Tone Deaf Test

• Smallest pitch step you heard: in cents. A semitone, the step between two neighboring piano keys, is 100 cents. This is the step you could tell apart about 7 times out of 10. Smaller is finer.
• Beats matched: how many of the 5 rhythms you tapped back closely. Tempo doesn't count: your taps are stretched to the rhythm's length before comparing.
• Rhythm timing error: on average, how far each gap between your taps was from the rhythm's gap, in percent.
• Notes named (optional part): how many single notes you named exactly. A note one semitone off earns partial credit in the percentage, the way researchers score it [1].

1. Sound check. You hear four notes going up, so you can set a comfortable volume. Loud is not better.
2. Higher or lower? Two tones play, one after the other. Was the second one higher or lower? The first tone's pitch changes every time, between 330 and 660 Hz, so you can't learn a fixed note. The step starts at 100 cents. After two right answers in a row it gets smaller; after a wrong answer it gets bigger. This "2-down, 1-up" rule settles where you are right about 71% of the time [9]. It stops after 10 turning points, and your result is the average of the last 6.
3. Rhythm. A short click rhythm plays 2 times; then tap it back. There are 5 rhythms.
4. Perfect pitch test (optional). 12 single notes, with no reference note and no feedback. Name each on the keyboard.

Every sound is made in your browser; there are no recordings. Your answers are scored on our server, which replays the higher/lower steps from your answers. Results are saved to build fair comparisons, as our privacy policy explains.

Perfect (absolute) pitch is naming a note without hearing a reference note first. In one large online study, people who had it scored far above everyone else; scores formed two separate groups, with few people in between [1]. How common it is depends on who you ask: about 30% of Japanese music students and 7% of Polish music students passed a strict test [7], and early lessons and a tone language make it more likely [6]. Most people, including most good musicians, have relative pitch instead: they hear the steps between notes, not the notes themselves.

• Musical training. Years of playing an instrument or singing make pitch steps much easier to hear [2][3].
• Practice on the task itself. Thresholds drop over the first runs, even within a session [2]. Compare your next try with this one.
• Headphones and room. Headphones and a quiet room help. Tiny phone speakers can make low tones hard to hear.
• Attention and tiredness. A lapse of attention on one trial makes the step jump up again.
• Rhythm habits. People tend to drift toward simple rhythms, like long notes twice as long as short ones, when tapping back [10]. Some "error" is normal for everyone.

The Helibrain tone deaf test is a fun ear game based on research tasks. It is not a hearing test, not a diagnosis of amusia, and not the research batteries used to diagnose it (such as the Montreal Battery of Evaluation of Amusia) [11]. Browser audio and speakers are not lab equipment, so treat your numbers as rough.

If you are worried about your hearing, for example if speech sounds muffled, see a doctor or an audiologist.