Note Values: Whole to Sixty-Fourth Notes and Their Length at Any BPM

What are the note values in music?

Seven note values cover almost all written music, from the whole note down to the sixty-fourth note. Each step halves the length of the one above it, so two half notes fill a whole note and two sixteenth notes fill an eighth.

American English names the values by fraction; British English uses older Latin-derived names. Every note value has a matching rest of the same length.

How do rests match note values?

A rest marks silence for exactly the length of its matching note. A quarter rest lasts one quarter-note beat; an eighth rest lasts half a beat.

• Whole rest — a filled block hanging below the fourth staff line; it also marks a full bar of silence in any meter.
• Half rest — a filled block sitting on the third staff line.
• Quarter rest — a vertical zigzag.
• Eighth to sixty-fourth rests — a slanted stem with one to four flags, matching the flags of the note.

How long is each note value at 60, 90 and 120 BPM?

Multiply the quarter-note length, 60,000 ÷ BPM, by the note’s beat count. At 60 BPM the quarter note lasts 1,000 ms, so every value is a round number; at 90 and 120 BPM the same ratios apply.

note length (ms) = (60,000 ÷ BPM) × quarter-note beats

For any other tempo, the BPM to ms chart fills in the same table, and the note-length calculator on the home page adds hertz and bar length.

How do note values connect to the time signature?

The bottom number of a time signature names the note value that counts as one beat. A 4 means the quarter note, a 2 the half note, an 8 the eighth note and a 16 the sixteenth note. The top number counts how many of those values fill a bar.

Bar lengths assume 120 quarter notes per minute. A 6/8 bar and a 3/4 bar hold the same total time but group it differently: two groups of three eighths against three quarter notes. The time signature guide covers simple and compound meters in full.

How do dots, ties and triplets change a note value?

Dots and ties lengthen a note; tuplets such as triplets squeeze extra notes into the same time. None of them adds a new note symbol; each modifies an existing value.

• A dot adds half the note’s value, so a dotted quarter lasts 1.5 beats: 750 ms at 120 BPM. The rule and its double-dot variant are in the guide to dotted note lengths.
• A tie joins two notes of the same pitch into one sound; a quarter tied to an eighth lasts 1.5 beats, the same as a dotted quarter.
• A triplet fits three notes into the time of two, so each lasts ⅔ of its plain value: an eighth-note triplet lasts 166.67 ms at 120 BPM. The triplet guide covers quarter and sixteenth triplets as well.

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