Features  /  Tuner
Tuner

Tuner

The whole instrument at once, the drones one at a time, and a reading of how steady you blow.

The tuner listening to the whole instrument
Polyphonic

Hear the Whole Instrument at Once Free

Bass drone, both tenors and the full chanter scale, each on its own gauge, all from one microphone. A beat meter shows the tenors pulling into unison, and rather than tuning to a number you can tune the drones to your actual chanter: sound your Low A and every gauge re-centres on where your pipe really sits.

Play a slow scale under full drones and the chanter grid fills note by note, so you can see exactly which fingers need tape.

The guided tune-up showing bass, middle and outside drones
Drones

The Drones, One at a Time

Bass, middle and outside each get a gauge, in the order they stand on your shoulder, so your eye goes straight from the reading to the slide. The guided tune-up takes them in turn: it asks for the bass and the outside tenor first, then brings the middle in against them, with a needle for each tenor showing which way to move and how far. Ask Siri for it: “Help me tune my drones in Ultimate Piper.”

Blowing mode drawing pitch against time with a steadiness score
Steady Blowing

Steady Blowing, Measured Free

Pitch follows pressure, so the tuner can read your bag. Blowing mode draws the last twenty seconds of pitch for chanter, tenors and bass as lines against time and scores the steadiness out of 100. A flat line is a steady bag, a wandering one is not, and you can see which drone gives first.

Pipes only: a practice chanter's pitch follows the reed and your mouth rather than the bag, so the meter is not offered there.

The steady blowing strip above the score during follow-along
While You Play

Blowing Under a Tune

The same strip is a tap away while you follow along with a tune, from the wind button in the playing bar. Play the tune, glance down, and see whether the pressure held through the hard corners or sagged on the long notes.

Polyphonic tuner on Apple Watch showing drone gauges, tenor beat rate and chanter note Drone gauges on Apple Watch with the middle tenor stopped Chanter Low A captured at 483.7 Hz on Apple Watch Metronome on Apple Watch
Apple Watch

On Your Wrist Free

The tuner hears the whole instrument at once: bass drone, both tenors and chanter together, with a gauge for each drone in the order they stand on your shoulder. Tune two ways: against the target frequency set in the tuner on your iPhone, or sound your Low A, capture where your chanter actually sits, and let every gauge judge the drones against that. A beat-rate readout shows the tenors pulling into unison — tune until it reads zero. Stop the middle tenor to set bass and outer first, and the chanter line names the note you're sounding with its offset in cents.

The metronome is still a tap away: adjust BPM with the Digital Crown, feel haptic taps on every beat, and your settings sync automatically from your iPhone.

Beat Meter

Two tenors a shade apart beat against each other, and the tuner draws that beat as it happens. Watch it fall to nothing as they lock, then bring the bass in.

Tune to Your Chanter

Sound your Low A and the tuner takes your chanter's pitch as the reference, so the drones tune to the instrument you actually have rather than a number on a chart.

Four Tuning Schemes

GHB Standard with the flat harmonic High G, Just Intonation, Seumas MacNeill's 1954 ratios, or equal temperament for comparison. Pick the scheme and the target Low A once; they sync to every device.

Hands Free

“Tune my pipes in Ultimate Piper” opens the tuner listening before you have the pipes on your shoulder. Every tuner command is on the Siri & Shortcuts page.

Works on iPhone, iPad, Mac, and Apple Watch

All your tunes, folders, practice sessions, and settings sync seamlessly via iCloud.

Requires iOS 26, iPadOS 26, macOS 26, or watchOS 26.