There are no rules, play for an hour, play for 5 minutes. If your fingers hurt skip a day if you want, or play anyway.
Also look up videos of actual practices you can do. I am guilty of noodling for an hour and never practicing anything to actually get better.
I am on about month three. I have picked it up at least once every single day. I know if I skip a day, it will lead to more skipped days, so I do it least 5 minutes, but 5 minutes has turned out to never be less than a half hour. I say keep going at least a little even when it hurts. Once you're over that hump, there is no more pain really, just the calluses you earned that you don't want to lose. Also, I've become guilty of playing the few chords and riffs I know over and over. A good structured lesson plan would be a great idea. I have lost much patience in the continuous yammering on YouTube with not enough real instruction on guitar and everything else in the world. I recently stumbled on a new source I hadn't thought of - Roku channels. So far they seem more to the point and less story telling.
Yes to everything especially practice videos or some variation. Honestly even look up videos on HOW to practice will be useful especially this early. Definitely play for fun, but if you want to get good you should be practicing with intention ( should still be fun though or what's the point). Set goals and do your best to stick to it, for me at the beginning '07 it was learning simple songs i.e. sabbath or classics pretty much everyone learns like sunshine of your love or something but work on specifics until you get it down. If I could go back and talk my kid self I'd say 70/30 dedicated practice to noodling or just playing for fun, and try to get used to using your pinky finger earlier rather than later cause it can take awhile to build good strength and control with it.
Sure I agree, but OP never said they want to get better or get good quickly. My point is more if your lil fingies hurt thereās no rules saying you have to play every day.
Do what you can, but importantly do it because you want to. Let your fingertips and willpower dictate how much you play in the early stages.
If you want it, youāll get it. Time will take care of itself āŗļø
If you feel like you should do a certain amount of time, you could grow to resent this, especially at this very early stage of learning.
You canāt force learning, you can only support it.
Whenever you feel like it.
I only consider guitar as my hobby and i work full time, so i usually only practice for 30 minutes whenever i have free time. It depends on what the guitar is to you, if it's your job, you definitely need to practice daily for around 2 hours or more, if it's just a hobby, then i'd say 30 minutes or 1 hour is enough.
Your fingers hurting is a normal thing everybody experiences, just practice more & more until you get used to the guitar.
yeah, generally with any instrument, 20 mins/day at least 5 days a week is enough to ensure you're doing more than just warming up and maintenance. Especially so after maxing out your "beginner gains"
The point is to enjoy it - so whatever is fun for you. From a learning perspective, frequency is more important than duration. Better to play 10-15 minutes a day than 90 minutes on a Saturday.
During the period when you are building callouses and hand strength, short-frequent sessions are especially important.
Not forever, but for at least some period in your life you gotta take those 6 hr practice days for sure. Every now and then I go through phases of doing that to help push through plateaus
As much as you can but only while you are enjoying it, Also you'd be surprised how just spending 5 or maybe 10 minutes a day on specific disciplines will show good results. So something like 5 mins chord changes, 5 minutes scales etc. Keep your guitar on a stand so it is easy to pick up and play when you feel like it but also setting a schedule can be really helpful. Most important practice what needs practicing, don't just keep doing what you know you can already do.
Think about following a structured course like Justin guitar.
No matter your level, 30-60 minutes per day of dedicated practice is enough to make consistent progress throughout your life.
Sticking to that schedule is the hard part.
At this stage, the most important thing is consistency. You want to make sure you pick the thing up every day, even if it is just for a few minutes. Itās much important to do that than to force yourself to practice until you are in so much pain that you feel like you want to skip it the next day. The habit of practicing is what you want to develop much more than simply getting as good as you can as quickly as you can. Otherwise it will never be a lifelong thing where you actually have a love of the instrument.
Don't burn yourself out on it. It's not a job, and there are no requirements of you. It's for enjoyment. That being said, the beginning is by far the hardest part and the most discouraging...and the time when you'll have to contend with being unable to play, having to work on the basics over and over. Shoot for every day practice, whether it's 10 minutes or 10 hours, but try your best to pick it up every day and make some noise on it.
The first hurdle is the largest: learning fundamentals, how to make chords and switch, how to pick, tuning etc. That takes a while and is the *only* barrier between being able to play guitar and not. It will *feel* like you're learning. Once you've built some calluses and got the "boring" part out of the way, you'll just be able to learn songs.
Once you start learning songs, guitar will be something that calls to you. You'll have an urge to play it, instead of having to kind of force yourself to play. It'll be exciting when you unlock the puzzle of songs you enjoy. I'll never forget the thrill of learning the first couple songs. You're still in the learning phase, but now it's coming together and becoming much more rewarding and enjoyable.
Once you've got a bunch of songs learned, you'll realize how much your skills have grown without you even realizing you were trying, because you were just having fun exploring. You're sharpening your skills with every new song, every new technique you incorporate, every new chord shape and picking pattern...but it doesn't feel like work.
Once your skills are starting to be sharpened, you'll realize that some songs are *easy to play on guitar,* and you'll start searching for more challenges. This will lead you down musical rabbit holes and you'll find new players to listen to and broaden your horizons, and further hone your sound and skills.
Then, once your musical horizons are broadened, you develop your own voice on the guitar.
All this might take you a year, a decade, or a lifetime. It doesn't matter. Don't force schedules on yourself, just *don't give up.*
That's not important, what's important is that you make sure you do it every day.
One guy plays for 70 minutes every Sunday, another plays for 10 minutes every day. The latter learns quicker.
Your fingers will stop hurting in a couple of weeks if you keep it up. After that, if you still have to ask how much you should practice, maybe playing an instrument just isn't for you. The answer is as much as possible. But it's supposed to be fun, so you're gonna end up spending hours on the thing not because you have to but because you want to. If you have to force yourself to play like 30 minutes a day in the beginning and then you end up skipping it even, I mean, why are you forcing yourself to do something you don't wanna?
Btw, consider playing electric instead of acoustic. That doesn't mean do so, I'm just asking you to consider. It's way easier and less painful in the beginning
I used to tell my students to practice until they're bored of it, and then just 10 minutes more after that.
Those last 10 minutes are often really purposeful and good quality, and sometimes last longer if you get a second wind. But if not, 10 mins isn't so long that it feels like too much of a chore.
The intensity and purpose of what you do with your time is more important than the amount.
Do you know what you want to learn? Write down a few things you think you need to learn, it could be a song, it could be chords, it could be simply spider crawl exercises, then budget what actually fits in your dedicated guitar time.
As a dad with a busy life I save at least 1h/day, I break it down to technique and theory, 30min each (I donāt include the warm up, thatās a good 5min to me).
If I have extra time I work on a song that I am learning.
There are no fixed rules though. But once you find a rhythm, treat your conditions as rules, so that you keep consistency.
Your needs and the way you see time with the guitar will also change as you progress and take on new stuff you want to learn.
For now, minutes at a time throughout the day is fine. Your fingers will stop hurting in the next week or two as you build up calluses. Once you are settled in and can practice for longer it's really up to you. Are you taking lessons or learning by yourself? If lessons practice what your teacher has you doing for as long as you like each day. If learning by yourself, I'd recommend you mirror something like Justin Guitar or similar so you have some structure.
Now, here's the part a lot of people don't want to talk about. Once you're practicing steadily, the real question is how good you want to be and how fast do you want to improve? If you practice a half hour a day, your are simply not going to grow as fast as the guy who does an hour or hour and a half a day. So, where's the sweet spot? In my opinion, once you're through your growing pains, I think you should shoot for a minimum of an hour a day of focused practice and then increase from there to however much you want.
Guitar is hard. Very hard and it demands its pound of flesh from your fingertips for entrance. If youāre at the first few weeks of beginning stage then 15-30 minutes per day. Getting in the habit of it of picking it up and keep picking it up is the hardest part. Play what you want, but you have to fall in love with learning it. Start with a riff or a lick that caught your attention and replicate it until youāre content and searching for whatās next.
Finger skin pain does not last too long, it should take 2 weeks to go away. After the finger pain goes away, the main problem will be sore hand and finger muscles due to the weird hand and finger positions.
If it hurts take breaks. Donāt force yourself to play. Iād say practicing for like 30 minutes is fine. It can hurt a little bit but just donāt injure yourself.
The real answer has already been submitted ("there are no rules", put googley eyes on everything, destroy a classroom with your shirt brother)
Pro tip: get a strandberg and never stop practicing. They haven't released a water proof line yet, so showering is complicated, but once you figure out the seatbelt trick and knee steering, you're pretty much in the clear.
Lately I'm at 2 plus hours a day. Caveat: I work from home and I'm currently obsessed with learning bluegrass leads. Getting it up to speed is a challenge.
More is better, as long itās not harming your body or responsibilities or happiness. At absolute minimum, you should be spending 15 minutes a day. Less than that and youāre not going to get very far.
I played about 8-9 hours a day when i started, my goal was to study guitar and become instrumentalist. It entirely depends what you want to achieve. If you wanna be āguitaristā you have to play as much as you can. Otherwise 30 min daily should be fine
No rules except for maybe level of playing. Beginner. Intermediate advanced. A beginner should basically live with their guitar. Intermediate or advanced should maybe spend an hour a week once or twice and noodle in between. I at least get in a 15-20 minute noodle daily. Mandatory for mental health š
I was looking on a few videos from a great Brazilian guitar (Kiko Loureiro) and he said that if youāre worried about how long you need to train, you probably should be playing. That said, just pick it and play as much as you want. Tbh any time spent is worthy
try not to worry too much about your fingers hurting, once youve started playing for a while the pain mostly goes away, and it just leaves a mark rathet than actually causing pain, id suggest just playing until ur fingers start to hurt would be a good way to start off :) there arent really any rules to how much time you should be playing for( just whatever feels best for u :3
However long you want. I would just write down some things you want to work on and build a routine.
I used to have a very detailed one. Play FĆ¼r Elise to warm up, then a list full of specific exercises, scale positions, chords, improvisation. I'd set a timer for each thing, use a metronome, and knock out a bunch of stuff in 30-60 minutes.
The timer helps you stay focused. It also trains you that thirty minutes of practice really isn't that long. The metronome will both force you to admit you suck/can't play in time AND show you measurable results as you do inevitably progress.
Now I'm pretty comfortable with guitar and the work it will take me to improve I don't want to do (diminishing returns), so my "practice" now is playing some songs and noodling around the pentatonic scale. I still start with FĆ¼r Elise though and don't let myself do anything else until I play it 100% correctly.
TLDR: It depends. Want to be the world's greatest? You don't do anything but guitar ever. Want to impress your friends who don't play? Twenty minutes every day.
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as much as you want lol obviously more practice is gonna be better but donāt go so strict that it becomes work. iāve always found practicing for shorter periods more frequently is better than longer periods less frequently. like 30 minutes a day is better than 5 hours once every week
Take breaks, make sure the action isnāt super high and keep good posture (shoulders back and down).
Donāt power through, when it feels like negativity step away and come back in fifteen.
Mental practice when you are played out - memorize songs mentally.
Also spend at least 10m a day memorizing all the notes on the fretboard, in key of C, one string at a time.
Beginnings are always tough, it's when your fingers will hurt and progress will be a bit slow, so try to religously practice it one hour everyday and don't give up, you will keep getting better faster with time and you'll start to love it, then even a whole day will feel less.
I started at about 30 mins a day then after a month or so gradually increased to 45 mins, an hour and a few months in I was going 90min - 2 hours daily practice. Ur fingers will stop hurting soon & stop pressing the strings so hard š.
Iāve been playing for over 26 years. I started as a kid on my dadās guitar and he paid for weekly lessons. Because he was paying for it, I was required to practice for an hour a day and he enforced it. Iām so grateful because now I have this thing that Iāll never stop doing. I think intense, daily practice is especially important in those first few years. It gets you over the hump where it becomes less work and more play. Now Iām grown and have kids and would love to be playing/practicing guitar an hour a day.
Iāll try to be as concrete as I can by describing what you should expect during different phases of development.
**First Month - Building Calluses and Strength**
For the first month, your physical limitations will be the main obstacle. I recommend practicing in 15-minute segments, if you can manage it. If you work or are in school, maybe fit in 15 minutes in the morning, then 15 minutes right after you get home. Then after dinner, another 15-minute bout and maybe a 30 minute break before you do one more 15-30 minute bout.
Try to avoid playing to the point that your fingertips feel like stabbing or burning. A dull ache is okay. If your hbd or forearms are cramping, take a short one-minute breather. Literally breathe deep to get oxygen back to those muscles. A lot of people donāt realize how much they hold their breath while playing!
**Second through Fourth Months - Building Chord Form Memory**
Whatever you were practicing in the first month is fine, but once you get your calluses and some finger strength, youāre going to need to spend dedicated time learning chord shapes and switching between them ā often by picking nice straightforward repetitive songs to play like folk songs or blues or basic rock. Hand cramps will be your biggest enemy, so think of this like a gym workout ā doing āsetsā and ārepsā except that a āsetā is one playthrough of a 3-5 minute song, and the ārepsā are the chords inside that song. Or break the song down into verse, chorus, and bridge and treat each of those as a set. At this point you can probably manage 1, or ideally 2, 30-minute sessions per day.
**Five Months and Beyond - Going Deep**
At this point you should have the physical strength to handle practice sessions of 1-3 hours. You pick a technique or a theory topic and spend 30-60 minutes on it. You have a bunch of songs to learn or write for your band and spend an hour or two on that.
**Going Pro**
If youāre thinking to study at the collegiate or conservatory level you will spend 4+ hours practicing per day. As a pro it will be 6+. When I was a young lad I started learning bass at 22, and at the age of 24 I joined a very serious prog metal band. I practiced about three hours per day for the next 18 months to do that album and be able to do live shows.
Just as much as you feel. Iām still in the learning stages but between college works and the clubs Iām at school I maybe only get an hour or 2 in a week
First of all:
Try not to turn it into homework. When you're tired, take a break. If you're burned out, take a day off. This is a hobby, it's supposed to be fun, and yes, improvement is part of that, but stay connected to the joy of it.
Secondly:
I think a good idea is to make yourself play for five minutes every day unless you really need a day off for some reason. Now usually those five minutes will turn into 15 or 30 or longer, and that's great. But some days you're not feeling it, and that's okay. That being said:
Third:
I feel like most of my actual growth as a musician has happened in 3-6 week "spurts" where I've been really focused on only one thing. You're a raw beginner, so this isn't so relevant to you right away, but if I spend a month of 5-6 days a week really focusing on, say, my major pentatonic soloing, at the end of that month I've locked in some real growth that won't have happened if I spread out those same hours interspersed with, say, solo finger style playing in between days when I worked on it. I don't know what the minimum time for that sort of "lock-in" effect is but I do think it's probably at least 4-5 sequential days of focused practice on one thing.
But that comes back to point one: this isn't homework. Some days I want to work on my singer-songwriter stuff. And unless I have a particularly plan of something I'm building for ("oh, hey, I've got that open mic in three weeks, I want to be able to play this song") I improve more, because I *play* more, if I let myself dabble a bit here and there and make sure I'm having fun with it.
I used to practice for at least one hour every day until I got pretty good (after 6 months). The fingers will quit hurting after a few weeks when you develop calluses.
Play whenever you feel like it and it's appropriate. Play it because you love it and for no other reason. Just keep playing. Record yourself and listen back every week or so. You'll definitely hear Improvement in your playing that should be commensurate with the time you spend with her. Welcome to the fold.
Itās relative bro. Itās really up to you, if just say if youāre gonna play for a while, just enjoy your playing until you get annoyed or bored with it
Setup specific practice everyday. Set a timer fkt each excerise. If you do this 30 min a day you will see physical improvement. Learn songs. Learn scales theory and play to specific backing tracks in a particular key.
Shoot for a minimum of 10 mins a day, focus is on consistent every day practice rather than length. I think reinforcement matters more than extended sessions, especially earlier. And chances are if you pick it up, youāll usually play longer than 10 mins.
More advanced stuff will take more focused time, but for now just shoot for consistency
Always keep your guitar close. Near the couch or chair you sit in while watching tv, next to your desk, etc. I usually practice 20-30 minutes a day just to keep my fingers loose and callouses built up on weeks Iām not gigging. Even 5-10 minutes a day can build strength
Steve Lukather (donāt @ me if I misspelled his name lol)
But he says his only rule for practice is to stop if something starts to hurt. So youāre probably building calluses on your fret hand and muscle. When it starts to hurt. Pause. Put it down. Do mental reps of what youāre learning then come back. I know when I first started playing 3 decades ago I could only play for a few minutes before my fingers and fret hand would start to cramp. The other piece of advice Iād give; practice different things; triads, inversions, a scale or 3, open major and minor chords, bare chords. Give your hands different things to work one. Not only does this work different muscle groups in your fret hand but it also in sticks you from doing the same thing over and over. Also realize learning never ends. Musicās true joy is not only the artistic outlet/sounds we make but understanding that the learning process, the improving process NEVER ends.
Ok truly last tip; donāt store your guitar in the case. Have it on a stand looking at with big puppy dog eyes saying; please play me. Even if youāre sneaking in 10 minutes here, 10 minutes there it adds up.
Play as much as you like but do practice scales for 10 minutes every day. Eventually add intervals, diads & triads to the mix and youāll be surprised at how much youāll progress in the first year. It all snowballs, once you get it rolling downhill youāll be good to go
I started playing when I was an obsessed edgy 12 year old... Now more than 2 decades later, I realize what a superpower that youthful obsession and focus was.
That being said, find a way to make it fun.
Anytime you're counting minutes or regimenting time - you're not having fun.
Heck, my friends and I started a band before we even really knew how to play our instruments. It was fun as hell. Before I knew it, we had all gotten much better and were swapping notes.
A lot of the "hump" in learning guitar actually comes down to muscle memory. (Fingers dont do, or feel, how our brain wants them to). So whether its five minutes or thirty... just keep at it.
You're on the right track OP!
Anything less than about 20min/day won't amount to much, but honestly as much as you can. Push through the pain, provided you're not literally cutting your fingers open, and you'll build up callouses in no time. If it becomes unbearable, give yourself a couple of days to let the skin build up then start practicing again.
I used to play up to 4+ hours a day, and I quickly learned that this pretty much wrecks your guitar due to overuse. I recommend less than that if you donāt wanna ruin your frets
There are no rules, play for an hour, play for 5 minutes. If your fingers hurt skip a day if you want, or play anyway. Also look up videos of actual practices you can do. I am guilty of noodling for an hour and never practicing anything to actually get better.
At this level though, absolutely anything will improve your skills, unless you have bizarrely terrible technique
I still don't understand why I have to peg while wrapping the strings around my nuts. But hey, it sounds like it could use some work.
Sounds like me.
I am on about month three. I have picked it up at least once every single day. I know if I skip a day, it will lead to more skipped days, so I do it least 5 minutes, but 5 minutes has turned out to never be less than a half hour. I say keep going at least a little even when it hurts. Once you're over that hump, there is no more pain really, just the calluses you earned that you don't want to lose. Also, I've become guilty of playing the few chords and riffs I know over and over. A good structured lesson plan would be a great idea. I have lost much patience in the continuous yammering on YouTube with not enough real instruction on guitar and everything else in the world. I recently stumbled on a new source I hadn't thought of - Roku channels. So far they seem more to the point and less story telling.
Sounds like a guitar player š
Yes to everything especially practice videos or some variation. Honestly even look up videos on HOW to practice will be useful especially this early. Definitely play for fun, but if you want to get good you should be practicing with intention ( should still be fun though or what's the point). Set goals and do your best to stick to it, for me at the beginning '07 it was learning simple songs i.e. sabbath or classics pretty much everyone learns like sunshine of your love or something but work on specifics until you get it down. If I could go back and talk my kid self I'd say 70/30 dedicated practice to noodling or just playing for fun, and try to get used to using your pinky finger earlier rather than later cause it can take awhile to build good strength and control with it.
Generally agree. You probably wonāt get better without playing at least 2hrs a week though.
Sure I agree, but OP never said they want to get better or get good quickly. My point is more if your lil fingies hurt thereās no rules saying you have to play every day.
Playing guitar should be fun. I pick up and learn new stuff periodically through the day if Iām home doing nothing.
I just play the same songs over and over or maybe learn new tabs. I should be studying more theory but I mainly just play and sing to chill.
I'd say try to fit 30minutes each day. Generally the more the better, but if it hurts take a break.
Do what you can, but importantly do it because you want to. Let your fingertips and willpower dictate how much you play in the early stages. If you want it, youāll get it. Time will take care of itself āŗļø If you feel like you should do a certain amount of time, you could grow to resent this, especially at this very early stage of learning. You canāt force learning, you can only support it.
You should play according to your level of motivation.
Whenever you feel like it. I only consider guitar as my hobby and i work full time, so i usually only practice for 30 minutes whenever i have free time. It depends on what the guitar is to you, if it's your job, you definitely need to practice daily for around 2 hours or more, if it's just a hobby, then i'd say 30 minutes or 1 hour is enough. Your fingers hurting is a normal thing everybody experiences, just practice more & more until you get used to the guitar.
Bare minimum 20mins a day. But after u get into it youll end up playing for hours in a day. It'll always be in your hands
yeah, generally with any instrument, 20 mins/day at least 5 days a week is enough to ensure you're doing more than just warming up and maintenance. Especially so after maxing out your "beginner gains"
The point is to enjoy it - so whatever is fun for you. From a learning perspective, frequency is more important than duration. Better to play 10-15 minutes a day than 90 minutes on a Saturday. During the period when you are building callouses and hand strength, short-frequent sessions are especially important.
If you want to be a pro you need to get up to >6 hours a day.
Not forever, but for at least some period in your life you gotta take those 6 hr practice days for sure. Every now and then I go through phases of doing that to help push through plateaus
Agreed. If you want it to be your job someday, you gotta treat it like a job now.
As much as you can but only while you are enjoying it, Also you'd be surprised how just spending 5 or maybe 10 minutes a day on specific disciplines will show good results. So something like 5 mins chord changes, 5 minutes scales etc. Keep your guitar on a stand so it is easy to pick up and play when you feel like it but also setting a schedule can be really helpful. Most important practice what needs practicing, don't just keep doing what you know you can already do. Think about following a structured course like Justin guitar.
No matter your level, 30-60 minutes per day of dedicated practice is enough to make consistent progress throughout your life. Sticking to that schedule is the hard part.
15 minutes everyday is better then one 4 hour session a week
At this stage, the most important thing is consistency. You want to make sure you pick the thing up every day, even if it is just for a few minutes. Itās much important to do that than to force yourself to practice until you are in so much pain that you feel like you want to skip it the next day. The habit of practicing is what you want to develop much more than simply getting as good as you can as quickly as you can. Otherwise it will never be a lifelong thing where you actually have a love of the instrument.
As much as you can if you like it. If not and itās a chore donāt bother. Should just be for fun
You see those guys playing on TV? They played literally for hours upon end. Get a friend to practice with.
Don't burn yourself out on it. It's not a job, and there are no requirements of you. It's for enjoyment. That being said, the beginning is by far the hardest part and the most discouraging...and the time when you'll have to contend with being unable to play, having to work on the basics over and over. Shoot for every day practice, whether it's 10 minutes or 10 hours, but try your best to pick it up every day and make some noise on it. The first hurdle is the largest: learning fundamentals, how to make chords and switch, how to pick, tuning etc. That takes a while and is the *only* barrier between being able to play guitar and not. It will *feel* like you're learning. Once you've built some calluses and got the "boring" part out of the way, you'll just be able to learn songs. Once you start learning songs, guitar will be something that calls to you. You'll have an urge to play it, instead of having to kind of force yourself to play. It'll be exciting when you unlock the puzzle of songs you enjoy. I'll never forget the thrill of learning the first couple songs. You're still in the learning phase, but now it's coming together and becoming much more rewarding and enjoyable. Once you've got a bunch of songs learned, you'll realize how much your skills have grown without you even realizing you were trying, because you were just having fun exploring. You're sharpening your skills with every new song, every new technique you incorporate, every new chord shape and picking pattern...but it doesn't feel like work. Once your skills are starting to be sharpened, you'll realize that some songs are *easy to play on guitar,* and you'll start searching for more challenges. This will lead you down musical rabbit holes and you'll find new players to listen to and broaden your horizons, and further hone your sound and skills. Then, once your musical horizons are broadened, you develop your own voice on the guitar. All this might take you a year, a decade, or a lifetime. It doesn't matter. Don't force schedules on yourself, just *don't give up.*
That's not important, what's important is that you make sure you do it every day. One guy plays for 70 minutes every Sunday, another plays for 10 minutes every day. The latter learns quicker.
Your fingers will stop hurting in a couple of weeks if you keep it up. After that, if you still have to ask how much you should practice, maybe playing an instrument just isn't for you. The answer is as much as possible. But it's supposed to be fun, so you're gonna end up spending hours on the thing not because you have to but because you want to. If you have to force yourself to play like 30 minutes a day in the beginning and then you end up skipping it even, I mean, why are you forcing yourself to do something you don't wanna? Btw, consider playing electric instead of acoustic. That doesn't mean do so, I'm just asking you to consider. It's way easier and less painful in the beginning
As much as you want. Sometimes 5min. Sometimes 5 hours. It's a hobby not a job. Enjoy :)
I used to tell my students to practice until they're bored of it, and then just 10 minutes more after that. Those last 10 minutes are often really purposeful and good quality, and sometimes last longer if you get a second wind. But if not, 10 mins isn't so long that it feels like too much of a chore.
Ask yourself: "Do I feel like playing guitar"? If yes, play guitar. If no, stop playing guitar.
As much as you want, but frequency is more important than duration when it comes to practice.
The intensity and purpose of what you do with your time is more important than the amount. Do you know what you want to learn? Write down a few things you think you need to learn, it could be a song, it could be chords, it could be simply spider crawl exercises, then budget what actually fits in your dedicated guitar time. As a dad with a busy life I save at least 1h/day, I break it down to technique and theory, 30min each (I donāt include the warm up, thatās a good 5min to me). If I have extra time I work on a song that I am learning. There are no fixed rules though. But once you find a rhythm, treat your conditions as rules, so that you keep consistency. Your needs and the way you see time with the guitar will also change as you progress and take on new stuff you want to learn.
For now, minutes at a time throughout the day is fine. Your fingers will stop hurting in the next week or two as you build up calluses. Once you are settled in and can practice for longer it's really up to you. Are you taking lessons or learning by yourself? If lessons practice what your teacher has you doing for as long as you like each day. If learning by yourself, I'd recommend you mirror something like Justin Guitar or similar so you have some structure. Now, here's the part a lot of people don't want to talk about. Once you're practicing steadily, the real question is how good you want to be and how fast do you want to improve? If you practice a half hour a day, your are simply not going to grow as fast as the guy who does an hour or hour and a half a day. So, where's the sweet spot? In my opinion, once you're through your growing pains, I think you should shoot for a minimum of an hour a day of focused practice and then increase from there to however much you want.
Don't hurt yourself is step 0. Otherwise every day for at least 1 minutes.
An hour once a week, 5-10 minutes a day, and a lesson bi-weekly
Or you know like, 3 hours a day
Yeah if you wanna suck
According to Two Set, 40 hours per day is the minimum.
As much as you want can which is hopefully a lot.
Guitar is hard. Very hard and it demands its pound of flesh from your fingertips for entrance. If youāre at the first few weeks of beginning stage then 15-30 minutes per day. Getting in the habit of it of picking it up and keep picking it up is the hardest part. Play what you want, but you have to fall in love with learning it. Start with a riff or a lick that caught your attention and replicate it until youāre content and searching for whatās next.
Finger skin pain does not last too long, it should take 2 weeks to go away. After the finger pain goes away, the main problem will be sore hand and finger muscles due to the weird hand and finger positions.
Just play it when you want. There is no formula you need to follow
If it hurts take breaks. Donāt force yourself to play. Iād say practicing for like 30 minutes is fine. It can hurt a little bit but just donāt injure yourself.
The real answer has already been submitted ("there are no rules", put googley eyes on everything, destroy a classroom with your shirt brother) Pro tip: get a strandberg and never stop practicing. They haven't released a water proof line yet, so showering is complicated, but once you figure out the seatbelt trick and knee steering, you're pretty much in the clear.
Play at least a little most days, not quite every day, till the pain diminishes. Then play as much as you want/can.
I agree with many of these comments; just keep playing as much as you can. It will get better as you get better.
Lately I'm at 2 plus hours a day. Caveat: I work from home and I'm currently obsessed with learning bluegrass leads. Getting it up to speed is a challenge.
Wait until your fingers heal and then play again. After, practice for an hour.Ā
More is better, as long itās not harming your body or responsibilities or happiness. At absolute minimum, you should be spending 15 minutes a day. Less than that and youāre not going to get very far.
I played about 8-9 hours a day when i started, my goal was to study guitar and become instrumentalist. It entirely depends what you want to achieve. If you wanna be āguitaristā you have to play as much as you can. Otherwise 30 min daily should be fine
No rules except for maybe level of playing. Beginner. Intermediate advanced. A beginner should basically live with their guitar. Intermediate or advanced should maybe spend an hour a week once or twice and noodle in between. I at least get in a 15-20 minute noodle daily. Mandatory for mental health š
I was looking on a few videos from a great Brazilian guitar (Kiko Loureiro) and he said that if youāre worried about how long you need to train, you probably should be playing. That said, just pick it and play as much as you want. Tbh any time spent is worthy
Like others said practice as much as you want. You will get back what you put in.
Tito ortiz : "Play 6 days a week, 5 of those days play 3 days a week, 3 of those days you'll play twice, so you'll be practicing 6 days a week"
try not to worry too much about your fingers hurting, once youve started playing for a while the pain mostly goes away, and it just leaves a mark rathet than actually causing pain, id suggest just playing until ur fingers start to hurt would be a good way to start off :) there arent really any rules to how much time you should be playing for( just whatever feels best for u :3
As much as possible. Be kind to yourself and enjoy the journey.
However long you want. I would just write down some things you want to work on and build a routine. I used to have a very detailed one. Play FĆ¼r Elise to warm up, then a list full of specific exercises, scale positions, chords, improvisation. I'd set a timer for each thing, use a metronome, and knock out a bunch of stuff in 30-60 minutes. The timer helps you stay focused. It also trains you that thirty minutes of practice really isn't that long. The metronome will both force you to admit you suck/can't play in time AND show you measurable results as you do inevitably progress. Now I'm pretty comfortable with guitar and the work it will take me to improve I don't want to do (diminishing returns), so my "practice" now is playing some songs and noodling around the pentatonic scale. I still start with FĆ¼r Elise though and don't let myself do anything else until I play it 100% correctly. TLDR: It depends. Want to be the world's greatest? You don't do anything but guitar ever. Want to impress your friends who don't play? Twenty minutes every day.
Maybe not a lot of time until your fingers get a bit used to it, then you could spend longer and longer each time
Depends on your goals and your timeline for reaching them.
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as much as you want lol obviously more practice is gonna be better but donāt go so strict that it becomes work. iāve always found practicing for shorter periods more frequently is better than longer periods less frequently. like 30 minutes a day is better than 5 hours once every week
Take breaks, make sure the action isnāt super high and keep good posture (shoulders back and down). Donāt power through, when it feels like negativity step away and come back in fifteen. Mental practice when you are played out - memorize songs mentally. Also spend at least 10m a day memorizing all the notes on the fretboard, in key of C, one string at a time.
15 mins a day is better than 7 hours one day and none at all for the rest of the week.
Beginnings are always tough, it's when your fingers will hurt and progress will be a bit slow, so try to religously practice it one hour everyday and don't give up, you will keep getting better faster with time and you'll start to love it, then even a whole day will feel less.
I started at about 30 mins a day then after a month or so gradually increased to 45 mins, an hour and a few months in I was going 90min - 2 hours daily practice. Ur fingers will stop hurting soon & stop pressing the strings so hard š.
I have a VERY unfocused practice routine, so I try and cordon off 2 hours a day to make up for it
Iāve been playing for over 26 years. I started as a kid on my dadās guitar and he paid for weekly lessons. Because he was paying for it, I was required to practice for an hour a day and he enforced it. Iām so grateful because now I have this thing that Iāll never stop doing. I think intense, daily practice is especially important in those first few years. It gets you over the hump where it becomes less work and more play. Now Iām grown and have kids and would love to be playing/practicing guitar an hour a day.
At a certain point, if you truly just enjoy playing, an hour or two will go by before you even think about it
Since ye be a leprechaun, yer fingers will be hurtin' more than average. Just keep pluggin' and ye'll be foin.
40 hours a day
However much you want bruh
15 min a day. 5 min per exercise. Always use a metronome. Timing is everything
I play anywhere from 0 to 8 hours a day every day. I highly suggest learning slowly and correctly then building speed
Iāll try to be as concrete as I can by describing what you should expect during different phases of development. **First Month - Building Calluses and Strength** For the first month, your physical limitations will be the main obstacle. I recommend practicing in 15-minute segments, if you can manage it. If you work or are in school, maybe fit in 15 minutes in the morning, then 15 minutes right after you get home. Then after dinner, another 15-minute bout and maybe a 30 minute break before you do one more 15-30 minute bout. Try to avoid playing to the point that your fingertips feel like stabbing or burning. A dull ache is okay. If your hbd or forearms are cramping, take a short one-minute breather. Literally breathe deep to get oxygen back to those muscles. A lot of people donāt realize how much they hold their breath while playing! **Second through Fourth Months - Building Chord Form Memory** Whatever you were practicing in the first month is fine, but once you get your calluses and some finger strength, youāre going to need to spend dedicated time learning chord shapes and switching between them ā often by picking nice straightforward repetitive songs to play like folk songs or blues or basic rock. Hand cramps will be your biggest enemy, so think of this like a gym workout ā doing āsetsā and ārepsā except that a āsetā is one playthrough of a 3-5 minute song, and the ārepsā are the chords inside that song. Or break the song down into verse, chorus, and bridge and treat each of those as a set. At this point you can probably manage 1, or ideally 2, 30-minute sessions per day. **Five Months and Beyond - Going Deep** At this point you should have the physical strength to handle practice sessions of 1-3 hours. You pick a technique or a theory topic and spend 30-60 minutes on it. You have a bunch of songs to learn or write for your band and spend an hour or two on that. **Going Pro** If youāre thinking to study at the collegiate or conservatory level you will spend 4+ hours practicing per day. As a pro it will be 6+. When I was a young lad I started learning bass at 22, and at the age of 24 I joined a very serious prog metal band. I practiced about three hours per day for the next 18 months to do that album and be able to do live shows.
Until you are done playing for the day. So, somewhere between 5 minutes and 24 hours.
Just as much as you feel. Iām still in the learning stages but between college works and the clubs Iām at school I maybe only get an hour or 2 in a week
0-24 hours.
15-45 minutes, **every** day.
First of all: Try not to turn it into homework. When you're tired, take a break. If you're burned out, take a day off. This is a hobby, it's supposed to be fun, and yes, improvement is part of that, but stay connected to the joy of it. Secondly: I think a good idea is to make yourself play for five minutes every day unless you really need a day off for some reason. Now usually those five minutes will turn into 15 or 30 or longer, and that's great. But some days you're not feeling it, and that's okay. That being said: Third: I feel like most of my actual growth as a musician has happened in 3-6 week "spurts" where I've been really focused on only one thing. You're a raw beginner, so this isn't so relevant to you right away, but if I spend a month of 5-6 days a week really focusing on, say, my major pentatonic soloing, at the end of that month I've locked in some real growth that won't have happened if I spread out those same hours interspersed with, say, solo finger style playing in between days when I worked on it. I don't know what the minimum time for that sort of "lock-in" effect is but I do think it's probably at least 4-5 sequential days of focused practice on one thing. But that comes back to point one: this isn't homework. Some days I want to work on my singer-songwriter stuff. And unless I have a particularly plan of something I'm building for ("oh, hey, I've got that open mic in three weeks, I want to be able to play this song") I improve more, because I *play* more, if I let myself dabble a bit here and there and make sure I'm having fun with it.
Depends on my mood but in the 3 weeks that I've had my guitar i still haven't skipped a day and played for 1-3 hours every day even if my fingers hurt
I used to practice for at least one hour every day until I got pretty good (after 6 months). The fingers will quit hurting after a few weeks when you develop calluses.
Play whenever you feel like it and it's appropriate. Play it because you love it and for no other reason. Just keep playing. Record yourself and listen back every week or so. You'll definitely hear Improvement in your playing that should be commensurate with the time you spend with her. Welcome to the fold.
At first maybe 30 minutes an hour. After a few months or a year, 1-2 hours. And after that, 2-4 hours.
Me2
Be prepared to quit for a while because muscle memory takes time. Keep at it even when you want to smash that guitar, the payoff is worth it
As much as you want. Whether that be 5 minutes or 5 hours.
Itās relative bro. Itās really up to you, if just say if youāre gonna play for a while, just enjoy your playing until you get annoyed or bored with it
15 minutes at least
Setup specific practice everyday. Set a timer fkt each excerise. If you do this 30 min a day you will see physical improvement. Learn songs. Learn scales theory and play to specific backing tracks in a particular key.
Shoot for a minimum of 10 mins a day, focus is on consistent every day practice rather than length. I think reinforcement matters more than extended sessions, especially earlier. And chances are if you pick it up, youāll usually play longer than 10 mins. More advanced stuff will take more focused time, but for now just shoot for consistency
Always keep your guitar close. Near the couch or chair you sit in while watching tv, next to your desk, etc. I usually practice 20-30 minutes a day just to keep my fingers loose and callouses built up on weeks Iām not gigging. Even 5-10 minutes a day can build strength
Steve Lukather (donāt @ me if I misspelled his name lol) But he says his only rule for practice is to stop if something starts to hurt. So youāre probably building calluses on your fret hand and muscle. When it starts to hurt. Pause. Put it down. Do mental reps of what youāre learning then come back. I know when I first started playing 3 decades ago I could only play for a few minutes before my fingers and fret hand would start to cramp. The other piece of advice Iād give; practice different things; triads, inversions, a scale or 3, open major and minor chords, bare chords. Give your hands different things to work one. Not only does this work different muscle groups in your fret hand but it also in sticks you from doing the same thing over and over. Also realize learning never ends. Musicās true joy is not only the artistic outlet/sounds we make but understanding that the learning process, the improving process NEVER ends. Ok truly last tip; donāt store your guitar in the case. Have it on a stand looking at with big puppy dog eyes saying; please play me. Even if youāre sneaking in 10 minutes here, 10 minutes there it adds up.
Play as much as you like but do practice scales for 10 minutes every day. Eventually add intervals, diads & triads to the mix and youāll be surprised at how much youāll progress in the first year. It all snowballs, once you get it rolling downhill youāll be good to go
I started playing when I was an obsessed edgy 12 year old... Now more than 2 decades later, I realize what a superpower that youthful obsession and focus was. That being said, find a way to make it fun. Anytime you're counting minutes or regimenting time - you're not having fun. Heck, my friends and I started a band before we even really knew how to play our instruments. It was fun as hell. Before I knew it, we had all gotten much better and were swapping notes. A lot of the "hump" in learning guitar actually comes down to muscle memory. (Fingers dont do, or feel, how our brain wants them to). So whether its five minutes or thirty... just keep at it. You're on the right track OP!
Anything less than about 20min/day won't amount to much, but honestly as much as you can. Push through the pain, provided you're not literally cutting your fingers open, and you'll build up callouses in no time. If it becomes unbearable, give yourself a couple of days to let the skin build up then start practicing again.
I used to play up to 4+ hours a day, and I quickly learned that this pretty much wrecks your guitar due to overuse. I recommend less than that if you donāt wanna ruin your frets
Thatās just general wear and tear that would happen anyways though