PÖKITT USER GUIDE
Everything PÖKITT does and how to get the most out of it. Still stuck? Email drumpimp@gmail.com and include your iPhone model and what you were doing.
GETTING STARTED
- Plug in wired or USB-C headphones. You hear the track, the mic hears only your drums.
- Open SETUP (top right of the home screen) and run the SYNC TEST once.
- Pick TRACKS, MY SONGS, CLICK ONLY or DROP OUT.
- Choose what you're playing and where you want to sit, then tap START.
- Play through the count-in. Your score and coach tips show up when it ends or when you tap STOP.
THE SYNC TEST
Every phone and every pair of headphones adds a small delay between the sound leaving the phone and reaching your ears, and between your drums hitting the mic and the phone hearing them. The SYNC TEST measures that delay so your scores are exact.
Turn the volume up to about 75%. On the phone speaker, set the phone down in a quiet room. With headphones, hold one earbud or headphone speaker right against the bottom of the phone. Tap START and stay quiet while 16 clicks play.
The result is saved for that output. Run it again when you switch headphones. If you know you played dead on and PÖKITT still reads you late, slide FINE TUNE by that much.
WHAT ARE YOU PLAYING?
Every hit is matched to the nearest note on the grid. Pick QUARTERS, 8THS, TRIPLETS or 16THS to match the finest note you're playing. If you play 16th-note hi-hats, pick 16THS. If you only play quarter notes, pick QUARTERS.
Hits that land halfway between two grid notes count as OFF. They don't change your pocket numbers, but lots of them lower your score. Swing tracks swing the grid for you.
WHERE DO YOU SIT?
ON TOP aims about 10ms ahead of the beat, for music that drives. DEAD CENTER aims right on the grid. LAY BACK aims about 12ms behind, for music that leans.
The shaded band on the play screen is your target. A hit inside it counts as IN THE POCKET.
READING THE POCKET LINES
The four neon lines are the four beats of the bar. The line for the beat you're on glows.
Every hit lands on its beat's line. Left of the center line means early, right means late. The numbers along the bottom are milliseconds. Cyan hits are in the pocket, pink hits are outside it, and gray hits are OFF.
SITTING is your average: how far ahead or behind you live. LOCK is how steady that is. The smaller the LOCK number, the tighter you are.
YOUR SCORE
Your score blends three things: how steady you are (LOCK), how close you sit to where you aimed (SITTING), and how many hits landed off the grid. 95+ is DEEP POCKET, 85+ LOCKED IN, 72+ IN THE POCKET, 58+ FINDING IT.
It takes at least 8 clean hits to score a session. Results show every hit on a timeline, where your hits landed, and coach tips. Scored sessions earn XP, level you up, keep your day streak alive and unlock badges.
TRACKS, CLICK & DROP OUT
TRACKS are ten grooves with no drums, so you are the drummer. Turn on GUIDE DRUMS to hear the groove played first. Set any tempo with the slider, the + and − buttons, or TAP TEMPO.
CLICK sets when the metronome plays: OFF, COUNT-IN only, EVERY BEAT, or on 2 & 4.
DROP OUT cuts all the sound for a few bars at a time. Keep playing through the silence. Results compare where you sat with sound and in the gap.
MY SONGS
Tap IMPORT A SONG to add an audio file from Files, iCloud Drive or AirDrop, or share a file to PÖKITT from another app. Songs recorded to a click work best. Apple Music downloads are copy-protected and can't be opened.
PÖKITT finds the tempo and every beat. On the song screen the cyan lines are bar lines and the violet lines are beats. They should sit right on the hits in the waveform. Tap PREVIEW WITH CLICK to hear them.
If the click sounds off: use −1 / +1 and −.05 / +.05 to fix the tempo, ½ TIME or 2× TIME if it's counting at half or double speed, SLIDE THE GRID to move every line by a few milliseconds, SLIDE HALF A BEAT if the click lands between the beats, and WHERE IS BEAT 1? if the bar starts in the wrong place. Pick START AT BAR, then PLAY ALONG.
E-KITS
Set INPUT to E-KIT to score from your electronic kit instead of the mic. Every pad sends its own timing, so there's no room noise and no mic delay.
USB: plug the module into the phone. Use a USB-C cable, or a USB-C to USB-B cable for modules with a square USB port. Kits with only round 5-pin MIDI jacks need a USB MIDI adapter in between. No setup needed. PÖKITT connects to every kit it finds.
Bluetooth: open KIT CHECK and tap CONNECT BLUETOOTH KIT, then pick your kit from the list.
Hearing the track: many modules work as a USB sound card, so the track plays in your kit headphones along with your drums. If yours only sends MIDI, run the phone's audio into the module's AUX IN or a small mixer.
E-KIT NUDGE in SETUP corrects a kit that always reads a few milliseconds late or early.
KIT CHECK, PADS & SOUNDS
Open KIT CHECK from SETUP. Hit every pad. Each one should light up the matching drum on screen, with the note number and how hard you hit.
If a pad lights the wrong drum or nothing at all, turn on TEACH PADS, tap the drum on screen, then hit that pad on your kit. RESET TO DEFAULT clears what you taught.
KIT SOUNDS makes PÖKITT play a drum sound for every hit, for silent practice pads and MIDI controllers. Leave it off if your module makes its own sound. With KIT SOUNDS on, the TAP PAD plays a snare.
With an e-kit, results also score each drum on its own: kick, snare, hi-hat, toms and cymbals. You'll see which limb drags or rushes, like a kick sitting 12ms behind a dead-on snare.
TAP PAD
No kit around? Set INPUT to TAP PAD and tap the pad on the screen in time. Great for working on your inner clock anywhere. TAP NUDGE in SETUP corrects for your screen.
PRACTICE PADS
A practice pad is 20–30 dB quieter than a drum, so turn on PAD MODE (in SETUP, KIT CHECK, or under INPUT → MIC on any setup screen). PÖKITT then listens with the raw mic, turns the bottom mic up, listens 12 dB deeper, and tunes the hit detector for the short 'tock' of a pad: fast doubles count and room rumble doesn't.
Set the phone 6–12 inches from the pad with the bottom edge (where the mic is) pointed at it. A phone flat on the pad's stand works well.
Wear wired or USB-C headphones. This matters more than anything else: on the phone speaker the track is louder than the pad and drowns it out.
Tap SET PAD LEVEL. Stay quiet for 2 seconds, then hit the pad 8 times at your normal volume. PÖKITT measures the room and the pad and sets MIC SENSITIVITY itself: low enough for ghost notes, safely above the room. Run it again in a new room or with a new pad.
Still missing soft strokes? Move the phone closer, find a quieter spot (a fridge or AC is loud next to a pad), or turn MIC SENSITIVITY up. Pads with a trigger or MIDI out can plug in as an E-KIT, where volume never matters.
Turn on KIT SOUNDS to hear a snare for every hit. Switch PAD MODE off when you go back to a real kit.
FREE TRIAL & UNLOCK
PÖKITT is free to try for 3 days with everything unlocked. No payment, nothing renews. After 3 days, a one-time $2.99 unlock keeps you playing forever. Your stats, badges and songs are always yours.
Changed phones or reinstalled? Tap RESTORE PURCHASES in SETUP.
TROUBLESHOOTING
Too many hits or OFF hits: turn MIC SENSITIVITY down in SETUP, wear headphones so the track doesn't bleed into the mic, and check WHAT ARE YOU PLAYING.
Missing ghost notes or quiet hits: turn MIC SENSITIVITY up. The HIT counter in SETUP lights up for every hit the mic hears.
Practice pad too quiet to score: turn on PAD MODE and run SET PAD LEVEL. See PRACTICE PADS.
Every score reads late or early: run the SYNC TEST again with the headphones you're wearing.
Bluetooth headphones: their delay drifts from moment to moment. Wired or USB-C headphones give steady scores.
E-kit not showing up: unplug and replug the cable, make sure the module is on, then open KIT CHECK.