70 BPM
70 beats per minute is one beat every 857.14 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 70.
Updated 2026-10-17
70 BPM
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Beat, bar and phrase lengths at 70 BPM
At 70 BPM one beat lasts 857.14 ms and a 4/4 bar lasts 3.429 s. The beat is not a whole number of milliseconds, so round to the nearest 0.1 ms when you type times in by hand, or use your plugin's tempo sync. That is 1.167 beats per second, or 17.5 bars of 4/4 per minute.
Dance tracks are usually arranged in 8-, 16- and 32-bar phrases. At 70 BPM a 16-bar phrase takes 54.86 s and a 32-bar intro or outro takes 1:49.7 min. That is 22.86 s longer than the same 16 bars at 120 BPM. A six-minute track at this tempo contains about 105 bars.
| Length | Time | Milliseconds |
|---|---|---|
| 1 beat | 0.857 s | 857.14 ms |
| 1 bar (4 beats) | 3.429 s | 3428.57 ms |
| 4 bars | 13.71 s | 13714.29 ms |
| 8 bars | 27.43 s | 27428.57 ms |
| 16 bars | 54.86 s | 54857.14 ms |
| 32 bars | 1:49.7 min | 109714.29 ms |
| 64 bars | 3:39.4 min | 219428.57 ms |
Delay times at 70 BPM
Straight values follow the beat; dotted values are 1.5 times as long and triplets are two-thirds as long. At 70 BPM the popular dotted-eighth delay is 642.86 ms and a quarter-note slapback is 857.14 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) | 3428.57 ms | 5142.86 ms | 2285.71 ms | 0.292 Hz |
| 1/2 | 1714.29 ms | 2571.43 ms | 1142.86 ms | 0.583 Hz |
| 1/4 (one beat) | 857.14 ms | 1285.71 ms | 571.43 ms | 1.167 Hz |
| 1/8 | 428.57 ms | 642.86 ms | 285.71 ms | 2.333 Hz |
| 1/16 | 214.29 ms | 321.43 ms | 142.86 ms | 4.667 Hz |
| 1/32 | 107.14 ms | 160.71 ms | 71.43 ms | 9.333 Hz |
Reverb times at 70 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 70 BPM a 1/64-note pre-delay is 53.57 ms and a 1/32-note pre-delay is 107.14 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 | 53.57 ms | 857.14 ms |
| Medium plate on vocals | 107.14 ms | 1714.29 ms |
| Large hall or pad wash | 107.14 ms | 3428.57 ms |
| Ambient tail over two bars | 214.29 ms | 6857.14 ms |
Genres at 70 BPM
70 BPM is a slow tempo; many listeners will also hear it at double-time. It sits near the low end of the ambient/downtempo range (60–100), at the bottom of the hip-hop range (70–100) and at the bottom of the reggae/dub range (70–100).
Counted at double-time (140 BPM) it matches UK garage/breakbeat, techno, trance and dubstep. 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.
- Ambient/downtempo: typically 60–100 BPM — beatless ambient may not have a useful BPM at all.
- Hip-hop: typically 70–100 BPM — boom-bap often sits around 85–95.
- Reggae/dub: typically 70–100 BPM — the off-beat skank can make the pulse feel faster than it is.
Mixing into 70 BPM
To bring a track at another tempo up or down to 70 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 70 BPM reaches 64.4–75.6 BPM; a ±16 % range reaches 58.8–81.2 BPM.
| Track tempo | Pitch change to reach 70 | Key shift without key lock |
|---|---|---|
| 64 BPM | +9.38 % | +1.55 st |
| 66 BPM | +6.06 % | +1.02 st |
| 68 BPM | +2.94 % | +0.5 st |
| 69 BPM | +1.45 % | +0.25 st |
| 71 BPM | −1.41 % | −0.25 st |
| 72 BPM | −2.78 % | −0.49 st |
| 74 BPM | −5.41 % | −0.96 st |
| 76 BPM | −7.89 % | −1.42 st |
Half-time, double-time and nearby tempos
Half-time of 70 BPM is 35 BPM and double-time is 140 BPM.
35 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 12.07 ms, so neighbouring tempos are close enough to beatmatch with a small pitch move.
Frequently asked questions
- How many milliseconds is one beat at 70 BPM?
- One beat (a quarter note) at 70 BPM is 60,000 ÷ 70 = 857.14 ms. A 4/4 bar is four beats, 3428.57 ms.
- What is the dotted eighth delay time at 70 BPM?
- A dotted 1/8 delay at 70 BPM is 642.86 ms: an eighth note (428.57 ms) multiplied by 1.5. A straight quarter-note delay is 857.14 ms and a quarter-note triplet is 571.43 ms.
- What genre is 70 BPM?
- Ambient/downtempo, hip-hop and reggae/dub commonly use 70 BPM. Genre ranges overlap, so the drum pattern and sound decide the style more than the number does.
- What is 70 BPM in Hz?
- 70 BPM is 1.1667 Hz when one cycle equals one beat. An LFO synced to one bar runs at 0.2917 Hz, and one synced to sixteenth notes at 4.667 Hz.