Polyrhythm & Polymeter Visualizer
One row per player, like a drum machine. Press play and watch conflicting rhythms drift apart and lock back together.
Every player fits the same bar: A splits it into 3, B into 2. They meet on beat 1.
Hear it in famous songs
Each page below loads the visualizer with a real song's rhythm, isolated and slowed down so you can actually hear what's going on.
What is a polyrhythm?
A polyrhythm is two or more conflicting rhythms played at the same time, for example three evenly-spaced notes against two, both fitting in the same bar. The layers line up on beat one, drift apart, and lock back together at the start of every cycle.
Polyrhythms are the backbone of West African drumming, and run through jazz, progressive rock, metal, gospel, and electronic music. Getting comfortable with them radically improves your timing, independence, and feel.
The generator above builds any combination from 2 to 16 and plays it back with a distinct click per player, so you can hear each layer as well as see it.
Polyrhythm vs polymeter
The two get mixed up constantly, and the tool above has a mode for each:
Polyrhythm: same bar, different splits. Both players start and end the bar together, but one divides it into 3 while the other divides it into 2. Every bar realigns on beat 1.
Polymeter: same pulse, different loop lengths. Everyone plays the same underlying eighth-note pulse, but one player's phrase is 7 pulses long while another's is 4. The downbeats drift apart and only realign after the least common multiple, 28 pulses for 7 over 4. This is the Tool and Meshuggah trick: a riff cycling in 7 while the drums hold a groove in 4, so the same riff keeps landing in a different place against the backbeat until everything clicks back together.
Try the 7 over 4 preset in polymeter mode and watch Player A's downbeat walk across Player B's groove.
Common polyrhythms
| Ratio | Name | Where you hear it |
|---|---|---|
| 3:2 | Hemiola | The gateway polyrhythm: triplets over a duple pulse. Everywhere in African music, jazz, and EDM builds. |
| 4:3 | Four over three | Common in prog rock and gospel chops. Count "pass the gosh-darn butter". |
| 5:4 | Five over four | The quintuplet feel. Think Radiohead and modern jazz drummers. |
| 7:4 | Seven over four | Odd-meter staple in metal and West African bell patterns. |
How to practice polyrhythms
- Start with the composite. Use the counting grid above: the cycle shows exactly where every hit of both layers lands. Clap the combined pattern slowly as one rhythm first.
- Use words. 3:2 is "hot cup of tea" (hits on hot, cup, of, tea). 4:3 is "pass the gosh-darn but-ter". Phrases encode the spacing for free.
- Split your hands. Tap layer A with your right hand, layer B with your left, at a slow tempo. Only speed up when it stops requiring thought.
- Switch your anchor. First feel A as the beat with B floating over it, then flip. Hearing the same pattern both ways is what makes it usable in real music.
The tool doubles as a polyrhythm metronome: set your ratio, pick a slow tempo, and practice hands separately against it. Work on your basic timing first with the regular metronome; subdivisions there are the stepping stone to full polyrhythms.