How to Tune a Ukulele

By Nan Liang · Fact-checked against acoustic pitch standards

A ukulele out of tune ruins even perfect chord shapes. Here is the whole job in three steps — no tuner required for the first pass.

Step 1 — Know your target notes

Standard ukulele tuning is g C E A (written low-to-high by string position). Say them out loud: good cats eat anchovies. The little g means the 4th string is tuned high — higher than the C string. This is re-entrant tuning, and it is the single most confusing thing for beginners.

Step 2 — Tune relative to the A string

No tuner? Use the instrument against itself:

1. Play the open A string (top string). That is your anchor — get it roughly right by ear or against any known pitch (a piano A4, a tuning fork, another instrument, or our reference tone).
2. Hold fret 2 on the G string — that note is A. Match the open A string to it.
3. Hold fret 4 on the C string — that is E. Match the open E string to it.
4. Hold fret 5 on the C string — that is A. Double-check against your anchor A.

Step 3 — Verify with the tuner

Open our free ukulele tuner, allow the microphone, and pluck one string at a time. The tuner shows the note name with its octave — G4, C4, E4, A4 for a standard uke. If it shows G3, your 4th string is an octave low.

Common problems

• New strings slip. Stretch each string gently away from the uke, re-tune, repeat 3–4 times. Nylon takes days to settle.
• Tuner flips between two notes. You are between semitones — turn the peg in smaller movements and pluck again.
• Everything sounds close but wrong. Check you are not a whole step off (A vs G♯). Compare against the reference tone.