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F♯m7♭5 guitar chord

F♯ minor 7 flat 5 is F♯, A, C and E. Below are the shapes up the neck, the note each string sounds, and the country, blues, and pop progressions F♯m7♭5 turns up in — press ▶ on any grid to hear it.

Root
Quality

F♯m7♭54 shapes up the neck

Open position
Root on the 6th (low E) string
1F♯♭3A♭7E♭3A♭5C♭7E2341
G shape
4th fret
Root on the 4th (D) string
4fr1F♯♭5C♭7E♭3A1222
D shape
9th fret
Root on the 5th (A) string
9fr1F♯♭5C♭7E♭3A1324
A shape
10th fret
Inversion — a chord tone other than the root in the bass
10fr♭5C1F♯♭3A♭7E1214

Where you'll hear F♯m7♭5

The chord in its usual company, already moved into your key. F♯m7♭5 is the highlighted one — it won't always be first, because some chords only ever pass through on the way somewhere else. Hit play to hear a line strummed at a tempo typical of the style, or turn on Repeat and let it loop while you play along.

Blues84 bpm
Em7i7F♯m7♭5iiø7B7V7Em7i7

The last four bars of a minor blues — the half-diminished sets up the 5 chord.

Pop104 bpm
F♯m7♭5iiø7B7V7Emi

The minor 2–5–1. Half-diminished is what the 2 chord becomes in a minor key.

Only two styles here. Country doesn't use it. Half-diminished is a jazz and minor-blues chord.

How to use the shapes

  • The number on a dot is that note's job in the chord: 1 is the root, 3 the third, 5 the fifth. A flat sign marks a lowered tone — the ♭3 is what makes a minor chord sound minor.
  • Major, minor, and 7th chords (dom 7, maj 7, min 7) show the five CAGED positions — the badge under each grid names the open chord the grip is borrowed from. One shape stays open; the other four are that grip moved up the neck. A few of the minor and 7th grips skip strings a full hand can't reach — the × marks show what to leave out.
  • Every other quality gets the same badge wherever the shape earns it: an E-shape sus4 and an A-shape 6th are the plain open grips with one note moved. Expect fewer than five — the C and G shapes run out of fingers once a chord carries a 6th or a 9th, and the richest voicings (9ths, 13ths) come from jazz grips no open chord gives rise to. Those are still worth learning; they just go unbadged rather than get a label they haven't earned.
  • The small greyed numbers under each grid are a suggested fingering — 1 is the index finger, 4 the little finger. They're only a suggestion, and they sit outside the grid on purpose: what a note is doing in the chord matters more than which finger presses it.
  • Press ▶ on any grid to hear that exact voicing strummed.
  • Learn the open position first, then the shape with the root on the 6th string, then the one rooted on the 5th — that trio covers most songs.
  • Shapes with no open strings are movable: slide the whole grip up or down and the root string tells you which note names the chord.
  • A long bar across the dots is a barre — one finger flattened over several strings.

Chords feel awkward at first? The Foundations path builds them up one finger at a time →

Chord voicings from the open-source chords-db project (MIT license).