A capo is a clamp that holds down all the strings at one fret at once. It works like a new nut: everything sounds higher, but your grips stay the same. If you play a C shape with the capo at the 2nd fret, you hear a D.
What is it good for?
- For your voice: if a song is too low to sing, put the capo one or two frets higher – and keep the easy grips.
- Playing with others: if the guitar uses a capo, you can put yours at the same fret and play the same chord shapes.
- Avoiding hard keys: a song in D with lots of tricky grips? With the capo at the 2nd fret you can play it in C shapes.
Which fret gives what?
Every fret raises everything by a semitone. This is how the C shape sounds:
- Capo at fret 1: C sounds as C# (Db)
- Capo at fret 2: C sounds as D, G as A, Am as Bm, F as G
- Capo at fret 3: C sounds as Eb
- Capo at fret 4: C sounds as E
- Capo at fret 5: C sounds as F
How to fit the capo properly
- Place it right behind the fret wire, on the side towards the headstock – not in the middle of the fret and not on top of the wire.
- It should sit straight across the neck and press all four strings evenly.
- Not too tight: if it pulls the strings sideways or presses very hard, they sound slightly sharp. Just tight enough that nothing buzzes.
- Then check briefly with the tuner. The easiest way is to tune the ukulele without the capo and then put it on carefully.
Which capo fits?
Choose a small, light capo made for ukulele. Guitar capos are often too wide and heavy for the narrow neck and press too hard. There are spring clamps, ones with a small adjusting screw and simple elastic ones. For children’s hands a spring capo is the most comfortable – you can move it with one hand.
The capo in the app
In every song you can change the key. If you want to play along with a capo song without using a capo yourself, simply raise the song by as many semitones as the capo has frets – the app then shows you the grips for the sounding chords. More about changing keys in Transposing.
Play songs