The piano lays out the notes in one line. The guitar spreads them over six strings, so the same note shows up in several places. That looks confusing at first, but it follows a simple pattern. Once you know it, you can find any note.
In standard tuning the are, from the lowest (thickest) to the highest: E A D G B E. Guitarists number them the other way round: string 1 is the high e, string 6 the low E. A saying to remember them: "Eddie Ate Dynamite, Good Bye Eddie". Click to hear each one:
Both E strings play the same note, two octaves apart. On this site the low E is at the bottom and the high e on top, the way guitar tab shows it (more on tab on the next page). It's as if the guitar lay face-up on your lap, neck pointing left.
Each raises a string by a half step. Neighbouring strings are tuned five half steps apart, so the 5th fret of a string plays the same note as the next higher open string. There is one exception: from G to B it's only four half steps, so there it's the 4th fret.
This is how guitarists tune by ear: play the 5th fret, then the next open string, and adjust until they sound the same. Listen to each pair:
If every string were five half steps above the last, the top string would be F4, not E. Tuning the B string a half step lower makes the two outer strings both E, and it lets the common shapes fit under four fingers.
The price: every shape that crosses from the G to the B string moves up one fret. You'll see this in the octave shapes below, and later in chord shapes and scale patterns. When a pattern "bends", the B string is usually why.
The dots on the neck at frets 3, 5, 7, 9 and 12 help you find your way. At the 12th fret (the double dot) every string starts over, an octave higher. Learn the natural notes on the two lowest strings first: later you'll use them to find where many chords start.
The small numbers are the frets. Between the natural notes are whole steps (two frets), except E–F and B–C, a half step (one fret), just like on the piano.
To find the same note an higher, go two strings up and two frets up. Crossing the B string, it's three frets up (that B string again):
Put it together and you can find any note all over the neck. Pick a note to see every place it sits, up to the 12th fret:
Every G on this board is one of the same few shapes: the same fret on both E strings, the octave shape, and the 12th fret. Practise finding notes with the note trainer.
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