25 guitar goals for beginners and intermediate players

Guitar goals for beginners

Beginner goals are about sore fingertips and one whole song, in that order.

• Pick up the guitar every day for 30 days, even for 10 minutes.
• Learn 8 open chords.
• Change between G, C and D in time for a full minute.
• Tune the guitar yourself before every practice for a month.
• Play your first whole song from start to finish.

Chord and rhythm goals

Chord goals count clean changes, and rhythm goals are tested against a metronome.

• Play a clean F barre chord.
• Make 60 changes between two chords in one minute.
• Strum a whole song with a metronome at 80 beats a minute and no stops.
• Learn 3 strumming patterns.
• Play barre chords in 5 positions up the neck.

Song and repertoire goals

Song goals count pieces you can play all the way through. Singing while you play is its own skill, and singing goals cover the other half of it.

• Learn one new song a week for 10 weeks.
• Sing and play one song at the same time.
• Know 10 songs by heart.
• Learn one solo note for note.
• Fingerpick one whole song.

Technique and theory goals

Technique goals are scales and picking, and theory goals tell you why they work. Scales are easier to see on a keyboard, which is one reason guitarists set piano goals too.

• Play the minor pentatonic scale in all 5 positions.
• Play a major scale at 100 beats a minute.
• Do an alternate picking drill with a metronome every day for 4 weeks.
• Name every note on the two lowest strings.
• Improvise for 2 minutes over a backing track.

Practice and performance goals

Practice goals count days and hours, and performance goals put someone else in the room.

• Play guitar on 100 days this year.
• Play 50 hours in 6 months. That is about 16 minutes a day.
• Film your hands once a week for 3 months.
• Play 3 songs for friends.
• Play with another musician 5 times.

What is a good guitar goal?

A good guitar goal is specific enough to test. A review of 35 years of goal research found that specific, hard goals lead to higher performance than being told to do your best. "Get good at guitar" has no test. "60 chord changes in a minute" has a stopwatch.

Practice counts for a lot, but only the right kind. A review of 88 studies found that deliberate practice explained about 21 percent of the differences in music performance. Deliberate means working on what you cannot do yet, not replaying the song you already know. Aim your goals at the hard part.

The old way to keep a daily practice is to mark each day on a calendar, the method known as don't break the chain. A plain count of days does the same job and does not fall apart when you miss one.

How to track guitar goals

Tick off the day when you put the guitar down. A review of 138 studies found that people who monitored their progress reached their goals more often, and that recording it beat keeping it in your head.

Practice days are a day count, and 100 of them is a 100 day challenge by another name. Minutes and songs learned are amounts that add up.

Your hands improve too slowly to notice from one day to the next. A picture that fills up one practice at a time shows the days you put in.

Frequently asked questions

What are good guitar goals for beginners?

Practise 10 minutes a day for 30 days, learn 8 open chords, and play one whole song. Changing chords in time is the first real hurdle, so give it a goal of its own.

What are good guitar goals for intermediate players?

Barre chords in 5 positions, the minor pentatonic scale in all 5 positions, one solo learned note for note, and 2 minutes of improvising over a backing track. Each one opens a part of the neck you were avoiding.

How long should I practise guitar each day?

Pick a length you can keep. Sixteen minutes a day is 100 hours in a year. What matters as much is what you practise: a review of 88 studies found that deliberate practice explained about 21 percent of differences in music performance.