Drop D Tuning for Guitar

Drop D runs D2, A2, D3, G3, B3, E4, in playing order. The lowest-pitched string is D2 (73.42 Hz) and the highest is E4 (329.63 Hz), measured against A4 = 440 Hz. Those are the exact target frequencies the tuner on this page listens for.

1 of the 6 strings move: E2 down 2 semitone(s) to D2. Work through them in order, then go back and re-check the first string — retuning shifts the neck tension slightly, so the earlier strings drift as you go.

The gateway drop tuning: only the sixth string changes, so every chord shape above it still works. The payoff is a one-finger power chord across the bottom three strings and a low D that rings a whole tone below standard. Ubiquitous across grunge, hard rock and acoustic fingerstyle alike.

D2 is 73.42 Hz at concert pitch (A4 = 440 Hz). That's the fundamental — the string also produces harmonics above it, which is why a tuner reading the wrong octave usually means it locked onto a harmonic rather than the fundamental. This is the lowest string in this guitar tuning.

Lowering only the sixth turns the bottom three strings into a stacked fifth and fourth — root, fifth, octave — which is a complete power chord under one barred finger. Everything from the fifth string upward keeps its standard relationship, so the entire chord vocabulary above it survives untouched, and that asymmetry is the whole appeal: maximum rhythmic payoff for one peg turn. The low D also unlocks a bass note a whole tone under the guitar's usual floor, which is why fingerstyle players in the key of D adopt it for reasons that have nothing to do with distortion. Scale patterns on the sixth string shift two frets toward the nut; everywhere else the fretboard behaves exactly as before.