Online metronome · Free · No sign-up
The classic running cadence, and the tempo punk and thrash are usually taken at. 180 BPM is three beats a second, and it is the point where most players switch to counting the bar rather than the beat.
Beats per minute
180
Press Space to start and stop · ↑ ↓ to nudge off 180 · or
The tempo
Runners meet 180 as a target because coaches have used 180 steps per minute as a cadence benchmark for decades: one step per click, or one click per two steps at 90. Musicians meet it as the speed at which a straight-eight punk beat stops being a groove and becomes a wall. Both readings describe the same 0.333 seconds between beats.
Where you hear it
Counted in half time, this is the same music as 90 BPM: the click marks beats one and three instead of all four. If a part at 180 feels frantic, try the half-time click and play across it.
Wondering whether a particular track is 180 BPM? Tap along with it and compare, or let the MagicBPM app listen and tell you.
Practice note: For cadence work, set 180 and land one step per click. For music, set 90 and play two beats per click: the same tempo, half the noise, and far easier to stay inside.
Presets
Every one opens the metronome already running at that BPM.
Need something in between? The full metronome covers 40 to 300 BPM.
MagicBPM for iPhone and Android
The app pairs the same metronome with a real-time BPM detector that hears the music around you, so you can lift a tempo off a track and practice to it straight away.
Good to know
Three beats a second, quick enough that counting every one is work. A beat lands every 0.333 seconds, so one bar of 4/4 lasts 1.333 seconds and a three-minute song runs to about 135 bars. Press Play above to hear it.
180 BPM is very fast. It sits in the middle of Presto, twice the speed of the 90 BPM most pop grooves sit at, and about as quick as a tempo can get before a metronome click starts to blur.
Running and cycling cadence drills at 180 steps per minute; Punk, hardcore and thrash; Bebop heads counted in two, at 90 to the bar. The list is a guide rather than a rule: tempo varies within every genre.
Counted in half time, 180 BPM is 90 BPM, with the click marking beats one and three instead of every beat. Both readings describe the same music, which is why two people, or two apps, can give different answers for one song and both be right.
This page opens already set to 180 BPM, so press Play or hit the spacebar. To move off it, drag the slider, type a number into the BPM box, or use the arrow keys to nudge a beat at a time.
Measuring instead of setting? Use the tap tempo tool to find a song’s BPM.
