FretTutor vs FretCipher

FretTutor is a guitar companion that does its thinking on your iPhone. It listens to you play, works out the chords in songs you bring it, and shows you every way to play what it finds, without accounts, ads, or analytics. TUNER Play a string and the screen fills with that note's colour, so you can read it from across the room. It tracks every string to within a couple of cents and holds steady while the note rings out. Nine tunings are built in: standard, drop D, drop C, half and full step down, open G, open D, DADGAD, and 12-string, where the six courses are treated as six things to tune. CHORDS A searchable library of 27 chord qualities across all 12 roots. Every chord shows its playable voicings, staff notation you can tap to hear, a map of its tones on the neck, and a parent scale guaranteed to contain every chord tone. The Circle of Fifths lives here too, with the diatonic chords of every major and minor key. FRETBOARD Pick a root and a chord or scale. Chord mode steps through every voicing on the neck (D major alone has 19). Scale mode boxes off numbered positions that tile the whole fretboard. Tap any fret to hear it, or press and slide along a string. ANALYZE Bring a song in from the Files app or your music library, capture one through the microphone, or try a built-in example. FretTutor finds the key, the chord progression on a synced timeline, the tempo and meter, a tab sketch, the song's structure, and a suggested capo position when one turns an awkward key into open shapes. Analysis runs entirely on the device, so it works in airplane mode. Save results and play along with them. METRONOME 40 to 240 bpm with tap tempo, time signatures from 2/4 to 12/8, and subdivisions down to sixteenths. The click is scheduled on the audio clock rather than a timer, so it does not drift over a long practice. SHOTS Record short video takes of your playing. Takes stay on your iPhone: keep the ones you're proud of, leave yourself a note about what to fix, share one through the share sheet, delete the rest. A sample feed previews what a shared feed will look like in a future update. GAMES A daily exercise graded live through the microphone. Play the chords and notes it asks for and hear whether they landed. Difficulty-aware keys keep beginners out of B-flat. Play Along runs you through a whole progression, chord by chord. Earn gold, silver and bronze awards and browse them in your trophy case. PRIVACY FIRST FretTutor has no account, no ads, no analytics, and no tracking. Your recordings, your music and your microphone are processed on your iPhone and never uploaded. The one optional feature that uses the internet, downloading experimental recognition models in Settings, asks you first and is off by default. Requires iOS 17. Designed for iPhone.

Master the guitar fretboard. See how music theory actually connects. FretCipher is an interactive guitar fretboard, music theory reference, and training tool designed to help guitarists understand what they’re playing—not just memorize patterns. Explore scales, modes, chords, triads, intervals, and note relationships directly on the fretboard. Whether you’re learning your first scale positions, connecting shapes across the neck, studying chord tones, or trying to finally understand how music theory applies to guitar, FretCipher makes it visual. SEE THE ENTIRE FRETBOARD Choose a key, scale, or mode and instantly see the notes and intervals mapped across the neck. Move between positions or view the larger pattern to understand how everything connects. EXPLORE CHORDS & TRIADS Visualize chord tones, triads, inversions, and different voicings on the fretboard. See where the root, 3rd, 5th, 7th, and other intervals actually live beneath your fingers. LEARN SCALES & MODES Explore major and minor scales, pentatonics, modes, and other useful scale patterns. Switch between note names and intervals to study the fretboard from different perspectives. TRAIN, DON’T JUST STUDY Interactive games and quizzes help turn fretboard knowledge into instinct. Practice identifying notes, intervals, triads, positions, key signatures, and more. BUILD YOUR OWN Create and save custom scales and note combinations for the sounds and concepts you want to explore. MAKE IT YOUR FRETBOARD Customize the appearance of the fretboard with your own color schemes so roots, intervals, and important notes stand out the way you want them to. SAVE & EXPORT Save your favorite scales and configurations, then export clean fretboard diagrams for practice, teaching, songwriting, or reference. FretCipher is built for guitarists who want to go beyond memorizing boxes and start understanding how the fretboard works as one connected musical system. See it. Understand it. Play it.