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Ukulele is a compact string instrument that originally comes from Hawaii. Because of their size and price, they’re popular with both children and adults – and even the gloomiest song becomes a little cozier on a Ukulele.
The best-known and most popular is the soprano Ukulele, but it’s actually the smallest of the Ukulele sizes. If you’d like an instrument with a bit more resonance and more room for your fingers, you may want to use a concert Ukulele, which is slightly larger. They sound fuller, and if you have big hands, it’s easier to fit your fingers on the fretboard. There are also tenor and baritone Ukuleles, which are larger, but they aren’t as popular domestically.
A Ukulele uses nylon strings like a Spanish guitar, so it doesn’t take much force to press them down. Unlike a guitar, however, a Ukulele has only 4 strings and they’re tuned completely differently – so the chords are different too.
How do you tune a Ukulele?
A Ukulele is tuned to gCEA, but unlike a guitar, where the strings are arranged from lowest to highest, the first string is the second-highest in pitch. This helps give the Ukulele its bright tone.
It’s much easier to tune the Ukulele with a clip-on tuner than by ear, so it’s a good idea to get a tuner along with your Ukulele.
Five easy chords for Ukulele
The five chords you’ll get in this guide are C, A minor, F, Em7 and G. The first two can be played with one finger, F and Em7 require two fingers, and for G you’ll need three fingers. Luckily, these five chords also work well together, so you can use them to play a lot of songs!
The chord diagrams below are read as a “picture” of the Ukulele’s fretboard (where you place your fingers). The horizontal lines are the Ukulele’s frets (the metal strips under the strings) and the vertical lines are the strings. If there’s a dot on a string, it should be pressed down – a good tip is to just go for it – the first couple of chords are quite easy to make sound good!
1. C chord (C major)
The basic finger position for the C chord on Ukulele is to place your middle finger on the second fret of the A string – the one facing down toward the floor. You can also start by using your index finger, but in the long run it’s easier to switch to the other chords if you use your middle finger.
2. Am chord (A minor)
Here you get to make do with just one finger again – enjoy it while it lasts ;) The most commonly used finger for Am is the ring finger, but again you can start with your index finger.
3. F major chord
With F major you’ll need to use two fingers. Use your ring finger on the 2nd fret of the G string and your index finger on the 1st fret of the E string (this is where it starts to make sense why, for example, you use your ring finger for the A minor chord).
4. Em7 chord (E minor 7)
Em7, like F major, uses two fingers. Here you should use your index finger on the 2nd fret of the C string and your ring finger on the 2nd fret of the A string.
5. G chord
As the last chord in this beginner’s guide, you’ll need three fingers. First you reuse the fingers from Em7 – index finger on the 2nd fret of the C string and ring finger on the 2nd fret of the A string – and finally you place your middle finger on the 3rd fret of the E string. At first it can be difficult to get all the strings to ring clearly – especially on a soprano Ukulele there isn’t much space – but with practice it’s possible, even for the biggest hands!
Tips for learning chords on Ukulele
Once you’ve got the chords into your fingers, the next step is to practise switching between them quickly. It’s simply a matter of practice, as your fingers need to build muscle memory for where the different chords are placed. The good thing is that as you get the chords down, it becomes easier and easier to learn new chords.
From here, we wish you lots of fun playing the Ukulele! As mentioned, there are an incredible number of songs you can tackle with these five chords. Many chord sites let you transpose (transpose) the songs – if you transpose to the key of C major or A minor, it fits the five chords in this guide. The remaining chords in the key are B minor and D minor – you can quickly find a chord diagram for them online when you’re ready to move on to more chords – but it’s a good idea to get the first five properly in place first, because then it’s much easier to move on!
Tip: Also read our guide: Learn to play guitar easily
