In this day and age, you can find an app for just about anything. Cooking, exercise, learning a language, brain-training, origami, lucid dreaming, just name an activity and there will be an app to go along with it. Learning an instrument is no exception to this, so I have decided to find out whether you can learn to play the piano using an app.

Over the past month, I have been using the three most popular music tutor apps currently on the App Store/Google Play Store. They all feature interactive lessons, note-recognition and come with both free and paid content. I have tested all of the apps on a Samsung Galaxy S8, without using any headphones or microphones. I have reviewed each app in three categories, which are:

Piano Basics: how well the app teaches the fundamentals of piano playing, such as finding your way around the piano, reading musical notation and playing rhythmically.

Reading Music & Note Recognition: how easy the built-in note-reader is to use when playing, any practise aids that are included (such as slowing down the music) and how accurate the app is at recognising the notes it hears.

Paid Features: the overall value for money you get from the app, taking into account the quality of the app, the amount of free content and the price of a subscription.

Yousician

First up is the most popular app for learning an instrument, Yousician. It offers lessons in piano, guitar, ukulele, bass and singing. This review is purely for the piano classes that Yousician offers.

Piano Basics: ★★☆☆☆

Let’s start with the positives: of the three apps reviewed, this was one of two to offer guidance on healthy piano postures. If you are having lessons with me, or have read any of my blogs before, then you will know just how important I consider posture to be.

As you can see from the screenshots above, the tutor demonstrates how to make a pianistic shape by relaxing your hand and resting your fingers on the keys (she asks you to imagine holding a baseball to achieve the correct hand-shape).

I was disappointed, however, that the tutor did not say a word on how high/low or near/far from the piano to sit. If you are not sitting at the correct height or distance then it will be impossible to assume the postures she demonstrates so well.

When it came to the introductory lessons, the tutor explained how to find notes on the piano, albeit very briefly. I suppose it doesn’t matter whether students understand how to navigate the piano when the app is constantly you where you need to be using an on-screen, flashing keyboard. Beginners may find this helpful, however, it discourages students from actually thinking about the notes they are playing.

There is also no mention of rhythm, as students simply have to hold the required notes down for as long as the app says to. This may seem harsh, however, my grumble with the lack of teachings on rhythm and keyboard geography is that anyone learning from this app will have a hard time playing without it in front of them.

Reading music & Note recognition: ★★★☆☆

When it came to playing the piano from Yousician, you are faced with a compressed piano keyboard and the standard musical staff of five lines. When a song starts, a green line will move along the staff and you must play the notes when the green line reaches them. The note recognition will then feed back to you whether you played it correctly and how in-time you were.

I liked that at the start I was given the option to choose which level to start at. If at any point you want to attempt a more advanced class then you will first have to complete a “skills test.” The note recognition was mostly accurate; in some of the more advanced pieces, it wasn’t able to comprehend everything it heard, however, it did not hinder me in passing the “skills tests” and progressing through the classes (as it did in Simply Piano, reviewed below).

If you do not play notes where the app expects to hear them then you will be told that you have played “late” or “early”. This is the closest that Yousican comes to teaching rhythm. I found that even when playing the notes correctly I was still informed of “lateness” or “earliness”, leading me to wonder if the app was programmed by J.K. Simmons’ character from Whiplash.

The music reader allows you to slow down the music, which is very helpful when practising. The sliding speed-scale is the most precise speed-control of the three apps tested. Users can also turn on the built-in metronome, or learn just one hand at a time. These are both welcome inclusions.

I was also given the option of reading standard musical notation, or simplified coloured bars. My problem with simplified notation is that pupils will have great difficulty learning music from other sources, so unless you are happy playing music from a single app (which you will need a monthly subscription for) then use standard notation. I should also mention that I found the simplified notation is much harder to comprehend at higher levels, to the extent that I was unable to pass skills tests that I had completed using standard notation.

Paid features: ★★★☆☆

Upgrading to a premium plan on Yousician will allow you unlimited access to all of the lessons and content. The free content is very generous, you will certainly have a chance to see whether you are finding the app useful before you hit the paywall.

If you commit to a year of Yousician’s premium features then it will cost you £12.99 per month, which is the most expensive of the three apps tested. I did not feel that it offered significantly more than Flowkey (reviewed below), which is cheaper if you make an annual payment.

Being a premium member also won’t unlock all of the songs; you’ll need an extra “premium plus” subscription if you’d like to access the complete song library. I wonder if they will introduce a “premium plus plus” at some point?

Final Verdict: ★★★☆☆

It is certainly possible to learn something from Yousician, however, if you are new to the piano then it won’t be easy to make any meaningful progress past the beginner classes. If you have a teacher then you may find Yousician to be a helpful aid between lessons, but be wary of growing too dependant on the app. Avoid the simplified notation at all costs, it is a cheap shortcut for absolute beginners that is not helpful at all in the medium-long term.

Update, July 12 2019: Yousician was the only one of the three apps to send practise reminders to the email address I registered with, which I thought to be a nice addition.

Simply Piano

Next under the microscope is JoyTunes Simply Piano. It has over 1.5 million users and claims to be the #1 piano app worldwide. It was chosen as one of Google Play’s best apps of 2017, and at the time of writing is #71 in education on the App Store.

Piano Basics: ★☆☆☆☆

On the App Store, there is an editor’s note saying: “within minutes you’ll start reading music, and soon you’ll be playing along with familiar songs and adopting good habits.” From this, I can surmise that the editor of the App Store is not a pianist of any great distinction, for Simply Piano makes no attempt to illustrate good habits at the piano.

This is the only app of the three reviewed to offer no guidance on helpful postures at the piano. You could use this app for a year and end up wondering why you always feel so uncomfortable and sore when playing.

Simply Piano makes no attempt to teach important concepts such as rhythm and pulse, and it skims over how to navigate the piano. This is presumably done with the belief that it is better to have to constantly show students where they need to play, rather than have them know how to find their way around the instrument for themselves.

The first lesson plays out much the same way as it does in Yousician; it introduces the piano keyboard and the notes on the stave. Like Yousician, it displays a keyboard at the bottom of the screen for reference while playing. My criticism is the same: if users are constantly shown where their fingers go on the piano, then how will they ever learn to read music and play independently?

Reading music & Note recognition: ★☆☆☆☆

The note recognition was competent when doing the beginner classes, however when faced with picking up more than three notes at a time, Simply Piano struggled. The problems were consistent, in one piece it couldn’t recognise a single E in a series of repeated A minor chords, and in another, it repeatedly failed to detect the C in a C major chord. Oddly, when I stopped playing the C and played only two of the three notes, Simply Piano believed that a C was being played.

The main problem with the note-recognition is not how poor it is, but that progress is tied to the app correctly detecting the right notes. If too many notes go undetected then the app will restart the song in “practise mode”, which slows down the tempo. This does nothing to address the issues with recognition, and if you are unable to complete the song then you must take the class again. Because of this, most of the classes above intermediate level I was unable to complete.

The worst part of this is that many of the songs are locked behind a prerequisite class, without any option to unlock them apart from completing the class. Because of this much of the song library was totally inaccessible to me, as any classes that I failed to complete because of the note-recognition issues remained a barrier to the song it should have unlocked.

When I contacted customer services on the Play Store because of the issues with note-recognition, they simply pointed me to the in-app guide. This guide is laughably unhelpful, merely offering suggestions such as “make sure you are playing in a quiet environment”, “re-position your device” and “avoid using the sustain pedal”. Needless to say that after trying these suggestions Simply Piano was no more adept at recognising notes than it had been before.

Paid features: ★☆☆☆☆

There is precious little free content on Simply Piano. Beyond the first lesson - a 6-part series teaching the notes C-G in the right hand - you will have to subscribe to the premium plan to access the remaining classes. Simply Piano makes some bold statements to persuade you to upgrade:

I was particularly horrified by the claim that you could make fast progress by studying 10 minutes week. I can’t think of any worthwhile skill that can be learned by committing just 10 minutes a week. A beginner piano lesson is 30 minutes and that is without any assigned practise!

The promise of “personalised workouts” and “tailored courses” was also unfulfilled, all the classes are identical, regardless of your skill, experience or playing habits. When you first log in to Simply Piano it asks you how much experience you have at the piano, however, it may as well not bother as whatever answer you give it will start you on the “Piano Basics” course.

If you choose an annual plan then Simply Piano costs £4.99 per month - the cheapest of the three. Bear in mind, though, that you will be debited £59.99 for this plan straight away; it is a yearly payment and not a monthly one.

Final Verdict: ★☆☆☆☆

I don’t have a single good thing to say about Simply Piano. There is a real danger that somebody who has a real interest in learning the piano will come across this app and end up giving up after a few weeks (or days), writing the whole experience off as something to be avoided. With over 5 million downloads worldwide, it is sobering to contemplate the number of people who have been turned off learning the piano because of the poor learning experience offered by Simply Piano.

Update, September 2 2019: A song library feature has since been added for Android users (this feature was already available on iOS). The developers issued a response which you can read here: Response from the developers of Simply Piano.

Flowkey

Finally, we have Flowkey, which has a significantly smaller user-base than Yousican and Simply Piano (just 500,000 downloads, compared with Simply Piano’s 5,000,000 and Yousician’s 10,000,000).

Piano Basics: ★★★★☆

Of the three apps, Flowkey has the best piano course. Like Yousician, Flowkey effectively demonstrates some healthy piano postures, including the same “imagine you are holding a ball” explanation as to how to form a piano hand. Also like Yousician, however, it does not say a word on how high up/low down or near/far from the piano you should position yourself.

Flowkey illustrates the geography of the piano very well. One of the advantages of learning through videos is that graphics and labels can be added, and Flowkey certainly makes the best use of them. I was pleased to see the groupings of black keys were clearly highlighted, and in later classes covering chords and intervals, there are all sorts of colourful annotations.

What I was most surprised by is that Flowkey also has entire classes dedicated to reading rhythms, something which filled me with joy. It is the only app of the three to do so (discounting Yousician’s over-eager reminders of “late” and “early” notes), causing me to question further why rhythm classes were omitted from the other two apps.

Reading music & Note recognition: ★★★★★

There is really very little to say about this, other than that Flowkey’s note-reader was comfortably the easiest to comprehend and read from. Unlike Yousician, Flowkey avoids the trap of using a simplified notation, which goes very much in its favour. Like Yousician, there are practise aids such as slowing down the speed and practising one hand at a time.

The decision to play a top-down video of an instructor playing along with the user also pays off. Unlike a computer-generated piano, showing a full-sized keyboard makes it harder to play the music without following the notes on the score. This, for me at least, is a positive, as it discourages students from switching off their brains while playing and “learning by rote.”

Of course, the correct notes are still highlighted, so having the piano there can still be an aid if students get stuck. Overall it is less intrusive to music-reading than having a digitised keyboard constantly flashing at you, something which supports good music-reading.

The note-recognition was the most accurate of all the three, I tested it with a thick-textured chord-heavy pop song and the C major prelude from Bach’s Well-Tempered Klavier. In both cases it was able to pick up almost everything I was playing).

Paid features: ★★☆☆☆

There are just 8 songs available for free from their library, which is considerably less than Yousician. Selected classes are available for non-premium users, however, I was disappointed that most of the lessons are locked behind the paywall. This even goes for the beginner classes; new users will find themselves halted after the first lesson.

The single-month payment of £17.99 is the most expensive option of all the payment plans across the three apps. If you are willing to commit to a 12-month subscription, however, then the monthly fee comes down to £8.74, which is cheaper than Yousician’s equivalent subscription at £12.99. Do be aware that the annual Flowkey subscription is an up-front payment of 12 instalments, whereas Yousician charges you monthly for all its plans.

Unlike Yousician and Simply Piano, Flowkey does not offer a free trial to its users, so to progress past the first class you will have to pay. I personally feel that Flowkey would be well advised to offer slightly more free content or free trial of premium features. At the moment there is very little being showcased to compel users to make an expensive up-front payment.

Final Verdict: ★★★★☆

It is a real shame that so much of Flowkey is hidden behind an expensive paywall. I suspect this is why their user-base is significantly lower than that of Yousician and Simply Piano. Having paid the required £17.99 for a single month’s access, I can say that the content is by far the best of the three apps reviewed here.

The app makes no elaborate claims of bestowing you with piano-playing abilities after just a few quick sessions, instead, there seems to be a genuine focus on useful content. I would like to see Flowkey introduce a free trial of premium content, even if it is just for a week so that more people can experience what quality online tuition should be.

Final thoughts

Having experienced three piano-teacher apps of differing quality, I have come away with a fresh understanding of the role that the digital world can play in piano education.

Though I was impressed by some of the content offered, I ultimately felt that none of the apps are able to teach a beginner how to play the piano without the aid of a teacher. This is not the fault of the apps themselves, but merely because of the necessity of human interaction when learning such a complex and diverse subject.

It would be easy to say that apps such as these are merely capitalising on the incidental whim of a mobile user to learn an instrument, however, I do not feel this is entirely fair. There is such a wealth of content on offer that pianists can use these apps in many ways to better themselves, as well as to just have some fun playing music from their libraries.