MemoToMIDI — User Manual

Last updated: 2026-07-20

Turn what you play into editable MIDI, right on your iPhone or iPad.

This manual covers the iOS app. A macOS plugin version is in the works and will get its own guide.

1. Introduction #

MemoToMIDI turns a recording of your playing into editable MIDI — the note data your music software reads. Play a riff, a melody, a chord part, or hum a line, and the app detects the notes and presents them on a piano roll to clean up and export.

Instrument doesn’t matter: guitar, bass, piano, voice, strings, winds, a synth line. If it has pitch, the app will try to transcribe it.

What you can do with it

• Capture MIDI without a MIDI controller, or a computer.
• Get a rough transcription automatically, then correct it by hand.
• Send the result to Logic, Ableton, GarageBand, or any app that opens a MIDI file.

The workflow. Every project follows the same four steps:

1. Record or import — record into the app, or bring in an audio file you already have.
2. Transcribe — when a recording stops, the app analyzes the audio and lays the notes onto a piano roll automatically. From there you adjust the detection to get the most faithful version before you start editing.
3. Edit — delete or add notes, re-pitch, dynamics, quantize, etc.
4. Export — save the result as a standard MIDI file.

The transcription usually isn’t perfect. Auto-detection gets you most of the way, and then you tighten it up after. You could polish it in your DAW instead, but MemoToMIDI keeps everything lined up right where you recorded it — making it easy to compare with your ears and tweak anything that doesn’t sound quite right on your phone.

The rest of this manual covers each step and the tools around them: the tuner, the click track, your recording library, and settings.

MemoToMIDI reads pitched playing, not drums, and it runs entirely on your device — your audio stays on your device, and nothing is uploaded.

2. Getting started #

Installing the beta #

MemoToMIDI is currently distributed through TestFlight, Apple’s app for pre-release builds.

1. Install TestFlight from the App Store if you don’t have it.
2. Open the invitation link you were sent, or enter your invite code in TestFlight.
3. Tap Install next to MemoToMIDI, then Open.

You’ll need an iPhone running iOS 17 or later, or an iPad running iPadOS 17 or later. Once MemoToMIDI reaches the App Store you’ll install it the usual way.

First launch #

The app opens to your Library — the home screen. It’s empty until you record or import. Two buttons:

• Record (microphone icon) — capture audio with your device’s mic.
• Import (download icon) — bring in an audio file you already have.

Microphone permission #

The first time you tap Record, iOS asks to use the microphone. Tap Allow — the app can’t record without it. If you decline, you can turn it back on later in the iOS Settings app under MemoToMIDI; if the app finds the mic blocked, it shows a shortcut to that screen.

Finding your way around #

The app has four stops:

1. Library — your saved takes; where you start and return.
2. Record / Import — getting audio in.
3. Detection — where the app transcribes the audio and you edit the notes on a piano roll.
4. Export — turning the finished notes into a MIDI file.

3. Recording audio #

To record, open the Library and tap Record.

Before you record #

When the screen is ready it remains still. Nothing is saved until you press Record. If microphone access has not been decided yet, the app asks when you press Record or open Tuner; a granted Record request continues straight into the take.

Choose one timing workflow before you begin:

• Click — the recommended default. Its tempo, beats-per-bar, and audible or visual output controls appear directly on the page.
• Free — record without a click and map the beat later in Groove. Recording a counted one-bar lead-in makes Beat 1 easier to place later.

The screen also includes a compact Tuner — see Tuner.

Recording #

1. Tap Record. Recording begins immediately; there is no automatic count-in. With Click selected, audio capture and the click start together, so you can listen through as many lead-in bars as you need before playing.
2. As you play, the screen shows a running timer and a live waveform. Recording is mono — point your device at the source and keep a steady distance. Closer is generally better, but distance isn’t as important as a quiet room and a clean performance.
3. Tap Stop when you’re done.

There’s no length limit, but short, focused takes transcribe more cleanly than long ones. On either device, keep the built-in microphone pointed toward the source; a connected microphone works too.

After you stop #

The take is saved automatically as a draft. The screen shows Take saved with a Review Your Take strip; tap play to hear it back. Then choose:

• Continue to Detection — opens the take in Detection, where it’s transcribed and you edit the notes.
• Retake — returns to Ready to record with the same setup and waits for a deliberate Record tap. The saved original remains safe until its replacement is successfully saved.
• Discard — asks for confirmation, then deletes the draft and returns to the Library.

4. Tuner #

A built-in tuner gets you in tune before you record. On the Record screen, tap Tuner; it uses the same microphone permission as recording.

Play a single note and it names the nearest note, with a cents bar and a readout showing how far sharp or flat you are. The display lights up when you’re in tune. It’s chromatic, so it works for any instrument. Tap the ✕ to close.

5. Tempo & beat-tap #

Knowing where the beats fall lets MemoToMIDI line your notes up to bars later. You can set it up two ways: play along to a click track while you record, or tap the beat on a take you’ve already recorded.

Recording to a click #

On the Record screen, select Click to play along to a metronome. Click is the default for a fresh setup, and the app remembers your later Click/Free choice:

• Tap — tap this button in time a few times to set the tempo from your tapping.
• A BPM readout with −/+ buttons to nudge the tempo a beat at a time.
• Beats per bar — 2 through 7 (4 is the usual choice).
• Click output — choose Audible or Visual only. Audible shows the current speaker, headphone, or Bluetooth route. Visual only uses the on-screen pulse without playing a click through that route.

Because the app knows the click’s timing, your bars are already mapped. Audible click takes show a compact beat indicator while the recorded waveform and timer remain primary; Visual only uses the larger visual beat.

The audible click won’t become MIDI notes, but your microphone may still hear it in the recorded audio. Use headphones or Visual only when bleed matters.

For a free take, select Free and consider counting one bar before you start playing. Keeping that 1 2 3 4 lead-in in the recording makes Beat 1 easier to identify when you set Beat Timing later.

Setting Beat Timing afterwards #

For a take recorded without a click, open Set Beat Timing in Groove and tap the steady beat you would count — not every note or subdivision. The screen moves through three stages:

1. Prepare. The full-take waveform is visible before playback. Start on the first beat of a bar if you can, then tap Start Tapping for a visual 3-2-1.
2. Capture. Audio starts from the beginning. Tap anywhere on the screen — the waveform included — in time with the beat, through to the end; raw tap marks and a compact captured-tap count appear on the waveform. An occasional missed beat is okay. Restart discards this draft and begins again from zero.
3. Review. MemoToMIDI shows the cleaned beats it will use, including any distinctly marked stray taps it ignored. Use Play with Beat Clicks to listen, tap the waveform to choose a later review start, or choose Use All Taps when an ignored tap belongs in the beat sequence.

Tap Save to commit the reviewed Beat Timing. Retap changes only the draft; Cancel closes the screen, discards that draft, and leaves the previously saved timing unchanged. Remove Beat Timing is the explicit destructive action.

You don’t have to set a tempo at all — MemoToMIDI works fine with free timing. A tempo makes bar-aligned editing and export possible.

6. Importing audio #

You can bring in an audio file instead of recording fresh.

From the app #

1. In the Library, tap Import.
2. Pick an audio file from Files, iCloud Drive, or wherever it lives.
3. The app converts it and adds it to your Library. You’ll see Importing Audio while it works, then the take is ready to open in Detection.

MemoToMIDI handles WAV, M4A, MP3, AIF, and CAF files. If a file’s format isn’t supported you’ll see Import Failed; convert it to one of those formats first.

From another app (the Share Sheet) #

You can also send audio to MemoToMIDI from elsewhere — Files, Voice Memos, a browser, a messaging app:

1. Tap Share in the other app.
2. Choose MemoToMIDI from the share sheet.
3. A brief Importing to MemoToMIDI… screen appears, then the app opens with your file in the Library.

If MemoToMIDI can’t open right away, it leaves a notification — “1 recording ready to import. Tap to open.” — and finishes the import the next time you open the app.

Imported audio behaves like a recording from here on: open it, let it transcribe, edit, and export.

7. Your recording library #

Every take you record or import lands in the Library and stays until you delete it.

What a row shows #

Each row shows:

• Its name and length.
• A thumbnail of the waveform. Once a take is transcribed, its notes are drawn over the waveform too, so you can recognize a take at a glance.
• A play button (▶) on the thumbnail — tap it for a quick listen without opening the take; tap again (■) to stop.

Tap anywhere else on the row to open the take in Detection.

Sorting #

With more than one recording, a sort control appears next to the Library heading. You can sort by:

• Date created — newest or oldest first.
• Date modified — recently edited or oldest first.
• Name — A–Z or Z–A.

Managing takes #

• Rename — touch and hold a recording, choose Rename, and type a new name. You can also tap the pencil beside the title in the Editor. Changing the recording name never changes its MIDI export filename. Leave the field empty to return to the automatic date-and-time name.
• Duplicate — touch and hold, then Duplicate to make a copy before trying a different edit.
• Delete — swipe the row left and tap Delete. You’ll confirm, because this removes the recording and its MIDI edits for good.

8. Transcription basics #

Open a take in Detection and the app transcribes it: it analyzes the audio and lays the notes onto a piano roll. Treat that first pass as a starting point — it gets you most of the way, and you fix what it missed from here.

It happens automatically #

There’s no transcribe button. As soon as a recording finishes — or you open a take from the Library — the app transcribes it: you’ll see Processing audio… for a moment, then the notes appear, ready to play or edit.

The three tabs #

Detection has three tabs:

• Detect — the transcription and the controls that shape it.
• Groove — tightening timing against the beat.
• Export — turning the finished notes into a MIDI file.

Poly, Mono, Voice #

The Detect tab has a Mode switch with three settings:

• Poly (polyphonic) — for anything with more than one note at a time: chords, strummed guitar, piano parts. Poly automatically preserves notes that keep ringing through short detector dropouts while leaving real mutes and repeated attacks available to the normal note-splitting controls. There is no separate Sustain setting to manage.
• Mono (monophonic) — for one note at a time: a bass line, a flute, a lead. Telling the app there’s only ever one note stops it from detecting phantom extras.
• Voice — for singing. A sung note drifts in pitch and carries breath and consonant noise that Mono reads as extra notes; Voice holds a note through that drift and keeps the note boundaries where you re-articulated.

If a transcription looks cluttered with notes you didn’t play, switch modes — a single-line melody read in Poly is the most common cause.

Singing a melody in #

A musical idea is not attached to its lyrics. To get a melody out of your head and into MIDI, sing each note as “bah” and hold the vowel until the next note. The “b” marks where each note starts — including a repeated note on the same pitch — and the held vowel gives the app a steady pitch to read.

Lyrics and humming still work; expect more cleanup. Words move the pitch around inside a note, and humming gives repeated notes no boundary to find, so pairs can read as one long note.

9. Fine-tuning detection #

If the first pass isn’t right, the Detect tab has a handful of controls that re-run the transcription as you adjust them. Make small changes and watch the roll update.

The controls #

• Range (min – max). The app keeps only notes inside this range — useful for cutting low rumble or high ghost notes. Tap the min or max chip to pick a note by hand.

  When you first open a take, the range fits itself to your playing. It starts from a default of C2–C6 and widens outward to take in the bulk of the detected pitches, so a take with low bass or a high lead reveals that content without you touching the chips. It only ever widens, never narrows, so isolated rumble or squeal at the extremes stays filtered. Low instruments — bass, low piano, cello — are read right down to their bottom notes. If real notes still fall outside the range, a banner appears above the roll with a Fit to content button that widens it to include them.

• Min Length. Ignore notes shorter than the set length (up to 300 ms). Most of the unintended artifacts that the app produces are short and can be filtered in this way. Slide it to Off to keep everything.

• Sensitivity (Poly only — Less … More). How freely the app picks up notes. Toward More catches quiet or subtle notes; toward Less keeps only the clearly played ones. In Mono this control is hidden — single-line detection doesn’t use it.

• Onset Split. Turn this on when a repeated note on the same pitch reads as one long note instead of several. With it on, a Splits slider (Fewer … More) sets how eagerly the app breaks re-struck notes apart.

In Voice mode two of these rows change:

• Pitch Hold (replaces Min Length). How long a sung note holds its pitch through a drift or wobble before the app accepts it as a real note change. Raise it if vibrato or pitch drift splits notes that you sang as one; lower it if quick real note changes get absorbed.
• Splits (replaces the Onset Split toggle — Fewer … More). How much attack evidence it takes to start a new note. Toward More catches soft re-articulations — hummed repeated notes, legato singing — at the cost of extra notes; toward Fewer keeps only clearly re-articulated boundaries. The default sits left of center, tuned for “bah”-style takes. The middle of the slider is a real boundary: left of it the app also heals splits that land mid-vowel with no audible gap; right of it that safety net switches off so soft re-articulations can come through.

A tuning order that works #

1. Set Mode first — Poly, Mono, or Voice (see Transcription basics).
2. Adjust the Range if the auto-fit left anything out, or to tighten it to your instrument.
3. Nudge Sensitivity until you’re catching what you played without too many extras.
4. Use Min Length to sweep up leftover specks.

Editing locks these controls #

Once you start editing notes by hand, the detection controls grey out. That’s deliberate: re-running detection would throw your manual edits away. To get them back, tap Reset manual edits — it clears your hand edits (after a confirmation) and unlocks the controls. So it’s worth getting detection close before you fine-edit individual notes.

10. Editing notes (the piano roll) #

The piano roll is where you fix whatever the transcription got wrong. Time runs left to right; pitch runs bottom (low) to top (high). Each note is a block.

Getting around #

• Pinch to zoom; drag the background to pan.
• When you rotate the phone or re-run detection, the roll preserves your place in the view, so you can keep working without being jumped to a selected note.
• The toolbar shows the current bar and beat, and a metronome toggle adds a click during playback.

Selecting notes #

Tap a note to select it; a selected note gets a compact editing inspector. For this ordinary single-note selection, tapping empty space clears it.

To work on several notes at once, tap the dashed-rectangle Select control in the pitch corner. Drag a rectangle over the notes you want, tap individual notes to add or remove them, or tap a pitch-row label to select that pitch. Empty space clears the set while Select mode stays on. In Select mode, use two fingers to pan and pinch to zoom; tap Select again when the set is ready to edit. The selected notes stay protected from accidental taps until you deliberately clear or change the set.

Moving, resizing, and merging #

• Move — drag a note to slide it in time, or up and down in pitch. A selected group moves together in time and keeps its pitches and spacing.
• Resize — drag the handle at a note’s start or end edge to change where it begins or how long it lasts. A selected group resizes from the same edge together.
• Merge — drag one note’s edge into the note next to it to join them, useful when one note got split in two.

Fine adjustments (the selection inspector) #

With a note or group selected, the inspector offers precise controls. Wider layouts show the full set; compact layouts keep velocity easiest to reach. Its controls apply to every note in the selected group:

• Timing — on Detect, small and micro nudges move notes earlier or later. On Groove and Export, when the take has a beat map, this becomes the per-note Q n% control: use minus and plus to set each selected note’s quantize strength. Tap its percentage to clear the overrides and return to the recording-wide Quantize setting.
• Pitch — up or down a semitone at a time; the note’s name shows between the arrows.
• Velocity — louder or softer (see Dynamics & velocity).

Adding and deleting notes #

• Add — touch and hold an empty part of the roll to place a new note. While you hold, drag to position it in time and pitch, then lift to drop it in. It arrives at a default length; adjust its start and end with the handles, like any other note.
• Delete — select a note (or several) and tap the trash in the toolbar.

Looping a section #

A trim range bar sets a start and end point on the take. Drag the handles inward and playback loops between them. The same range also crops the take: anything outside the handles is left out of what you export.

The strip doubles as a navigator for the whole take: tap empty space in it to move the playhead there, or drag to scrub. If the spot you pick is off screen, the roll scrolls just enough to bring it into view.

Undo, redo, reset #

• Undo and Redo sit in the toolbar — every edit is reversible.
• Reset manual edits clears your hand changes and unlocks the detection controls again. It asks to confirm first.

11. Dynamics & velocity #

Every MIDI note carries a velocity — how hard it was played, which usually comes through as how loud it sounds. MemoToMIDI gives you one overall control and one per-note control.

The Dynamics slider #

On the Detect tab, the Dynamics slider sets how much velocity varies across the take:

• Flat — every note gets a similar velocity.
• Natural — the middle setting (and default) keeps the relative louds and softs the app recovered from this recording.
• Full — the louds and softs of your playing map across a wide velocity range.

Slide between the three to taste. Dynamics changes how strongly the notes play; it does not add or remove notes from the transcription.

Per-note velocity #

For individual notes, select a note and use the louder / softer buttons in the selection inspector. The note’s current velocity shows as you adjust it.

Velocity travels with the MIDI you export, so whatever you set here is what your DAW or instrument plays back.

12. Playback & sound #

You can play your transcription back at any point and choose what it plays through.

Playing back #

Press play to hear the notes on the roll; stop returns to the start. The roll follows along and the bar/beat counter keeps time. Turn on the metronome for a click alongside.

Source vs MIDI — the Compare slider #

On the Detect tab, the Compare slider crossfades between two things:

• Source — your original recording.
• MIDI — the transcription, played by the app.

Slide toward either (or anywhere between) to A/B them and hear how closely the notes match what you played. It’s the quickest way to catch a wrong or missing note. Compare lives on the Detect tab only; on the Groove and Export tabs, playback is the MIDI alone.

Choosing a sound #

Tap the Sound picker to choose from one collection of fixed sounds, including Piano, Electric Piano, Organ, Strings, Bass, Marimba, waveform voices, and more. Tap a sound to select it and preview it when playback is stopped; tap the selected sound again to hear it again. On iPad the full collection appears in two columns; on iPhone, scroll if needed and tap Done or swipe down to close the picker.

The sound is only for auditioning in the app. It doesn’t change the notes, and the MIDI you export carries the notes, not the sound — pick any instrument you like in your DAW afterward.

13. Tightening timing & exporting MIDI #

The last two tabs — Groove and Export — tidy the timing and turn your work into a MIDI file.

Groove: snapping to the grid #

If you played a little loose, the Groove tab pulls notes onto a rhythmic grid. Turn quantize on, then set:

• Quantize (0–100%) — how strongly notes snap to the grid. 100% locks them exactly to the grid; lower amounts tighten the timing while keeping some of your natural feel.
• Grid — the note value notes snap to (1/4, 1/8, 1/16, and triplet grids).
• Swing (0–100%) — a swung, shuffled feel. Available with quantize on and a suitable grid.

Quantizing snaps notes to the beat, so it needs the take to have a beat map — the app’s record of where the beats fall in your recording. You make one by recording to a click or by tapping the beat in afterward (see Tempo & beat-tap); without one, Groove has no beats to snap to. There’s also an export tempo here: the BPM written into the MIDI file, so your DAW opens it at the right speed.

Export: saving the MIDI #

On the Export tab:

• Export As sets the standard .mid filename. Tap its pencil to change it; it defaults from the recording name, but changing it does not rename the recording.
• Save MIDI writes that .mid file.
• Share opens the iOS share sheet — AirDrop it, email it, drop it into Files, or send it to another music app.
• Transpose shifts the exported notes up or down by octaves and semitones, if you want the file to land in a different register than you played.
• Scale Lock constrains the notes to a key. Turn it on, pick a Key and a Scale, then choose Snap to pull off-scale notes onto the nearest scale tone, or Drop to remove them. A quick way to clean up stray or mis-detected notes that fall outside the key you played in.

The exported file is a Standard MIDI File, the format every DAW reads. It carries your notes, their timing and velocities, and the tempo. Open it in Logic, Ableton, GarageBand, FL Studio, or anything else, and assign whatever instrument you like.

Save and Share stay greyed out until there are notes to export. If they’re disabled, go back to Detect and check the transcription has notes.

14. Settings #

Open settings from the gear in the corner of the Library. Everything here is optional; the defaults are sensible.

Appearance #

• Color Scheme — Light, Dark, or follow your device.
• Accent Color — pick a color from a palette of swatches. It colors your notes in the piano roll, the playhead, selections, and active controls; everything else stays neutral. Cosmetic only.

Recording #

These set the defaults for new recordings; you can still change them per take on the Record screen:

• Click on by default — whether a fresh recording setup starts on Click or Free. Choosing either mode on the Record screen remembers that choice.
• Default BPM — the starting tempo for the click.
• Default beats per bar — 2 through 7.
• Click volume — how loud the click is, while recording and during playback in Groove and Export.

Playback #

• Handedness — put the play button on the left or right of the screen, for one-handed use. In landscape, the Record screen mirrors to match, keeping the Record button under your chosen thumb.

Inference cache #

When MemoToMIDI transcribes a take it caches the analysis, so reopening is instant. This section shows how much space the cache uses and offers a Clear Cache button. Clearing is safe — your recordings and edits are untouched — but the next time you open each recording it analyzes again (roughly 3–8 seconds per recording).

About #

About shows the installed app version. Open Acknowledgments there for third-party notices and license text.

15. Tips & troubleshooting #

Getting the cleanest transcription #

A clean recording does most of the work. Detection only has the audio you give it, so a tidy performance in a quiet room transcribes far better than a noisy or hesitant one.

• One instrument, up close, quiet room. Record a single instrument with the mic near the source and as little background noise as you can manage. Overlapping instruments, room hum, and distant sound all muddy the result.
• Play cleanly and deliberately. Clear attacks and steady notes read more accurately than rushed or mumbled ones. A careful take beats a fast one.
• Set the right Mode. Mono for single-line parts (melody, bass, lead), Poly for chords.
• Tune up first with the built-in tuner — in-tune playing transcribes more accurately.

The first few takes will show you what it handles well and how Mode, Range, and Sensitivity change the result.

Common fixes #

Reporting a problem (beta) #

On the Export tab, tap Report a problem:

1. Under What went wrong?, choose one or more tags — Missing notes, Extra notes, Wrong pitch, Timing, or Other.
2. Add an optional note under Details.
3. Tap Create report, then share the bundle with the developer.

The report includes the recording’s audio so the problem can be reproduced.