You’ve decided to learn to play the guitar and are very excited about this new endeavor. You’ve picked out a few tabs to begin practicing with, but you’ve realized that you don’t have any idea how to read guitar tabs! Fortunately, it’s not hard to read guitar tabs; they are made with the novice in mind and once you learn how, you’ll have no trouble whatsoever using tabs. They are far easier to begin using than sheet music.

Reading guitar tabs is easy once you get to know the layout of the tabs. Tabs are the preferred method of music for many beginning guitar players, because it allows you to start learning how to play guitar before you even learn how to read sheet music. There are many differences and similarities between traditional sheet music and guitar tabs. First, guitar tabs show you where each note that is to be played is and how to play it.

There are some similarities between traditional sheet music and guitar tabs; the most important difference is the layout of the tabs. Unlike sheet music, guitar tabs indicate the placement of your fingers while playing.

As you are learning how to read guitar tabs, you’ll probably notice that unlike sheet music, guitar tabs feature six lines as opposed to the five seen in sheet music. That’s for a good reason – these six lines represent your guitar’s six strings. Once you know this, things should be much clearer to you.

See those metal lines on the neck of your guitar? Those are the frets and on your tabs, they are indicated by the vertical lines you see there – your fingers are placed in between (not on!) the frets while playing. When you’re reading guitar tabs, there will be numbers – these tell you which fret your fingers should be on.

You will find numbers in accordance to the guitar frets on the guitar tab; however, you might find a zero on the tab as well. This will mean that the string indicated will be openly played, instead of pressed. A good example of frets is if you were to see the number three on the A tab line, you would play the A note on the third fret.

While you are learning how to read guitar tabs, you will also notice a number of symbols on the tab as well. There are many symbols such as X, B, R, H, P, PM, T, or /. Each of these symbols have a specific meaning on a guitar tab. While reading guitar tabs, an X will indicate that the string itself will not even be played during that chord or note. The B symbol will indicate that you will bend the note, while the P symbol will mean that you will pull off the note.

To briefly run down the other symbols, an H denotes a hammer-on, R release, T is for tap, PM means to palm mute that note or chord and a / means to slide. When you are learning to read guitar tabs, you will gradually become with all of these parts of playing and reading tabs – frets, symbols and everything else.