DJ BPM Transition Calculator
How far do you push the pitch fader to get from one BPM to another, and how much does the key shift?
Within a standard ±10% pitch range, mixable on any gear.
Common transitions
| Transition | Pitch | Key shift |
|---|---|---|
| 120 → 124 BPM | +3.3% | +0.57 st |
| 122 → 128 BPM | +4.9% | +0.83 st |
| 124 → 126 BPM | +1.6% | +0.28 st |
| 126 → 130 BPM | +3.2% | +0.54 st |
| 128 → 132 BPM | +3.1% | +0.53 st |
| 128 → 140 BPM | +9.4% | +1.55 st |
| 130 → 138 BPM | +6.2% | +1.03 st |
| 140 → 150 BPM | +7.1% | +1.19 st |
| 140 → 174 BPM | +24.3% | +3.76 st |
| 150 → 160 BPM | +6.7% | +1.12 st |
| 160 → 174 BPM | +8.8% | +1.45 st |
| 174 → 87 BPM | -50.0% | -12.00 st |
How pitch faders change BPM and key
A turntable or CDJ pitch fader speeds up or slows down the whole track. Playing a 128 BPM track at +9.4% makes it 140 BPM, but it also raises the pitch by about 1.5 semitones, because speed and pitch are locked together unless keylock (master tempo) is enabled.
Rule of thumb: every 6% of pitch is roughly one semitone. Shifts up to about ±3% are barely noticeable; beyond ±6% vocals start to sound noticeably chipmunked or dragged unless keylock is on.
Keylock keeps the musical key constant while the tempo changes, at the cost of slight audio artifacts at extreme settings. For big jumps (say 140 to 174 BPM), DJs usually don't ride the fader at all: they use an echo-out, a half-time/double-time trick, or a breakdown swap instead. See our half-time BPM calculator for tempos that mix as halves or doubles.
Harmonic mixing
If keylock is off, a pitch change also changes the key relationships between tracks. One semitone is 12 positions around the Camelot wheel, so even a 3% pitch ride (~half a semitone) can push two harmonically compatible tracks out of tune with each other.
Find any track's BPM, key, and Camelot code by dropping the file on our BPM & key analyzer.