How to make a song in your browser for beginners

By Tongkit Leong · June 15, 2026 · 8 min read

To make a song in your browser for free: open the Tracks studio, set a tempo, program a drum pattern, draw a melody and bassline in the piano roll, arrange your clips into a verse and chorus, then export to WAV or MP3 — no download, no account, no cost.

What you need

A modern browser (Chrome, Edge, Firefox, or Safari), headphones or speakers, and a few minutes. Everything else — synths, drum machines, mixer, piano roll — is already loaded in the studio. Your project is stored in your browser and never sent to a server.

Step 1: Set a tempo

Open the studio and click anywhere on the page once to unlock audio. Find the BPM field in the transport bar at the top and set your tempo. If you're not sure what to use, here are common starting points:

• Chill / lo-fi: 70–90 BPM
• Hip-hop / R&B: 80–100 BPM
• Pop: 100–130 BPM
• House / electronic: 120–130 BPM
• Drum & bass: 160–175 BPM

Pick one and move on. You can change it later without breaking anything — Tracks also supports a tempo map if you want the BPM to change across the song.

Step 2: Lay down a drum pattern

Add a drum track and open the drum machine. You get an 808 or 909 kit with all the standard voices — kick, snare, open hat, closed hat, clap, toms, and more — laid out as rows in the piano roll.

Start with just three hits per bar to keep it simple:

1. Kick on beat 1 (and often beat 3).
2. Snare on beats 2 and 4.
3. Closed hi-hat on every eighth note.

That basic pattern works in almost every genre. Tap the pads to play it live and record, or draw hits directly on the grid. Once you have something you like, copy the clip and loop it across four to eight bars — that gives you a working foundation to build on.

For a deeper look at drum patterns and groove, see How to make beats in your browser.

Step 3: Choose a key and draw a chord progression

Before you add any notes, set the project key in the transport bar. Tracks will snap the piano roll to that scale, so every note you draw will sound in tune by default.

Add a synth track and pick a chord or pad preset. In the piano roll, draw a simple four-chord loop — for example, in C major: C, Am, F, G. Each chord gets one or two bars, and you hold the notes for the whole bar. This is the chord progression behind hundreds of hit songs.

If you want a melody instead of chords, draw a single-note line that follows the root notes of each chord. Keep it short — four to eight notes per bar is plenty for a first song.

Step 4: Add a bassline

Add a second synth track and pick a bass preset. The simplest approach is to play the root note of each chord on the downbeat — so if your chord is C major for two bars, play a C in the low register on beat 1. Then experiment with adding a few passing notes between the chord changes to give it movement.

Lock the bassline to your kick drum: wherever the kick hits, the bass should land on the same beat or very close to it. That relationship is the glue that makes a mix feel tight.

Step 5: Record vocals (optional)

If you want to sing or rap over the track, add an audio track and click the record button. Tracks captures mic input directly in the browser. You'll get a count-in before recording starts. Record multiple takes — the studio supports take comping, so you can pick the best moments from each and stitch them together.

Once recorded, you can apply the built-in autotune to snap the pitch to your song's key, or use time-stretch to adjust the timing without changing the pitch. See How to record and tune vocals in your browser for the full walkthrough.

Step 6: Arrange your song structure

Most songs follow a simple structure: intro, verse, chorus, verse, chorus, outro. In the arrange view, you can see all your clips as blocks on a timeline. Here is a practical layout to get started:

• Bars 1–4: Intro — drums only, or drums plus a pad.
• Bars 5–12: Verse — drums, bass, and chords, maybe melody. Keep it a little sparse.
• Bars 13–20: Chorus — everything playing, full energy.
• Bars 21–28: Verse 2 — same as verse 1, or add one new element.
• Bars 29–36: Chorus again.
• Bars 37–40: Outro — strip back to drums, then fade.

To build this in Tracks, right-click a clip and copy it, then drag the copies along the timeline into position. Mute tracks or automate the volume to create the drop into the chorus and the quiet in the verses.

Step 7: Mix and export

Open the mixer. Each track has a fader, pan knob, and access to per-track effects. Start by setting levels:

• The kick and snare should be the loudest things in the mix — they anchor everything else.
• Bass sits just below the drums in volume.
• Melodic elements (chords, melody) fill in behind the rhythm section.
• Vocals, if any, sit on top.

Add a little reverb to the chords and melody using the reverb/delay send on those tracks. Keep the kick, snare, and bass dry. That separation makes the mix sound bigger than it is.

When it sounds right, click the export button and choose WAV for the full-quality file or MP3 to get a smaller file you can share immediately. The studio also lets you export per-track stems if you want to take the project somewhere else later.

Tips to keep moving when you're stuck

• Finish over perfect. A finished song you can share is worth more than a loop you've been tweaking for a week. Export it and start the next one.
• Use the scale lock. With the project key set, every note you draw is in tune. You can't play a wrong note on purpose, which removes one big source of frustration for beginners.
• Steal structure, not notes. Pick a song you like, count the bars in each section, and replicate that structure. The actual notes and sounds are yours.
• Save often. The studio saves your project automatically in your browser storage, but you can also export a .tracks.json project file to your hard drive as a backup.

Frequently asked questions

Do I need to know music theory to make a song in a browser?

No. Set a key in the studio and every note you draw will be in scale. You can build a full chord progression by picking any notes in the highlighted keys. That is enough to get started — you can learn more theory as you go, but it is not a prerequisite.

Will my song be saved if I close the browser tab?

Yes. Tracks saves your project automatically in your browser's local storage. It will be there when you reopen the tab on the same device and browser. For a backup you can take anywhere, use the export option to download a .tracks.json project file.

Can I use my own samples or loops?

Yes. Drag audio files onto any audio or sampler track to load them. The 16-pad sampler accepts one-shots and loops, and you can slice a loop onto pads automatically for chopping and rearranging.

Can I collaborate with someone else on the same song?

Not in real time — Tracks is a local studio. But you can export stems or the .tracks.json project file and share it with someone else who has Tracks open, and they can import it and continue where you left off.

Is this really free? What's the catch?

The studio is free to use, no account required. The site shows ads to support hosting. There are no feature locks or time limits.