Practice that rewards you. Every session now earns XP and moves you toward the next level, achievement badges celebrate your milestones, and daily and weekly challenges give you something to aim for. It's built into every mode and free for everyone. Plus a live preview keyboard on every practice setup, new Learn filters, and a long list of polish and fixes.
Every completed lesson, scale, chord, ear-training round, two-hand drill, and song now earns XP and moves you toward the next level, with a full-screen celebration each time you cross one. Your home card carries a live XP bar and level chip, and each session ends with an animated '+N XP' breakdown. Free for everyone.
Dozens of badges across bronze, silver, and gold tiers mark the milestones that matter, from your very first chord to finishing a whole learning track. The Achievements gallery shows a five-track mastery meter; tap any badge for a plain-language hint about how to unlock it and a 'Go to area' button that takes you straight there.
New badges reward finishing your learning, not just starting it: complete theory chapters (Chapter Done, Well-Read, Graduate), work through Play & Explore (Explorer, Trailblazer, Master Explorer), read music (Note Reader, Sight-Reader), and cover every kind of lesson (Full Spectrum).
Daily and weekly challenges
Fresh daily and weekly challenges, plus longer multi-day ones, appear on an Active Challenge card on your home screen. They refresh on their own and gently steer you toward the practice types you've been neglecting, so you stay well-rounded.
Keep a daily practice streak going and hit streak milestones along the way. Optional reminders nudge you about level-ups, gold badges, and challenges about to expire.
A live preview on every practice setup
Scale, Chord, Chord Progressions, and Two-Hand Drill setups now show a live animated keyboard at the top that plays through exactly what you've configured, following your key, scale type, chord, play mode, voicing, and left-hand drone as you change them, with each hand shown in its own color. Turn it off in Settings if you prefer.
Start a focus session as you learn
Finish a lesson and tap Continue, and the app can offer to start a focus session so you stay in the zone. Ask once, or turn it off for good.
New Learn filters
A 'To Do' chip narrows the lesson list to what you haven't finished yet, and a 'Warm-ups' chip lists the bonus warm-up mini-games so you can jump straight to one. Both combine with the category chips and search.
macOS: Achievements in the Window menu
A new Window menu command opens the Achievements gallery from anywhere on Mac.
Improved
A warm welcome for returning players
If you've been playing before this update, a one-time welcome quietly catches up the badges you've already earned, shown as a single summary the first time you open the Achievements gallery instead of a flood of pop-ups.
Contrary-motion scales your way
The Contrary Scale drill now plays both hands through the same scale in opposite directions by default (the classic contrary-motion exercise), with an option to switch to an exact mirror.
Focus areas track what you practise
Your Journal's daily focus and coaching now highlight Two-Hand Drills, replacing the older MIDI Practice slot. Chord progressions are tracked together with Chord Practice.
Achievement details tell you where to earn them
Every badge now has a 'how to unlock' hint and a 'Go to area' button, unlocked badges are unmistakable at every tier, and type-specific badges use the app's own iconography.
Two-Hand Drill setup header
The Two-Hand Drill setup now has a proper header bar with the drill icon, title, and a close button, matching the Scale and Chord setups.
Fixed
Engaged players are actually asked to rate
The occasional rating prompt now waits until you're genuinely engaged (based on your practice, not a launch counter) before it appears, so active players are asked and new users aren't pestered on the next launch.
End Session keeps your result (iPhone)
Ending a Scale or Chord practice session on iPhone now keeps the result summary on screen with a smooth transition, instead of flashing it away and briefly showing the setup view.
No burst of celebrations after an update
After an update that adds new chapters, you no longer see a rapid-fire series of chapter-unlock celebrations for chapters you'd already earned.
Badges unlock at the right time
Fixed several badges that could unlock too early or not at all, including one that could fire after the very first lesson and others (like Sound Explorer) that showed full progress but never completed.
July 2026
Tiny Instrument 2.5
Real sheet music, everywhere. The grand staff now engraves like printed music — correct stems, stacked chords, accidentals and key signatures, and chord and roman-numeral labels above every bar. A new Reading Sheet Music Learn track teaches notation one subject at a time. And MusicXML import and export open a full round-trip with MuseScore, Sibelius, Dorico, and Logic. Plus compositions in Play, a rebuilt metronome, and a long list of refinements.
The grand staff was rebuilt to read like printed music: stem direction follows the notes and flips above the middle line, a chord shares one stem, and close intervals offset across the stem instead of overlapping. Applied everywhere the staff appears — Play, lessons, games, and ear-training.
Sharps and flats now draw on the staff. Settings → Staff & Notation offers three styles: Explicit (♯/♭ beside every altered note), Key signature (drawn at the clef, only out-of-key notes marked, with ♮ to cancel), or Off (the note name carries it). Double-sharps and double-flats render too.
Chord names and roman numerals above the staff
In Play, each chord is captioned above the staff with its chord symbol and, when a key is set, its roman numeral — in both Progression and Chord modes. Inversions read as slash chords; roman numerals are bold serif, coloured by chord quality. Toggle each independently in Settings → Staff & Notation.
Roman Numeral Style setting
Choose how numerals are spelled in minor keys: Scale-specific (i ii° III iv v VI VII) or Always-major (i ii° ♭III iv v ♭VI ♭VII). Major keys read identically either way. Applies to staff labels, the diatonic play strip, Compose chips, and the circle of fifths.
Reading Sheet Music — a new Learn track
Learn to read real notation, one subject at a time: Staff Geography, Reading Rhythm, Time & Meter, Advanced Accidentals, Expression & Articulation, Navigation & Repeats, and Pedal, Glissando & Advanced Rhythm. Read-the-staff, pick-the-staff, and tap-the-rhythm lessons on a live notation engine.
In the Ornaments lesson, pressing Play now performs each ornament: a trill trembles to the note above, a mordent flicks down and back, a turn curls around the note, and a grace note is crushed in just before the beat. Tapping an ornament tag anywhere auditions it too.
Chord Voicings chapter
A new advanced Learn chapter on voicings — close vs open, inversions, two-hand spread, shell voicings, drop-2, rootless jazz voicings, voice leading, and quartal — with interactive comparison and practice.
MusicXML import and export
Open .musicxml, .xml, and .mxl scores as compositions, and export any composition to a MusicXML 4.0 file. A full round-trip with MuseScore, Sibelius, Dorico, and Logic — notes, chords, ties, key, and tempo intact, split across the grand staff.
Open a saved composition inside Play and hear it back with all its parts, then play along on the keyboard as every note lights up. Open one from the Compose library's 'Open in Play' menu or the new Compositions list in the Play sidebar.
Octave-numbering convention
A new setting labels middle C as C4 (scientific, the default) or C3 (Yamaha / Logic / Cubase), relabeling octave numbers across the app. It never changes the pitch you hear. Settings → Note Names → Octave Numbers.
Browse lessons as a grid
A list/grid switch on the Learn screen lays your chapters out as cards, grouped by section, each with a progress bar. Tap a chapter to open its lessons as a grid, then tap one to start. Your choice is remembered.
A metronome on your Apple Watch
A standalone metronome now runs on your Apple Watch, keeping time with wrist haptics and sharing its tempo, time signature, and accents with your phone. Set the tempo with the Crown, tap tempo, and start or stop from your wrist.
Family Sharing and Ask to Buy
Every in-app purchase now supports Family Sharing — buy any pack or the Full Library once and your whole Apple Family group gets it. And when a child taps to buy, a friendly 'sent for approval' note appears instead of a purchase that looks like it failed.
Improved
A rebuilt metronome
The metronome sheet was redesigned into clean Tempo, Meter, and Sound cards with consistent controls and VoiceOver labels. While it runs, a live beat-dot indicator sits in the header — tap it to open the metronome.
One transport for everything in Play
MIDI files, melodies, and compositions now share a single, consistent playback transport, and only one plays at a time. Melody playback gains real pause and resume, an eject button, and stays loaded so you can replay it.
Sharper music symbols
Notation symbols — clefs, rests, dynamics, ornaments, segno and coda, fermatas — now render from a proper music font instead of look-alike text, so they're crisp and correct at every size, on every platform.
Cleaner MIDI names
MIDI files with underscore-filled filenames now show a clean title and artist across the app, instead of raw names like 'Where_is_My_Mind'. It's a display change only — nothing is renamed.
One clear import chooser
The Compose import menu now offers MIDI or MusicXML from one place, each with a one-line description, so there's no guessing which button does what.
Better chord charts from a composition
'Create Song from Composition' now keeps the harmony flowing: a bar whose notes don't spell a full chord holds the previous chord instead of a wall of 'N.C.', and trailing empty bars are trimmed. The Compose menu wording is tidied up too.
Compose metronome remembers itself
The Compose metronome now remembers whether you want it on or off across sessions, with a dedicated switch in Settings → Compose → Playback.
Circle of Fifths, redesigned
The Circle of Fifths lesson diagram was rebuilt as a clean, aspect-locked wheel with evenly spaced keys and a compass hub — no more overlapping nodes — and the same interactive wheel now heads the Circle of Fifths concept lesson.
A scale is a movable pattern
A new lesson makes the major scale's W-W-H-W-W-W-H shape move: the highlighted run slides across the keyboard as you change the home note, so a scale reads as one portable shape rather than a fixed set of notes.
More related-concept links
Twenty-three concept mini-lessons that were defined but never surfaced are now linked from the lessons that teach them, reaching deeper into scales, keys, intervals, and articulation.
Scale highlights stay put
In Play, an explicitly highlighted scale now stays on the keyboard as you play, instead of switching to a chord — it clears only when you commit a chord or remove the highlight.
A thank-you, not an upsell
If you already own the Full Library, the onboarding pricing page now shows a short thank-you instead of an upsell you can't act on, and any pack you already own is clearly marked Purchased.
Accidentals in the Theory Reference
The Theory Reference now includes a section for the accidental symbols — sharp, flat, natural, double-sharp, and double-flat — with what each one does.
Fixed
No freeze creating a song from a composition
Generating a chord chart from a large composition now runs in the background with a progress spinner, instead of briefly freezing the screen before the import sheet appears.
MusicXML import placed the bass staff correctly
Importing a two-staff piano score no longer placed the bass line a full measure late; the grand-staff cursor is now rewound between the treble and bass voices as the format intends.
Narration toggle in Play & Explore
The speaker button in Play & Explore lessons (such as Call & Response) now correctly turns Aria narration on and off; previously tapping it did nothing.
Chord mode shows the right chord
With a progression loaded, switching to Chord mode now focuses the chord from the sidebar grid (a plain I) instead of the progression's voicing.
Note names sit above the note, not on it
The 'Above Note' name position on the staff now lifts the letter clear of the notehead, instead of drawing it centered on the note.
Smoother onboarding
The slide animation between onboarding steps is now consistent; the Notifications and Aria Personality steps no longer jump in without a transition.
A calmer rating prompt
The occasional 'enjoying Tiny Instrument?' prompt no longer re-appears on the next launch if it was quietly closed, and a returning user who changes their mind can be asked again — all within a strict cap.
macOS: Theory Reference opens from any mode
The Theory Reference menu command now opens the reference in every mode, not just Play, and a duplicate View menu was merged into the system View menu.
July 2026
Tiny Instrument 2.4
The whole app scales to your preferred text size on iPhone, iPad, and Mac — with a custom macOS solution. Six accessibility dimensions get in-app System / On / Off overrides. Keyboard Themes add 12 finishes to the on-screen piano; key-press and border effects bundle in. Plus an Aria voice orb, staff ghost fluid dissipation, chapter unlock celebration, and Play dock improvements.
Every mode — Learn, Play, Practice, Compose, Listen, Songs, and Aria — now respects your preferred text size on iOS, iPadOS, and Mac. macOS gets a custom `@AppScaledMetric` + `.appFont()` solution since SwiftUI's built-in hooks are ignored there. Use ⌘+ / ⌘− or Settings → Text Size on Mac.
In-app accessibility overrides
Settings → Accessibility now has a System / On / Off picker for each dimension: Text Size, Reduce Motion, Differentiate Without Color, Reduce Transparency, Bold Text, and Increase Contrast. System follows the OS setting; On and Off let you override per dimension without leaving the app.
Choose Very Slow, Slow, Normal, Fast, or Very Fast for all lesson and Aria narration. A Preview button in Settings → Sound → Narration speaks a sample at the selected rate so you can dial it in before a lesson starts.
Keyboard Themes
12 keyboard finishes: Classic and Midnight are free; the $1.99 Keyboard Themes pack unlocks Space Gray, Starlight, Rose Gold, Pacific Blue, Alpine Green, Cosmic Orange, Blush, Citrus, Indigo, and Rainbow. Full overlay theming — shadows, scale-guide highlights, fingering badges, and the scale-degree strip all recolor per theme. Rainbow colors each pitch class for learning.
Five border styles (Glow, Sweep, Rainbow, Shimmer, Reactive Only) animate around the keyboard, ramping intensity with notes held and velocity. Four key-press styles (Stardust, Sparkle, Splash, Flash) fire on held and released keys — a glow while held, continuous particles, then a burst on release. Bundled in the $1.99 Keyboard Themes pack; off by default; Reduce Motion gated.
Completing the final lesson in a Core Theory chapter shows a slide-in overlay on iOS and iPadOS — a moment to mark the achievement before returning to the lesson list. Existing users won't see a backlog of celebrations on first launch. Reduce Motion uses a fade.
Aria voice orb
A Siri-style orb appears while Aria narrates lessons and chat replies, modulated live by the real voice amplitude. Tap to interrupt. Reduce Motion shows a static disc instead.
Staff ghost fluid dissipation
When a ghost note is played correctly and then clears from the Play grand staff, it dissolves with an upward green fluid wisp — a real-time Metal fluid simulation. Reduce Motion replaces the wisp with an instant fade.
Tap ghost notes to play
Gray ghost preview notes on the Play grand staff are now interactive — tap or click to hear the note play. Long-press on iOS or right-click on macOS shows a context menu with the note's name.
The Five Modes lessons
A new 'The Five Modes' chapter in Learn (grouped under Tiny Instrument, above Songbook) adds five short lessons — one per app mode: Learn, Listen, Practice, Play, and Compose. Each includes a hands-on element: the Play lesson uses the live keyboard, the Listen lesson plays a chord example. Tapping 'Try It' at the end saves progress and jumps straight to that mode.
Keyboard display options
Three new opt-in display pickers for the keyboard, each defaulting to today's look so nothing changes unless you opt in. Note Name Position: above the keys or on the key faces. Highlight Style: a full-key color wash or a slim strip along the bottom edge. Octave Position: the octave number inline with the note name ('C4') or as a separate label above each C key. Find them in Settings → Piano Keys.
Improved
Reduced Motion — full coverage
Aria's border effect freezes to a static ring, the shimmer modifier goes static, the ear-training waveform stills, toasts use fade-only transitions, the ripple overlay is skipped, and key-press effects cap at a single flash — all when Reduce Motion is on.
Bold Text honored app-wide
Every `.appFont` text site respects Bold Text — the system setting or the new in-app override. Weight bumps one step, capped at bold. Monospaced and tabular text is excluded to preserve alignment.
Differentiate Without Color — unique token icons
Every inline music token (interval, chord quality, scale, degree) now has a unique icon shape, so tokens are distinguishable by shape alone — not only by color.
Reduce Transparency — key sites
The toast notification, the paywall lesson scrim, and the Play dock now swap their translucent backgrounds for opaque fills when Reduce Transparency is on.
Play dock: Progression / Chord / Chord Lab toggle
A three-segment pill in the Play dock guide-panel header replaces the old separate Progression and Chord Lab pills. Progression shows the diatonic strip; Chord focuses a single chord; Chord Lab opens the tap-chord pads.
Strip chord selection mirrors to Chords sidebar
Selecting a chord in the Play diatonic strip highlights the matching card in the Chords sidebar when a key is active. Deselecting the strip clears the sidebar highlight.
Auto-play chords on select in Play
A new Settings → Mode → Play toggle auditions a diatonic-strip chord the moment it's selected — by tap or with ← / → keyboard navigation. Default on. Mirrors Compose's existing Auto-Play on Select behavior.
Play a single chord in Chord mode
Chord mode now has a play button to hear the chord you've selected, voiced as a block, arpeggio, or strum — the same options the progression player offers.
Play dock layout pass
The Play dock was tidied across iPhone, iPad, and Mac: the mode switcher, key and chord chips, and the Key / Scale / Chord / Quick Chords buttons line up at consistent, easy-to-tap sizes. On iPad and Mac the chord playback controls and the Diatonic / Progression switch sit together beside the chord; on iPhone they fit neatly, the staff rises to fill the space when you hide the keyboard, and spacing around the keyboard and Chord Lab was tightened.
Liquid Glass Play dock and chord card (macOS 26 / iOS 26+)
The Play dock and the active chord edit card use the OS Liquid Glass effect on macOS 26 and iOS 26+. Older systems fall back to sidebar vibrancy (macOS) or regular material (iOS).
Scale octave on staff and keyboard (macOS)
The Root Octave stepper in Play → Scales now moves the highlighted scale run on the staff and keyboard live. The staff draws the exact chosen octave; the keyboard snaps to the nearest visible octave when the chosen one is off-screen.
↑/↓ root + ←/→ octave shortcuts for Scales (macOS)
A new Scale menu in the macOS menu bar: Higher/Lower Root (↑/↓) steps the scale root a chromatic step; Higher/Lower Octave (→/←) steps the octave. Mirrors the arrow-key navigation the Chords sidebar already had.
⌘+ / ⌘− steps Text Size on macOS
The View menu Zoom In / Zoom Out commands now change the app Text Size on macOS. Compose keeps its existing canvas zoom behavior.
Staff note spelling follows the active key
Noteheads now sit on the correct staff line for their spelled note, not a fixed enharmonic table. In sharp keys, G♯/D♯/A♯ spell and position correctly — previously 'A♭' could land on the same line as A in E major. The notehead position and label are derived from the same resolver, so they can never disagree.
Unified accidental control — with Automatic mode
Settings → Accidentals now governs note roots, key names, chord names, and the staff all at once. A new Automatic default picks the key's native spelling when one is active, or fewest-accidentals otherwise — so C♯ major reads as D♭ everywhere it appears. Flipping the setting re-spells the selected root live.
Staff & Notation settings section
A new Settings → Staff & Notation section gathers all the staff display controls: Show Staff, View (Grand Staff / Guitar / Instrument — now surfaced in the UI for the first time), Show Note Names, Staff Note Name Position, and Ledger Lines.
Chord Lab panel and note labels follow the keyboard theme
When a keyboard theme is active, the Chord Lab panel, pads, and toggles retint to match — Maj/Min/Dim pads keep their semantic blue/purple/orange. Note labels on the keys are now two-tone: resting labels use a theme-aware legible color; pressed labels flip to a contrasting active color tested WCAG-AA-large against each theme's pressed key.
Fixed
Selecting a diatonic strip chord no longer hides the strip
Writing the chord root note to settings triggered a re-highlight that flipped `playDiatonicStripShown` off, hiding the strip you were selecting from. Strip-originated chord changes are now flagged so the sidebar highlights without re-triggering the keyboard guide.
Arrow-key chord and key nav in Chord mode (macOS)
The Progression menu's ← / → (previous/next chord) and ↑ / ↓ (higher/lower key) shortcuts were only published inside the Progression block, so they did nothing in standalone Chord mode. Now active in both modes.
Microphone Tuning: Reset Calibration button
Settings → MIDI Connections → Microphone Tuning now has a Reset Calibration button that zeroes all three mic corrections at once. It only shows when at least one correction is non-zero.
Microphone Input moved to top of MIDI Connections
The Microphone Input section now sits above MIDI Input in the MIDI Connections settings pane, so the mic toggle and Tuning link are the first thing you see.
Middle C renders as a clean stemless notehead
Middle C on the grand staff previously used a half-note or quarter-note glyph, which carried a stem that looked wrong crossing the shared ledger line. It's now drawn as a plain stemless ellipse.
June 2026
Tiny Instrument 2.3
Chord Lab plays full chords from a single finger. The Compose progression editor lets you play a progression straight in from MIDI, pick chords from an interactive circle of fifths, and read every chord by colour. Plus Two-Hand Drills, multiple MIDI inputs, and Do-Re-Mi note names.
A new chord instrument in Play: press one key and hear a full chord. Choose major, minor, suspended, or diminished — the four base types and a bass voice are free forever. The Chord Lab pack adds stackable extensions (6, m7, Major 7th, 9), Key Mode for automatic in-key chords, voicing control, and MIDI pad mapping.
Tap the new Listen button in the Compose progression editor and play chords on your MIDI keyboard — each one is detected and added as you release it, with a live preview of the chord you're holding. In-key chords show their Roman numeral; out-of-key chords stay fully editable.
On the Mac, the chord picker is now three collapsible sections — Key Chords, Any Chord, and an interactive circle of fifths. Tap any wedge to add that chord; the chords in your key are lit and labelled with their Roman numeral, and every name follows your sharp or flat preference.
A new practice mode for hand coordination: scales over a bass drone, parallel and contrary scales, chords with a walking bass, and arpeggio splits — generated from any key. Practice each hand on its own, then together, and earn bronze, silver, and gold tiers as your accuracy and tempo improve.
Multiple MIDI inputs
Activate more than one MIDI controller at once. Settings shows a per-device on/off list, and the bottom-bar device menu toggles each one and shows how many are active.
Do-Re-Mi note names
Switch note names to fixed-Do solfège and every keyboard, staff, and chord label follows along — with your choice of Si or Ti for the seventh. Find it in Settings → General → Note Names.
Improved
Colour-coded chords everywhere
Chords now read by colour across the progression strip, the chord quick-edit panel, the Play-mode Quick Chords strip, and Chord Lab's type pads: major blue, minor purple, diminished orange, and out-of-key green. Selecting a chord fills it with its colour.
Select any chord in a progression to step through inversions or set a slash bass; the chord name, keyboard preview, and sound update live as you re-voice it, and the picker auditions each chord as you pick it.
Accidentals setting moved to General
The sharp/flat spelling preference now lives in Settings → General beside the note-name system, since it applies to the whole app.
macOS drag-to-reorder in the progression strip
Reordering chords by dragging now works reliably on the Mac, with a full-opacity drag preview and a clear insert indicator.
Fixed
Change Key opens instantly
Opening the Change Key picker in the progression editor no longer pauses while it scans every scale — that work moved off the main thread behind a brief loading indicator.
Songbook dropped some chords with a flat fifth
Chord-chart lines using a hyphen-flat spelling (like F-5) were skipped on import. They're now parsed correctly so the line isn't dropped.
June 2026
Tiny Instrument 2.2
Music theory comes to Play mode: pick a key, see the scale, name every chord, and play along with a live-engraved staff that turns green note by note. Plus chord inversions and slash chords in the progression editor, sparkle effects across all practice modes, and a full-library thank-you to early users.
Pick a root and mode in Play; the keyboard highlights that key's scale and a strip below names every diatonic chord.
Chord name overlay
The note display above the keyboard names the chord you're holding in real time, slash chords included.
Global accidental spelling
Choose Follow Key, Sharps, or Flats; applies consistently across chord names, inversions, and lessons throughout the app.
Free Songbook lesson chapter
A new chapter on turning a chord chart into real practice, available to everyone at no cost.
Early-adopter full-library grant
If you downloaded the app before June 10, 2026, the full content library is yours — no unlock needed.
Natural staff notation and ghost play-along
The Play grand staff now uses real music engraving — stems flip by register, chords stack into one column, ledger lines always appear. Set a key and gray ghost notes show what to play next; hit each note and it turns green with a sparkle. Wrong notes appear at the cursor and fade. Finish the passage and the board holds green, then auto-clears.
Chord inversions in the progression editor
Each chord in a saved progression can now be voiced root-position or inverted, with the same ◀ ▶ stepper as Play mode. Inversions carry through to the chord strip label, keyboard highlight, audition, full playback, and Chase-the-Notes practice.
Slash chord bass in progressions
The progression editor now supports foreign-bass slash chords — a C chord over a D bass, for example. Pick any bass note from the Bass picker; chord-tone basses route to inversions automatically. The bass carries through the label, keyboard highlight, Play-mode loading, and Chase-the-Notes.
Improved
Load a progression into Play
Open any saved chord progression directly in Play mode; the app auto-advances through chords as you play.
Scale degrees and fingering in Play highlights
Play highlights now show scale degree numbers and fingering annotations, with hand-split colors when both hands are active.
About screen
Redesigned with a Metal ripple effect on tap, community links (Reddit, support), and a cleaner layout.
Settings: Live Rewind and stuck-note controls
Live Rewind can now be enabled or disabled from Settings. Stuck-note warning threshold and auto-clear are also configurable.
Compose: progression editor with Play-strip controls
The Compose progression editor now embeds the shared Play chord strip: select a chord, step through inversions with ◀ ▶, and audition it. Full-progression playback is cancellable; voice selections and play mode persist per chord.
Sparkle effects in all practice modes
The green correct-note sparkle now fires across every staff-based practice mode — Scale, Chord, Chord Progression, MIDI files, and Songbook songs. Effects settings moved to Settings → General so they apply app-wide.
Mode settings: per-mode drilldown
Settings → Mode is now a list of all five modes; tap any to open its own grouped panel. Play's panel is sectioned by Display, Effects, Playback, and Live Rewind.
Performance across Play and chord detection
ChordIdentifier is now memoized and runs off the main thread, cutting per-call cost from 10 ms to under 1 ms on cache hit. The chord explorer and key reference no longer block the main thread — 14 hangs per session down to zero. Progression-editor playback went from 24 main-thread hangs to zero. Diatonic triads precompute off-main so the chord strip appears instantly.
Fixed
Play staff snapping to bottom on free-played notes
The grand staff auto-scrolled to the bottom anchor on every free-played note. Now the follow-scroll only activates during song playback.
iPad: Play staff and chord strip after rotating
Two compounding bugs collapsed the staff to a sliver and hid the chord strip after a double device rotation. Fixed orientation detection and per-device height rules.
Advance-as-you-play stalled on high-voiced chords
Chords voiced above the keyboard's visible range had unreachable keys, so advance-as-you-play never triggered. The highlight now fits the voicing into the visible window automatically.
Chord highlight dropped the root note
After the high-octave crash fix, triads highlighted only the 3rd and 5th — the root was missing. The root is now explicitly prepended at all chord-highlight sites.
macOS: Compose progression footer layout
The Step/Free segmented picker showed its label inline on macOS, breaking the bar's height. Fixed with .labelsHidden().
MIDI input listened to all connected devices
MIDI events from any connected controller were forwarded. Input now filters to the selected device only.
High-octave crashes in the Scales explorer
Selecting a root above octave 5 pushed note numbers past MIDI 127 and triggered an Int8 overflow crash. All MIDI note construction is now clamped to 0–127.
Also in this release
Sticky keyboard dock — Play mode layout rebuilt to keep the keyboard pinned at the bottom across every orientation and device size.
Collapsible Play dock — A chevron collapses the guide panel and chord strip to a slim row, growing the keyboard into the freed space. State persists across sessions.
In-app 'What's New' sheet — After an update, established users see the release highlights once on launch as an illustrated swipeable walkthrough. Accessible any time from Settings → About.
Lesson tagging and topic lookup — Lessons can be tagged by topic; a chip row lets you filter by concept, and Aria can look up lessons by topic name.
iPhone chord-progression picker — iPhone Practice → Chord Progressions now opens the full saved + template list before setup, matching iPad and Mac.
Practice quality of life — Confirm before abandoning a session; reconfigure play mode, BPM, and hand split while a session is running.
June 2026
Tiny Instrument 2.1.1
iCloud sync for songs, chord progressions, and compositions across all your devices — plus a responsive song-practice layout that adapts to every screen.
2 improved
Improved
iCloud sync for songs, progressions, and compositions
Chord charts in your Songbook, saved chord progressions, and compositions now sync automatically across iPhone, iPad, and Mac via iCloud.
Responsive song-practice layout
The song-practice screen now adapts to your device and orientation. iPhone portrait splits the space between lyrics and staff. iPad landscape places the staff and note strip side by side. iPhone landscape surfaces lyrics with the keyboard sticky at the bottom. On Mac, the keyboard is pinned fully at the bottom with a unified non-scrolling layout.
June 2026
Tiny Instrument 2.1
Practice real songs. Paste any chord chart, follow karaoke-style lyrics as you play, drill sections with Chase the Notes, and build your Songbook from chord charts or existing Compositions.
Paste a chord chart from any source and Tiny Instrument parses it into named sections — Verse, Chorus, Bridge. Follow the highlighted chord as it plays, or drill any section with Chase the Notes and Falling Notes. For songs with lyrics, karaoke-style practice scrolls through the lines in sync: the active lyric center-screen, previous and next lines faded, with chord chips hovering above. Every chord shows its Roman numeral in the song's key. Tap any chord to hear it and see the notes on the keyboard.
A new Songbook in the Compose tab stores all your chord charts in one place. Import by pasting a chart, or convert any of your Compositions into a song — sections and chords carry over automatically as a starting point. Organise songs into categories and filter the Songbook to find what you need. Any symbol that couldn't be recognised is flagged before you start playing.
Deeper chord practice tools
Every chord exercise now offers a BPM-goal metronome that steps up as you clear exercises, a choice of play mode (Block, Arpeggio, Strum), a hand-split option that routes bass notes to your left hand, and per-chord inversion controls so you always practice the voicing you intend.
Improved
Richer slash chord split
For slash chords with a seventh or extension (Am7/G, D7/F#), the chord tooltip and practice note strip now show the hand split: bass in purple for the left, chord tones in blue for the right. The on-screen keyboard guide tints to match. Simple triad slashes stay a single shape.
Jump from Practice to Compose
Right-click or long-press any song or chord progression in Practice to open it in Compose for editing, or to rename, duplicate, or delete it — without leaving Practice.
Categorize your Songbook
Move any song to a category from its menu and filter the Songbook by category, sharing the same taxonomy as the MIDI library. The filter bar appears once your songs are categorized, on iPhone, iPad, and Mac.
Readable MIDI control names
MIDI control-change messages now show meaningful names instead of "CC 64". Standard controls read as Sustain Pedal, Mod Wheel, Expression, and more. Connect a recognised controller (Arturia KeyLab, Akai MPK, Roland A-series) and Tiny Instrument shows its actual button and knob names, detects the controller, and offers to set up its transport buttons automatically.
Hide the keyboard's navigation arrows
Settings → On Screen Keyboard → Show Navigation Arrows lets you hide the left/right octave-shift arrows for a cleaner look. The Mac Shift+Arrow shortcut and MIDI octave-shift still work.
Clearer song-practice header
The section jump menu now shows the section you're currently playing ("Verse 1", "Outro") instead of just "Section". The save button reads "Save Changes" on Mac when you have unsaved edits.
More consistent lists, with type badges
Rows across the app now share one card style. Items carry a small type badge on their icon — song, melody, MIDI file, warm-up — so you can tell what each item is when browsing the library together.
MIDI practice library inline on Mac
Picking MIDI Practice now opens the MIDI library in the main pane, the same way Melodies and Songbook do, instead of in a floating sheet.
Free-tier composition limit
Composition creation is now gated at 5 on the free tier, unlocked with Composition Studio.
June 2026
Tiny Instrument 2.0.1
Point release with refinements across the app.
1 improved
Improved
Aria narration reveals as it speaks
When chat narration is on, Aria's reply now appears one sentence at a time in sync with the voice, growing the conversation downward. The chat no longer dumps the full answer and jumps back to the top to start reading — and navigation cards land once narration finishes.
June 2026
Tiny Instrument 2.0
The biggest update yet. A full freemium model with content packs, iCloud sync, Live Activities on the Lock Screen, Aria device intelligence, 14 composition templates, a cross-mode metronome, and dozens of refinements across every mode.
Tiny Instrument is now free to download. Unlock the full curriculum with individual chapter packs or a full-library bundle. Previous purchasers are automatically grandfathered.
Cross-device progress sync
Practice on your iPhone, pick up on your iPad. Lesson progress and settings sync automatically across all your devices via iCloud.
Live Activities & Dynamic Island
Your practice timer and focus session now appear on the Lock Screen and in the Dynamic Island — so you can glance at your progress without unlocking your phone.
Compose: Progression templates
Choose from 14 chord progressions spanning Pop, Jazz, Blues, and Classical styles. Browse by genre and drop any template into your composition in one tap.
Arm a slot, play a chord on your MIDI keyboard or on-screen keyboard — Tiny Instrument detects the chord and drops it into the progression automatically.
The metronome is now accessible from any app mode. Tap the toolbar button to dial in BPM, time signature, and volume, with beats that animate in sync across the whole interface.
Aria: Smart device support
Aria now detects whether your device supports Apple Intelligence. If it does but isn't set up yet, you'll get a guided setup flow. Unsupported devices get a graceful fallback.
Live Rewind
Play mode now keeps a rolling 30-second buffer of everything you play. Tap Rewind to hear it back, save it as a Compose composition, or adjust the duration — so nothing you improvise is lost.
Aria remembers your last conversation. Reopen the chat and pick up where you left off — previous exchanges are shown as read-only context, with the full history available via the clock button.
Home Screen widgets
Launch any app mode, see your practice streak, or jump into your last lesson — directly from your Home Screen in small, medium, and large widget sizes.
Siri Shortcuts
Ask Siri to open a mode, practice a specific scale or chord, or start a focus session. All major app actions are exposed as App Shortcuts and work with the Shortcuts app.
Spotlight Search
Lessons, scales, and chords are now indexed in Spotlight. Search for anything by name and jump straight in from the system search.
In-app notification landing
Tapping a push notification now opens the exact lesson, challenge, or session it refers to — no digging through menus.
Improved
macOS menu bar
A full menu bar is now wired up on Mac — File (New Composition, Open MIDI, Import), View (timeline, grand staff, keyboard toggles), Playback (play/pause, loop, tempo), Window (Tuner, Metronome, Debug), and Help links. All keyboard shortcuts work.
Scale fingering hints
Correct right-hand fingering is now shown for all 12 major and natural minor scales in the scale practice view, with finger numbers displayed above each key.
Fingering exercises
Two new Play & Explore exercises: thumb crossunder technique (3→1 crossunder) and triad chord shapes (major and minor).
Lesson narration highlights
Words light up sentence by sentence as they're spoken during narrated lessons — easier to follow along and great for learners who read while listening.
Lesson long-press menu
Long-press any lesson to open it, mark it as a favorite, or schedule a reminder. Reminders show a date badge on the lesson row.
Locked lesson upgrade screen
Tapping a locked lesson now shows a context-aware bottom sheet with the lesson name, chapter, pack highlights, and a direct purchase CTA — drag it up to see the full chapter.
Focus session: countdown + extend
The focus timer now counts down to zero and presents extend options (5, 10, 15, or 30 minutes) when time runs out rather than ticking on indefinitely.
Aria: sequential scale playback
"Play scale" in Aria now plays notes one at a time at a steady tempo instead of triggering all notes simultaneously.
Mode settings section
Play and Learn mode settings now live in a dedicated Mode section in Settings, making them much easier to find.
Settings row captions
Common settings rows now show a short description beneath the label, clarifying what each toggle actually does.
"Practice Chord" in Chord Explorer
Tap the new Practice Chord button from any chord in the Chord Explorer to launch a single-chord practice session for that exact chord.
Keyboard note name strip
A note name strip can now be shown below the on-screen keyboard — always on in Chapter 0 lessons, toggleable elsewhere.
TipKit onboarding tips
First-launch tips guide new users through key features at the right moment using the system TipKit framework.
Fixed
MIDI playback: control changes now applied
CC messages — sustain pedal, modulation, and others — are now correctly processed during MIDI file playback.
MIDI playback: tempo changes respected
Songs with mid-track tempo changes now play back at the correct speed throughout the entire file.
MIDI keyboard: simultaneous notes
Fast keyboard playing now triggers all intended notes at the same time instead of playing them sequentially.
Scale & chord practice: note name setting
The "Show Note Names" global setting is now correctly applied when you open a practice session.
Compose: track color stays consistent during playback
Track colors no longer shuffle when playback starts.
Compose: correct instrument per track
Each track now uses its assigned instrument during playback rather than the last globally-selected instrument.
Focus timer stops at zero
The focus session timer no longer continued counting past zero.
MIDI library: no more duplicates after iCloud migration
Moving files to iCloud no longer produced duplicate entries in the MIDI library.
Aria: chord names spoken correctly
"Cmaj7" is now spoken as "C major seven" rather than "C maj seven."
macOS: Settings no longer crashes
Opening the Settings window on macOS no longer caused a crash.
Performance: audio off the main thread
MIDI playback scheduling, metronome ticks, and chord preview audio have all been moved off the main thread for smoother performance.
Performance: keyboard rendering
Wide keyboard layouts no longer slow down during idle or playback. Fixed three compounding causes — redundant per-key Tonic construction, over-rendering from state reads in body, and ungated animation timelines — reducing on-CPU work by over 60%.
Performance: selection views and practice stats
Compose, Ear Training, and Practice selection views no longer re-render on every session publish. Practice stat lookups moved from per-render full-table fetches to a memoized store, eliminating render spikes during playback.
macOS: Aria preset question now sends on tap
Tapping a suggested question in the lesson Aria picker on macOS now opens the chat and sends the question immediately, instead of opening with the question unsent.