Documentation

Three steps take you from a fresh install to a song on your music stand.

1. 01

   Choose a songs folder

   The first time you open chordlist, pick where your library lives. Use chordlist Folder keeps your songs on this device. Select Songs Folder lets you choose any folder instead, such as one in iCloud Drive to sync between your iPhone and iPad.

   

2. 02

   Add a song

   Tap + on the song list, enter a title, artist, and lyrics, and add chords if you have them. Tap Save and the song is written to a Markdown file in its artist's folder.

   

3. 03

   Open it and play

   Tap the song to open it. Press play to start hands-free scrolling, and tap the chord progression to change key.

   

• You can switch folders at any time — choose Select Songs Folder from the ⋯ menu on the song list, or open ⋯ → Settings → Songs Folder. chordlist remembers its permission to the folder and checks it for changes whenever you return to the app.
• Changed something in another app? Pull down on the song list to refresh straight away.

The song list shows every song in your folder, grouped by artist. None of these tools move or rename your files — they only change what you see.

Search

Type in the search field at the bottom of the list to match titles, artists, and tags at the same time.

Filter by tag

Tap a tag above the list to show only songs with that tag. Select several to see songs with any of them, and tap a tag again to clear it.

Sort

Open the ⋯ menu to sort by Artist, Title, Last Played, or Play Count.

Shuffle

Tap the shuffle button in the top-left corner to open a random song from the songs currently shown — handy for practice or building a set.

Now Playing

Connect Apple Music in Settings and chordlist matches the track that is playing to a song already in your library.

Tidy up your tags

Scroll to the end of the tag row and tap the pencil to hide tags you rarely use or put the important ones first.

Open any song to see its lyrics and chords. Everything you need while playing sits on this one screen.

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Tap + on the song list to open the editor. Only the title, artist, and lyrics are required — everything else can be added later with the edit button on the song.

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Other ways to add songs

Share from Safari

On a lyrics or tab page, tap the share button and choose chordlist. Check the title, artist, and lyrics, then tap Import to chordlist. If anything still needs filling in, the app finishes the import when you next open it.

From Apple Music

With Apple Music connected, start a new song from the track that is currently playing.

Add a file directly

Copy a Markdown file into an artist folder with Files, Finder, or another app — see Files and folders below.

Make sure you have the right to use any lyrics or chords you import.

Lyrics are plain text, so chords are too. chordlist understands three ways of writing them, and you can mix them in the same song.

C                G
Hold the morning light
D            Em
Slow it down awhile

[Verse] G D Em C

[Chorus] C G D Em, C G D

Hold the (C) morning light (G)
Slow it down awhile (D) (oh)

Section headings

A heading is a section name in square brackets on its own line. Capitals don’t matter, and you can number them — [Verse 2], [Part II] — or write [Final Chorus]. These names are recognized:

• [Intro]
• [Verse]
• [Pre-Chorus]
• [Pre-Hook]
• [Chorus]
• [Hook]
• [Refrain]
• [Part]
• [Bridge]
• [Solo]
• [Instrumental]
• [Interlude]
• [Breakdown]
• [Outro]

Use a different name? Add your own under ⋯ → Settings → Behavior → Section Markers.

Your library is just a folder. Inside it, each artist has a folder, and each song is a Markdown file in its artist’s folder. The names on disk are what you see in the app.

Songs/
├── The Beatles/
│   └── Let It Be.md
└── Tracy Chapman/
    └── Fast Car.md

---
chords: G D Em C
tags:
  - practice
  - piano
playCount: 3
lastPlay: 2026-10-03T19:30:00Z
---

[Verse] G D Em C
G                           D
Coffee on the counter going cold

Frontmatter fields

• Only .md files are read, and only one level deep: Songs/Artist/Song.md. Files in deeper subfolders are ignored.
• A file placed directly in the songs folder, outside an artist folder, appears only if its frontmatter has an artist field.
• Renaming a file renames the song. Moving it to another artist folder changes its artist.
• Files and folders whose names start with a dot are hidden, and skipped.
• Any other frontmatter is kept when chordlist saves a song, so details added by another tool live safely alongside the app’s fields.

Because the library is made of folders and text files, chordlist is not the only way to work with it. Close the song editor before changing the same file elsewhere, then pull down on the song list when you return.

Files and Finder

Rename, move, duplicate, share, or back up songs with Apple’s Files app or Finder. Remember that renaming a file or moving it to another folder changes its title or artist.

Markdown editors

Open a song in any editor that saves plain Markdown. Keep the Artist/Song.md structure, and save as UTF-8 for the most predictable results.

Backups and version control

Copy the whole songs folder to another drive or backup service. On a computer, you can also use Git to keep a history of every change.

An Obsidian vault is also a folder of Markdown files, so the same folder can be both an Obsidian vault and a chordlist library.

1. On iPhone or iPad, create an Obsidian vault with Store in iCloud turned on. Obsidian keeps iCloud vaults in iCloud Drive/Obsidian/[Vault Name].
2. In chordlist, open ⋯ → Settings → Songs Folder and select that vault folder.
3. Inside the vault, create one folder per artist and keep each song as Artist/Song Title.md. Obsidian’s hidden .obsidian settings folder is ignored by chordlist.
4. Edit lyrics and frontmatter in either app. Back in chordlist, pull down on the song list if an edit hasn’t appeared yet.

iCloud Drive/
└── Obsidian/
    └── Songbook/          ← select this folder in chordlist
        ├── .obsidian/     ← ignored
        ├── Adele/
        │   └── Someone Like You.md
        └── Bob Marley/
            └── No Woman No Cry.md

A folder in iCloud Drive can appear in Files while some of its songs are stored only in the cloud. Before a rehearsal, trip, or gig without a reliable connection, tell your device to keep the whole songs folder downloaded.

1. Open the Files app on the iPhone or iPad you will play from.
2. Tap Browse, then open iCloud Drive.
3. Find your songs folder — or the Obsidian vault folder, if you use Obsidian — and touch and hold it.
4. Choose Keep Downloaded. Files downloads everything in the folder and keeps it on that device.
5. Wait until the cloud download icons are gone, then open chordlist once to check every song is there.

• Repeat this on every iPhone or iPad that needs offline access; the setting applies to one device only.
• If Keep Downloaded isn’t offered, the folder may already be stored on the device.
• Changes made offline sync back to iCloud once the device reconnects. Avoid editing the same song on two offline devices at once, or iCloud may keep both versions as a conflict.
• Keep Downloaded makes songs available, but it is not a backup. Keep a separate copy of a library you care about.

chordlist is free for your first 10 songs. chordlist unlimited is a one-time in-app purchase that removes that limit for good and supports the app’s development.

What it includes

Unlimited songs

Add as many songs as you like, forever.

No ads

The small advert for another independent app, shown at the end of the song list and of each song, goes away. Those adverts come from Kickstart Exchange, where independent apps promote one another.

About Kickstart Exchange

Pay once

It is a single purchase, not a subscription. Nothing renews and nothing is charged again.

All your devices

The unlock belongs to your Apple Account, so it works on every iPhone and iPad signed in with it. There is no chordlist account to create.

Family Sharing

If you use Family Sharing, the members of your family group can use the unlock too.

How the free version works

• Once your library has 5 songs, adding another first shows the unlock screen. Tap Continue Free to carry on.
• At 10 songs, adding a song in the app needs the unlock.
• Reaching the limit never locks the songs you already have: you can still open, play, edit, and share every one of them.

How to buy it

1. Open ⋯ → Settings and tap Unlock Unlimited Songs under chordlist unlimited. The same screen also appears on its own when you add a song past the free limit.
2. Tap the unlock button and confirm the purchase with Face ID, Touch ID, or your Apple Account password.
3. That’s it. The lock beside chordlist unlimited in Settings opens, and you can add songs straight away.

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If something goes wrong

Apple processes the payment, and chordlist never sees your card or bank details. How purchases are verified is described in the privacy policy.

Most problems come down to where a file is or what it is called. Start here.

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