Adele
Someone Like You chords
Someone Like You by Adele is a beginner song in A, played with no capo. The whole sheet is 5 chords (A, C#m, F#m, D, E) across 2 sections: Verse ×2 → Chorus ×2. 3 of the 5 shapes are open chords. Shapes that use a barre: C#m, F#m. It sits at roughly 67 BPM.
By Chiye · Updated
Hardest change in the sheet: C#m → F#m, once.
- Difficulty
- Beginnerbarre shape C#m
- Key
- Awith no capo
- Tempo
- 67BPM
- Tuning
- Standard (E A D G B E)low to high
- Chords
- 53 open, 2 with a barre
- Sections
- 2each with its own progression
Chords in Someone Like You
Frets read low E to high E, x means leave that string out.
Chord sheet
One chord per bar in this practice sheet. Follow the time signature shown beside each section; dots mark the remaining counts in the bar. Tap a bar to hear its chord, or loop the section to practise the changes.
Chord accompaniment only. Follow the section notes for this arrangement’s timing. Songs whose words are public domain →
Verse× 2 · 4/4 · ♩=67
Chorus× 2 · 4/4 · ♩=67
Printable one-page chord chart
How to play Someone Like You
This guitar arrangement of Someone Like You uses A, C#m, F#m, D and E. The verse and chorus share three chords but differ in their second chord, so learn their printed rows separately before connecting them.
The chorus changes through A, E, F#m and D, while the verse also uses C#m. The shown C#m is an A-minor shape at fret 4, and F#m is an E-minor shape at fret 2: they are different grips. An A-minor shape at fret 9 can also produce F#m, but it is a higher alternative. Practise the displayed low-position change first.
Strum gently in half-time — a soft downstroke per beat, letting the bass notes lead. If the barre chords buzz, play them with just the top four strings until your index finger builds strength. The song rewards restraint: quiet verses, a full but unhurried chorus, and lots of space.
How to practise Someone Like You
Four steps computed from this sheet: the order the shapes are easiest to learn in, the changes that really occur in the progressions above, where each chord turns up, and the tempo ladder up to the speed marked here.
Learn the shapes easiest first
A (x-0-2-2-2-0, beginner) → D (x-x-0-2-3-2, beginner) → E (0-2-2-1-0-0, beginner) → C#m (x-4-6-6-5-4, intermediate, needs a barre) → F#m (2-4-4-2-2-2, intermediate, needs a barre)
3 of the 5 shapes are open chords, so start there and leave C#m until the others change cleanly.
Drill the changes this sheet actually uses
F#m → D2×A → C#m1×A → E1×C#m → F#m1×
These counts come from the progressions on this page, so they are the changes you will actually play, not a generic list of pairs to practise.
Know where each chord turns up
- Aevery section
- C#mVerse
- F#mevery section
- Devery section
- EChorus
Climb the tempo ladder
Start at 40 BPM and move up only when a full pass is clean: 40 → 50 → 60 → 67 BPM. The tempo marked on this sheet is 67 BPM, and the last step is the one that always feels like a jump. Stay at 60 for longer than feels necessary.
Practise each section's chord changes slowly, then play the sheet through at a steady tempo without pausing between sections.
Playing Someone Like You with a capo
This sheet needs no capo. Each card shows what you would finger at that capo position so the song still sounds exactly as written. Useful when the shapes above are awkward, or when you want to sing it higher without learning new chords.
No capoas written
A C#m F#m D E
3 of 5 stay open
Fret 1
Ab Cm Fm C# Eb
no open shapes left, all barre
Fret 2
G Bm Em C D
4 of 5 stay open
Fret 3
F# Bbm Ebm B C#
no open shapes left, all barre
Fret 4
F Am Dm Bb C
3 of 5 stay open
Fret 5
E Abm C#m A B
2 of 5 stay open
Fret 6
Eb Gm Cm Ab Bb
no open shapes left, all barre
Fret 7
D F#m Bm G A
3 of 5 stay open
Working out a different key? The capo calculatordoes the same arithmetic for any chord set.
More songs built on the same chords
If Someone Like You clicks, these use the closest set of shapes, so the chords you just learned keep working.
More beginner songs to learn after this one: Sweater Weather, Payphone, The Scientist, 505.
These chords across the songbookHow often each chord in Someone Like You turns up across all 104 songs on this site, and what it most often moves to next. The counts come from the sheet library itself, not from theory.
134bars of this chord across the songbook
24songs use this shape
Most often followed by D, 19×.
3bars of this chord across the songbook
2songs use this shape
Most often followed by F#m, 2×.
13bars of this chord across the songbook
6songs use this shape
Most often followed by D, 4×.
323bars of this chord across the songbook
58songs use this shape
Most often followed by G, 52×.
69bars of this chord across the songbook
11songs use this shape
Most often followed by Eadd9, 6×.