150 BPM
150 beats per minute is one beat every 400 ms. Below: bar and phrase lengths, delay and reverb times, LFO rates, the genres that use this tempo, and the pitch change needed to mix in from nearby tempos. Start the metronome or tap along to a track to check it is really 150.
Updated 2026-10-17
150 BPM
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Beat, bar and phrase lengths at 150 BPM
At 150 BPM one beat lasts 400 ms and a 4/4 bar lasts 1.6 s. That beat is a whole number of milliseconds, so delay and gate times can be typed in exactly, without rounding. That is 2.5 beats per second, or 37.5 bars of 4/4 per minute.
Dance tracks are usually arranged in 8-, 16- and 32-bar phrases. At 150 BPM a 16-bar phrase takes 25.6 s and a 32-bar intro or outro takes 51.2 s. That is 6.4 s shorter than the same 16 bars at 120 BPM. A six-minute track at this tempo contains about 225 bars.
| Length | Time | Milliseconds |
|---|---|---|
| 1 beat | 0.4 s | 400 ms |
| 1 bar (4 beats) | 1.6 s | 1600 ms |
| 4 bars | 6.4 s | 6400 ms |
| 8 bars | 12.8 s | 12800 ms |
| 16 bars | 25.6 s | 25600 ms |
| 32 bars | 51.2 s | 51200 ms |
| 64 bars | 1:42.4 min | 102400 ms |
Delay times at 150 BPM
Straight values follow the beat; dotted values are 1.5 times as long and triplets are two-thirds as long. At 150 BPM the popular dotted-eighth delay is 300 ms and a quarter-note slapback is 400 ms. The Hz column is the matching rate for an LFO, tremolo or auto-pan synced to the straight note.
| Note | Straight | Dotted | Triplet | Rate (straight) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1/1 (one 4/4 bar) | 1600 ms | 2400 ms | 1066.67 ms | 0.625 Hz |
| 1/2 | 800 ms | 1200 ms | 533.33 ms | 1.25 Hz |
| 1/4 (one beat) | 400 ms | 600 ms | 266.67 ms | 2.5 Hz |
| 1/8 | 200 ms | 300 ms | 133.33 ms | 5 Hz |
| 1/16 | 100 ms | 150 ms | 66.67 ms | 10 Hz |
| 1/32 | 50 ms | 75 ms | 33.33 ms | 20 Hz |
Reverb times at 150 BPM
A common way to keep a reverb in time is to tie its pre-delay to a short note value and let the tail fade within a longer one. At 150 BPM a 1/64-note pre-delay is 25 ms and a 1/32-note pre-delay is 50 ms.
The decay control on most reverbs is RT60, the time it takes the tail to fall by 60 dB, so the audible tail ends earlier than the number shown. Treat these values as starting points and adjust by ear.
| Reverb character | Pre-delay | Decay (RT60) |
|---|---|---|
| Tight room on drums | 25 ms | 400 ms |
| Medium plate on vocals | 50 ms | 800 ms |
| Large hall or pad wash | 50 ms | 1600 ms |
| Ambient tail over two bars | 100 ms | 3200 ms |
Genres at 150 BPM
150 BPM is in the up-tempo, high-energy range. It sits at the top of the techno range (125–150) and in the middle of the hardstyle range (145–160).
Heard at half-time (75 BPM) it lines up with ambient/downtempo, hip-hop and reggae/dub. A detector or a tag in your library may report either reading, so check by ear which one the drums suggest.
These ranges are common practice rather than rules: genre is decided by rhythm, sound and scene as much as by tempo, and plenty of tracks sit outside the usual numbers.
- Techno: typically 125–150 BPM — from restrained 125 to fast, hard styles near 150.
- Hardstyle: typically 145–160 BPM — most releases sit near 150.
Mixing into 150 BPM
To bring a track at another tempo up or down to 150 BPM, move its pitch fader by the percentage below. Without key lock the key moves too, by the number of semitones shown; about 6 % is one semitone, so changes beyond that are where key lock (master tempo) starts to matter.
A ±8 % pitch fader on a track at 150 BPM reaches 138–162 BPM; a ±16 % range reaches 126–174 BPM.
| Track tempo | Pitch change to reach 150 | Key shift without key lock |
|---|---|---|
| 144 BPM | +4.17 % | +0.71 st |
| 146 BPM | +2.74 % | +0.47 st |
| 148 BPM | +1.35 % | +0.23 st |
| 149 BPM | +0.67 % | +0.12 st |
| 151 BPM | −0.66 % | −0.12 st |
| 152 BPM | −1.32 % | −0.23 st |
| 154 BPM | −2.6 % | −0.46 st |
| 156 BPM | −3.85 % | −0.68 st |
Half-time, double-time and nearby tempos
Half-time of 150 BPM is 75 BPM and double-time is 300 BPM.
300 BPM is outside the 60–200 range of these pages; the half/double-time converter works with any value.
Each 1 BPM step at this tempo changes the beat by about 2.65 ms, so neighbouring tempos are close enough to beatmatch with a small pitch move.
Frequently asked questions
- How many milliseconds is one beat at 150 BPM?
- One beat (a quarter note) at 150 BPM is 60,000 ÷ 150 = 400 ms. A 4/4 bar is four beats, 1600 ms.
- What is the dotted eighth delay time at 150 BPM?
- A dotted 1/8 delay at 150 BPM is 300 ms: an eighth note (200 ms) multiplied by 1.5. A straight quarter-note delay is 400 ms and a quarter-note triplet is 266.67 ms.
- What genre is 150 BPM?
- Techno and hardstyle commonly use 150 BPM. Genre ranges overlap, so the drum pattern and sound decide the style more than the number does.
- What is 150 BPM in Hz?
- 150 BPM is 2.5 Hz when one cycle equals one beat. An LFO synced to one bar runs at 0.625 Hz, and one synced to sixteenth notes at 10 Hz.