan. ## Fretlist vs OnSong OnSong is iOS-only. Fretlist works on any device. Key differences: no lock-in, edit from desktop natively, simpler interface, more affordable (€24/year for Pro, a free plan for 50 songs, vs €24-48/year for OnSong). OnSong wins if you need MIDI/DMX/lighting/backing tracks. More details: https://fretlist.com/alternative/onsong ## Fretlist vs SongbookPro SongbookPro requires separate app purchases per platform. Fretlist is one web app everywhere. Key differences: one account for all devices, automatic cloud sync, modern UI. SongbookPro wins if you prefer a one-time purchase or native apps. More details: https://fretlist.com/alternative/songbookpro ## Fretlist vs BandHelper BandHelper is a full band management platform. Fretlist focuses on chord sheets and setlists only. Key differences: much simpler, works the same on all devices, up and running in minutes. BandHelper wins for bands needing scheduling, finances, MIDI, stage plots, and backing tracks. More details: https://fretlist.com/alternative/bandhelper ## Fretlist vs JustChords JustChords is minimalist and local-first. Fretlist adds automatic cloud sync, offline PWA, visual chord diagrams with capo awareness, bulk import from many formats, and a full Play Mode with section-aware diagrams. ## Links - Website: https://fretlist.com - Documentation: https://fretlist.com/docs - Blog: https://fretlist.com/blog - Changelog: https://fretlist.com/changelog - Sign up: https://fretlist.com/login - OnSong alternative: https://fretlist.com/alternative/onsong - SongbookPro alternative: https://fretlist.com/alternative/songbookpro - BandHelper alternative: https://fretlist.com/alternative/bandhelper - Contact: hello@fretlist.com ## Technical Details - Web app (PWA) — works in any browser, installable on mobile and desktop - Built with Next.js 16, React 19, TypeScript, Tailwind CSS - Hosted on Vercel - Data stored in Supabase (Postgres) with row-level security - Payments via Stripe - AI-powered import via Claude (Anthropic) ## Documentation ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "How to install the Fretlist app" description: "Fretlist isn't in the App Store or Google Play Store. It installs straight from your browser onto an iPhone, iPad, Android phone, Mac, or Windows PC, so it lives on your home screen and works offline." source: "https://fretlist.com/docs/install-the-app" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Fretlist is a web app, so there's nothing to download from the App Store or Google Play Store. You install it straight from your browser instead. It still ends up as an icon on your home screen or Dock, opens full screen with no browser bar, and works offline once your songs have synced. This works the same on an iPhone, iPad, Android phone, Mac, or Windows PC. Pick your device below. ## Before you start You don't need an App Store or Play Store account. Open [fretlist.com](https://fretlist.com) in your phone or computer's browser, then follow the steps for your device below. ## iPhone and iPad (iOS) On iPhone and iPad you install from **Safari** (not Chrome or another browser). 1. Open [fretlist.com](https://fretlist.com) in Safari. 2. Tap the **Share** button in the menu bar (the square with an arrow pointing up). 3. Scroll down and tap **Add to Home Screen**. 4. Tap **Add** in the top corner. A **Fretlist** icon appears on your home screen. Open it like any other app and it runs full screen. ## Android On Android you install from **Chrome**. 1. Open [fretlist.com](https://fretlist.com) in Chrome. 2. Tap the menu in the top corner. 3. Tap **Install app** (it may read **Add to Home screen**). 4. Confirm with **Install**. A **Fretlist** icon is added to your home screen. ## Mac On a Mac you install from **Safari**. 1. Open [fretlist.com](https://fretlist.com) in Safari. 2. In the menu bar, go to **File → Add to Dock**. 3. Confirm the name and click **Add**. Fretlist lands in your Dock and opens in its own window. ## Windows On Windows you install from **Chrome** or **Edge**. 1. Open [fretlist.com](https://fretlist.com) in Chrome or Edge. 2. Look for the **install icon** in the address bar (a small monitor or screen with a down arrow), or open the menu. 3. Click **Install**, then **Install** again to confirm. Fretlist opens in its own window and you can pin it to your taskbar or Start menu. ## Signing in the first time When you open the installed app for the first time, it starts with a fresh session, so you'll need to sign in again even if you were already signed in in your browser. Once you're in, your songs and setlists sync and you stay signed in from then on. ## The Install Fretlist prompt While you're signed in, Fretlist may show a small **Install Fretlist** card in the corner with the right steps for your device. You can follow that card, or use the steps above any time. Dismissing the card doesn't stop you installing later. ## What you get once it's installed - A home screen or Dock icon, so Fretlist is one tap away. - A full-screen app with no browser address bar. - Offline access to your songs and setlists once they've synced, handy on stage or anywhere with no signal. - Automatic updates. There's nothing to reinstall when a new version ships. ## Related - [Printing and exporting](/docs/print-and-export): get a PDF or paper copy of any song or setlist - [Organizing songs with folders](/docs/folders) - [Getting the most out of Frets](/docs/getting-the-most-out-of-frets): chord diagrams in your song sheets ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "How to migrate from SongbookPro to Fretlist" description: "Move your entire SongbookPro library (songs, setlists, metadata) into Fretlist in minutes. Here's how." source: "https://fretlist.com/docs/import-from-songbookpro" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Want something that works on every device, not just your iPad? Fretlist reads SongbookPro backups natively. Songs, setlists, keys, capo, tempo: everything comes across. ## What gets imported - **Songs**: lyrics and chords, exactly as you had them - **Metadata**: title, artist, key, capo, tempo, time signature - **Setlists**: recreated with the same songs in the same order - **Deleted songs are skipped**: anything you trashed stays trashed ChordPro formatting is preserved. Chords render above lyrics, just like you're used to. ## Step 1: Export from SongbookPro 1. **Settings** → **Backup & Sync** → tap **Backup Library** 2. Save the `.sbpbackup` file. AirDrop to your Mac, send to iCloud/Google Drive, or email it to yourself ## Step 2: Import into Fretlist 1. Log in to [the app](https://fretlist.com/app): the dashboard has a big dropzone right there 2. Drop your `.sbpbackup` file onto it. Fretlist auto-detects the format, no need to pick anything 3. Fretlist shows the totals: songs and setlists detected. Optionally skip setlists, then hit **Import** The backup imports as-is. The parser reads the JSON structure directly, no conversion step. Songs save in batches and setlists are linked to the newly imported songs automatically. ## Clean up duplicates After a big import, libraries can get messy. **Settings → Matching titles** finds songs that share a title and shows them side-by-side so you can keep the version you want and drop the rest. ## After the import - **Any device, any browser**: phone, tablet, laptop. No app store dependency. - **One-click transpose**: change key instantly, chords update in real time - **Play Mode**: full-screen performing view with auto-scroll, wake lock, swipe navigation - **Offline mode**: cached locally for gigs without reliable Wi-Fi - **Sharing**: send songs or setlists via link, WhatsApp, or email > [Try Fretlist for free](https://fretlist.com): your chord charts and setlists, accessible everywhere. ## Related docs - [Import from OnSong](/docs/import-from-onsong): bring your entire OnSong library across in one go - [Import from Ultimate Guitar](/docs/import-from-ultimate-guitar): bring songs across one at a time with a simple copy/paste ## Related reading - [Moving from SongbookPro to Fretlist](/blog/moving-from-songbookpro): how a musician brought two bands' libraries across, including the rough edges I fixed along the way - [Fretlist vs SongbookPro: the full comparison](/alternative/songbookpro) --- - [Fretlist vs SongbookPro: the full comparison](/alternative/songbookpro) ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "How to migrate from OnSong to Fretlist" description: "A step-by-step guide to exporting your songs and setlists from OnSong and importing them into Fretlist, with everything intact." source: "https://fretlist.com/docs/import-from-onsong" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Tired of OnSong's iOS-only lock-in and dated interface? You don't have to re-enter hundreds of songs to switch. Fretlist imports your entire OnSong library, songs and setlists, in one go. ## What gets imported - **Songs**: lyrics, chords, ChordPro formatting, section headers - **Metadata**: title, artist, key, capo, tempo, time signature, duration - **Setlists**: recreated with the same songs in the same order - **Attachments**: PDF and Word files embedded in the backup are extracted and processed ## Step 1: Export from OnSong 1. Open the **Utilities** menu → **Backup** 2. Pick a destination, name the file, and save. AirDrop the resulting `.backup` to your Mac, send it to iCloud/Google Drive, or email it to yourself ## Step 2: Import into Fretlist 1. Log in to [the app](https://fretlist.com/app): the dashboard has a big dropzone right there 2. Drop your `.backup` file onto it. Fretlist auto-detects the format, no need to pick anything 3. Fretlist shows the totals: songs and setlists detected. Optionally skip setlists, then hit **Import** The backup imports as-is. Songs save in batches and setlists are linked to the newly imported songs automatically. PDF and Word attachments are extracted and processed server-side. ## Clean up duplicates After a big import, libraries can get messy. **Settings → Matching titles** finds songs that share a title and shows them side-by-side so you can keep the version you want and drop the rest. ## After the import - **Works everywhere**: phone, tablet, laptop, any browser - **Instant transpose**: change key with one click - **Play Mode**: distraction-free full-screen view for the stage - **Auto-scroll**: hands-free scrolling at adjustable speed - **Offline access**: your library is cached for gigs without Wi-Fi Open a setlist, hit Play, and you're performing. > [Try Fretlist for free](https://fretlist.com): your songs and setlists, on any device, ready for the stage. ## Related docs - [Import from SongbookPro](/docs/import-from-songbookpro): migrate your SongbookPro library into Fretlist - [Import from Ultimate Guitar](/docs/import-from-ultimate-guitar): bring songs across one at a time with a simple copy/paste ## Related reading - [OnSong for Android: what to use instead](/blog/onsong-for-android-what-to-use-instead): why OnSong has never shipped for Android and how Fretlist fills the gap - [Fretlist vs OnSong: the full comparison](/alternative/onsong) --- - [Fretlist vs OnSong: the full comparison](/alternative/onsong) ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "How to import songs from Ultimate Guitar into Fretlist" description: "Open the song, press Cmd+A to select the whole page, copy, and paste into Fretlist's import box. That's it: no API, no scraping, no extra tool." source: "https://fretlist.com/docs/import-from-ultimate-guitar" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── ## TL;DR Open the song on **ultimate-guitar.com** (chord version preferred, tabs work too), press **⌘A / Ctrl+A** to select the complete website, copy, then click **Ultimate Guitar** under the Import card on the Fretlist Dashboard and paste. Fretlist strips UG's page chrome and pulls out title, artist, key, capo, tuning, and chord-above-lyrics structure automatically. No API, no scraping, no extension. > **Just want clean ChordPro without signing up?** Use the free [Ultimate Guitar to ChordPro converter](/tools/ultimate-guitar-to-chordpro): same paste workflow, ChordPro output, download as `.cho` or save to your library. ## Steps 1. **Open the song** on ultimate-guitar.com. The chord version imports most cleanly, but tabs are supported too. 2. **Select the complete website and copy:** ⌘A → ⌘C on Mac, Ctrl+A → Ctrl+C on Windows. Don't worry about selecting only the chord block. Fretlist handles the surrounding chrome. 3. **Paste into Fretlist:** on the Dashboard, click **Ultimate Guitar** next to "paste from" in the Import card. Paste (⌘V / Ctrl+V) and click **Import**. Just getting started, with fewer than 5 songs? Then pick the **Ultimate Guitar** tile at the top of the Dashboard and paste into the box it opens. 4. **Review:** Fretlist shows the parsed title, artist, key, capo, tuning, and chord sheet. Edit anything before saving. 5. **Save**: the song is in your library, ready to transpose, add to a setlist, or open in Play Mode. ## On your phone The Ultimate Guitar app has a cleaner route than the website. It hands over the song itself: chords, lyrics and capo. It leaves out the title and artist, so Fretlist opens the song with the title field ready for you to fill in. Save waits until there is a title. ### iPhone and iPad 1. In the **Ultimate Guitar app**, open the song and tap the **three dots** at the top. 2. Tap **Share**, then **Open with…**, then **Copy**. 3. In Fretlist, tap **Ultimate Guitar** on the Dashboard (or **Ultimate Guitar** next to "paste from" in the Import card) and paste. ### Android This needs Fretlist installed as an app: in Chrome, tap the menu and then **Add to home screen**. 1. In the **Ultimate Guitar app**, open the song and tap the **three dots** at the top. 2. Tap **Share**, then **Open with…**, and pick **Fretlist**. 3. Fretlist opens with the song. Check it and tap **Import**. Fretlist shows up in the share sheet of other apps too, so you can send it a PDF or a text file from Files, WhatsApp or your email the same way. Nothing is imported until you tap **Import**. ## Why no built-in UG search? Some chord apps scrape Ultimate Guitar to search and import on your behalf. Fretlist doesn't, for two reasons: - **Legal.** Ultimate Guitar's terms don't permit scraping or automated access, and the chord transcriptions are user-submitted content under their own copyright rules. The Cmd+A paste workflow keeps you in control of what you're copying, same as if you'd handwritten it from the page. - **Reliability.** UG redesigns their site regularly, and that breaks every scraper that depends on it. The browser already does the work; Fretlist just has to clean up the paste. ## Related docs - [Import from Chordie](/docs/import-from-chordie): paste Chordie chord pages with the same workflow - [Import from OnSong](/docs/import-from-onsong): bring your entire OnSong library across in one go - [Import from SongbookPro](/docs/import-from-songbookpro): migrate your SongbookPro library into Fretlist ## Need help? Email [hello@fretlist.com](mailto:hello@fretlist.com). Dear John reads every message. ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "How to import songs from Chordie into Fretlist" description: "Open the song on Chordie, switch to ChordPro view, press Cmd+A to copy, and paste into Fretlist's import box." source: "https://fretlist.com/docs/import-from-chordie" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── ## TL;DR Open the song on **chordie.com**, click the **eye icon** and switch to **ChordPro view**, press **⌘A / Ctrl+A** to select all and copy, then click **Chordie** under the Import card on the Fretlist Dashboard and paste. Fretlist parses the ChordPro content and pulls out title, artist, and the full chord sheet automatically. ## Steps 1. **Open the song** on chordie.com. 2. **Switch to ChordPro view:** click the eye icon on the song page and select **ChordPro**. 3. **Select all and copy:** ⌘A → ⌘C on Mac, Ctrl+A → Ctrl+C on Windows. 4. **Paste into Fretlist:** on the Dashboard, click **Chordie** next to "paste from" in the Import card. Just getting started, with fewer than 5 songs? Click **Clipboard** there instead: Fretlist recognizes a Chordie page on its own. Paste (⌘V / Ctrl+V) and click **Import**. 5. **Review and save:** Fretlist shows the parsed title, artist, and chord sheet. Edit anything before saving. ## Related docs - [Import from Ultimate Guitar](/docs/import-from-ultimate-guitar): paste UG chord pages with the same workflow - [Import from OnSong](/docs/import-from-onsong): bulk-import a whole OnSong library - [Import from SongbookPro](/docs/import-from-songbookpro): migrate from SongbookPro ## Need help? Email [hello@fretlist.com](mailto:hello@fretlist.com). Dear John reads every message. ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "Writing in the song editor" description: "The song editor colors your chord sheet as you type and writes the brackets and braces for you. The Sections and Directives rail, the slash menu, Tab between fields, Expand, links in a song, and changing the key." source: "https://fretlist.com/docs/song-editor" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── The editor is where you write a song, in either of Fretlist's two formats. It colors the sheet as you type and can write the syntax for you, so your attention stays on the words and the chords instead of on where a brace goes. For the formats themselves, see [Chords over Lyrics](/docs/chords-over-lyrics) and [ChordPro](/docs/chordpro). ## Colors as you type Everything you write is colored as you go: - **Chords** take your chosen chord color, whether they sit inline like `[C#m]` or bare on a chord line. The chord name in a `{define: ...}` takes it too, since that is the part you scan the line for. - **Section headings and directives** are teal, so the shape of the song stands out from its words. - **Bracketed text that is not a chord**, like `[x4]`, `[N.C.]` or `[*Break]`, is an annotation: italic, in the lyric color. - **Lyrics** stay in the normal text color, and so does the fret data in a definition. The brackets are not what decides the color. Whether the text names a chord is. These are the same colors the finished chord sheet uses, so a song looks the same while you write it as it does when you play it. _Chords, directives, annotations and lyrics each take their own tone._ ## The Sections and Directives rail Above the writing area is a row of buttons that insert syntax at the cursor, so you never have to remember how a directive is spelled. The first chips are section headings, and Fretlist puts the ones this song already uses first, so a song with three verses keeps **Verse** within reach. The full set is Intro, Verse, Pre-Chorus, Chorus, Bridge, Instrumental, Interlude, Solo and Outro, and the **Section** chip opens all of them with a search box. After those come the things you can drop into a song: - **Chord**: an inline `[ ]` chord, ready to type into - **Chord line**: a chord line above the lyric you are on - **Chords table**: a `[Chords]` block for chord diagrams - **Chord definition**: a `{define: ...}` for a custom voicing - **Comment**: a comment line - **Note**: a performance note - **Chord grid**: a grid block, named and ready to fill - **Repeat bars**: repeat marks inside a grid - **Tab block**: a tab staff - **Repeat chorus**: a reference back to the chorus you already wrote Which of these show as chips depends on the song and the format you are in. The **Directive** chip opens the full list, and every chip has a tooltip saying what it writes. On a wide window the rail ends with a quiet **or type /** reminder. The rail wants a wide window. It appears from desktop widths up, and is off on phones and narrow tablets where the keyboard wants the bottom of the screen. _Section chips first, then directives. The Section and Directive chips open the full lists._ _The Section chip opens every section name, with a search box._ ## The slash menu On any device, type as the first character on a line and a menu opens under it, grouped into **Sections** and **Directives**. Keep typing to narrow it to the rows that start with what you type: `/r` finds Refrain, `/def` finds Chord definition. The first match is highlighted, so usually picks the one you meant. Tap a row to insert it, or with a keyboard: - move through the list - inserts the highlighted item - closes the menu Every row shows the text it will write, so you can see what you are about to insert before you commit to it. The slash only counts at the start of a line. Anywhere else it is just a slash, so a chord like `G/B` never opens the menu by accident. On an empty line the editor shows a faint **Press / to add** (or **Type / to add** on a touch screen) as a reminder. _Each row shows what it will write. The count at the bottom right tracks the matches._ ## Tab moves between fields is navigation in the editor rather than indentation, and it does whatever is most useful where the cursor is. **On a chord line**, Tab jumps to the start of the next word in the lyric below, padding the chord line out if it is shorter than that column. goes back. Placing the second chord costs the same as the first. **On a chord definition**, Tab walks the fields in order: the chord name, the base fret, then each fret. Each one arrives selected, so filling in a voicing is Tab, type, Tab, type. A definition you insert is not blank. Fretlist looks at which chords the song plays, picks one that has no shape yet, and fills in the usual fingering for it. The chord name comes back selected, because that is the one part it had to guess. **In a chord grid**, Tab tours the block in reading order: the name first, then every cell of every row, each selected so typing replaces it. Tab past the last cell parks the cursor at the end of the block. walks back the same way. ## Expand **Expand** hides the title, artist and details rows and gives that space to your lyrics. Expanded, those rows fold into one line that still says which song you are in. Click that line to bring them back, or use the **Close** button where Expand was. Press in an editor to fold the sidebar away for more room still, and again to bring it back. _Expanded, the metadata rows fold into one line that still names the song._ Expand is a desktop control. On a phone the field is already the screen. ## Links in a song A web address you write into the body of a song becomes a link you can tap. Paste the backing track, the tutorial you learned it from, or the tab you transcribed, and it opens in a new tab so you never lose your place in Fretlist. Both `https://youtu.be/...` and a bare `www.justinguitar.com/...` are recognized. Nothing else is: a plain `fretlist.com` in a lyric stays a lyric, because song words are full of things that look like addresses and a link where you wrote a word is worse than no link at all. A setlist's description works the same way, so a link you put there is tappable on the setlist page and on a setlist you have shared. That is the natural home for the reference recording everyone in the band needs. The short note you attach to a single song stays plain text: it sits inline in a row you scan at a glance, and a link in there gets in the way more than it helps. Two places handle links differently on purpose. Play Mode leaves out any line or comment that holds a link: a tap there belongs to the song, opening a browser mid-set is the last thing you want, and a link you cannot follow is only clutter on the stand. And a line that has chords sitting above it stays plain, so the chords keep their exact place over the words. ## Change the key Pick a new key in Song Details and Fretlist asks what you mean: - **Transpose** moves every chord to the new key. A song in G set to F gets F, Bb and C where it had G, C and D, inline chords and chords above the lyrics alike, and the chords stay in their place over the words. Until you save, **Undo** on the message that appears (or one Cmd+Z) puts the whole sheet and the key back. - **Only change the key** leaves the chords as they are. Use it when the sheet was already in that key and only the label was wrong. Your own chord shapes move with the song where they can. A barre shape with no open strings slides along the neck under its new name, so a G barre at the third fret becomes an F barre at the first. A shape with open strings cannot slide, so the new chord uses the standard shape. Saving removes the old one, as it does any shape for a chord the song no longer has. Undo before you save brings it back. It only asks when there are chords to move. A first key on a new song, a key that uses the same chords (G and its relative minor Em), or a sheet without chords just changes the label. Changing the key here changes the song itself, so in a band it changes for everyone. To play a song in another key for one gig, set the key on the setlist instead. To play it in another key just for you, use the transpose buttons on the song: in a band they always change your own key, also when you opened the song from a setlist. See [Band key, set key, your key](/docs/band-workspace#band-key-set-key-your-key). Keys that were already chosen stay put when you save. If a setlist played the song in G, or you had transposed it to G yourself, it is still in G afterwards, for every member of the band. Where nobody chose a key, the song plays in its new key. ## Two formats, one song The tabs above the field switch between **Chords over Lyrics** and **ChordPro**. The first shows as **CoL** when the row is too narrow for its full name. Switching converts the song, and the lines you did not touch come back exactly as you wrote them. A heading typed as `Verse:` stays `Verse:`, and one written as `= Chorus` stays that way too, rather than being rewritten into a form you did not choose. ## On a phone The phone editor is the field. It scrolls like any other page and the keyboard slides over it. The Song Details bar tucks away as you scroll down and comes back as you scroll up, and tapping into the lyrics puts it away until you are done writing. Tapping the song name drops a panel from the top bar for the title and artist, and the **CoL** / **ChordPro** switcher rides the corner of the field so the format is always one tap away. _On a phone the field is the screen, and the keyboard slides over it._ The rail is off here. The slash menu is the way to insert a section or a directive on a phone: type at the start of a line and tap what you want. ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "Chords over Lyrics" description: "The default editor format. Chord names sit on a line above the words. What Fretlist renders and what it ignores: chords, sections, performance notes, diagrams, and tabs." source: "https://fretlist.com/docs/chords-over-lyrics" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── The song editor has two tabs above the text box (labeled **Lyrics & Chords**): **Chords over Lyrics** and **ChordPro**. Chords over Lyrics is the default, and it is the style most tab sites use: you type the chord names on their own line, directly above the words. You type in the editor and the preview renders the finished sheet as you go. This page covers everything that renders in Chords over Lyrics. For the inline `[G]` style, see [ChordPro](/docs/chordpro). ## Chords above the words Put the chord names on a line by themselves, directly above the lyric, and space them so each chord sits over the syllable where it changes: Fretlist lines the chords up by character position, so the spaces in front of each chord are what place it. A line is read as a chord line when most of what is on it is recognizable chord names, and the line directly below it becomes the lyric those chords sit over. ## What counts as a chord A chord is a root note (A to G), optionally sharp or flat, with the usual extras: `G`, `Am`, `C7`, `Dsus4`, `F#m7`, `Bb`, `Cmaj7`, and slash chords like `G/B`. If a line is mostly ordinary words, Fretlist treats the whole line as a lyric and shows it unchanged, so a normal sentence that happens to start with a capital letter is not mistaken for chords. The flip side: when you want a row of chords, keep it to chords and spaces. ## Section headers Label a section by putting its name in square brackets on its own line: Two hash marks work too: `## Verse`, and so does a leading equals sign, `= Verse`, which is how [chordsheet.com](https://www.chordsheet.com) writes a section title. Common labels are `[Intro]`, `[Verse]`, `[Chorus]`, `[Bridge]`, and `[Solo]`. Whichever you type, Fretlist writes it back in the square-bracket form. A single `#` at the start of a line is a hidden comment. It does not appear in the sheet, so you can use it for private notes to yourself. One hash hides the line, two hashes make a visible heading. ## Notes that aren't chords For a performance cue that is not a chord (a "stop", "let ring", an "x2"), put it in parentheses in the chord row. It renders above the lyric like a chord, but in italic, and it never transposes: If you actually want the parentheses to show, double them. `((Break))` displays `(Break)`: In ChordPro this same note is written `[*Stop]`. ## Chord diagrams Add a `[Chords]` block at the very top of the song to show fingering diagrams. Each line is a chord name followed by its fret notation: Diagrams have their own page: see [Getting the most out of Frets](/docs/getting-the-most-out-of-frets). ## Tabs Paste a tab block and Fretlist renders it as tab. Keep the string letter and bar at the start of each line: ## Chord grids For an instrumental, an intro, or a turnaround, chart the bars on their own with a `[Grid]` block. A space separates each bar: Grids have their own page, with split bars, repeats, and endings: see [Chord grids](/docs/grids). ## The preview, and switching formats The preview renders the finished sheet live and scrolls in step with the editor. Switch to the **ChordPro** tab at any time to convert the song to the inline `[G]` style, then switch back to return to Chords over Lyrics. One caution: if a song uses ChordPro directives that have no Chords-over-Lyrics equivalent, Fretlist warns you when you switch, because editing and saving in this view can drop them. ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "Import chord sheets from Word and LibreOffice" description: "Drop .docx and .odt files onto the Import card and Fretlist reads the chord sheet out of them. One file or a folder of them, on their own or inside a ZIP." source: "https://fretlist.com/docs/import-from-word" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── ## TL;DR A lot of chord sheets live in word processors. Drop the files on the **Import** card on the Dashboard and Fretlist reads them: **.docx** from Word or Google Docs, and **.odt** from LibreOffice. You can drop one file, a whole folder, or a ZIP with a mix of formats inside. ## What Fretlist reads The words and the chords. A chord line written above its lyric is detected the same way it is when you paste a sheet, and a sheet written in ChordPro with `[G]` brackets or `{title:}` directives is read as ChordPro. The title comes from a `{title:}` directive if there is one, and from the file name if not. Name a file `Artist - Title.docx` and the artist is filled in too. Formatting does not come across. Bold, colors and fonts are left behind, because a chord sheet in Fretlist gets its look from your Display settings, not from the file. ## What it cannot read A document that is only a picture of a sheet has no text in it, and Fretlist does not read images yet. It reports the file as one it could not read rather than importing an empty song. The sheet has to be typed or pasted in for now. Apple Pages files are not supported. Export from Pages as PDF, Word or plain text first. ## When nothing imports If every file was skipped, the preflight says **Nothing here could be read** and lists each file with the reason, so you can see exactly what happened. It never tells you a file is already in your library unless it actually found a matching song. ## Related docs - [Import from Ultimate Guitar](/docs/import-from-ultimate-guitar): paste a page straight from the site - [Import from OnSong](/docs/import-from-onsong): bring an OnSong library across in one go - [Import from SongbookPro](/docs/import-from-songbookpro): migrate a SongbookPro library ## Need help? Email [hello@fretlist.com](mailto:hello@fretlist.com). Dear John reads every message. ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "ChordPro" description: "The inline editor format. Chords go in square brackets right where they fall in the lyric. What Fretlist renders: inline chords, section directives, notes, diagrams, tabs, and what it skips." source: "https://fretlist.com/docs/chordpro" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── ChordPro is the second editor tab. Instead of a chord line above the words, the chords go inline, in square brackets, right where they fall in the lyric. It is an open, portable plain-text format. This page covers what the editor renders. For the full background on ChordPro, including its history, converting from other apps, and how transposition works, see the blog post [ChordPro explained](/blog/chordpro-complete-guide). For the chords-above-words style, see [Chords over Lyrics](/docs/chords-over-lyrics). ## Inline chords Each chord sits above the character right after its bracket, so put the bracket exactly where the chord changes: What counts as a chord is the same everywhere in Fretlist: a root note (A to G), optionally sharp or flat, with quality, extension, and an optional slash bass, like `Am`, `C7`, `F#m7`, `Cmaj7`, `G/B`. ## Section headers Mark a section with a comment directive: `{comment: ...}` is the long form of `{c: ...}`. Environment directives work too: `{start_of_chorus}` (or `{soc}`), `{start_of_verse: Verse 2}`, and `{chorus}` to mark a chorus repeat. ## Notes that aren't chords Mark a non-chord cue with an asterisk right after the bracket. It renders above the lyric in italic and never transposes: It is the same note that Chords over Lyrics writes as `(Stop)`, and switching tabs converts between the two. Fretlist also accepts bare brackets like `[Mute]` or `[(stop)]` as notes. ## Chord diagrams Define shapes with `{define:}` and they render as fingering diagrams: See [Getting the most out of Frets](/docs/getting-the-most-out-of-frets) for the full diagram system. ## Tabs Wrap tab in `{start_of_tab}` and `{end_of_tab}`. Fretlist also auto-detects tab lines, so the wrapper is optional: ## Chord grids Chart bars without lyrics in a `{start_of_grid}` environment. Real barlines divide the bars and a dot is a beat with no new chord: See [Chord grids](/docs/grids) for split bars, repeats, first and second endings, and strum patterns. ## What the editor skips A line starting with a single `#` is a hidden comment, and metadata or layout directives (`{title}`, `{artist}`, `{key}`, `{capo}`, custom `{x_...}`) are not drawn in the chord-sheet body. In this example only the two lyric lines render: They stay in the song text exactly as you wrote them. Type or paste `{key}`, `{capo}`, `{tempo}`, `{time}`, `{duration}`, `{tuning}` or `{year}` and those values fill in the song's details, for a new song and an existing one. Change one of those details later and the matching directive in the text changes with it. ## Directive support at a glance Here is where the major ChordPro directives stand in Fretlist. When something is not drawn, it is kept in the file rather than dropped, so nothing is lost on export. ## The preview, and switching formats The preview renders the finished sheet live. Switch to the **Chords over Lyrics** tab to see the same song in the chords-above-words style, then switch back for ChordPro. A few ChordPro directives have no Chords-over-Lyrics equivalent, so Fretlist warns you before you edit in that view. ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "Chord grids" description: "Chart a song as bars and chords, no lyrics. Write grids the simple chordsheet.com way or with the full ChordPro grid environment: split bars, repeats, endings, strums, and how the two forms convert." source: "https://fretlist.com/docs/grids" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── A chord grid charts a song as a row of bars, with a chord in each, and no lyrics underneath. It is how you write an intro, a turnaround, a jazz head, or a whole instrumental: the shape of the tune at a glance, aligned so the barlines line up down the page. Fretlist reads grids two ways, and both draw the same chart. In **Chords over Lyrics** you use the compact [chordsheet.com](https://www.chordsheet.com) style, where a space is all that separates one bar from the next. In **ChordPro** you use the full `{start_of_grid}` environment, which spells out every beat. This page starts with the simple style, then the full one, then how they convert. ## The simple way: a `[Grid]` block In Chords over Lyrics, open a grid with `[Grid]` on its own line and list the bars below it. Separate bars with a space; each chord is one bar: Give the grid a heading with `label`, exactly like a `[Verse]` or `[Chorus]` section: The block ends at the first blank line, so a grid and the section after it stay separate. ### Two chords in one bar Glue chords together with an underscore to split a bar between them (a "split bar"), each taking half: Use a tilde instead when both chords land on the same beat. They share one slot rather than dividing the bar: ### Repeats Wrap bars in parentheses to repeat them. `|:` and `:|` work the same way: Add a play count right after the closing bracket, `3x` or `x3`, to say how many times: ### A double barline Two pipes mark a heavier division, like the end of a section: ### A note in the grid Start a line with `-` to put a note between the rows, handy for a "repeat to fade" or a section cue. `;` keeps its spacing exactly, `:` and `=` mark section titles, and `#` works too: A bare `-` on its own line just adds a little breathing room between rows. ### An empty bar, or a bar that repeats the last one Write `*` for a bar you have not worked out yet. Write `%` to repeat the bar before it, or `%%` to repeat the two before it: ### A label or a note beside a row A floating title sits on its own line and attaches to the row **below** it. Start it with `<-` to label that row on the left, or `>-` to annotate it on the right: ## The full way: `{start_of_grid}` In the ChordPro tab, a grid is an environment between `{start_of_grid}` and `{end_of_grid}`. Here a bar is written with real barlines, `|`, and every beat gets a slot. A dot, `.`, is a beat with no new chord: This is the form to reach for when the rhythm matters: it places each chord on its beat, and the shared beat count keeps the barlines aligned down every row even when the rows split their beats differently. A few marks earn their keep here: - **`~`** packs two chords into one beat: `F~G`. - **`%`** repeats the previous bar. - **`|1` … `:|2`** open first and second endings (voltas). - **`shape="1+4x2+1"`** sets the geometry the rows align to. It reads `left + measures x beats + right`, so that one is: one cell of left margin, four measures of two beats, one cell of right margin. - **Words outside the bars** label the row. Anything before the opening `|` sits in the left margin, so `A |: C . | F G :|` labels that row `A`. Anything after the closing `|` sits in the right margin, so `| C . | G . | Fade` marks that row `Fade`. Labels are how the example below gets its `A` and its `Volta 1`. If you would rather not crowd the row, write the same text on its own line with `<- text` for the left margin or `>- text` for the right, exactly as in the simple form. Both spellings land in the same place, so use whichever reads better: A floating title normally attaches to the row **below** it. Write one as the last line of the grid, though, and it attaches to the row above instead, so you can annotate a row you have just finished writing. ### More about `shape` Every part of a shape is optional except the middle: | Written | Means | | --- | --- | | `4x4` | Four measures of four beats. No margins declared. | | `16` | Sixteen beats in one measure. | | `1+4x4+1` | The same four-by-four, with one cell of margin on each side. | | `2+4x4` | A double-width left margin, nothing declared on the right. | The margin numbers are how much room a row's labels get. Raise the left number and the label column gets proportionally wider, which is worth doing when your labels are words like `Instrumental` rather than a letter. Set one to `0` to close that side up. A label you have actually written is never hidden, so a `0` on a side you are using is simply ignored. Leave `shape` off a later grid and it reuses the one before it, so a song can declare its geometry once at the top. Leave it off everywhere and each grid just sizes itself to its own content. ### Strum patterns A row of strum codes draws the picking hand instead of chords. There are three base codes: `d` down, `u` up, and `x` a muted hit. The modifiers attach to a base code and never stand on their own. Write `a` for arpeggiated (`da`, `ua`), `s` for staccato (`ds`, `us`), and a trailing `+` for an accent (`d+`, `da+`). Join two codes with `~` for eighth notes: Open the row with `|s`, as above. That marks it as a strum row: it borrows the bar structure of the chord row above instead of drawing its own barlines. Give a strum row the same number of measures as the chords it belongs to. On a narrow screen a wide grid breaks into several lines, and the two rows break together, so a strum row that stops early simply has nothing under the last chords. If a measure is deliberately not strummed, write it as empty beats (`| . . . . |`) rather than leaving it off, and the row stays as long as the chords. ## Two looks: Flat and Blocks Grids draw in one of two skins, and you pick the one you like under **Settings → Display → Chord grid style**. The choice syncs across your devices and applies everywhere a grid appears, including Play Mode. - **Flat** is the notation look: thin barlines with the chords sitting between them. It is the default. - **Blocks** fills each measure as a rounded panel, so the bars read as tiles. The chords and barlines land in exactly the same places either way; only the decoration changes, so switching never reflows a chart. ## Transposing a grid Grids transpose with the rest of the song. The transpose and capo controls move grid chords through the same engine as the chords in your lyrics, so a whole chart follows the key you set. ## How the two forms convert Switch editor tabs and Fretlist rewrites the grid to match the view: - A grid the simple style can express shows as a compact `[Grid]` block in **Chords over Lyrics** and as `{start_of_grid}` in **ChordPro**. Either tab round-trips to the other. A repeat counts even when it spans rows: the `(` sits on the row that opens it and the `)` on the row that closes it. - Row labels and margin notes convert too, as floating titles: `<- Intro` labels the row that follows it, `>- second time arpeggiate` annotates it on the right. A ChordPro label written outside the bars becomes one of these on the way over, since the simple style has no barlines to sit outside of. A repeat's play count stays attached to its bracket instead, as `(D G)3x`. - A grid that uses something the simple style has no words for stays in the `{start_of_grid}` form in both tabs. Nothing is dropped; the fuller form is simply kept. That covers empty beats, a `%` repeat, a first/second ending, a strum row, a `/` play mark, and a repeat that opens or closes in the middle of a row. So you can write the easy grids the easy way and still open the demanding ones, and no edit costs you a chart you already have. For the two editor styles in general, see [Chords over Lyrics](/docs/chords-over-lyrics) and [ChordPro](/docs/chordpro). ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "Getting the most out of Frets" description: "Chord diagrams in your song sheets, a section-aware panel in Play Mode, and two ways to change a voicing: one updates the song, one works like a transpose when viewing or playing a song." source: "https://fretlist.com/docs/getting-the-most-out-of-frets" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Frets brings visual chord diagrams to Fretlist: fingering grids in your song sheets and a live panel in Play Mode that updates as you scroll through sections. ## The [Chords] block Add a `[Chords]` section at the top of any song (before the first verse) to define the shapes used in that song. Each line names one chord: The numbers are fret notation: each digit is one string, `0` = open, `x` = muted. The block renders as a row of diagrams above the lyrics. ### Multiple instruments in one song By default `[Chords]` means guitar. To add shapes for a different instrument, use a tagged header: You can have both blocks in the same song, one for guitar and one for ukulele: ``` [Chords] G 320003 D xx0232 [Chords:ukulele] G 0232 D 2220 ``` The **instrument switcher** in the Chords bar controls which block is displayed. Switch to Ukulele and the ukulele shapes appear; switch back to Guitar and the guitar shapes return. Supported tags: `guitar` (default), `ukulele`. Tags `mandolin` and `banjo` are parsed but have no built-in library: Fretlist will render the shapes you write and show a message that no library exists for those instruments yet. Any stringed instrument you added under [Your instruments](/docs/instruments) works the same way. Its tag is the name with its string count, exactly as Settings shows it: ``` [Chords:Cavaquinho (6)] G 320003 D xx0232 ``` You rarely need to type this. Open the song in Edit View, pick the instrument under Song Details, and tap any chord in the preview: the editor writes the block for you, one line per shape you save. That is how you build a library for an instrument Fretlist does not ship one for. ### ChordPro format In ChordPro mode, chord shapes use `{define:}` directives per the ChordPro spec. Guitar is the default, so no instrument marker is needed: For ukulele (or any other instrument), prefix the defines with `{instrument:}`: `{instrument:}` stays active from that point forward in the file until you set it again. Switching between **Chords over Lyrics** and **ChordPro** tabs in the editor converts back and forth automatically, and instrument assignments are preserved. The `fingers` parameter in `{define:}` is not preserved. ## Three view modes The **Chords** toggle next to a song's title controls how the block is displayed: - **Frets**: SVG chord grids, labelled with the chord name above each diagram - **Text**: chord names only, no diagrams (faster to scan on a small screen) - **Hidden**: block hidden entirely; chords still appear above lyrics in the song body Your view-mode choice is saved per song, per device. ## Two ways to change a voicing Frets gives you two ways to change a voicing. One updates the song itself, the other is just for viewing and playing the song (like a transpose). The view you're in decides which. ### Editing the song's voicing (Edit View) Open a song in **Edit View** and click the **Preview** tab. Tap any chord card, pick a shape, save. This updates the song, same as editing its lyrics or key. ChordPro exports include the new shape. Use this when you want to permanently change the voicing: for printing, exporting, or just because you want this shape every time the song opens. ### Adjusting the voicing for yourself (Song View) Open a song in the normal song view (not Edit View). Tap a chord card and pick a shape. This is more like setting a transpose: the song's own voicing stays as-is, and your tweak is remembered for you. The next time you open the song, on any device, your voicing comes back. Use this when a shape doesn't suit your hands or your tuning, but you don't want to change the song. **What resets it:** deleting your account. There's no manual reset in V1. ## On shared songs Frets works on shared song links too: the view-mode toggle, instrument switcher, and chord editor all show up. Tap a chord and pick a voicing to see it your way. Since you don't own the song, the change is session-only: it stays until you close the tab, then it's gone. No account required. ## Play Mode Frets panel In Play Mode, tap the fretboard icon in the floating controls to open the **Frets panel**: - On **desktop / landscape tablet**, the panel appears as a rail on the right side, staying visible while you scroll - On **phone / portrait tablet**, the panel appears as a dock at the bottom, dismissible with a tap The panel is **section-aware**: as you scroll through Verse, Chorus, Bridge and so on, the chord set updates to show only the chords used in the current section. Chords that appear in multiple sections show the same shape throughout. To close the panel, tap the fretboard icon again or the × inside the panel. The open/closed state is saved per song. ## Instrument switching Use the **Instr.** dropdown in the Chords bar next to the view-mode toggle. Your own instruments from [Settings](/docs/instruments) come first, one entry per instrument and tuning, so a standard guitar and a half-step-down guitar are two picks. Below them: Guitar, Ukulele, and any instrument the song's own `[Chords:…]` blocks name. The grid follows the instrument: six strings for a guitar, four for a ukulele, and whatever count you gave a typed instrument. The pick also sets which capo range and tuning apply, which is why it stays available when the diagrams are hidden. Your choice is saved per song and synced to every device you sign in on. If a chord exists under a flat name (`Bb`) but the library stores it under the sharp equivalent (`A#`), Fretlist normalizes automatically. You don't need to relabel your chords. ## Tunings Set a song's tuning in the metadata panel and Frets follows it. Most tunings move every string by the same interval. Half a step down, or the ukulele's D-tuning, keep every shape exactly where it was and only change the pitch you sound, so the diagrams stay put and the key badge does the work. A tuning that changes the intervals *between* the strings is different, because the old shapes stop spelling the chords they are named after. **Baritone ukulele** is the one Fretlist handles today. It is tuned DGBE, which is a guitar's top four strings, so it gets its own diagrams rather than the standard ukulele's. A baritone chart names its chords the way a guitar chart does: write C, finger the baritone C, hear C. A few chords have no baritone shape. Six guitar strings can hold notes that four cannot, so voicings like `C13` or an open `Cmaj7` would lose a note on the way down. Those show the name only instead of a diagram that is missing part of the chord. Write the shape yourself in the `[Chords]` block if you have one you like. ## What falls back to name-only Not every chord string can be rendered as a diagram: - A chord not in the library and with no explicit shape in the `[Chords]` block shows the name only, with a "Wrong shape" hint on hover - Shapes written as custom voicings in the block always render, even if they're not in the library - Exotic extensions (e.g. `G13#11`) may not have a library entry; write the shape explicitly if you need it ## Keyboard shortcut In Play Mode, toggles the Frets panel open and closed. ## Turning Frets off If you prefer to work without chord diagrams, go to **Settings > Features** and toggle Frets off. This hides the Chords block and Frets Panel on that device without removing any data from your songs. ## Related - [Introducing Frets: chord diagrams in Fretlist](/blog/introducing-frets-fretlists-new-chord-diagram-feature): the launch post with screenshots and the thinking behind the feature - [Import from SongbookPro](/docs/import-from-songbookpro) - [Import from OnSong](/docs/import-from-onsong) ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "Show and hide parts of a song" description: "Turn lyrics, chords, grids, tabs, and comments on or off. Hide the lyrics for a chords-only music view, or hide everything but the words. One setting for every song by default, synced across your devices, and it follows into Play Mode and print." source: "https://fretlist.com/docs/show-and-hide" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Every song is built from a few layers: the lyrics, the chords above them, chord grids, and tab. You can show or hide each one on its own, so a chart looks the way you want to read it. ## Where to find it Open a song, then the **⋯ menu** in the top right, and choose **Display**. _Open Display from the ... menu on any song._ You get seven switches: - **Sections**: the Verse, Chorus and Bridge headings - **Lyrics**: the words - **Chords**: the chord names above the words, and chord-only lines - **Grids**: chord grids (bar-and-chord charts) - **Tabs**: tab notation - **Comments**: the `{comment: …}` lines in a ChordPro song, like "Capo 2" or "repeat twice" - **Notes**: the My notes card, in the song and in Play Mode. Band workspaces only, where the notes live Turn any of them off and the sheet updates straight away. _Each part of the song toggles on its own, with a Hide all switch at the top._ ## A chords-and-grids only view Turn **Lyrics** off and you get a music view: the chords stay exactly where they fall over the line, the grids stay, and the words drop away. This is the one to reach for if you read charts rather than sing from the sheet, or you want a clean chord map of a song. Turn **Chords**, **Grids**, and **Tabs** off instead and you are left with a plain lyric sheet. Turn **Sections** off as well and even the headings go, which is the tidiest a sheet gets. Hiding something never leaves a hole where it was: the blank lines around it close up, so a song with its chords off reads as a lyric sheet rather than a lyric sheet full of gaps. ## Show all and Hide all The top row turns everything on or off at once. **Show all** brings all seven back. **Hide all** turns all seven off, including the lyrics, and leaves you with an empty page if that is what you want. Nothing is locked on. If you play from your own notes and want nothing else on screen, you can switch all seven off. Tapping any switch brings that part back. The same switch is in Play Mode. Open the **gear**, and it is the first row of the **Show** section. ## One setting for every song, or one per song Normally these seven switches apply to all your songs. Hide the lyrics once and they stay hidden on every song, on every device you sign in to. Most people want this: if you play from the chords, you never want to see the words. Some people want it the other way, so that one song can show its tabs and no other song does. To do that, go to **Settings > Features > Show / Hide** and turn on **Set show / hide per song**. Each song then remembers its own five switches. You can switch between the two whenever you like. Your per-song settings are kept either way, so turning **Set show / hide per song** back on brings every song back exactly as you left it. ## It follows you everywhere The setting syncs across your devices, so a song you set to a music view on your laptop opens the same way on your phone. It also carries into **Play Mode** (open the gear, then the Show section) and into **Print & Export**, so what you print matches what you see. ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "Performing with Play Mode" description: "Play Mode is Fretlist's full-screen stage view: a big, distraction-free chord sheet with auto-scroll paced to the song, a metronome, chord diagrams, setlist navigation, keyboard and foot-pedal shortcuts, and the screen kept awake." source: "https://fretlist.com/docs/play-mode" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── **Play Mode** is Fretlist's stage view: your song fills the screen as a large, clean chord sheet, with everything you need to perform tucked into a floating control stack and a slim header. It auto-scrolls in time with the song, keeps the screen awake, runs a metronome, shows chord diagrams, and moves through a whole setlist hands-free. It's built to be read at arm's length, on a stand, mid-gig. ## Opening Play Mode - **From a song**: open any song and tap **Play Mode** (the monitor-with-a-play icon in the action row). - **From a setlist**: open a setlist and tap **Play Setlist**. This plays the whole set in order, so you can move song to song without leaving the stage view. - **On a keyboard**: press while viewing a song or setlist. Play Mode opens as a full-screen layer over the app, so you never lose your place underneath. _Open Play Mode from a song, or Play Setlist from a setlist._ ### Setlist context When a song belongs to a setlist and you open it *from* that setlist, Play Mode carries the set with it: you get the same song-to-song navigation as full setlist playback (a song counter, chevrons, swipe, and the end-of-song pill). Open a standalone song that isn't part of a set and Play Mode is just that one song, with no navigation. ### A night in more than one set A setlist can be split into sets, and Play Mode knows about them. The counter at the top names the set you are in and counts within it, so a three-setter of twelve reads **Set 2 · 1/12** rather than 13/36. Tap it and the song picker is grouped the same way, with each set's songs numbered from one. A setlist with a single set says nothing about sets at all, because there is nothing to tell apart. Step off the last song of a set and you land on a **Break**. It is a screen, not a message: it names the set coming up and the song that opens it, with the instrument and key you will read it in. Stay on it as long as the room takes. There is no timer, because a break ends when the band says so. **Start Set 2** begins the next set; the arrows and swipe step off the break the way they stepped onto it. On the setlist itself, each set header has its own play button, so you can start the night at set 2 without scrolling past set 1. If **Follow Me** is on, the break reaches every device at once: when the person leading walks off, the whole band sees the same screen. ## What's on screen When Play Mode opens you see, from top to bottom: - The **chord sheet** itself, rendered large in the performance font, with your saved transposition, capo, flats/Nashville choices, and chord/tab visibility already applied. - A slim **header** across the top. In a setlist it shows a **1/12** song counter (tap it to open the full song list), with previous/next chevrons. On desktop it also carries a **?** keyboard-shortcuts button and the close button; on a phone it has a small drag handle you can pull down to exit. - The **floating control stack** in the bottom-right corner. - A thin **progress bar** along the very bottom edge that fills as you scroll, so you can see at a glance how far through the song you are. _A song in Play Mode: big chord sheet, header counter, floating controls, and the scroll progress bar._ ## Auto-scroll Tap the **Play** button (bottom of the stack) to start scrolling; tap again to pause. The scroll is buttery and sub-pixel smooth at any speed. **Smart speed** is the default: Fretlist paces the scroll to the song's length, so a 3:10 song reaches the bottom in about 3:10 and you finish reading right as the song ends. A teal **sparkle** in the speed control means smart speed is active. Songs without a saved duration fall back to a calm default speed you can nudge. While scrolling, a **speed** control (a gauge) slides in just above Play. Open it to fine-tune the pace, or tap the sparkle to snap back to smart speed. Once you reach the bottom, Play disables (it has nothing left to scroll); scroll back up and it's live again. ## The control stack The floating stack in the bottom-right holds the controls you reach for on stage. From the top: - **Settings** (gear): opens the setup sheet (below). - **Metronome**: tempo, time signature, tap tempo, and a silent flash mode. - **Text** (an **Aa** icon): a small popover with **text size** (`−` / value / `+`) and line **spacing** (`−` / value / `+`). Click either value to reset it. - **Auto-scroll speed** (gauge): appears only while scrolling. - **Play / Pause**: at the bottom, under your thumb. A curved **drag handle** rides the top-left of the stack. Drag it up or down to resize every control at once across five sizes, so you can make the buttons big enough to hit reliably on whatever device is on your stand. The size is remembered per device. _The floating stack. Drag the handle on the top button to resize every control._ ## Settings (the gear) The **Settings** gear opens a roomy sheet that slides up from the bottom; the chord sheet stays visible behind it so every change previews live. Dismiss it by swiping it down, tapping the **×**, pressing , or just using any other control. - **Show**: switches for **Chords**, **Tabs**, and (if you use chord diagrams) **Frets**. These are the same per-song display settings as the song view. - **Text size**, **Spacing**, and (on a wide screen) **Columns**: the same steppers as the bar's Text popover, plus a 1 / 2 / 3 column layout for fitting a song on one screen. Columns is landscape/desktop only. - **End of song**: the end-of-song pill and how it behaves (see below). The pill's behavior switch (**Advance to next song**: **Auto** or **Manual**) and the **Show restart button** switch only appear when you're in a setlist. _The settings sheet previews every change live on the sheet behind it._ ## Metronome Tap the **Metronome** in the stack to start it. It uses the song's tempo, or 120 BPM in 4/4 if the song has none. Tap it again while it runs to open its menu, and tap it once more (or **Pause** in the menu) to stop it. Tapping outside the menu closes it and keeps the beat going. In the menu, set the tempo by clicking the **BPM** number and typing (30–300), or tap the **Tap** button four times to set it by ear. Click the **time signature** to edit it, and **Reset** to clear an override. The metronome is independent of auto-scroll, so you can click along whether the sheet is moving or not. Under **Metronome** in the Play Mode settings (the gear), choose how it keeps time: **Click**, **Flash**, or **Both**. Flash lights a bar along the top of the song on every beat, brighter on the first beat of the bar. Flash on its own is a metronome only you can see, for playing live when the click would reach the PA. With a flash, **Flash metronome for** sets how long it runs: the **Full song**, or **8 bars**, enough to catch the tempo; with Flash alone, the metronome stops when those 8 bars are up. These choices are remembered on this device. ## Chord diagrams (Frets) If you have **Frets** turned on, Play Mode shows the chord shapes for the part you're on, following your global Frets setting. On a wide screen they sit in a **rail** down the right edge (drag its inner edge to resize it, or collapse it to a thin strip you click to reopen). On a phone or tablet they dock along the **bottom**; drag the dock's handle to make it taller for a second row of shapes, or down to close it. Toggle Frets anytime from the **Show** group in Settings or with the key. See [Getting the most out of Frets](/docs/getting-the-most-out-of-frets) for how the diagrams are built. _On a wide screen, the Frets rail runs down the right edge._ _On a phone or tablet, the same diagrams dock along the bottom._ ## Moving through a setlist In a setlist (or a song opened from one), several ways move you between songs: - **Header**: the previous/next **chevrons**, or tap the **1/12** counter to open the full song list and jump to any song. - **Swipe**: swipe left or right anywhere on the sheet. - **Tap the edges**: on a touch screen, tap the left edge for the previous song or the right edge for the next. - **Keyboard / foot pedal**: the arrow keys, or Page Up / Page Down. _In a setlist, the counter opens the full song list; the chevrons step through it._ ## The end-of-song pill When you reach the bottom of a song in a setlist, a pill slides up offering the **next song**. How it behaves is your call, set under **End of song** in Settings: - **Manual** (the default): the pill waits. Tap it to move to the next song and start playing it. It's a deliberate "go," handy when you want to cue the next number yourself. - **Auto**: while you're auto-scrolling, the pill counts down and advances on its own, then keeps scrolling the next song. A **stop** button cancels the countdown, and you can tap the pill to skip ahead immediately. A small **restart** button on the pill takes you back to the top of the current song (and resumes the scroll if you were scrolling). On the last song of a set, or a standalone song, the pill simply offers that restart. Don't want the pill at all? Its **×** turns it off, and you can switch it back on in Settings. _At a song's end, the pill cues the next one, on a tap or on a countdown._ ## Keyboard shortcuts and foot pedals On a keyboard, press for the full shortcut list (the **?** button in the header opens it too). The essentials: - : play / pause auto-scroll - / : scroll up / down - / : previous / next section - / : scroll speed down / up - / : font size up / down - : toggle Frets   : toggle metronome   : tap tempo - / or / : next / previous song (in a setlist) - : exit Play Mode **Foot pedals** work through these same keys. Most Bluetooth page-turners send Page Up / Page Down, which step through the songs in a set (or scroll, on a single song). If your pedal lets you remap its keys, set them to and to jump between sections instead. ## On stage - **The screen stays awake.** Play Mode holds a wake lock so your device won't dim or sleep mid-song. - **It works offline.** Once a song is saved on your device it plays in full with no connection, so a dead-zone stage WiFi is no problem. - **It's touch-free if you want.** Between smart-speed auto-scroll, a foot pedal, and the auto-advancing end-of-song pill, you can get through a whole set without touching the screen. - **Your other devices can follow.** Turn on [Follow Me](/docs/follow-me) and the tablet on the stand opens whatever song you start on your phone, and flips when you flip. ## Leaving Play Mode Close Play Mode with the **×** (top-right) or press . On a phone you can also pull down the handle at the top. If you were playing a setlist, you land back on the song you were viewing when you exited, with its link back to the setlist intact. ## Related - [Follow Me](/docs/follow-me): drive Play Mode on all your devices from one of them - [Getting the most out of Frets](/docs/getting-the-most-out-of-frets): the chord diagrams shown in the Frets panel - [Chords over Lyrics](/docs/chords-over-lyrics) and [ChordPro](/docs/chordpro): the two formats your chord sheets are written in - [Printing and exporting](/docs/print-and-export): a paper or PDF copy of the same chord sheet ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "Your instruments" description: "Tell Fretlist what you play and in which tuning. Your instruments decide which chord diagrams get drawn and what new songs start as." source: "https://fretlist.com/docs/instruments" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Your instruments live in **Settings → Account → Instruments**. It is a short list: one row per instrument you play, each with the tuning you play it in. Fretlist uses that list for the chord diagrams you see and for what new songs start as. ## What the list changes **Chord diagrams.** A guitar chord and a ukulele chord are different shapes with the same name. Fretlist draws the shapes for the instrument you are holding, not guitar ones transposed by wishful thinking. That is the first instrument in your list, on every song, unless you picked another instrument for that song. In a band, it is your Main in that band: see [Your instruments in a band](#your-instruments-in-a-band). **What a new song starts as.** A new song takes its instrument *and* its tuning from the first row in your list, together. If your main is a ukulele in Standard, new songs start there. If it is a guitar in half step down, they start there. Amazing Grace, the starter song every new account gets, is charted for your main instrument too, so a ukulele player sees ukulele grips there. Those two halves come from the same row deliberately. Taking the instrument from one place and the tuning from another is how a ukulele song ends up stamped with a guitar's tuning. ## Adding an instrument Pick from the list: **guitar**, **bass**, **ukulele**, **mandolin**, **banjo**, **keys**, **drums**, **vocals**. Anything else, type it. A typed name that matches one of the above resolves to the real instrument rather than becoming a lookalike, so typing "Guitar" gives you a guitar, with its tunings and its chord library, not a text label that happens to say guitar. For a stringed instrument that is not on the list, Fretlist asks how many strings it has and remembers it as, for example, *Bouzouki (8)*. The string count travels with the instrument everywhere it is shown, shared songs included. ### Chord libraries Guitar and ukulele have full chord libraries, so Fretlist can draw any chord you name. Mandolin and banjo are recognised instruments with their own tunings and capo ranges, but their libraries are stubs: Fretlist will draw the shapes you write out yourself and tell you when it has none of its own to offer. A typed stringed instrument starts with no library at all, but it has a fretboard, so you can build one. Open a song in Edit View with that instrument selected and tap a chord in the preview to define its shape; the song keeps it in a `[Chords:Bouzouki (8)]` block. In the normal song view the same tap saves a shape for you alone, like a transpose. See [Getting the most out of Frets](/docs/getting-the-most-out-of-frets#multiple-instruments-in-one-song). Keys, drums and vocals have no fret diagrams, for the obvious reason. ## Tuning Each row carries its own tuning. Pick a preset, or type your own: *Open C*, whatever you actually use. Two kinds of tuning behave differently, and it is worth knowing which is which: - **Pitch shifts**: half step down, whole step down. Every string moves by the same amount, so the shapes stay the same and only the sounding pitch changes. Fretlist can account for these, because the maths is a straight shift. - **Shape tunings**: Drop D, Open G, DADGAD. These rearrange the strings, so the shapes themselves change. They are a voicing layout, not an offset, and Fretlist treats them as such rather than pretending they shift your key. ## Order matters The first row is your primary. Drag to reorder. Primary decides which chord diagrams you see and what new songs default to. Everything below it is still yours and still selectable on any song. A primary without chord diagrams (vocals, keys, drums) means no chord diagrams: a drummer's songs show the chart without them. ## Your instruments in a band Each band keeps its own order of the same list. Switch to a band, open **Settings → Instruments**, and drag: the top one is your **Main** in that band. Play ukulele in one band and bass in another, and switching bands switches the chord diagrams with you. Until you reorder, a band follows your own order. Adding, removing or retuning an instrument always changes your list everywhere. Only the order is per band. You can also drag your instrument chips in the band's **Band** card on the dashboard. A band leader can put your instruments in order for their band the same way, but can't add, remove or change them. ## One song on another instrument Pick a different instrument for one song from the instrument menu on that song. That choice wins over everything above, for that song only. ## An empty list is fine A drummer or a singer has no chord instrument, and the list is allowed to be empty. Fretlist will not invent one: when a song does not say what it is for, it renders as guitar in standard tuning, which is a rendering fallback and not a claim about you. Signing up pre-selects guitar to save the most common case a step. It is a row like any other. Remove it. ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "Follow Me: lead Play Mode from one device" description: "Start Play Mode on your phone and the tablet on the stand opens the same song. Which device leads, what a follower can do on its own, and what happens when the leading device leaves." source: "https://fretlist.com/docs/follow-me" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── **Follow Me** lets one device lead all the others. Start Play Mode on your phone, and the tablet on the stand and the laptop by the mixer open the same setlist at the same song. Change song on the phone and they change with it; start auto-scroll and they scroll along. There is nothing to pair and nothing to set up per device: if you are logged in and online, it follows. ## Turning it on Follow Me is one switch for your account, in two places: - **Settings > Features > Follow Me across your devices.** - **Inside Play Mode**: open the gear (the setup sheet) and flip **Follow Me** under its own heading. Handy when you are already on stage and want the second screen to catch up. Flipping it on inside Play Mode makes that device the leading one right away. Flipping it off on the leading device ends the session, so every follower leaves Play Mode. ## Which device leads Whichever device you **press Play on** leads. There is no setting for it. Start Play Mode on the phone and the phone leads; walk over to the tablet and press Play there and the tablet takes over, while the phone quietly becomes a follower. The Play Mode header says which one you are holding: **Leading** on the device that leads, **Following** on the ones that follow. ## What a follower can do A follower is a full Play Mode, not a mirror. Text size, the metronome, chord diagrams and your capo all work as usual on each device. **Auto-scroll follows, and every sheet lands together.** Start auto-scroll on the leading device and every follower starts scrolling too; stop it and they stop. Each follower paces its own sheet to reach the bottom at the same moment as the leading device, so a device with chords hidden, or bigger text, or a smaller screen, reaches the last line with the others. That is smart speed on the leading device's clock, and like smart speed it steps aside when you have set your own speed for a song: your speed leads on your device. Tapping play or pause on a follower only changes that device, until the leading device's next play or pause. Flip a page on a follower (swipe, tap an edge, use the chevrons or the song picker) and it stops following for the moment, so you can glance at the next song while the leading device is still on this one. The header says **Paused** and a pill at the bottom says **Following paused**: - Tap **Rejoin** on the pill to jump back to the leading device's song, at the spot it is reading. A device that joins mid-song lands there too. - Do nothing and the follower rejoins on its own the next time the leading device changes song. - Tap the **×** on the pill to stop following on that device for the rest of the session. It stays where you put it until someone presses Play again. **The countdown follows.** When the leading device reaches the end of a song and the end-of-song pill starts counting down, every follower shows the same countdown, synced to it, with the next song's title, capo and key. Nobody advances on their own: the leading device's move lands and everyone follows it. A follower's own pill (when it reaches its own bottom) waits for a tap instead of counting down. ## The break between sets On a setlist split into sets, the person leading steps off the last song of a set onto a **Break** screen, and every follower lands on it too. Nobody is left looking at a song that finished ten minutes ago, and nobody is dropped into the next set without warning. When the leader taps **Start Set 2**, the band goes with them. ## Leaving - **Exit on the leading device** and every follower exits with it. - **Exit on a follower** and only that device leaves. The leading device keeps playing, and that device stays out until someone presses Play again. ## Good to know - The status chip names who you are following. A bandmate is named; your own other device says so, because a tab you left open on a laptop is a device like any other and will lead if it is still running. - **Requires an internet connection**, on the leading device and on every follower. Follow Me travels through Fretlist's servers. Offline, Play Mode still works on each device; they just do not talk to each other. Making this work on a stage without internet is the end goal, but not there yet. - **No venue WiFi? Use a hotspot.** Nothing here needs the venue's network. If your phone has signal, turn on its hotspot and put the tablet on it; Follow Me works the same. - **If the leading device disappears** (a dead battery, a closed app), followers keep the last song up and stop reacting after a few minutes. Press Play on another device to carry on from there. - **The switch is one setting for your account.** Flip it on the phone and Settings on the tablet shows it flipped, live. The same now goes for "Show chord diagrams" next to it. - **An editor is never interrupted.** A device sitting on the song editor or the new-song page does not jump into Play Mode. ## Related - [Performing with Play Mode](/docs/play-mode): everything else on the stage view - [Installing the app](/docs/install-the-app): put Fretlist on the tablet that lives on the stand ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "Printing and exporting" description: "The Print & Export window: a live page preview, one-click PDF, the browser print dialog, and editable exports (ChordPro, Word, plain text). Plus setlist running orders and chord-sheet booklets." source: "https://fretlist.com/docs/print-and-export" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Every song and setlist has a dedicated **Print & Export** window: a live, full-page preview on one side and the controls on the other. Change a control and the preview re-paginates, so you see exactly what you'll get before you print or save a page. ## Opening Print & Export Open any song or setlist, then open the **...** menu (the More actions button) and choose **Print & Export**. The window opens full-screen over the app, so you don't lose your place. Close it with the **×** in the top-right of the header or press . _Open Print & Export from the ... menu on any song or setlist._ ## The preview The center of the window is a live, fit-to-width preview of the printed pages, with a **page x / y** badge in the bottom-right corner. It's the real output: the same monospaced chord sheet, chord diagrams, page breaks, and colored keys you'll see on paper. On desktop the controls sit in a rail on the right; on a phone they stack below the preview, with the Print and Save buttons pinned to the bottom. _The full window: live preview on one side, controls on the other._ ## Two ways to get a PDF The two buttons at the bottom produce different kinds of PDF. **Save as PDF** captures the preview exactly as you see it and downloads it in one click. It's a raster copy, so it switches off above 20 pages and isn't available offline. On iPhone and iPad it opens the system share sheet so you can save to Files or send it on. **Print** opens your browser's own print dialog: the highest-quality, vector path, and it works offline. From there you can print on paper or choose your browser's own "Save as PDF" for the sharpest file. ## Other formats Click the small chevron next to **Save as PDF** for the editable, re-importable formats, plus a **Share** option that emails the PDF. For a single song: **ChordPro** (`.pro`), **Word** (`.docx`), and **Plain Text** (`.txt`). These carry their own structure, not the page layout (a note in the menu says as much). The menu is online-only. _The chevron beside Save as PDF opens the editable formats and Share._ ### Emailing the PDF Choose **Share** from that menu to email the song (or setlist) with its PDF attached. The dialog opens with **Attach PDF** already ticked, and the attachment is the same styled render you see in the preview (for a setlist, that's the running order). Add one or more email addresses and an optional short message, then send. You can also create or copy a public link from the same dialog if you'd rather share that way. _Share emails the song with its PDF attached, with the styled chord sheet as the attachment._ ## Adjusting the layout The controls re-flow the preview live (a small spinner sits by a control's label while it re-paginates). - **Page**: **A4** or **Letter**, **Portrait** or **Landscape**. - **Include**: **Song details** (key, capo, tempo, and the rest) and **Chord diagrams** (only offered when the song has chords). - **Text size** and **Chords size**: `−` / value / `+` steppers; click the value to reset to 0. Chord size only shows when diagrams are on. - **Columns**: **1**, **2**, or **3**. Three is landscape-only; portrait offers 1 or 2. - **Color**: **High contrast** prints chords and keys in solid black instead of amber, for clearer photocopies and low-ink printing. _Every control re-paginates the preview as you change it._ ## Printing a setlist A setlist adds a pair of tabs at the top of the controls for **what** to print: - **Setlist** (the default): the gig running order, with the details you choose to show. Always portrait, always black-on-white. - **Chord sheets**: a booklet of every song's full chord sheet, one per page, using the same song controls above. In the **Setlist** tab, a **Show** group matches the print to what's on screen: **Artist**, **Keys**, **Capo / played key**, **Durations**, **Notes**, and **Talk time** (Durations and Talk time only appear when the setlist has durations turned on). With more than one set, a **Layout** group adds **Each set on new page**. _A setlist prints either the running order or a booklet of every song's chord sheet._ In the **Chord sheets** tab, large setlists preview only the first couple of songs to stay responsive. Print or Save as PDF expands to the full set first (a brief "Preparing all N songs..." state), then produces the complete document. Its export menu bundles every song into a single `.zip` (ChordPro, Word, or Plain Text). ## Saving a default Set the window up the way you like it, then click **Save as default** (the last control, below the layout options). Those settings become the starting point for every Print & Export window, on every device, in real time. When the current settings already match, the button reads **Current default**. Saving a default needs a connection. ## Working offline Print keeps working with no connection (the browser dialog is built in, and you can save a PDF from there). The one-click **Save as PDF**, the file exports, **Share**, and **Save as default** all need a connection and are disabled offline. ## Related - [Getting the most out of Frets](/docs/getting-the-most-out-of-frets): the chord diagrams that show up in your printed sheets - [Chords over Lyrics](/docs/chords-over-lyrics) and [ChordPro](/docs/chordpro): the two editor formats your exports are built from - [Organizing songs with folders](/docs/folders) ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "Building and playing setlists" description: "Build a setlist for a gig: add and reorder songs, split the night into sets, time each set, add notes, set the key a song is played in, then play, print or share the whole thing." source: "https://fretlist.com/docs/setlists" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── A setlist is the running order for a gig, a rehearsal or a jam: the songs you will play, in order, split into sets if the night has more than one. It lives next to your songs, works offline, and opens in Play Mode as one continuous set. ## Create a setlist Open the **+** menu (above the song or setlist list, or in the top bar) and choose **New Setlist**. The dashboard has a **New Setlist** button too. The editor asks for: - **Title**: the only required field. Save stays disabled until there is one. - **Location**: the venue, or anything else that tells you where. - **Event Date**: the date of the gig. - **Notes**: anything about the gig as a whole. They show at the bottom of the setlist, and links in them can be clicked. Click **Save** (or press , on Windows) to save, or **Cancel** () to leave. If you leave with unsaved changes, Fretlist asks before throwing them away. To change a setlist later, open it and click **Edit**, or press . ## Add songs Under each set, click **Add Song(s)** (or **Add songs to Set 2** once the set has a name). A picker opens with your library: - **Tap songs to select them.** Each selected song gets a number, and that is the order they are added in. Tap again to deselect. - **Search, sort and filter** to find songs quickly. Sort by **A to Z**, **Recently added**, **Most played** (how many setlists a song is in) or **Date (new to old)**. Filter by the same groups as your library, or by key. - A small **check mark** means the song is already in this setlist. You can still add it again, for a song you play twice. Click **Add** to put the selected songs at the end of the set. In the editor, pastes songs you copied from another setlist (see [Copy songs between setlists](#copy-songs-between-setlists)). ## Reorder and remove songs In the editor, drag a song by its **grip handle** (the dotted icon on the left of the row) to move it up or down. Drag it onto another set to move it there. On a phone, only the handle starts a drag, so you can still scroll the list by swiping anywhere else. The **×** at the end of a row removes the song from the setlist. The song itself stays in your library. ## Split the night into sets Click **Add Set** at the bottom of the editor for a second set, a third, an encore. The first time you add one, both sets are named **Set 1** and **Set 2**; type over the **Set title** to call them anything, like **Encore**. Next to each set title: - The **up** and **down arrows** move the whole set earlier or later in the night. - The **notes** icon opens or closes the notes on every song in that set at once. - The **bin** removes the set. If it has songs, Fretlist asks first. A set can stay empty for now. It shows on the setlist as **No songs in this set yet**, so the shape of the night is there before the songs are. On a setlist with more than one set, each set header gets its own **Play** button, so you can start the night at set 2. ## Time your sets Turn on **Show durations** in the editor to work with times. - Each set gets a **Duration** field: the time you have for it, in minutes. - The set's running total adds up the duration of each song (set on the song itself) plus any talk time. Next to a target, a bar fills as the set grows. It turns amber past 90% and red when the set runs over, with how much over it is. - When you add songs to a set that has a target, the picker shows the time remaining (or **Set is full**), and dims songs that would no longer fit. **Talk time** is the minutes you spend talking after a song: an intro, a story, a tuning break. Open a song's notes (below) and enter it in the **talk** field. On the setlist it shows as a small divider between that song and the next. ## Add a note to a song The **note** icon on a song row in the editor opens a notes field for that song in this setlist: "capo 3 for this one", "start with the chorus", "Lisa sings". The icon turns teal when a song has a note. Notes belong to the setlist, not the song, so the same song can carry a different note in every setlist. On the setlist they show in italics under the song. ## Choose what the setlist shows On the setlist, open the **...** menu and choose **Display**. Switch each one on or off: - **Artist** - **Keys** (with the instrument you read the song on) - **Capo / played key** - **Durations** (only when the setlist has durations turned on) - **Notes** - **Talk time** **Hide all** and **Show all** flip them together. These choices are remembered on this device and apply to every setlist. ## Change the key for one set Every song row can have its own key, for "we play it in A in this set". The song itself keeps its key; only this row moves. **On the setlist** (viewing or editing), click a song row's **key badge**. It turns into a **- key +** stepper: - **-** and **+** move the key a half step. - Click the **key in the middle** to reset it to the song's own key. - Press , or click away, to close it. On the setlist page the change saves right away and needs a connection. In the editor it is saved with the rest of the setlist when you click Save. When a row's key differs from the song's own key, the badge gets a **purple dot**, and its tooltip names the song's key. A song without a key shows the change as a number of half steps, like **+2**. The key belongs to the row, so the same song can sit in two setlists, or two sets, in two different keys. Open a song from the setlist and you read it in that row's key; Play Setlist, the printout and a shared link use it too. ### In your own library In a personal workspace there is only one key to worry about. Open a song from a setlist and the **+** and **-** on the song change the key for this setlist, not the song. A note at the top of the song says so (**Key is set to A in Friday gig. The song is originally in G.**), with a **Reset to G** link to go back to the song's key. Open the same song from your library (the sidebar) and the **+** and **-** change your own key for it, which leaves your setlists alone. ### In a band workspace In a band, the set key is shared: everyone in the band sees the same key on the setlist. - **Only leaders and members can change it**, and only on the setlist rows (viewing or editing). Viewers and guests see the set key but cannot change it. - **The + and - on a song always change your own key, never the band's.** That holds when you opened the song from a setlist too. - **Your own key wins over the set key.** If you chose your own key for a song, you keep reading it in that key in every setlist, even when the band moves it. The setlist row then shows your key with a purple dot and a **Transposed from A** style tooltip, and the song view and Play Mode show a badge like **Transpose -2**: how far your chart sits from the band, so you know what to set on your instrument. - **Reset** on the song puts you back on the band's key. The [band workspace guide](/docs/band-workspace) explains the three keys (band key, set key, your key) in full. ## Play a whole setlist On the setlist, click **Play Setlist** (the play icon on a phone), or press . Play Mode opens on the first song and carries the whole set: - Move between songs with the chevrons, the song counter, a swipe, the arrow keys or a foot pedal. - At the end of a song, a pill offers the **next song**, on a tap or on a countdown. - On a night with more than one set, the counter names the set you are in (**Set 2 · 1/12**), and the end of a set lands on a **Break** screen that names the next set and the song that opens it. **Start Set 2** carries on. Tap a song on the setlist and then open Play Mode, and it carries the set from that song on. Each set's own **Play** button starts the night at that set. Playing more than one device? Turn on [Follow Me](/docs/follow-me) and the tablet on the stand follows your phone, song by song and set by set. The [Play Mode guide](/docs/play-mode) covers auto-scroll, the metronome and everything else on the stage screen. _In a setlist, the counter opens the full song list; the chevrons step through it._ ## Print or export a setlist Open the **...** menu on the setlist and choose **Print & Export** (or press ). Two tabs decide what you get: - **Setlist**: the gig running order, for the floor or the music stand. Choose what it shows (artist, keys, capo, durations, notes, talk time), and with more than one set, **Each set on new page**. - **Chord sheets**: a booklet with every song's full chord sheet. Both use the setlist's keys. See [Printing and exporting](/docs/print-and-export) for the page options and file formats. _A setlist prints either the running order or a booklet of every song's chord sheet._ ## Share a setlist Open the **...** menu and choose **Share** to make a public link. Anyone with it can open the setlist in a browser, no account needed. Two switches decide what else they get: - **Share all songs** lets them open each song and play the set in Play Mode. - **Allow importing setlist** lets them copy the setlist and its songs into their own Fretlist. Shared setlists show the setlist's keys. The full story, including WhatsApp, email and stopping a link, is in [Sharing](/docs/sharing). ## Duplicate, copy songs, delete All three are in the setlist's **...** menu, and in the menu on a setlist in the sidebar. - **Duplicate** makes a copy named **Copy of** the original, with the same sets, songs, notes, talk time and keys, and opens it in the editor. The location and date start empty, ready for the next gig. Cancel the editor and the copy is not kept. - **Delete Setlist** removes the setlist after asking. The songs in it stay in your library. ### Copy songs between setlists **Copy songs** copies every song in the setlist, with its sets, notes, talk time and keys. Open another setlist's editor and choose **Paste songs** from its **...** menu, or press . If that setlist already has songs, choose **Replace all songs**, **Add to existing songs** or **Add as new set**. undoes the paste. ## Find a setlist The **Setlists** tab in the sidebar lists them all. Upcoming gigs come first, soonest at the top, then setlists without a date, then past gigs, most recent first. Once you have past gigs, headers mark **Upcoming**, **No date** and **Past**, and past gigs are dimmed. Search matches the title and the location. ## Offline Setlists sync to your device like your songs. With no connection you can still open every setlist, open its songs, and play the whole set in Play Mode. Creating, editing, sharing, duplicating and deleting setlists, and changing a set's key, need a connection. Printing from the browser's print dialog keeps working. ## In a band A band's setlists are shared with the whole band. Leaders and members can create and edit them; viewers and guests can open and play them. Guests cannot print or export. See [band roles](/docs/band-roles) for the full list, and the [band workspace guide](/docs/band-workspace) for how keys and **Copy to workspace** work. ## Related - [Play Mode](/docs/play-mode): the full-screen stage view a setlist plays in - [Follow Me](/docs/follow-me): one device leads, the others follow - [Printing and exporting](/docs/print-and-export): running orders and chord-sheet booklets - [Sharing](/docs/sharing): public links and importing a shared setlist - [Band workspace](/docs/band-workspace): band key, set key and your own key ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "How to share songs and setlists" description: "Share a song or a whole setlist by link, WhatsApp, or email. Recipients can view, transpose, play, and print it, and import it straight into their own Fretlist." source: "https://fretlist.com/docs/sharing" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Every song and setlist can be shared with a public link. Anyone with the link can open it in their browser, transpose it, play it, and print it, with no account. Turn on import and they can also pull it straight into their own Fretlist, which is how bands keep everyone on the same charts. ## Opening the share dialog Open any song or setlist, then open the **...** menu (the **More actions** button in the action bar) and choose **Share**. There is no separate Share button on the page; it lives in this menu on both songs and setlists. Once sharing is on, the same menu item reads **Shared** instead, with a quick copy-link button on its right so you can grab the link without reopening the dialog. Sharing actions need a connection, so the item is disabled offline. _Open Share from the ... menu on any song or setlist._ ## What's in the share dialog The dialog (titled **Share Song** or **Share Setlist**) opens with a single switch at the top. Turn on **Create share link** and the rest appears: - The **public link** in a read-only field, with a **copy** button beside it. - A **WhatsApp** button that opens a prewritten message with the link. - **New link**, which regenerates the link and retires the old one (see [Manage or stop sharing](#manage-or-stop-sharing)). - **Share via email**: add one or more addresses, an optional short message, then **Send**. Recipients get the link, and optionally a PDF (below). - The import switches at the bottom (see [Let people import it](#let-people-import-it)). _With the link on: copy it, send by WhatsApp, or email it (optionally with the PDF attached)._ ### Attaching a PDF In the email section, tick **Attach PDF** to send a rendered PDF along with the link. It is not a rough export: it is the same styled output the Print & Export window produces, built from your **saved Print & Export settings** (page size, columns, text size, high contrast, and what to include). For a song that is the chord sheet; for a setlist it is the gig running order. Set those defaults once in [Print & Export](/docs/print-and-export) (the **Save as default** button) and every shared PDF follows them. ## Let people import it By default a link is view-only. To let people copy it into their own library, turn on the import switch near the bottom of the dialog. **For a song:** turn on **Allow import** ("Let viewers add this to their own Fretlist"). **For a setlist** there are two separate switches, and they do different things: - **Share all songs** makes every song in the setlist individually viewable, so recipients can open and play each one on the shared page (this is also what unlocks Play Mode for them). It does not affect importing. - **Allow importing setlist** ("Let viewers copy this setlist and its songs into their Fretlist") lets people copy the whole setlist, with its songs, into their own Fretlist. Importing works even if you have not turned on Share all songs. _A setlist has two switches: Share all songs (individual viewing) and Allow importing setlist (copying)._ ## What people can do with a shared link No account is needed to view. On a shared page, anyone can: - **Read the chord sheet** in your chosen view. - **Transpose and capo** a shared song on the fly, without changing your original. - **Open Play Mode** for a full-screen, stage-ready view. For a setlist, Play Mode appears once you have turned on **Share all songs**. - **Print or export** the song, or the setlist's running order. - **Import it** into their own Fretlist, if you allowed it (a free account is needed to import). ## Import a shared song or setlist This is the band flow: you share, your bandmates import, everyone has the same charts. Recipients open the link, then: - **A shared song:** open the **...** menu on the shared page and choose **Add to library**. If they already have that song, a banner reads "This song is already in your Fretlist" with a link to open their copy. - **A shared setlist:** use **Import setlist and songs**, in the **...** menu and in a card below the setlist titled "Add this setlist to your Fretlist." One click rebuilds the whole setlist in their library, with the sets, order, keys, and capos intact. _Bandmates import the whole setlist from the shared page in one click._ If someone is not signed in when they import, they are sent to sign in or create a free account, then brought right back and the import finishes on its own. ### Songs you already have are reused When someone imports a setlist, Fretlist checks each song against what they already own. Songs they have are reused, not duplicated. Only the missing ones get copied in. Matching is the same smart matching the bulk importer uses, so small differences like a leading track number, an accent, or a "chords" label still count as the same song. You stay in control per song: if you turn off import on an individual song, it is skipped when someone imports the setlist (unless they already own it). ### Re-importing If someone imports a setlist they already have (same title and date), Fretlist asks first with a **You already have this setlist** prompt. They can **Open existing** to jump to their copy, or **Import a copy** to bring in a fresh one. No accidental duplicates. ## Manage or stop sharing Reopen the dialog from the **...** menu (it now reads **Shared**) any time: - **New link** generates a fresh link and immediately stops the old one from working. Use it if a link has spread further than you wanted. - Turning the top switch **off** disables sharing. For a setlist that has shared songs, Fretlist asks whether to also unshare those songs (an **Also unshare N songs** checkbox) before it turns the link off. ## Working offline Sharing needs a connection. The Share menu item and everything in the dialog (creating a link, WhatsApp, email, New link, the import switches) are disabled offline. Viewing and importing a shared page also need a connection. ## Related - [Printing and exporting](/docs/print-and-export) - [Organizing songs with folders](/docs/folders) ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "Organizing songs with folders" description: "Group your songs into folders, move them individually or in bulk, and import directly into a folder. Drag-and-drop on desktop, long-press on mobile." source: "https://fretlist.com/docs/folders" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Folders let you group songs by project, genre, band, or whatever works for your library. They sit in your song list alongside unfoldered songs. Each song can belong to one folder at most. _Creating a folder, moving songs into it, and navigating back to the main library._ ## Creating a folder Click the **+** button above the song list and choose **New folder**. Type a name, then tap **Create** or press Enter. The folder appears immediately. You can also open the **+** dropdown in the top bar and pick **New folder** from there, or create a folder on the fly when moving a song (see below). _Creating a new folder from the + button above the song list._ ## Adding songs to a folder ### Drag a song Grab any song row and drop it onto a folder. The folder highlights as you drag over it. If you have songs checked in bulk select mode, dragging any one of them moves the whole selection. {/* TODO: video, dragging a song from the list onto a folder row */} ### From the ... menu Open the **...** menu on any song (in the song list, the song view, or the editor) and choose **Move to**. Pick a folder from the panel that slides open, or choose **New folder** to create one on the spot. The song moves immediately and the sidebar opens the destination folder. {/* TODO: video, opening the ... menu on a song and using Move to */} ### Bulk select and move Open the **...** menu on any song and choose **Select**. This enters bulk select mode with that song already checked. The bulk toolbar appears at the top of the list. Tap more checkboxes to add songs to the selection, or hold **Shift** and click to select a range. Open **Move to** in the toolbar and pick a folder, or choose **New folder** to create one. All selected songs move at once and the sidebar navigates into the destination. _Using Select from the ... menu to enter bulk mode, then moving multiple songs to a folder using the Move to button in the bulk toolbar._ On mobile, tap and hold a song row to open its menu, then choose **Select**. ## Navigating folders Click any folder to open it. The folder view shows only the songs inside. Click the **back arrow** in the folder header to return to the main library. If you navigate to a song that lives in a folder, the sidebar opens that folder for you automatically. ## Renaming and deleting **Desktop:** right-click the folder header to open a menu with Rename and Delete options. **Mobile:** long-press the folder title. _Right-click on desktop or long-press on mobile to rename or delete a folder._ Deleting a folder does not delete its songs. They move back to the main library automatically. ## Bulk delete Select songs with checkboxes and tap the **trash icon** in the bulk toolbar. A confirmation dialog shows the count before anything is removed. Deleted songs cannot be recovered. ## Importing into a folder The import preflight screen has a **Add to folder** picker. Choose an existing folder or create a new one. All successfully imported songs land there. {/* TODO: video, choosing a destination folder in the import preflight screen */} You can also drag files directly onto a folder row to import them straight into that folder, skipping the picker. ## Folders in a backup A Fretlist Backup (Settings, then **Export Backup**) carries your folders along with your songs and setlists. Restore it and every song goes back into the folder it came from, by name. If a folder with that name already exists in the library you are restoring into, the songs join it rather than creating a second one. If you pick a folder in the **Add to folder** picker while restoring a backup, that choice only applies to songs that were not in any folder. Songs that had a folder keep it. Backups taken before September 2026 do not carry folders. Restoring one of those puts every song in the root, or in the folder you pick. ## Search and filters Searching or applying a filter flattens the view: all matching songs appear in one list regardless of which folder they belong to. A small badge next to each song name shows which folder it lives in. _Searching your library shows matching songs from all folders. Each result shows its folder name as a small badge._ Clear the search to return to the folder view. ## Related - [Getting the most out of Frets](/docs/getting-the-most-out-of-frets) - [How to migrate from OnSong](/docs/import-from-onsong) - [How to migrate from SongbookPro](/docs/import-from-songbookpro) ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "Band roles: Leader, Member, Viewer, and Guest" description: "Every bandmate you invite gets a role that sets what they can do, from full control to view-only on stage. Here's what each role can and can't do, and how many of you fit." source: "https://fretlist.com/docs/band-roles" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── > **Bands is open by request until 1 November.** Anyone can join a band they are invited to. To start your own, and I'll set you up. From 1 November, anyone can start a band. When you invite someone to a band, you give them a role. The role decides what they can do with the band's songs and setlists. The roles form a simple ladder: each step down removes one ability. ## The four roles **Leader** is the band's owner. Full control: invite and remove members, change roles, rename the band, and delete it. A band has exactly one leader. To hand it over, the leader transfers ownership to someone else. **Member** is your working bandmates. They can create and edit songs and setlists, and copy the band's content out (export files, or **Copy to workspace** into their own library). They can't manage members. **Viewer** is read-only access. Viewers see every song and setlist and can use Play Mode, and they can copy content out via export or **Copy to workspace**, but they can't make changes. **Guest** is for a session player sitting in on a gig. Guests can view songs and setlists and use Play Mode on stage, but they can't edit anything and can't copy the band's content out. ## What each role can do Two things sit outside this ladder: - **Personal layers are for everyone.** Every role, including guests, sets their own capo, instrument, transpose, and private notes on the band's songs. That is a reading preference, not an edit. See [the band workspace guide](/docs/band-workspace). - **A band on hold overrides edit.** If a band is on hold, editing pauses for every role until it is back. Reading, Play Mode, and your own personal setup keep working. [What a band on hold means](/docs/band-workspace#if-a-band-is-on-hold). ## How many people fit A band holds **15 people, you included**, whatever mix of roles they are. Guests and viewers take a place the same as members do. That covers a four-piece with a sound engineer and a couple of deps several times over. If you are running something bigger, a choir, a big band, a rotating pool of session players, mail [hello@fretlist.com](mailto:hello@fretlist.com) and I will sort something out for you. The count is checked when someone accepts, so sending a sixteenth invite works and the accept is what tells them the band is full. Remove someone who has moved on and the place frees up immediately. ## Changing someone's role Open **Settings → Band → Members**. As the leader, you can change any member's role from the dropdown next to their name, or remove them from the band. To make someone the new leader, open their menu and choose **Make owner**. That hands over full control and steps you down to Member, so do it only when you mean it. ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "Playing together in a band workspace" description: "How a band shares one library while everyone keeps their own capo, instrument, and key. The Band panel, set keys, private notes, and what happens when the leader leaves." source: "https://fretlist.com/docs/band-workspace" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── > **Bands is open by request until 1 November.** Anyone can join a band they are invited to. To start your own, and I'll set you up. From 1 November, anyone can start a band. A band workspace is one shared library. Everyone sees the same songs and setlists, but each member reads them their own way: their own capo, their own instrument, their own transpose. ## The Band panel Open any song in a band and you get a **Band** panel: the right sidebar on desktop, the **Band** pill in the song header on phone and tablet. One line per bandmate, calling out only what differs from the song as saved: an instrument badge (**Guitar (½ down)** when the tuning is not standard) and a **Capo II** chip only when a capo is on. Your own line also shows the chord shapes you play, when they differ from the band key. It updates live, and someone who has set nothing up just shows their name and instrument. Instruments come from **Settings → Instruments**, so nobody is assumed to play guitar. A drummer or vocalist gets the song without chord diagrams or capo. _The Band panel: who plays what on this song._ A purple dot means their setup sounds in a different key than the band key, and the tooltip spells it out: "Sounds in D (band key C#)". Tuning counts, so capo II with C shapes on a guitar tuned a half step down sounds in C# and gets no dot against a C# band key. Set your **Tuning** under **Settings** so the panel reads you right. ## Setting who plays what Every member has their own order of instruments in the band. The first one is their **Main** here, shown in teal, and every song shows its chord diagrams unless they picked something else for that song. Someone who plays bass here and ukulele in another band gets the right shapes in both. Drag your own instrument chips in the **Band** card on the dashboard (or under **Settings → Band → Members**) to change the order, or tap one to make it your Main. The leader can do the same for anyone in the band. Only the member can add, remove or change their instruments, in **Settings → Instruments**. Your own line carries the teal edge. Every line has a **...** menu (on hover on desktop, always visible in the sheet) holding two things: that person's own instruments, ticked on the one they are on for this song, and **Remove from song** / **Add to song**. A line that is off goes dim and reads **Not on this song**. In is always the default. _Each line's menu sets what that person plays, and whether they play this one._ ## Who edits what Roles gate the band's content ([see band roles](/docs/band-roles)), but personal layers work differently: - **Your own setup and notes are always yours.** Every role, guests included. - **Anyone who can edit the band's songs can set anyone's part.** Leaders and members use the **...** menu on any line. Handy for setting up the bass player's chart before rehearsal. Last change wins. - **Viewers and guests** set their own instrument from their own line, never someone else's. - **Capo and transpose stay personal.** Nobody sets a bandmate's capo or transpose, whatever their role. A setlist's key is the exception: it is shared, see below. Your own instrument works offline. Anything on someone else's line needs a connection. ## Band key, set key, your key A song has three keys: 1. **Band key**: the song's stored key, the reference everyone shares. 2. **Set key**: the key a setlist plays it in, for "we play it in A in this set." Shared with the whole band. 3. **Your key**: your own transpose, visible only to you. Which one you see depends on where you opened the song: - **From a setlist**, you see the set key, unless you chose your own key. - **From your library** (the sidebar), you see your own key. The **+** and **-** on a song are always yours: they change the key you read, never the band's, also when you opened the song from a setlist. The band's key for a set is changed on the setlist itself (below). **Your own key wins.** Once you choose your own key for a song, you keep reading it in that key, in every setlist, even when the band moves it. That includes the song's original key: a keyboard player can step the band's A back to G, keep the chords they know, and set the difference on the instrument. The song view and Play Mode show that difference as a badge, like **Transpose -2**: your chart sits 2 semitones below the band. On the setlist, that song's key badge shows your key with a purple dot. Reset puts you back on the band's key. When you are on your own key, the reset button says where it goes back to: **Back to the band's key (A)**. Your first transpose on a band song reminds you once that the band still sees the original key. To set the band's key for a set, click a song row's key badge on the setlist, viewing or editing, and it morphs into a **- key +** stepper. Click the center key to reset, to close. Changing a set key is for leaders and members, and it needs a connection. Viewers and guests see the set key but cannot change it. _Click a setlist row's key badge to set the key for that set._ The set key is shared, and prints and exports carry it. The same song can sit in two setlists in two keys: the setlist printout and the band panel use the key of the setlist you came from, and so do the setlist rows, the song view and **Play Setlist** unless you have your own key. ### Who changes what | You want to | Where | Who | |---|---|---| | Play a song in another key for one set, for the whole band | The song's key badge on the setlist (view or edit) | Leaders and members | | Read a song in your own key, in every setlist | **+** and **-** on the song, from a setlist or your library | Everyone, guests included | | Change the song's key for good | The song editor (**Transpose** or **Only change the key**) | Leaders and members | | Play with a capo without changing the key | The capo on the song | Everyone, just for you | ### Common questions **The band plays a song in A, but my chart shows G. Why?** You chose your own key for this song, and your own key wins over the set key. The **Transpose -2** badge says how far your chart sits from the band. Press reset on the song to follow the band's key again. **I'm the keyboard player. Can I keep the original chords when the band moves a song up?** Yes. Open the song from the setlist and step the key back to the original with **-**. Your chart keeps the chords you know, the badge shows the difference (for example **Transpose -2**), and you set that difference on your keyboard's own transpose. When the band moves the song again, your chart stays put and only the badge changes. **I pressed + on a song in our setlist and nobody else's chart changed.** That is right: **+** and **-** on a song only change your own key. To change the key for the whole band, use the song's key badge on the setlist itself. **Can a band leader read a song in their own key too?** Yes. The leader changes the band's key on the setlist rows, and their own key on the song, like everyone else. **What does the purple dot on a setlist key mean?** That the key shown is not the song's stored key: either the set plays it in another key, or you are on your own key. Hover it to see which. **I'm not in a band. What do + and - do on a song opened from a setlist?** They change that setlist's key for the song, because there is no band to differ from. In your library they change your own key. ## Where else purple shows up Purple always means one thing: a value differs from the reference it is measured against. On a setlist row it is the key you read against the song's stored key, or your own key against the set's; a capo alone never triggers it, because a capo does not change the sounding key. ## My notes Every song in a band has a **My notes** block below the chord sheet, private to you whatever your bandmates' roles. They show read-only in Play Mode, where the **My notes** switch hides them. Setlists don't show notes. ## Switching workspaces Your name at the bottom of the sidebar opens your menu, with the workspace switcher inside it. Each device remembers its own choice, so switching on your phone leaves your laptop where it was. New songs, imports and folders go into the workspace that device is in. ## Copy or move between workspaces Bringing your whole personal library in is one step: on a new band's dashboard, **Import your personal library** copies or moves everything, folders included. Song by song, the **...** menu has **Copy to workspace** (an independent copy, everyone but guests) and **Move to workspace** (leader-only, since it moves the song out for everyone). Moving always asks first, naming who loses what and warning when the song will drop out of setlists here. Moving a setlist takes its songs. Both need a connection. _Moving warns you by name before anything is deleted._ Copy a setlist into a workspace that already has songs with the same titles and a **Review matching titles** step lets you link to the existing versions or copy yours as new. No accidental duplicates. ## What a band costs Nothing until 1 November. Bands are free during Early Access: no card, nothing to choose. From 1 November, the Bands plan is €7 a month or €58 a year for the whole band. Your members pay nothing. Signed up before 1 November? Subscribe by 1 December and you pay half price for life: €3.50 a month or €29 a year. You will not lose anything either way. A band holds 15 people including you; [Band roles](/docs/band-roles#how-many-people-fit) has the detail. ## If a band is on hold A band on hold is read-only: nobody can add or change songs, and everyone sees a banner saying so. You can still read everything, play every setlist, and edit your own setup and notes. It happens one way: the leader stepped away and left it on hold. Nothing disappears, and they can still hand it over or delete it. _A band on hold is read-only, never gone._ ## If the leader leaves A band always has exactly one leader, so a leader can't just walk out. **Settings → Band → Leave band** offers two paths: - **Hand over and leave**: pick a new leader, they take over, you leave. - **Put on hold and step away**: the band goes read-only and you keep the leader role, so you can hand it over or delete it later. Everyone else leaves directly with **Leave band**. Leaving or being removed takes your own setup and notes for that band's songs with you; the band's songs and setlists stay untouched. ## FAQ **Can we track who sings lead or who sits a song out?** Not yet. Per-song role tracking for larger bands is on the radar. If your band needs it, tell me at [hello@fretlist.com](mailto:hello@fretlist.com). ## Related - [Band roles: Leader, Member, Viewer, and Guest](/docs/band-roles) - [Play Mode](/docs/play-mode) - [Printing and exporting](/docs/print-and-export) ## Blog ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "How to transpose chords with a capo (plus a capo chart)" description: "How to transpose chords with a capo: what each fret does to the key, a capo chart for common chord shapes, and how to move a song without one." source: "https://fretlist.com/blog/transpose-chords-with-capo" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── A song is written in a key. Your voice has a comfortable range of its own. Very often the two don't line up, and that is completely normal. The good news is that a guitar gives you an easy way to move a song: a capo. This post explains how to transpose chords with a capo, with a chart you can keep next to you, and what to do when a capo isn't the answer. I love playing with a capo, especially when I'm writing. Sometimes a song just won't click. Then I clip on a capo, my voice suddenly sits right on every note, and the song is there. On my nylon-string it's even better: fingerpicked high notes with a capo on have such a soothing sound. Jason Mraz, my biggest inspiration, wrote some of his finest songs with a capo. That's how I got into it. Try it before you read on. This is a song in A, with the same controls as in Fretlist. Pick **II** under **Capo** and watch the chords and the diagrams change to G shapes: The rest of this post explains what just happened, and how to work it out without an app. ## How do you transpose chords with a capo? A capo clamps every string at one fret. Each fret is one semitone (a half step). So the shapes you play stay the same, but the whole song sounds higher by one semitone per fret. That gives you one simple rule: **The key you hear = the shapes you play + the capo fret.** Play G shapes with the capo on fret 2 and the song sounds in A. G, C and D become A, D and E to the listener, while your fingers still make G, C and D. The chromatic scale is the ladder you count on. Every step is one fret: C, C#/Db, D, D#/Eb, E, F, F#/Gb, G, G#/Ab, A, A#/Bb, B, and back to C. To find where a capo should go, count the steps from the shapes you want to play up to the key you want to hear. From G up to A is two steps (G to G#, G# to A), so the capo goes on fret 2. ## A capo chart for the common chord shapes Most players stick to five open shapes: C, A, G, E and D. Find the shape you want to play in the top row, go down to the capo fret, and read the key the song will sound in.
Capo fretC shapesA shapesG shapesE shapesD shapes
No capoCAGED
1DbBbAbFEb
2DBAF#E
3EbCBbGF
4EDbBAbF#
5FDCAG
6F#EbDbBbAb
7GEDBA
Minor shapes work the same way. Am shapes with the capo on fret 2 sound as Bm. Em shapes on fret 3 sound as Gm. > Got a song you play with a capo? Open it in Fretlist, pick the fret under **Capo**, and the chords change to the shapes you play. [Try it on your own songs](/). ## Which capo fret should I use for a song? Read the chart the other way round. Find the key the song is in, and every cell with that key is an option. A song in Eb, for example, has three easy ways in: - D shapes with the capo on fret 1 - C shapes with the capo on fret 3 - A shapes with the capo on fret 6 They all sound in the same key, but they don't sound the same. A capo high up the neck gives a brighter, thinner sound. A capo low down keeps more of the guitar's body. Pick the shapes you play best, then let your ear choose between the options. There is one thing worth knowing before you put the capo on: it only moves a song up. If a song sits too high for you, a capo can't bring it down. For that, you transpose the chords themselves. ## How do you transpose chords without a capo? Move every chord by the same number of semitones, using the same ladder as above. Up two steps, a song in G goes like this: - G becomes A - C becomes D - D becomes E - Em becomes F#m The chord quality stays as it was. A minor chord stays minor, a 7 stays a 7. Only the letter at the front moves. In a slash chord like G/B, both letters move: up two steps it becomes A/C#. This is the way to go down in key, and it is the only way on instruments without a capo, like keys and bass. It is also how you get a song into a key that the band, or another singer, wants to play it in. > Need a song lower? In Fretlist, press **-** next to the key and every chord moves with it. [Move your own songs](/). ## Letting Fretlist do the counting Counting semitones is a good skill to have, but on a busy rehearsal evening I'd rather not do it for every song. So Fretlist has both controls on every song, side by side. **Transpose** is the **-** and **+** pair around the key. Each press moves every chord in the sheet one semitone, and the key in the middle updates with it. Use it when you want the song to *sound* in a different key. **Capo** is the dropdown next to it. Pick a fret and Fretlist rewrites the chords into the shapes you play at that fret, while the song keeps its key. A song in A with the capo on fret 2 shows G shapes, and the badge above the sheet reads **Capo II (G)**: capo on fret 2, playing G shapes. The two don't mix, on purpose. If you have transposed a song and then reach for the capo, Fretlist asks first: "Reset transpose to change capo?" The same goes the other way round. That way it is always clear which of the two moved the song. Here's the demo again, now that you know what each control does. Pick **II** under **Capo**, then press **+**: Fretlist asks before it swaps one for the other. A few more things that help: - **Sharps or flats.** The ♯/♭ button switches the spelling, so you can read Bb instead of A#, or the other way round. - **It's remembered per song.** Your transpose and capo are saved for that song on your account, so they come back when you open it again, on your other devices too. The song itself isn't changed. - **It follows the instrument.** Guitar, ukulele, mandolin and banjo get a capo. Keys and bass don't get a capo control, because they don't use one. You set what you play in [your instruments](/docs/instruments). - **Play Mode shows it too.** The capo badge comes along when you open a song in [Play Mode](/blog/play-mode-play-along-with-chord-sheets), so you see where the capo goes before the song starts. With [Frets](/blog/introducing-frets-fretlists-new-chord-diagram-feature) on, the chord diagrams show the shapes you are playing. And when you want a song in a new key for good, change the key in the song editor. Fretlist asks what you mean: **Transpose** every chord to the new key, or **Only change the key** and leave the chords as they are. The [song editor guide](/docs/song-editor) has the details. > Want to try it on your own songs? The transpose and capo controls are on every song in Fretlist. [Start with Fretlist](/). ## The short version - A capo raises a song one semitone per fret. The key you hear = the shapes you play + the capo fret. - Use the chart to find a capo fret for any key, and choose between options by ear. - To go down in key, or on keys and bass, transpose the chords themselves: move every letter by the same number of steps. Whatever key your voice likes, there is a way to get the song there. Have fun finding yours. ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "Bands are coming to Fretlist: a setlist app for the whole band" description: "A setlist app for bands, where everyone keeps their own key, capo and notes. Open by request now, and for every band from 1 November." source: "https://fretlist.com/blog/fretlist-for-bands" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Fretlist started as a band tool. For a couple of years I played with my buddy Ruud. We kept our songs on a WordPress site we built ourselves, and for every song we noted who played what: guitar or uke, capo or not. Each of us had our own view of the same song. That idea became the foundation of Fretlist for Bands. It has been the point on the horizon since the day I started building this. I wrote more about those early days in [why I built Fretlist](/blog/why-i-built-fretlist). Then Fretlist grew into an app for one musician at a time. Today it goes back to where it started. **Bands are coming to Fretlist**, and you can before everyone else. > **Fretlist for Bands is open by request until 1 November.** Leave your email and I'll set your band up. > > ## A setlist app for bands A band in Fretlist is one shared library. The songs and setlists live in one place, and everyone in the band opens the same ones on their own phone, tablet or laptop. What makes it work is what stays your own: - **Your own key.** The song keeps the band's key. Press + or - and only your chart moves. The rest of the band still sees the key it was in. - **Your own capo and instrument.** The guitarist reads it with a capo on the second fret. The bass player reads it without one. The singer gets the song without chord diagrams. - **Your own notes.** Every song in a band has a **My notes** block. Only you see it, whatever role your bandmates have. Your notes also show in Play Mode. The band also gets a key of its own for each set. "We play it in A tonight" is set once on the setlist, and the whole band reads it that way. If you chose your own key for that song, you keep it. Play Mode shows the difference with a badge, like **Transpose -2**. And there is a **Band** panel on every song. One line per bandmate, with their instrument and capo, so you see at a glance who plays what before you count in. Micha, who plays in a band, put it like this: > "Very cool to have the personal notes option in a band. This is something I always missed on SongbookPro." ## One device leads, the whole band follows On stage, a band needs one more thing: everyone on the same song. That is what **Follow Me** does. Turn it on, press Play, and every bandmate with the band open follows you: the same setlist, the same song. Move to the next song and the whole band moves with you. Start auto-scroll and everyone scrolls along, paced so every sheet reaches the bottom at the same moment, even with bigger text or a smaller screen. Following doesn't take anything away. Each device keeps its own capo, text size and chord diagrams. A bandmate can glance ahead at the next song and tap **Rejoin** to catch up. And when a set ends, the whole band lands on the **Break** screen together, until whoever is leading taps **Start Set 2**. The band leader and members can lead. Viewers and guests follow along. It needs an internet connection on each device, and a phone hotspot is enough. The [Follow Me guide](/docs/follow-me) has the details. ## Getting your band in Starting a band takes one step for your songs: on the new band's dashboard, **Import your personal library** copies or moves everything you already have, folders included. Then you invite your bandmates by email. A band holds up to 15 people, including you. Your bandmates pay nothing. They join with a free account and see every song and setlist the band has. Everyone you invite gets a role: Leader, Member, Viewer or Guest. A guest is for a session player sitting in on a gig: they read every song and use Play Mode, but can't edit anything or copy the songs out. The [band roles guide](/docs/band-roles) shows who can do what. ## Open by request now, for everyone on 1 November Right now Bands is open to a first group, by request. You ask, I set you up, and you get started. During Early Access it costs nothing: no card, nothing to choose. On 1 November, Fretlist gets paid plans and Bands opens for everyone. Bands is €58 a year (or €7 a month) for the whole band, not per person. The [pricing post](/blog/fretlist-pricing) has the full picture. **Here is the part that matters if you're reading this before 1 November.** Everyone who signs up before 1 November is an Early Access user. Early Access users get **half price for life** on any plan: Bands for €29 a year, if you subscribe by 1 December. That rate stays yours for as long as you use Fretlist. So if you play in a band and you have been meaning to try Fretlist, this is the month to do it. > **Two steps, both free.** [Create your account](/app/login?claim=earlyaccess) before 1 November to lock in Early Access. Then and I'll set your band up. ## What stays the same If you play on your own, nothing changes for you. Your personal library stays yours, and every plan has every feature. A band is something you add, not something you have to move into. I've been looking forward to this one for a long time. A band of two in a WordPress site turned into this. I can't wait to see what your bands do with it. Dear John ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "Fretlist gets paid plans on 1 November. Here's what changes, and what doesn't" description: "Free stays free with 50 songs and 3 setlists. Pro is €24 a year, Bands €58 for the whole band. Early Access users get half price for life." source: "https://fretlist.com/blog/fretlist-pricing" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Nine months ago I posted "I built a thing for musicians" and 35 people signed up overnight. Today there are over 500 of you, and on 1 November Fretlist gets a price. Before anything else, the sentence I've been promising since April. **You keep what you have.** Every song, every setlist, every note. Nothing gets hidden, locked or taken away, whatever plan you're on. A plan only ever limits how much more you can add. ## The plans **Free.** 50 songs, 3 setlists, every feature. Offline, Play Mode, chord diagrams, print, export, all of it. Not a demo. The real app with a smaller shelf. **Pro.** Unlimited songs and setlists. €24 a year, or €3 a month. That's €2 a month for the whole thing. **Bands.** One shared library for the whole band. You set up the songs and setlists, every member sees them on their own device with their own capo, instrument and notes on top. €58 a year for the whole band, up to 15 members, and members pay nothing. Your own Pro is included. Each extra band you lead is half price. The full picture is on the [pricing page](/#pricing). ## If you signed up before 1 November You were here during Early Access, and I said early users would get a fair deal. Here it is: **half price on any plan, for as long as you use Fretlist.** Pro at €12 a year. Bands at €29. Upgrade any time between 1 November and 1 December and that rate is yours for good, including bands you start later. After 1 December the offer closes and the price is the price. Early Birds: your Pro stays free, as promised. Bands is half price for you too. ## If you're over 50 songs today Nothing changes on 1 November. You keep the lot. You'll only meet the paywall the day you go to add song 51, and by then you'll know whether Fretlist has earned it. ## Why a subscription A few of you asked me this in April, and it deserves a straight answer. A one-off fee means building on money that was spent years ago. That's how apps stop getting updates, stop answering emails, and slowly stop working when the operating system moves on. I want to still be building this in five years. Every fix I've shipped since you signed up, every reply within a day, every feature that came out of a bug report, came from having the time to do it. A small yearly fee from the people who use Fretlist the most is what keeps that going. And it's small on purpose. €2 a month for Pro. Less than €5 a month for a whole band. And every plan has every feature. ## What stays true - Every plan has every feature. Free is not a crippled version. - Your data is always yours. Export everything, any format, any time. - No lock-in. If Fretlist stops being right for you, you take it all with you. - Nothing you already have is ever hidden or removed. That's the deal I said I'd make. Thank you for being here for the free part. It's why there's a paid part. Dear John ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "What "ChordPro support" really means (and where it gets hard)" description: "Almost every chord app supports ChordPro. But ChordPro is bigger than inline chords and a few directives. Here is the full picture, tier by tier, including where Fretlist itself still has gaps." source: "https://fretlist.com/blog/what-true-chordpro-support-means" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Open the feature list of almost any chord-sheet app and you will find the same two words: "ChordPro support." It is table stakes now, and honestly that is a good thing. [ChordPro](https://www.chordpro.org) is an open, plain-text standard, and the more apps that read it, the safer your library is. But "supports ChordPro" covers a lot of ground, because ChordPro is a bigger format than most people realize. Inline chords are the part everyone knows. The spec goes a long way past that, and how far an app follows it varies. That is not a scandal, most apps implement what their users actually paste in. It is just worth understanding, especially if you are about to move a whole library across and want to know what will survive the trip. So here is the full picture, tier by tier, including the parts Fretlist does well and the parts it still doesn't. I have spent a long time on Fretlist's ChordPro handling, so I will be specific. ## Tier 1: inline chords The core of ChordPro is one idea: chord names go inline with the lyrics, in square brackets, at the exact spot the chord should sound. ```chordpro [G]Hello [D]darkness my [Em]old [C]friend ``` Every app that reads ChordPro handles this, and any file that only uses inline chords renders the same everywhere. If you want the full syntax walk-through, I wrote a [complete ChordPro guide](/blog/chordpro-complete-guide) separately. Tier 1 is not where apps differ. The rest is. ## Tier 2: directives and metadata Next come directives, the `{curly brace}` tags that carry metadata and structure: ```chordpro {title: Sound of Silence} {artist: Simon & Garfunkel} {key: Em} {capo: 2} ``` The common ones are widely read. The long tail is where it gets patchy: `{composer}`, `{lyricist}`, `{subtitle}`, comment styles like `comment_box` and `comment_italic`, and the ALL-CAPS titles some exports produce. Fretlist splits a combined `{title: SONG - Artist}` into a real title and artist, title-cases shouty exports, and keeps the comment styles instead of flattening them. Small things, but they add up to a clean import versus an afternoon of fixups. ## Tier 3: environments ChordPro marks *sections*, using environments: a start directive, some lines, an end directive. ```chordpro {start_of_verse} [Em]Hello [D]darkness my [Em]old friend {end_of_verse} {start_of_tab} e|-----------------| B|-----------------| G|-------------0-2-| D|-----0-2-4-------| A|-0-3-------------| E|-----------------| {end_of_tab} ``` Verse, chorus, bridge, tab. The interesting question is whether an app keeps the structure or just reads the label. A tab environment, for instance, only works if the columns stay aligned and a chord line above the tab merges with it. And there is a second half people forget: **support is not just reading, it is writing.** An app that imports `{start_of_verse}` but exports plain text has lost the structure, and your library degrades a little every round trip. Fretlist keeps the environments intact both directions, labels and all. ## Tier 4: the grid environment Here is the part that got me into this. ChordPro has a grid environment for charting a song as bars and chords with no lyrics, the way a lead sheet works: ```chordpro {start_of_grid label="Outro" shape="1+4x2+1"} A |: C . | F G | Am7 F | Dm . :| Volta 1 |1 C7 . | C . :| Volta 2 |2 G7 . | C . | {end_of_grid} ``` Read it closely. There is a repeat (`|:` … `:|`), two chords in one bar (`F G`), first and second endings (the `|1` and `|2` voltas), a section label on the left margin, and empty beats marked with dots. This is real musical notation living in a plain-text file, and it is genuinely harder to render than lyrics with chords over them. Fretlist draws it: bars, repeats, first and second endings, the `%` simile for "repeat the previous bar," strum-pattern rows, split bars, in your choice of a flat or a filled-panel look. It transposes with the song and reads big in Play Mode on stage. You can [see it rendering on the homepage](https://fretlist.com). If you work with instrumentals or jazz charts, the grid environment is the tier worth checking before you commit to any app. ## Tier 5: chord definitions The deepest part of the spec: ChordPro can define chord *shapes*, not just names, with `{define}`. ```chordpro {define: Am7 base-fret 1 frets x 0 2 0 1 0} ``` That is a full fingering. Handling it well means rendering it as an actual chord diagram, respecting `{instrument: ukulele}` for instruments with different shapes, and writing your custom voicings back out as `{define}` on export so they survive. Fretlist does this, wired into the whole app: tap a chord, flip through voicings, type your own fret notation, and the diagram follows the song's transpose and capo. I wrote about [how Frets works](/blog/introducing-frets-fretlists-new-chord-diagram-feature) when it shipped. ## Where Fretlist still has gaps I would rather tell you this than have you find it in an import. ChordPro has corners Fretlist does not fully handle yet: - **Embedded music notation.** ChordPro can embed ABC and LilyPond scores between their own directives. Fretlist does not render these as a staff yet. On import the whole block is kept exactly as written, and the song shows a short note where it sits. If your charts carry melody lines as embedded notation, you won't see them in Fretlist, but they survive a round trip and export. - **Embedded images.** The `{image}` directive is not drawn yet, but like the notation blocks it is kept in the file, so it survives a round trip and export. - **Custom fonts, sizes, and colors.** Directives like `{textfont}`, `{chordsize}`, and `{textcolour}` are ignored on purpose. Fretlist applies its own consistent typography and theming across your whole library, which is usually what people want, but it does mean a file hand-styled with specific fonts and colors will look like Fretlist, not like the original. - **Multi-column page layouts.** `{columns}` and `{column_break}` collapse to a single reflowing column that adapts to the screen you are on, rather than a fixed print-style multi-column page. The thread through most of those: when Fretlist cannot render something, it preserves it rather than dropping it. Custom fonts, layout directives, the `{image}` tag and embedded ABC and LilyPond notation all survive a round trip untouched. Your file comes out the other side whole, even the parts we do not draw yet. ## Test any app in thirty seconds You do not have to take my word for any of this, including the good parts. Copy the snippet below and paste it into any app that reads ChordPro, Fretlist included, and watch where each one stops: It is one ordinary line followed by four things apps quietly disagree on: a grid with a repeat and first and second endings, a strum-pattern row, and a chord definition. The first line renders everywhere. After that, watch closely. If the grid draws as a chart, the strum row shows arrows, and the `{define}` becomes a diagram, that app follows the format a long way up. If those come in as literal text, it covers the common subset, which may be all you need. Either answer is useful. The point is to know before you move your library, not after. For the record, Fretlist draws every line of that snippet. That is the bar I hold it to. Your chord sheets will outlive whichever app you use this year. That is the whole reason ChordPro exists as an open standard, and it is the standard Fretlist tries to honor as fully as it can, gaps and all. > Want to see where Fretlist lands? [Try it free](https://fretlist.com) and bring your whole ChordPro library, grids, chord shapes, and all. ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "Six months of Fretlist, by the numbers" description: "Six months in: 18,000 songs on Fretlist, 94% of them imported from other apps, and how musicians actually use Play Mode, the metronome, and more." source: "https://fretlist.com/blog/fretlist-by-the-numbers" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── I build Fretlist on my own. It's a chord sheet and setlist app for gigging musicians: store your chord charts, transpose to any key, organize setlists, and pull them up offline on stage, on any device. After six months of building steadily, I pulled these numbers together the other day, and honestly, they made me a little proud. So I figured I would share them. (All figures are as of July 2026.) ## The library so far Across everyone using Fretlist, there are now **over 18,000 songs** and **384 setlists** built for gigs and rehearsals. Here is the number that stopped me: **94% of those songs were imported** from other apps. Roughly 17,000 of them came in from [OnSong](/docs/import-from-onsong), [SongbookPro](/docs/import-from-songbookpro), [Chordie](/docs/import-from-chordie) and [Ultimate Guitar](/docs/import-from-ultimate-guitar), plus ChordPro files, PDFs and plain text. Musicians are not adding a song here and there. They are moving whole chord sheet libraries across, sometimes hundreds at a time. That tells me something I care about. Switching apps is a pain, and if people are willing to bring their entire catalog, the import has to be genuinely good. It is the part of Fretlist I have spent the most time on, for exactly that reason. ## How musicians actually use it The features that get used most are the ones built for the moment you are actually playing. - **Play Mode** is where most musicians live, on stage and in rehearsal. **87%** of active players run their songs straight from Fretlist: full-screen, distraction-free, with the screen kept awake. Inside it, **67%** let the chart scroll itself hands-free and **29%** keep time with the built-in metronome. → [How Play Mode works](/docs/play-mode) - **The app on the phone.** **47%** installed Fretlist to their home screen for one-tap, fully-offline access on stage. → [Install the app](/docs/install-the-app) - **Print and export.** **23%** send a clean PDF to the music stand or hand a chart to a bandmate. → [Print & Export guide](/docs/print-and-export) - **Sharing.** **21%** send a song or a whole setlist by link, with no account needed on the other end. → [Sharing guide](/docs/sharing) ## What this tells me Fretlist is still early, and I like it that way. The people using it now are the ones shaping it: every song imported, every setlist built, and every bit of feedback in my inbox goes into what Fretlist becomes next. A working musician telling me exactly where a chart broke on stage is worth more than any roadmap I could write alone. So if you are one of the people in these numbers: thank you. You are the reason this thing keeps getting better. > New here? Bring your songs over in a couple of minutes. There is a guide for [OnSong](/docs/import-from-onsong), [SongbookPro](/docs/import-from-songbookpro), [Chordie](/docs/import-from-chordie) and [Ultimate Guitar](/docs/import-from-ultimate-guitar), or just drop in a folder of files. [Start with Fretlist](/). ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "Performing live with Play Mode: setlists, foot pedals, and hands-free song changes" description: "How to play a whole gig from Fretlist: open a setlist in Play Mode, step through songs with a Bluetooth foot pedal, auto-advance between songs, and keep the screen awake and offline on stage." source: "https://fretlist.com/blog/play-mode-live-performance-setlists-foot-pedals" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── When you are on stage, the rules change. Your hands are on the instrument, the song is moving whether you are ready or not, and the last thing you want is to be poking at a tablet between songs. A chord sheet on a stand is only useful if you never have to touch it. That is what Play Mode is built to do at a gig. It is Fretlist's full-screen performance view, and once you open a setlist in it, you can get through an entire show without laying a finger on the screen. _Open a setlist, tap Play Setlist, and run the whole set: each song auto-scrolls, the Frets panel follows along, and you step from one song to the next._ ## How do I play a whole setlist in Play Mode? Open a setlist and tap **Play Setlist**, and Fretlist drops into Play Mode on the first song with the whole set loaded behind it. You can also open a single song that belongs to a set and Play Mode will still carry the rest of the setlist with it. A song counter and previous and next arrows sit in the header, so you always know where you are in the show (song 4 of 18) and can jump a song in either direction. Each song keeps its own saved key, capo, and transposition, so the sheet looks exactly the way you set it up in rehearsal. ## How do I move between songs in a set? A few ways, depending on what is in reach. Swipe left or right on the sheet, or use the arrow keys on a keyboard. The genuinely hands-free option, though, is a Bluetooth foot pedal. Any Bluetooth foot pedal or page turner that sends keyboard events (Page Up, Page Down, or arrow keys) works in Play Mode with no setup inside the app. Pair it to your device once, and a tap of your foot steps through the songs in your set while your hands stay on the instrument. ## What happens at the end of a song? When a song scrolls to its end, an end-of-song pill slides up offering the next song. You can tap it to move on, or set it to **auto-advance** in Settings, in which case the next song loads on its own and starts scrolling, with a short pause so you can catch your breath between songs. Paired with auto-scroll that paces itself to each song's length and a foot pedal for the moments you want manual control, this means you can run a set start to finish hands-free. The pill is also there on a single song, where it simply takes you back to the top to play it again. ## Will the screen stay on, and does it work without venue WiFi? Both are handled, because both will ruin a set if they are not. Play Mode holds a screen wake lock, so your device will not dim or sleep between or during songs, with no system settings to fiddle with. And it works completely offline. Once your setlist is saved on the device, it plays from local storage with no connection. Stage WiFi that has no real internet behind it (a common situation with mixer networks) does not matter. Fretlist falls back to your local copy instead of waiting on a server. There is more on that in [the offline chord sheet app post](/blog/offline-chord-sheet-app). ## How do I read it from a music stand? A sheet on a stand is a meter away, not in your lap, so Play Mode lets you size everything up. From Settings you can bump up the text size and line spacing, and you can drag a handle to make the control buttons bigger so they are easy to hit at arm's length. On a tablet in landscape you can also split a long song into two or three columns to cut down the scrolling. All of it is remembered per device, so your stage setup is ready every time you open it. If you want chord shapes up there too, the Frets panel shows the diagrams for the section you are on and follows along as the song scrolls. See [Introducing Frets](/blog/introducing-frets-fretlists-new-chord-diagram-feature) for how those are built. ## Playing as a band Right now, Play Mode is a one-screen tool: your device, your setlist, your performance. For a band, that means everyone loads the same shared setlist and runs it on their own stand. Sharing a setlist is already built in. You can share a setlist by link and let your bandmates import the whole thing, songs and all, straight into their own libraries, so the whole group is reading from the same set. There is more coming here specifically for bands, and this is where it will land. Check back, or get your set into Fretlist now so you are ready for it. ## Getting set up for a gig Build your setlist, set each song's key and capo the way you play it live, and pair your foot pedal before you leave the house. At the gig, open the setlist, tap **Play Setlist**, and play. It is part of Fretlist, free during Early Access. For a full walk-through of every control, see the [Play Mode guide](/docs/play-mode). If you are still building the set, [here is how to organize your setlists](/blog/how-to-organize-chord-sheets-setlists). And if you mostly use Fretlist at home, Play Mode is just as good for that: [playing along while you practice](/blog/play-mode-play-along-with-chord-sheets). ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "Play Mode: play along with your chord sheets, at home or on stage" description: "Play Mode is Fretlist's full-screen, distraction-free way to play along with a song: auto-scroll paced to the song, a metronome, chord diagrams, screen kept awake, and it all works offline." source: "https://fretlist.com/blog/play-mode-play-along-with-chord-sheets" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Most people think of a "performance view" as a stage thing. It isn't, really. Most of the time you open a chord sheet, you are sitting at home with a guitar on your knee, trying to get a song under your fingers. Your hands are busy. Reaching over to scroll, or squinting at small text propped against a music stand, breaks the take every time. That is what Play Mode is for. It is Fretlist's full-screen view, built so you can play along with a song without touching the screen. The chord sheet fills the display in a large, clean font, scrolls in time with the song, and pushes everything else out of the way. Learning a song on the couch, running it before a gig, it works the same either way. Tap the **Play Mode** button on any song to open it (or press `P` on a keyboard). _Open a song, tap Play Mode, and the chord sheet scrolls in time so you can play along with both hands on the instrument._ ## How can I play along with a song without touching the screen? Tap the play button (at the bottom of the control stack in the lower-right corner) and Play Mode auto-scrolls the chord sheet for you, so you can keep both hands on the instrument. The scroll is smooth, and you can pause or resume with the space bar. The useful part is the pacing. If a song has a saved duration, Play Mode uses "smart speed" and matches the scroll to the song's length, so a 3:10 song reaches the bottom of the sheet in about 3:10. You read the last line right as the song ends, instead of racing ahead or falling behind. Songs without a saved duration use a calm default speed that you can nudge live with the on-screen speed control (or the `[` and `]` keys on a keyboard). Whatever speed you settle on is remembered, so the next time you open that song it picks up where you left it. ## How do I practice a song to a steady tempo? Play Mode has a built-in metronome. Set the tempo by typing a number or by tapping it out by ear with the tap-tempo button, set the time signature, and it clicks along while you play. The metronome runs independently of auto-scroll, so you can use it on its own when you are woodshedding a tricky section by hand, or alongside the scroll when you want to run the whole song at tempo. It is the same reason a metronome sits on every practicing musician's music stand, just without the extra device. ## How do I learn the chords as I go? If you turn on Frets, Play Mode shows the chord diagrams for the section you are currently on, and updates them as you scroll. Move into the chorus and the panel shows just the chorus chords, so you are not hunting through every shape in the song at once. This is built for learning a song you do not have fully in your hands yet. For everything about how the diagrams work, including custom voicings and capo handling, see [Introducing Frets](/blog/introducing-frets-fretlists-new-chord-diagram-feature). ## Can I read my chord sheets with no internet? Yes. Once a song is saved on your device, Play Mode loads it from local storage, so it works with no connection at all. There is no spinner and no delay. The chord sheet does not need a signal, so wherever you sit down to play, it is just there. And on a gig, dead-zone venue WiFi stops being a problem. Fretlist even spots WiFi that has no real internet behind it (the kind a stage mixer hands out) and falls back to your saved copy instead of hanging on a server that never answers. There is more on how that works in [the offline chord sheet app post](/blog/offline-chord-sheet-app). ## Will the screen stay on while I play? Play Mode holds a screen wake lock, so your device will not dim or fall asleep mid-song. You do not have to change any system settings or reach over to tap the screen awake halfway through a verse. It releases as soon as you leave Play Mode, so your normal auto-lock is untouched the rest of the time. ## Can I make the text big enough to read from across the room? You can size the text, the line spacing, and the controls to suit where you are reading from. Open Settings to set the text size and line spacing, and on a wide screen split a dense song into two or three columns so it fits without much scrolling. You can also drag a handle to resize the control buttons across five sizes, which helps when the device is an arm's length away on a stand rather than in your lap. All of these are remembered per device, so the way you set it up at the kitchen table is the way it opens next time. ## Does it work on my iPad, phone, and laptop? Play Mode runs in any modern browser, on iPad, iPhone, Android, Mac, and Windows. There is no separate app to install per platform, though you can add Fretlist to your home screen as an app if you want the full-screen, offline-ready version. Your library syncs across everything on one account, so a song you saved on your laptop is there on the iPad you practice with, and there on your phone when you are away from both. ## Does it go to the gig too? It does, and the same hands-free ideas carry straight onto the stage. Open a song from a setlist and Play Mode brings the whole set with it, you can step through songs with a Bluetooth foot pedal, and an end-of-song pill carries you from one song to the next. That is a topic of its own, so it has its own write-up: [performing live with Play Mode](/blog/play-mode-live-performance-setlists-foot-pedals). ## How do I open Play Mode? Open any song and tap **Play Mode** (or press `P`). To run a whole set, open a setlist and tap **Play Setlist**. On a keyboard, press `?` to see every shortcut. It is part of Fretlist, free during Early Access. If you have a song in your library, put your hands on your instrument and try playing along with it once, hands-free. That is the whole idea. For a step-by-step walk-through, see the [Play Mode guide](/docs/play-mode), and [organizing your setlists](/blog/how-to-organize-chord-sheets-setlists) if you are getting ready for a gig. ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "How SongbookPro Sync Works (and How to Fix It When It Doesn't)" description: "SongbookPro syncs through your own OneDrive, Dropbox, or WebDAV account. Here's how it works, why it stops, and a four-step fix when it does." source: "https://fretlist.com/blog/songbookpro-sync-explained" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── SongbookPro keeps your library in sync across devices through a cloud account you connect it to. When two devices stop matching, it is easy to assume the sync is broken. Usually it isn't. The app syncs in a specific way, and once you understand that, most sync problems turn into a two-minute fix. Let me walk through it. ## How does SongbookPro sync work? SongbookPro's sync stores your library in a cloud storage account you already own, either OneDrive, Dropbox, or a WebDAV provider, rather than on a server SongbookPro runs itself. You connect SongbookPro to that account, and it uses the cloud folder as the shared copy of your songs and setlists. Every device that points at the same account ends up with the same library. Two things follow from that design, and they explain most of what people run into. First, every device has to be signed into the exact same provider and the same account. SongbookPro can only match what it can see in that one folder. Second, the sync isn't always instant. You can run it on demand from the Quick Actions menu, the round arrows icon, or set it to run on startup, or on startup plus every ten minutes. If you edit a song and then close the app before a sync finishes, the change hasn't traveled yet. So when sync "fails," it is usually one of those two things quietly getting in the way. ## Why does SongbookPro stop syncing? In practice, the trouble almost always comes down to one of three causes. A different cloud account on one device. This is the big one. Maybe you signed into a work OneDrive on the tablet and a personal one on the phone, or you switched accounts at some point and forgot. The devices are syncing perfectly, just to different folders, so they will never see each other. A sync that never actually ran. If you have auto sync turned off and you edit on one device, nothing reaches the others until you trigger a sync. The data isn't lost, it just hasn't moved yet. A platform change. SongbookPro is licensed per platform. If you bought it on iOS and then pick up an Android tablet or a Windows machine, you need to buy and set up the app again on that platform, then connect it to the same cloud account. People sometimes read this as a sync failure when it is really a fresh install that hasn't been pointed at the library. ## How do I fix SongbookPro sync? Run through these in order. One of them solves it most of the time. 1. Check the account on every device. Open Settings, then Backup and Sync, and confirm each device is using the same provider and signed into the same account. Not "a OneDrive," the same one. 2. Run a manual sync. Open the Quick Actions menu and press the sync button, the round arrows. Let it finish. If it turns red, there was an error, usually a connection or sign-in issue, so check those and try again. 3. Make sure you are online and up to date. Sync needs a stable connection, and an out-of-date copy on one device can cause mismatches. Update the app everywhere before you compare libraries. 4. Use Backup and Restore as the safety net. If a device is badly out of step, you can create a full backup file from the device that has the correct library, then restore it on the other one. This moves songs and setlists directly, no cloud round trip needed. If you have done all four and a specific change still won't travel, that points at the cloud folder itself rather than the app, so it is worth opening the storage account in a browser to confirm the file is actually there. ## Can SongbookPro sync between an iPhone and a PC? Yes, but with one catch worth knowing up front. The license is per platform, so you buy SongbookPro separately on iOS, Android, and Windows. Once each copy is installed and connected to the same cloud account, they sync the same library between them. The sync itself is cross platform. The purchase is not. ## How do I make sure I never lose my songs? Whatever app you use, treat your library like the years of work it is. Keep auto sync on so changes travel without you remembering to push them. Make a full backup before any big change, a device upgrade, or an app update. And every so often, export a copy you can open without the app at all. Your songs are yours, and a plain export means you are never locked to one piece of software or one company's servers staying online. That last point is worth sitting with. Sync is convenient, but it is not a backup on its own. A backup is a copy you control. ## A different approach worth knowing about I build a chord chart app called Fretlist, so I will be upfront that I have a horse in this race. I am not here to talk anyone out of SongbookPro, plenty of musicians are happy on it, and if your setup works, keep it. But the model above is also the reason I built Fretlist the way I did. It syncs live across platforms without you buying it again per device, it works offline first so the gig doesn't depend on a signal, and your library is exportable any time, in your hands, not locked in. If the per-platform wall or the manual sync dance has been wearing on you, it might be worth a look. Either way, I hope the fixes above get your library back in sync. Most of the time it is closer to solved than it feels. If you want a hand moving a library over, there is a [migration guide here](/docs/import-from-songbookpro). Dear John ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "ChordPro explained: format, syntax, and converters" description: "ChordPro is the open, plain-text format for chord sheets: what it is, how to convert from Ultimate Guitar tabs, transposition, and the mistakes to avoid." source: "https://fretlist.com/blog/chordpro-complete-guide" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── If you have spent any time with digital chord sheets, you have probably bumped into ChordPro. It is the closest thing the chord-sheet world has to a universal format: readable as plain text, structured enough that apps can render it as a polished sheet, portable enough that your library survives whatever app you happen to be using this year. This guide answers the questions musicians and developers actually ask about ChordPro. Every example here renders the same way in [Fretlist](https://fretlist.com), OnSong, SongbookPro, LinkeSoft Songbook, and pretty much every other tool that claims ChordPro support. ## What is ChordPro? ChordPro is a plain-text format for chord sheets. The core idea is simple: chord names go inline with the lyrics, wrapped in square brackets, at the exact position where the chord should sound. ``` [G]Hello [D]darkness my [Em]old [C]friend ``` That one line is the whole format in miniature. Add directives for metadata (title, key, tempo), section markers (verse, chorus), and the occasional custom tag, and you have a complete chord sheet any ChordPro-aware app can render. The format was created by Martin Leclerc and Mario Dorion in the early 1990s and has been maintained as an open standard ever since, currently by [Johan Vromans at chordpro.org](https://www.chordpro.org). It is not owned by any single company, which is why your ChordPro file from 2005 still opens cleanly today. ## ChordPro syntax: what does a file look like? A minimal ChordPro song looks like this: ``` {title: Sound of Silence} {artist: Simon & Garfunkel} {key: Em} [Em]Hello [D]darkness my [Em]old [Em]friend [Em]I've come to [D]talk with you a[Em]gain ``` Three rules cover most of it: - **Directives** wrapped in curly braces carry metadata: `{title:}`, `{artist:}`, `{key:}`, `{capo:}`, `{tempo:}`, `{start_of_chorus}`, `{start_of_verse}`, `{comment:}`. Those eight cover almost every real-world song. The [full directive reference is on chordpro.org](https://www.chordpro.org/chordpro/chordpro-directives/). - **Chords** wrapped in square brackets sit inline with the lyrics at the character position where the chord change happens. - **Everything else is lyrics.** Blank lines separate sections. That is the whole core. Everything else is convenience. ## Why use ChordPro instead of plain text? Plain text and ChordPro look similar at first glance. The difference is structure. Plain text is what you see; ChordPro is what the app can understand. The practical wins: - **Transposition works.** Because chords are tagged in square brackets, an app can transpose every `[G]` to `[A]` in one click. Plain text cannot do this without guessing. - **Capo is respected.** A song marked `{capo: 2}` can be shown in either the played shape or the sounding key. - **Metadata is structured.** `{key: Em}`, `{tempo: 86}`, `{time: 4/4}` populate the song header the same way in every app. - **Sections are explicit.** Choruses, verses and bridges can be styled differently because the file says where each one starts and ends. Plain text gets you a sheet you can read on one device. ChordPro gets you a sheet that travels. ## Should chords go inline with the lyrics or on the line above? Both styles exist in the wild. You need to recognize both, but only one is canonical ChordPro. **Inline (canonical):** ``` [G]Hello [D]darkness my [Em]old [C]friend ``` **Chord-on-line-above (informal but extremely common):** ``` G D Em C Hello darkness my old friend ``` Strictly, the second style is not ChordPro. It is plain text with chord lines. In practice it is everywhere, especially in songs scraped from Ultimate Guitar and other tabs sites. A serious ChordPro app should handle both: Fretlist renders both formats natively (inline ChordPro and chord-above-lyrics) without any conversion step. OnSong and SongbookPro do similar. If a tool only handles one of the two styles, you will hit friction sooner or later. ## How do you convert Ultimate Guitar tabs or plain-text chord sheets to ChordPro? Converting chord-above-lyrics sheets to ChordPro by hand is tedious. Doing it in bulk is the difference between a library that grows and a library that stalls. The rule is simple: take each chord above a lyric line and insert it inline at the character position where it sits. So this: ``` G D Hello darkness my old friend ``` becomes this: ``` [G]Hello darkness [D]my old friend ``` A good importer handles this automatically and preserves the rest of the file: metadata, section labels, comments. Fretlist's bulk import handles ChordPro files, ZIPs, OnSong backups, SongbookPro backups, and plain-text dumps in one step. ChordPro files are stored as-is. Plain-text files from tab sites get the boilerplate stripped automatically (nav chrome, credits, chord diagrams, footer junk), so what lands in your library is clean song content. For a single song, the [Ultimate Guitar to ChordPro converter](/tools/ultimate-guitar-to-chordpro) is the fastest path. For an entire library of `.txt` files, use the [bulk import](/docs/import-from-ultimate-guitar). ## Using Fretlist as a free ChordPro converter Most musicians have hundreds of songs in chord-above-lyrics format from Ultimate Guitar and other tab sites. Converting them to proper ChordPro one by one is tedious work, and dedicated converter tools are either broken, behind a paywall, or require you to install something. Fretlist gives you two free in-browser converters built on the same engine the app uses internally: - [**Ultimate Guitar to ChordPro converter**](/tools/ultimate-guitar-to-chordpro): paste the full UG page (Cmd+A, Cmd+C), Fretlist strips the chrome and outputs clean ChordPro. - [**ChordPro converter**](/tools/chordpro-converter): paste any chord-above-lyrics sheet from a Word doc, PDF, or text file. Both work without an account. Copy the result, download as `.cho`, or save straight to your Fretlist library with one click. If you want full control, Fretlist's in-app editor has two modes: Chords over Lyrics and ChordPro. Switch between them and the content converts live, in either direction. Paste a ChordPro file, switch to Chords over Lyrics to edit it in the familiar tab-site style. Fretlist keeps the original ChordPro stashed in memory so switching back restores it exactly. If your ChordPro uses directives that won't survive the round-trip, Fretlist warns you before you edit. No other chord-sheet app exposes both views in the same editor with live switching. Most treat ChordPro as an import/export format and hide it. Fretlist treats it as a first-class editing surface. ## How do you handle transposition and capo in ChordPro? The file does not transpose itself. It carries the information that lets an app transpose it. - `{key: Em}` tells the app the song's written key. - `{capo: 2}` tells the app a capo is on the 2nd fret. From there, the app does the work. Press the transpose-up button and every `[Em]` becomes `[Fm]`, every `[D]` becomes `[D#]`, and so on. The song content and key stored in the database never change. Your transposition preference is saved per song to your account and synced across your devices. The reason to mark `{capo:}` rather than transpose the chords on paper is honesty: the song was written in one shape, you are playing it with a capo, and the app can show you either the shape or the sounding key depending on what is useful in that moment. Hard-coding the transposition into the chord names loses that information forever. ## How do you add notes that aren't chords? Real chord sheets are full of little instructions that are not chords: "stop", "let ring", "x2", a palm-mute cue, a note to drop out for a bar. ChordPro has a dedicated way to write these so the app knows they are notes, not chords. Put an asterisk right after the opening bracket: ``` [E5]You might know [*stop]that gloomy [Emaj7]weather ``` The `[*stop]` prints as a small note above the lyric, at the exact spot it happens, and it never transposes. The asterisk is only the marker, so it does not show on screen: `[*stop]` renders as `stop`. Transpose the song up a step and `E5` and `Emaj7` move while `stop` stays put. That is the whole point. A chord is a sound, a note is an instruction, and the format keeps them apart. This is canonical ChordPro, so the same `[*...]` note renders correctly in OnSong, SongbookPro, and the chordpro.org tools too. Fretlist is also lenient about it: anything in brackets that is not a valid chord is treated as a note, so `[Mute]`, `[x2]`, `[let ring]`, even `[(stop)]` with the parentheses showing, all render the same way. For the cleanest, most portable file, use the asterisk form. If you like seeing the parentheses as a visual cue, `[(stop)]` works fine in Fretlist. ## Which apps actually support ChordPro? Most chord-sheet apps claim ChordPro support but depth varies. A non-exhaustive list as of 2026: - **[Fretlist](https://fretlist.com)** - full read and write, live conversion between chord-above-lyrics and ChordPro in the editor, preserves custom directives, exports canonical ChordPro. Web-based and cross-platform. - **[OnSong](https://fretlist.com/alternative/onsong)** (iOS only) - mature ChordPro support, handles most directives. Paid app. - **[SongbookPro](https://fretlist.com/alternative/songbookpro)** (cross-platform) - reads ChordPro reliably and is a common starting point for musicians coming from a notebook workflow. - **LinkeSoft Songbook** (iOS / Mac) - split iOS and Mac interfaces, both ChordPro-native. - **[BandHelper](https://fretlist.com/alternative/bandhelper)** - supports ChordPro import alongside a wide range of other formats and band-management features. - **chordpro.org's reference tools** - the canonical implementation, useful for testing edge cases. - **Plain-text editors (VS Code, Sublime, Obsidian)** - ChordPro is plain text, so any editor opens it. Several have syntax-highlighting plug-ins. For context: Chordify is sometimes listed alongside these, but it solves a different problem. It detects chords from audio rather than managing chord-sheet libraries, and it does not use the ChordPro format. If a tool claims ChordPro support but mangles round-trips (stripping custom directives, dropping `{capo:}`, normalizing chord positioning), that is a red flag. Your library should survive a write-read cycle in any compliant tool. ## What are the five most common ChordPro mistakes? The same five errors trip up nearly everyone learning the format. 1. **Inconsistent colon usage.** The spec allows a colon, whitespace, or both as the separator after a directive name. In practice, most apps expect the colon. `{title: Wonderwall}` is the safe form; skip the colon and some parsers will stumble. 2. **Mixing inline and line-above chord styles in one song.** Pick one and stay consistent. Mixed-style songs render unpredictably. 3. **Wrapping a chord in parentheses.** `[(G)]` is not read as a chord. The parentheses turn it into a plain-text note, so it will not transpose. Write `[G]` for the chord, and save the parentheses for actual notes like `[(stop)]`. 4. **Relying on `{image:}` for portability.** The directive exists in the spec, but app support is inconsistent. Most tools, including Fretlist, skip it silently. If your sheet needs a visual that travels with the file, keep it as a separate file alongside the ChordPro source. 5. **Not setting `{key:}` and `{capo:}`.** Without these, transpose features cannot do anything sensible and other apps cannot disambiguate the song. A sixth one worth a note: chord positions are exact. `[G]Hello` puts the G above the H of Hello. `[G] Hello` (with a space) puts the G above the space, which renders one character earlier. Most rendering bugs trace to this. ## Why does ChordPro still matter in 2026? ChordPro's quiet superpower is portability. Your library exists as plain text. You can grep it, version-control it, back it up to a USB stick, edit it in any text editor on any computer, and still expect it to render correctly in whatever chord-sheet app you are using. That is a rare property in software. Most app-specific formats lock your data inside a single product. ChordPro does not. If your current app dies tomorrow, disappears from the App Store, gets bought, or raises prices, your library is still readable plain text and can move to whatever is next. It is why, when I built [Fretlist](https://fretlist.com), ChordPro was the first thing I supported, not the last. Your music is yours, and Fretlist will never hold it hostage. [Dear John](https://fretlist.com/about), building Fretlist from Alkmaar, Netherlands ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "Moving from SongbookPro: how Alan brought two bands' worth of songs to Fretlist" description: "Alan plays in two bands, had years of songs and setlists in SongbookPro, and no support when things broke. Here's how the switch went - bugs, fixes, and all." source: "https://fretlist.com/blog/moving-from-songbookpro" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── "This creation of yours is brilliant." Alan sent that line last week. He plays in two bands, Flyte Risk DSM and AKBand, and he'd been on SongbookPro for quite some time. Two weeks ago he started moving his entire setup to Fretlist. Two bands' worth of songs and setlists, intact. This is what happened. ## Why he was looking Alan wasn't a SongbookPro hater. What pushed him away was an accumulation of specific failures he'd dealt with long enough to know weren't getting fixed. The group features were essentially broken. Without timely support from the admin, syncing with bandmates was unreliable at best. And the disconnect behavior was its own special frustration: SBP would stay connected overnight, no problem, right up until you tried to do something that required an online connection. Then it would drop immediately. The UG integration in the Folder section had the same problem. Leave it running, looks fine, touch it and it falls over. As he put it: "There is zero feedback or support from SBP." Leaving a tool is rarely about one big thing. It's about realizing nobody's there to fix the small ones. ## The first import, and a bug Alan dropped his two `.sbpbackup` files into Fretlist's importer. The first try, songs from one band ended up in the other band's setlists. Not great. He sent me the files. The bug was a fingerprint collision: two backups, same internal song IDs, no way to tell them apart. I shipped a fix that gave each backup its own unique fingerprint. A few days later he tried again. His reply that night: > "SUCCESS!!!!!! I just uploaded 10 sets to Fretlist and it appears they all imported without issue." Ten setlists, both bands, songs intact. Keys, capos, tempos all preserved. ## Then a different bug A week later Alan came back with another problem. Play Mode autoscroll wasn't working on his Windows laptops. Turned out his devices were reporting scroll positions in fractions of a pixel (a display scaling thing), and Fretlist was getting confused by the fractional values. At low speeds it could never make progress. First fix shipped. Then Alan came back with a seven-device test matrix. Different Windows tablets, an Android, all on the same song, each needing different minimum scroll speeds. Clear signal the fix wasn't complete. Another round of digging, another fix shipped. Scroll now behaves consistently across his entire device range. While I was in there I also shipped column view in Play Mode, so songs can fit on one screen without scrolling at all. For Alan that's the better answer to his original problem. ## Pulling songs in from Ultimate Guitar There's no direct UG integration in Fretlist, and there won't be one any time soon. Direct integration with that site comes with legal considerations I'm not ready to take on. But there's a workaround that works really well: open the song on UG, Cmd+A to select everything on the page, then paste into Fretlist's importer. The importer reads the page, pulls out chords and lyrics intact, and captures the metadata too: title, artist, capo, tuning. Alan tried it on three songs: > "That rocks. Easily imported 3 songs from UG." The full how-to is at [fretlist.com/docs/import-from-ultimate-guitar](https://fretlist.com/docs/import-from-ultimate-guitar). ## What's still being figured out Alan wanted to share his library with bandmates. The full Band Plan, where multiple accounts log into the same library, is in design but not shipped. So I walked him through the share-link workaround: open a setlist, click Share, toggle "share all songs," send the link via WhatsApp. His reply: "I think that will work for now." He sent the link to one of his mates, and it worked. ## If you're considering the switch - `.sbpbackup` import handles multi-band libraries. Songs, setlists, keys, capos, tempos come across. - If you have multiple bands, do them as separate imports. They stay separate inside Fretlist. - UG songs come in by selecting all on the page and pasting into the importer. - After a big import, the Matching Titles tool tidies up duplicates you can decide to merge or delete. - Sharing with bandmates today works via share links. Full Band Plan is on the roadmap. The procedural guide is at [fretlist.com/docs/import-from-songbookpro](https://fretlist.com/docs/import-from-songbookpro). That's the how. This post is the why and what. ## How Fretlist gets built Two bugs surfaced through Alan. Two fixes shipped (the second one in two rounds). One new feature shipped on top. Sharing with bandmates works. That's the loop. No support team, no triage queue. Just one person reading every email and shipping fixes when the report is concrete. If you switch from SongbookPro and find something I haven't seen yet, the same thing happens. Drop your `.sbpbackup` files in at [fretlist.com](https://fretlist.com) when you're ready. Free during Early Access. — Dear John ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "Introducing Frets: Fretlist's new chord diagram feature" description: "Per-song voicings, ChordPro support, capo and transpose handling, and a section-aware Frets Panel for Play Mode." source: "https://fretlist.com/blog/introducing-frets-fretlists-new-chord-diagram-feature" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Fretlist now has **chord diagrams**. Real ones. Here's what's in. ## Chord diagrams that match the song Tap any chord, **flip through alternative voicings**, or **type your own fret notation**. `x57675` for Dmaj7 at the 5th fret. `x32010` for an open C. Stored **per song, per instrument, synced across devices**. ## ChordPro `{define:}` and `[Chords]` blocks Fully supported. If a song already defines voicings, Fretlist uses them. Voicings you change while viewing a song work like a transpose — **the song itself stays as-is**. ## Section-aware Frets Panel in Play Mode The **Frets Panel** sits on the right (desktop) or bottom (mobile). Scroll into the chorus and the panel header switches to "Chorus chords", **showing only the chords used in that section**. Verse, bridge, outro, same deal. ## Capo and transpose handled properly Diagrams show the **shape you're playing, not the sounded chord**. Song in D with capo II, the diagrams show C shapes. Same with transposition. The chord names update, the diagrams follow, your fingers know exactly where to go. If you've set a custom voicing on a chord and the shape is movable (no open strings), Fretlist **slides it up the neck** instead of swapping in a different one. Muscle memory survives. Sharp or flat preference works either way. ## Three view modes per song - **Frets** for visual chord diagrams - **Text** for fret notation in two columns (`F 133211`, `Bb x13331`) - **Hidden** hides the chord library entirely Stored per song, synced across devices. Hidden also keeps the Frets Panel out of the way in Play Mode. ## Guitar and ukulele, full chord libraries Both have full libraries built in. Switch between them with the instrument selector next to the view-mode toggle. **Mandolin and banjo** have no built-in library yet. You can still define your own shapes — use a `[Chords:mandolin]` block in the song, or `{instrument: mandolin}` followed by `{define:}` directives in ChordPro. See [Multiple instruments in one song](/docs/getting-the-most-out-of-frets#multiple-instruments-in-one-song) in the docs for the full syntax. ## Works on shared songs too If someone shares a song link with you, **Frets is right there** — chord diagrams, instrument switcher, voicing editor, all of it. Tap any chord and try a shape. Since it's not your song, adjustments stay for that session and disappear when you close the tab. No account required. ## Try it Open any song with chords in your library. Tap a chord to swap voicings. Hit Play Mode and watch the Frets Panel switch sections as you scroll. If something looks wrong, a voicing doesn't match what you play, or the section detection feels off, **hit reply**. Frets is part of **Fretlist Pro, free during Early Access**. For a full walkthrough of everything Frets can do, see [Getting the most out of Frets](/docs/getting-the-most-out-of-frets). Cheers, DJ ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "Offline Chord Sheet App: what a rehearsal mixing desk taught me" description: "Fretlist is an offline chord sheet app that works even when stage WiFi has no internet behind it. A real rehearsal bug, what it took to fix it, and what offline has to mean." source: "https://fretlist.com/blog/offline-chord-sheet-app" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Geoff plays in four bands in Ireland. He's 60, runs every gig from his tablet, and at a band rehearsal he found a bug in Fretlist that nobody had hit in development. Here's what happened, and what it forced me to fix. ## The bug The mixing desk in the rehearsal room was broadcasting its own private WiFi network for the engineer's iPad. Geoff's tablet auto-joined. The browser saw "WiFi connected." Everything looked online. But the mixer's network had no internet behind it. It was just there for the desk. Fretlist trusted what the browser said. It tried to fetch the setlist from the server, the request hung, and the app stalled instead of falling back to the offline copy already on the device. Right before the band ran their first song. It was a rehearsal, so Geoff worked around it and sent me the most useful bug report I've ever received. Next time it could have been on stage. ## Why I missed it Stage WiFi is full of "WiFi exists, no internet behind it" networks. Mixers, in-ear monitor systems, festival comms, hotel lobbies. The browser doesn't know. The OS doesn't know. They report "online" because there's a Wi-Fi signal, and that's all most apps check. I shipped a fix the same week. The app now checks for actual reachability instead of trusting the operating system's signal. If nothing answers, Fretlist falls back to the local copy and gets out of the way. ## What offline means in Fretlist now Your whole library lives on the device. Songs, setlists, lyrics, chords, keys, capo positions. Open [Play Mode](/) with no signal and there's no spinner, it's already there. Transpose and capo run on the device. Tap-tempo a song faster mid-set and the new BPM saves on the device, then syncs back when you reconnect. Editing or creating songs and setlists, signing in the first time, importing, sharing a public link, and sync between devices are the parts that still need internet. None of those happen during a performance. ## The brutal test Open your chord sheet app, force-quit it, switch the device to airplane mode, and re-open it. Does the library load? Can you transpose? Open Play Mode? Edit a song? If anything stalls, that's not really offline. That's "online with a cache." On stage, that's the same as broken. I run that test before every Fretlist release. Geoff's bug took it from a smoke-test to a non-negotiable. ## What Geoff sent me from the next gig _No backups tonight. All in Fretlist.com and no WiFi._ That's what I'm building for. Not the spec sheet. The moment a working musician trusts Fretlist enough to leave the printed sheets at home. If your chord sheets are spread across apps that quietly stop working when the WiFi gets weird, [give Fretlist a try](/). It's free during Early Access. Bring your library, or [import it](/docs) from whatever you're using now. --- - [Why I built Fretlist](/blog/why-i-built-fretlist) - [Going digital with chord sheets](/blog/from-notebook-to-screen-going-digital-with-chord-sheets) - [How to organize your chord charts and setlists for gigs](/blog/how-to-organize-chord-sheets-setlists) - [The OnSong alternative](/alternative/onsong) ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "OnSong for Android: why it doesn't exist (and what to use instead)" description: "OnSong has never shipped for Android, and it likely never will. Here's why — and the Android-friendly chord sheet app Android musicians are switching to." source: "https://fretlist.com/blog/onsong-for-android-what-to-use-instead" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── If you've searched for "OnSong for Android" you've already seen the answer: there isn't one. No Play Store listing, no APK, no beta. Despite being one of the most well-known chord-sheet apps on the planet, OnSong has been iOS-only for its entire existence — and there's no sign of that changing. This post explains *why* OnSong is iOS-only, what that actually means for Android musicians who want the same experience on stage, and the web-app alternative that fills the gap without asking you to buy an iPad. ## Why OnSong is still iOS-only after more than a decade OnSong launched in 2011 as an iPad app. It was one of the first serious attempts to turn a tablet into a gig-ready chord binder, and it went deep on the Apple ecosystem: AirTurn pedals, Core MIDI, AirPlay, iCloud sync, Apple Pencil. That deep integration is also why an Android port has never materialized. A few practical reasons: - **Native iOS codebase.** OnSong is built on Apple's frameworks. Porting to Android isn't a "recompile and ship" job — it's a rewrite. - **Small team, big app.** OnSong is a mature product with thousands of edge cases (MIDI triggers, DMX lighting, presentation modes). Maintaining two parallel codebases would roughly double the support load without doubling the revenue. - **The market's mostly on iPad.** Pro musicians skew iPad for stage use. For OnSong's core audience — worship teams, cover bands, gigging pros — iPad is already the assumed device. The commercial incentive to port has been weak. - **No public roadmap for Android.** The OnSong team has historically pointed people to web-based alternatives when asked, rather than promising an Android version "soon". Translation: if you're on Android and waiting for OnSong to come to you, don't. It's not a launch delay — it's a product decision. ## What "OnSong for Android" actually has to replace The mistake most OnSong refugees make is looking for a single Android app that matches OnSong feature-for-feature. You probably don't need all of it. The bit almost every gigging musician actually uses is a small subset: - A searchable library of chord sheets - Setlists you can pull up at a gig - Transpose on the fly - Auto-scroll with adjustable speed - Offline access (stage Wi-Fi is a myth) - A dark, full-screen stage view that doesn't sleep - Bluetooth page turner support MIDI pedal automation, DMX lighting, lyrics projection, backing tracks synced to cues — those are real OnSong features, but most players using OnSong as a "digital songbook" never touch them. Replacing the 20% you actually use is far easier than replacing the 100% you don't. ## The Android-friendly answer: a PWA, not another native app The reason no native Android app has caught up with OnSong is the same reason you don't need one: the web did. A modern browser on Android can: - Install a web app to your home screen (it gets its own icon, no browser chrome) - Store your library offline with service workers and IndexedDB - Keep the screen awake during a song - Run full-screen, locked to the stage view you want That's what a Progressive Web App is — and it's why the best OnSong-style experience on Android doesn't live in the Play Store at all. ## Fretlist: the OnSong experience on any device [Fretlist](https://fretlist.com) is a web app that does the core of what OnSong does — chord sheets, setlists, transpose, offline Play Mode — on whatever device you have. Android, iOS, ChromeOS, Windows, Mac, Linux. Same URL, same account, same library. For Android users migrating from an iOS friend's OnSong setup, the practical path looks like this: 1. **Ask them to export an OnSong `.backup`.** OnSong's Utilities → Backup menu produces a single file that contains songs, setlists, and metadata. 2. **Drop it into Fretlist's import dropzone.** Fretlist reads OnSong `.backup` files natively — no manual reformatting. It also handles ChordPro, PDF, DOCX, and ZIP archives, so a mixed library still comes across cleanly. 3. **Install Fretlist as an app on Android.** In Chrome, tap the menu → "Install app" (or "Add to Home Screen"). It launches full-screen from your home screen, offline-capable, indistinguishable from a native app. 4. **Open your setlist at the gig and hit Play Mode.** Auto-scroll, wake lock, section jumps, and Bluetooth page turner support out of the box — most pedals send standard PageUp/PageDown keys, which Fretlist picks up automatically. There's no Play Store review, no waiting for an Android build, no price-difference between platforms. A Pro plan is coming post-launch; right now it's free during Early Access. ## When OnSong is still the right call Be honest with yourself about what you actually need. If any of these describe your setup, OnSong on iOS is probably still the better answer — and Fretlist won't replace it: - You run MIDI or DMX cues from the same app that shows your chords - You project lyrics to a congregation or audience screen - Your whole band is already on iPads and in the OnSong ecosystem - You need MIDI-programmable pedal actions that go beyond page turning and section jumps For everything else — the 80% of gigging musicians who just want their chord sheets on stage on the device they already own — the "OnSong for Android" question has a better answer than waiting. Use the device you already have. ## Try it Fretlist is free during Early Access, imports OnSong backups directly, and runs on any Android device without an app-store install. [Open it in your browser](https://fretlist.com) and add it to your home screen — the whole setup takes about as long as reading this post did. Related reading: - [How to import your OnSong library into Fretlist](/docs/import-from-onsong) — step-by-step guide - [Fretlist vs OnSong: the full comparison](/alternative/onsong) - [From notebook to screen: going digital with chord sheets](/blog/from-notebook-to-screen-going-digital-with-chord-sheets) ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "From notebook to screen: why I finally went digital with my chord sheets" description: "After years of handwritten chord sheets and setlists, I made the switch to digital. Here's what I gained, what I lost, and why I'd never go back." source: "https://fretlist.com/blog/from-notebook-to-screen-going-digital-with-chord-sheets" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── I had a notebook in my guitar case for years. Small, spiral-bound, filled with my handwriting. Keys, capo positions, setlists — all of it. Before every gig I'd flip to the last page and write a new one. It was perfect. Until it wasn't. ## The notebook years That notebook was my safety blanket. I knew exactly where everything was because I'd written it myself. The muscle memory of flipping to the right page mid-set became second nature. Between songs I'd glance down, see my scribbled "Capo III — Am" in the corner, and just play. There's something satisfying about handwriting your setlist. It forces you to think through the flow. You're not dragging and dropping — you're committing ink to paper. Every crossed-out song is a decision. Every arrow is a last-minute change of heart. I still print my setlists for every gig, by the way. Paper on the music stand is non-negotiable. Old habits die hard. ## When the notebook broke down Two things happened. First, my library got too big. I had pages and pages of setlists but no easy way to find what I'd played where. New songs kept piling up faster than I could fit them in. I'd flip through the notebook looking for a chord progression I'd written down months ago and find three different versions — each in a slightly different key. Usually none of them were right. Second, I started playing as a duo with Ruud. You can't share a notebook. We both play half step down — me on nylon, Ruud on his Taylor — but we needed different capo positions, different chord voicings, and notes about who takes the lead on what. Two players, one song, two completely different pages. Sharing a single handwritten page wasn't going to work. ## The WordPress era So I built something. In WordPress, because that's what I knew from my day job. Nothing fancy — just songs with chords, capo settings, who plays what, and setlists we could both pull up on our phones. We used it at every gig for four years. It worked. Fun fact: Ruud always drew a little illustration on the printed setlist. A sketch of the venue, the crowd, sometimes just a doodle of whatever he was feeling that night. Those printouts became little artifacts of every show we played. I still have them all in a box somewhere. But the WordPress tool was held together with duct tape. It was slow, clunky on mobile, and every time WordPress updated something, I'd hold my breath. It was built for two people and it showed. ## What I lost going digital I'll be honest — there are things I miss about the notebook. **The ritual.** Sitting down with a pen and writing out the setlist was a kind of pre-gig meditation. It forced me to slow down and think about what I was about to play. **The permanence.** A notebook is an archive. Every page is a snapshot of a gig. Digital setlists get edited, duplicated, overwritten. The history blurs. **The simplicity.** A notebook never needs WiFi. It never crashes. It never runs out of battery. It never asks you to update. These are real trade-offs and I won't pretend otherwise. ## What I gained **Search.** I can find any song in seconds. No more flipping through pages trying to remember if I wrote "Hallelujah" under H or under L (for Leonard). **Transposition.** I play half step down. Every chord chart I ever found online was in standard tuning. I used to transpose in my head, scribble corrections on paper, lose the paper, find an older version in a completely different key, and wonder which one was right. Now I tap a button and every chord updates. **Sharing.** Ruud and I could finally see the same setlist with our own capo positions and notes. When someone asks me for a song, I send a link instead of photographing a page. **One source of truth.** No more three versions of the same song in different keys scattered across different pages. One song, one place, always current. **Stage confidence.** This was the unexpected one. I built a full-screen mode specifically for performing — big chords, auto-scroll, screen stays on. The first time I used it at a gig, I realized I wasn't squinting at my handwriting anymore. I was just playing. ## The real reason I switched Here's the thing nobody talks about: switching from paper to digital isn't really about features. It's about what happens when your system fails. With the notebook, failure meant showing up to a gig and realizing you left it at home. (Happened twice.) Or not being able to read your own handwriting under stage lights. (Happened constantly.) Or spilling a beer on the setlist. (No comment.) With digital, failure means your phone dies. That's a real risk — which is why offline mode was the first serious feature I built. Your songs are on your device now. No WiFi needed. No spinning wheel while the crowd waits. I didn't switch because digital is better than paper. I switched because my music outgrew what paper could hold. ## For the skeptics If your notebook works, keep using it. Seriously. A system that works is worth more than a system that's theoretically better. But if you're starting to feel the friction — the growing library, the bandmate who needs the same setlist, the key changes you keep getting wrong — maybe it's time. The jump is smaller than you think. > I built [Fretlist](https://fretlist.com) for musicians exactly like me — the ones whose notebook served them well until it didn't. It's free to try, and your first song takes about 30 seconds to add. The notebook got me through hundreds of gigs. I'm grateful for it. But my guitar case is lighter now, and I don't miss the frantic page-flipping between songs. Well, maybe a little. [Try Fretlist for free →](https://fretlist.com) --- - [Why I Built a Chord Sheet App After 15 Years of Gigging](/blog/why-i-built-fretlist) - [How to Organize Your Chord Charts and Setlists for Gigs](/blog/how-to-organize-chord-charts-setlists) ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "How to organize your chord charts and setlists for gigs" description: "A practical system for gigging musicians who want their chord charts, lyrics, and setlists organized and accessible on stage." source: "https://fretlist.com/blog/how-to-organize-chord-sheets-setlists" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── If you've been gigging for a while, you probably recognize this: chord charts in Notes, lyrics in Google Docs, a few PDFs in a random folder, and a handwritten setlist you can barely read under stage lights. It works — until it doesn't. Here's how I brought order to the chaos after 15 years of playing live. ## Step 1: Get everything in one place This is the single biggest improvement you can make. It doesn't matter how you organize things if your songs live in five different apps. Pick one system and commit to it. Move your chord charts and chord sheets out of Notes, Docs, Evernote, and wherever else they're hiding. Yes, it takes an afternoon. Yes, it's worth it. What to store per song: lyrics with chords above them, key, capo position, and any tuning notes. That's the minimum. If you play with others, add who sings lead or any arrangement notes. ## Step 2: Standardize your chord chart format Most musicians write chord charts slightly differently every time. One song has chords inline, another has them above the lyrics, a third is just a list of chords with no lyrics at all. Pick one format and stick with it. Chords above lyrics is the most readable on stage — it's how most musicians naturally scan a song while playing. Whatever you choose, be consistent. ## Step 3: Track the details that matter live A chord chart without context is only half useful. The things you'll actually need on stage: the key you perform it in, your capo position, the tempo if you use a click, and the total duration for setlist planning. These details save you the "wait, what capo was that?" moment at soundcheck. Store them with the song, not in your head. > I built [Fretlist](https://fretlist.com) specifically around this — every song stores key, capo, and tuning alongside the chord chart, visible at a glance. ## Step 4: Build setlists with intention Don't just throw songs in a random order. Think about key flow (avoid jumping between extreme keys), energy arc (open strong, build, close big), and practical things like tuning changes between songs. A good setlist app lets you drag and drop songs, see the metadata per song without opening each one, and gives you total duration so you know you're covered for the gig. ## Step 5: Make it accessible on stage Whatever system you use, it needs to work on your phone or tablet under stage lights. This means readable text at arm's length, easy navigation between songs, and no fiddling with menus mid-set. Print a paper backup if that makes you feel safe — but your primary system should be digital, searchable, and always with you. ## The short version One place. Consistent format. Song details stored, not memorized. Intentional setlists. Accessible on stage. That's it. If you're still managing your chord charts across multiple apps and notebooks, it might be time to consolidate. I went through the same process and eventually built [Fretlist](https://fretlist.com) to solve it — for myself first, now for any gigging musician who wants their stuff sorted. [Try Fretlist for free →](https://fretlist.com) --- - [From Notebook to Screen: Why I Finally Went Digital with My Chord Sheets](/blog/from-notebook-to-screen-going-digital-with-chord-sheets) - [How to Migrate from OnSong to Fretlist](/blog/how-to-migrate-from-onsong-to-fretlist) - [How to Migrate from SongbookPro to Fretlist](/blog/how-to-migrate-from-songbook-pro-to-fretlist) ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── title: "Why I built a chord sheet app after 15 years of gigging" description: "After 15 years of gigging and organizing chord charts across too many apps, I decided to build something better." source: "https://fretlist.com/blog/why-i-built-fretlist" ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── I've been performing as a singer-songwriter for over 15 years. Weddings, house concerts, bars and cafés. I also happen to be a developer. And I've always been the kind of musician who likes his stuff sorted — people sometimes call me an "office artist." ## The problem I was never messy. But my chord charts were everywhere: iA Writer, Evernote, Apple Notes, Notion. Some songs existed in multiple apps in slightly different versions. Setlists were handwritten in a booklet I kept in my guitar case. I wanted one source of truth. Not five apps and a notebook. ## The WordPress version When I started playing regularly with a buddy, we needed a shared place for our chord charts — keys, capo positions, guitar tunings, with separate settings per player. So I built a simple WordPress site for the two of us. It worked surprisingly well. We used it for every gig. But it was basic, built for two people, and WordPress made every small change feel heavier than it needed to be. ## The rebuild At the end of 2025, something shifted. New songs, new personal growth, new ambitions. 2026 felt like the year to give long-cherished dreams a real shot. So I took everything I'd learned and rebuilt it as a proper app — for every gigging musician who wants their chord charts and setlists organized: - **Chord sheets with chords above lyrics** — the way you'd read them on stage - **Key, capo, tuning** — stored per song, visible at a glance - **One-click transpose** - **Drag-and-drop setlists** - **Works on any device** — no app store required No MIDI. No backing tracks. No feature bloat. That became [Fretlist](https://fretlist.com). ## Why not OnSong or BandHelper? They're powerful tools — but built for a different kind of musician. I didn't need powerful. I needed simple. Web-based, no learning curve, built by someone who actually plays live. [OnSong](/alternative/onsong) is iOS-only and built around MIDI, projection, and backing tracks. [BandHelper](/alternative/bandhelper) adds scheduling, finances, and stage plots. Both are great — for the musician who needs all that. I needed chord sheets and setlists that worked on any device. > If that sounds familiar, [give Fretlist a try](https://fretlist.com) — it's free to get started. ## What happened when I shared it I kept procrastinating on posting about it. But 2026 is the year of not being afraid, so I shared it on Threads. Over 30 musicians signed up overnight. The messages were all the same: "I've been dealing with the exact same problem." Turns out there's a whole group of gigging musicians who don't need a complex music production tool. They just want their chord charts organized and accessible on stage. ## Where it's going Fretlist is still early. I'm building it with a small group of musicians who actually perform live. Their feedback shapes what gets built next. If your chord sheets are spread across too many apps and notebooks — I built this for people like us. [Try Fretlist for free →](https://fretlist.com) --- - [From Notebook to Screen: Why I Finally Went Digital with My Chord Sheets](/blog/from-notebook-to-screen-going-digital-with-chord-sheets) - [How to Organize Your Chord Charts and Setlists for Gigs](/blog/how-to-organize-chord-charts-setlists)