Best ear training apps in 2026: an honest comparison
Most ear-training-app roundups copy each other. This one tries to be useful: nine apps, real strengths and weaknesses, and the one question you should answer before picking any of them.
Most “best ear training apps” lists are functionally identical: same names, same paragraphs, same lazy ordering. We are obviously not unbiased — we make one of the apps on this list. But Fifths exists because the existing apps each get something right and something wrong, and a learner who picks the wrong one for their goals can spend months drilling without much musical improvement to show for it.
This is a more honest comparison: what each app actually does, where it falls short, and which kind of learner it suits.
The one question to answer first
Before downloading anything, decide: are you trying to drill interval recognition or functional hearing?
- Interval recognition is the textbook task: two notes play, identify the distance between them (minor third, perfect fifth, etc.). It is what almost every ear-training app does by default.
- Functional hearing is what musicians actually use to follow songs by ear: hearing each note as a role in the key (the third, the fifth, the leading tone) rather than as a distance from another note.
The empirical case for prioritizing functional training is strong (see Why interval drills alone don’t make you hear music). Interval drills are necessary but not sufficient — they often produce learners who can pass an interval quiz but cannot transcribe a melody.
Some apps support both. Some only really support one. Ask the question before you commit.
The apps
1. EarMaster
The category default. A 1996 desktop product (Denmark) that has aged into a comprehensive web/iOS/Android app covering intervals, chord identification, scale identification, melodic and rhythmic dictation, and sight-singing. Hundreds of lessons. Uses a “guided cadence” mode for functional training and supports multiple notation systems.
Strengths: breadth, instructional polish, longevity (the curriculum is well-tested), cadence-priming on most lessons. Weaknesses: UI dates itself; subscription is on the higher end for a self-directed learner; the depth-of-curriculum can feel overwhelming for someone who just wants to start drilling. Best for: the serious student who wants one app that covers the whole aural-skills curriculum a music-school program would, and is willing to commit time to a structured path. Pricing (2026): Pro subscription ~$5/mo billed annually, with free tier on web.
2. Tenuto
iOS-only, made by the people behind musictheory.net. Twenty-some focused mini-drills (interval ID, chord ID, scale ID, keyboard reverse, fretboard reverse, etc.) presented as a clean, no-frills toolkit. One-time purchase rather than subscription.
Strengths: excellent design economy, no fluff, lifetime purchase, the drills work; pairs with the (free) musictheory.net lessons online. Weaknesses: iOS-only (no Android, no web), no curriculum structure or progress tracking, mostly interval-and-chord-quality oriented (not strong on functional/scale-degree mode). Best for: iOS users who already know what they want to drill and prefer one-time purchase to subscription churn. Pricing: ~$4.99 one-time.
3. Functional Ear Trainer (Korchan / Benbassat method)
The free, single-purpose app that the relative-pitch community keeps coming back to. Plays a I-IV-V-I cadence, then a single note, and asks you to identify the scale degree (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, b3, etc.). That is the entire app. Available on Android and iOS.
Strengths: the cadence-priming + scale-degree task is the canonical functional-ear exercise; free; minimal; the daily 10-minute habit it enables is exactly what builds the ear over months. Weaknesses: does only one thing — no chord ID, no rhythm, no dictation, no progress tracking; mobile-only. Best for: the learner who wants the gold-standard functional drill, alone, and is willing to graduate to other tools for the rest of the curriculum. Pricing: free.
4. Perfect Ear
The Android default. Free with ads, comprehensive, covers intervals, chords, scales, rhythm tapping, and includes a notation reader. Active development.
Strengths: breadth on Android (where Tenuto isn’t an option); free; rhythm coverage is genuinely useful and underrepresented elsewhere; pleasant UI for a free product. Weaknesses: ads in the free tier; the breadth is broad-but-shallow — none of the modules go as deep as a dedicated tool; functional-ear coverage is present but not the focus. Best for: Android users who want a single broad-coverage app to cycle through different drill types daily. Pricing: free with ads, optional pro upgrade.
5. Tonegym
Web-first, gamified, social. The product positions itself between a music-theory drill and a daily fitness habit — daily targets, streaks, leaderboards. The roster of “games” includes interval recognition, chord identification, melodic dictation, and a popular standalone vocal-range tester.
Strengths: gamification works for some learners; daily-habit framing is exactly what ear training needs; social leaderboard if you find that motivating; the free vocal-range-test tool is genuinely useful. Weaknesses: the gamification can feel infantilizing for adult learners; subscription pricing is in the higher band; the depth-vs-breadth balance leans breadth; functional/scale-degree training is light. Best for: learners who respond to gamification and streak mechanics, and want a daily-habit framing. Pricing: free tier with paid Pro/Premium subscription tiers.
6. Musictheory.net
Free, browser-based, founded in 2000. Mostly known for its theory lessons — clef reading, chord construction, key signatures — but the Exercises section includes the same drills Tenuto packages: interval ID, chord ID, scale ID, keyboard reverse. Strict, plain, fast.
Strengths: free, fast, no signup, no ads; the exercises load instantly and let you drill exactly what you want; the lessons are still some of the best basic-theory explanations on the web. Weaknesses: dated visually; no progress tracking; no functional-ear mode; no rhythm coverage. Best for: anyone who wants to drill interval/chord/scale recognition for free in a browser without committing to anything. Pricing: free.
7. Teoria
The Spanish-origin (now multilingual) free web tool that has been quietly serving music schools since the early 2000s. Comprehensive — interval, chord, scale, sight-reading, and rhythmic dictation modules — with explanatory content alongside.
Strengths: free, multilingual, available on mobile browser; the rhythmic-dictation module is one of the better free implementations. Weaknesses: UI is even more dated than musictheory.net; no real curriculum or progress; functional-ear coverage is light. Best for: music students whose teacher recommended a specific Teoria exercise. Pricing: free.
8. SoundGym
Different category — ear training for audio engineers and mixers. Drills include EQ identification (which frequency was boosted/cut), compression timing, panning resolution, and reverb-decay matching. Subscription web product.
Strengths: the only serious app in this niche; the EQ ear-training drills are widely respected in the production community; daily-habit framing. Weaknesses: unrelated to musical (pitch/harmony) ear training — different skill entirely; subscription cost is significant. Best for: producers, mixing engineers, audio professionals. Not for learners trying to hear music. Pricing: monthly/annual subscription tiers.
9. Fifths (this one’s us)
A 2025 web-and-mobile app that prioritizes functional, scale-degree-based training and uses spaced repetition to surface specifically the items each learner keeps getting wrong. The differentiation: every exercise is presented inside an established key (cadence-primed); session analytics show which intervals, scale degrees, and keys are tripping you up; the 12-key rotation tradition (jazz pedagogy) and the Voice section (with pitch-detection feedback) are first-class. We are biased; here are the trade-offs.
Strengths: functional-first curriculum (informed by tonal-hierarchy research and the Berklee/Banacos jazz-pedagogy literature); per-item spaced-repetition surfaces weaknesses without you having to track them yourself; web + iOS + Android; one-time $99 lifetime tier for the first 100 seats; no ads, ever. Weaknesses: newer (so less battle-tested than EarMaster); the lifetime tier is limited; the app deliberately does not gamify with streaks-or-die mechanics, which some learners do prefer. Best for: adult learners who want measurable progress on functional hearing, jazz musicians who want serious harmony coverage, and the learners who tried interval-only apps and bounced off them. Pricing: free to try (no signup); $4.99/mo Pro; $99 lifetime for first 100.
Honourable mentions
- JazzEar and ToneSeed are smaller, jazz-focused apps that have started appearing in 2024-2025 listicles. Both are early but the jazz-specific framing is real and unmet by the bigger players.
- Auralia / Musition are the conservatory desktop products. Comprehensive and expensive; mostly bought by music schools rather than individual learners.
- MyEarTraining (Android, iOS) is a solid free-with-ads alternative to Perfect Ear with a smaller feature set.
- Complete Music Reading Trainer is a niche pick for note-reading-on-staff specifically.
Quick comparison
| App | Platform | Price | Functional mode | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| EarMaster | Web/iOS/Android | ~$5/mo | Yes (cadence mode) | Comprehensive curriculum |
| Tenuto | iOS only | $4.99 once | Limited | iOS, one-time purchase |
| Functional Ear Trainer | iOS/Android | Free | Yes (only mode) | Pure functional drilling |
| Perfect Ear | Android-first | Free + ads | Limited | Android breadth |
| Tonegym | Web | $$$ subscription | Limited | Gamification |
| Musictheory.net | Web | Free | No | Free interval/chord drills |
| Teoria | Web | Free | Limited | Free, school-aligned |
| SoundGym | Web | $$$ subscription | N/A (engineering) | Production / mixing |
| Fifths | Web/iOS/Android | $4.99/mo or $99 lifetime | Yes (default) | Functional + analytics + jazz |
How to actually choose
Pick the app whose default mode matches the skill you’re trying to build. If you want to learn to follow songs by ear, you want functional/scale-degree training; the apps that lead with that (Functional Ear Trainer, Fifths) will get you there fastest. If you want to drill interval recognition for a music-theory exam, an interval-default app (Tenuto, musictheory.net) is fine.
The other rule: the best ear training app is the one you actually use for ten minutes a day. Spaced, daily practice beats two-hour weekend sessions by a wide margin (this is one of the more replicated findings in skill-acquisition research; see Spaced repetition for musicians). A free app you open every day is worth more than a perfect app you open twice a month.
If you want to read more on the underlying pedagogy, the Fifths science blog has 35 articles citing the primary research behind every claim above.