Hi-hat patterns: eight genres' worth, on a machine that plays them
The kick and snare tell you the genre; the hi-hats tell you the decade. This page is eight hat vocabularies side by side - trap's 32nd rolls, drill's triplet stutters, boom bap's swung 8ths, house's offbeat open hat, garage's skipping pairs and three more - each inside a full two-bar beat so it plays as music, on the kit it belongs to. The grids are readable, the machine above plays any of them, and every one is a MIDI file and a page of the PDF.
We counted every hi-hat family hit - closed, open, tips and shakers - in the eight patterns on this page: 233 of them. The hat lane runs from 11 hits a bar (Techno) to 24 (House), and the busy ones are the quiet ones: Lo-fi plays 72% of its hats under 0.45 velocity, while Trap plays 41% of its hats at 0.7 or louder. Only 2 of the eight go finer than 16ths - Trap and Drill - and both do it for less than a beat at a time. Every pattern has an open hat, 1.8 a bar on average, and in 6 of the eight it sits on an "and". Swing is 0 in 4 of them (Trap, Drill, House, Techno) and runs from 8 to 34 in the rest. As on the hip hop sheet, these are our own programmings of each style, and the raw hits are in the MIDI files and the page's data file.
- Trap: 8ths that burst into 32nds 140
- Drill: triplet stutters and gaps 140
- Boom bap: swung 8ths 90
- Lo-fi: hats that barely tick 78
- House: the offbeat open hat 124
- UK garage: skipping pairs 133
- Techno: offbeat 8ths over 16ths 134
- Drum and bass: 8ths under a breakbeat 174
How to read the grids
Each grid is two bars of 16ths, left to right, four lanes: kick, snare (including claps, rims and ghost notes), hats (closed, open, tips, shakers) and percussion, where the 808 also sits. A full cell is a loud hit, a lighter cell is medium, and a hollow cell is a quiet one - in the snare lane that is a ghost note, a snare played so quietly it is felt more than heard. A ringed cell is an open hat. 32nd-note and triplet rolls show in the 16th cell they start in. Press Load into the machine and the same pattern arrives in the drum machine at the top of the page, on the kit it was written for, already playing; open EDIT there to move any hit, and SHARE to send your version to someone.
1. Trap: 8ths that burst into 32nds
Straight 8ths as the pulse, 16th and 32nd rolls as the melody, a triplet turnaround
The default pulse is plain 8ths, loud on beat 1 (1.0) and on the clap at beat 3 (0.9), 0.6 between. Everything people mean by "trap hats" is what interrupts that: 16ths filling beat 2 of bar 2, a pair of 32nds flicking off the "a" of 4 in bar 1, and the last beat of bar 2 breaking into six 16th-note triplets that crescendo into the loop point. Two open hats, on the "and" of 2 and of 3, ring for a moment and get choked. Swing is 0 - the movement is in the change of subdivision, not in pushing offbeats late.
Try
- Delete every roll and keep the 8ths: still trap, but 2012 trap.
- Hold HAT ROLL with REPEAT on 32 for one beat and let go - that is how the rolls are played on a pad, not drawn.
- Add swing and hear the 32nds smear. Trap hats are dead straight for a reason.
2. Drill: triplet stutters and gaps
Plain 8ths, one beat of triplets, then nothing - the hats hesitate instead of rolling
Accented 8ths (0.62 on the beat, 0.42 off it) for most of the bar, then beat 3 of bar 1 breaks into six 16th-note triplets climbing from 0.38 to 0.6 and stops. Bar 2 saves its stutter for beat 4 and uses the slower 8th-note triplet - three hits - so the bar ends with a lurch. A single 32nd flicks off the "a" of 4 into each downbeat. That is the difference from trap: trap rolls and keeps rolling, drill stutters and leaves a hole. Open hats on the "e" of 4, one per bar, choked at once.
Try
- Turn the triplet burst into straight 16ths and it becomes a trap roll - the triplet is the accent.
- Move the burst from beat 3 to beat 1 and the bar loses its skip; drill hats stutter late in the bar, into the snare.
- Take out the 32nd flicks and the hats no longer push into the 1. Two hits, and the forward lean is gone.
3. Boom bap: swung 8ths
8ths louder on the beat, a whisper of open hat on every "a", and 24 swing doing the rest
The closed hat plays every 8th at 0.85 on the beat and 0.6 off it, with nothing more for two bars. Under it the open hat whispers at 0.3 on every "a", the 16th just before each beat - too quiet to ring, just a breath of sizzle - and one hat tip marks the "and" of 4 in bar 1. What makes this a boom bap hat part is not the hits but the timing: 24 swing pushes every odd 16th late, so the whispers drag behind the 8ths the way a sampled drummer's do. Turn swing to 0 and the same hits sound like a drum machine demo.
Try
- Set swing to 0, then 16, then 34, and listen only to the open-hat whispers. That is the whole MPC swing lesson in three steps.
- Mute the closed hat and leave the whispers: the groove survives on ghosts alone, which is why old records could bury the hats in noise.
- Move the hat tip from the "and" of 4 to the "and" of 2 and it turns the bar around a beat early - a Pete Rock habit.
4. Lo-fi: hats that barely tick
Soft 8ths, a tip on the "e"s, a shaker on the "and"s, everything under half volume
Three quiet layers instead of one loud one. Closed hats on the 8ths at 0.55 and 0.4, a hat tip at 0.26 on every "e", and a shaker at 0.28 on every "and", so the 16th grid is full but nothing in it is louder than the kick's tail. An open hat at 0.42 on the "and" of 4 marks the turnaround. At 78 BPM with 34 swing the three layers stagger against each other and the top end shimmers rather than ticks. Lo-fi hats are a mix decision as much as a pattern: push any of these to 0.9 and the style is gone.
Try
- Raise every hat to 0.9 velocity - it stops being lo-fi instantly, with no note moved.
- Mute the shaker and the hat tip and leave the 8ths alone: it turns back into plain slow boom bap.
- Nudge the hat tips a few milliseconds late in EDIT (drag right) for the tape-wobble feel Dilla-era records get from a slightly lagging MPC.
5. House: the offbeat open hat
Open hat on every "and", choked by the closed hat on the beat - the pumping motion of every house record
The open hat sits on every offbeat 8th - the "and" of 1, 2, 3 and 4 - at 0.7 to 0.85, and is cut off by the closed hat that ghosts the "e" of the next beat at 0.3. Open, shut, open, shut: the up-down that the kick on every beat pushes against. Underneath, a shaker runs every 16th at 0.26 to 0.5, louder on the "and"s, so the grid never goes empty. A long open hat on the "and" of 4 in bar 2 rings over the turnaround. Swing is exactly 0; the lift comes from the offbeat, not from timing.
Try
- Move the open hats from the "and"s onto the beats, with the kick. It becomes a march; the offbeat is the pump.
- Shorten the open hat's decay in the pad editor until it barely rings: that is the difference between 1988 Chicago and 2010 tech house.
- Add 12 swing and it starts to lean towards UK garage. Add 34 and it is one.
6. UK garage: skipping pairs
Closed hats in pairs with holes between them, 34 swing turning the pairs into a skip
The closed hats do not fill the grid - they arrive in pairs on the "and" and the "a" of a beat, 0.7 and 0.45, and then skip the next downbeat entirely. Quieter hat tips at 0.5 sit on the "a" of 3 and the "a" of 4 between the pairs, a shaker at 0.3 keeps the off-16ths breathing through the holes, and an open hat at 0.8 to 0.9 lifts the "and" of 2 and the "and" of 4. With 34 swing every one of those off-16ths lands late, so the pairs skip rather than march. It is the house hat part with the beat taken out and the swing turned up.
Try
- Fill in the missing downbeat hats and it turns into swung house - the holes are the genre.
- Drop swing to 0 with the same hits: a stiff, wrong-sounding grid. Bring it up until the pairs start to skip; it happens around 25.
- Swap the open hat on the "and" of 4 for a ride tick and it slides towards 2-step's dubbier end.
7. Techno: offbeat 8ths over 16ths
A loud closed hat on every "and", a quiet tight hat on every "a", an open hat lifting the turnaround
Two closed hats doing two jobs. The mid hat plays every offbeat 8th at 0.7 to 0.8 and nothing else - the same offbeat as house, closed instead of open, so it ticks rather than pumps. The tight hat sits on the "a" of every beat at 0.26 to 0.3, the 16th just before the downbeat, a hiss that reads as texture rather than notes. One open hat on the "and" of 4 at 0.8 to 0.9 lifts each bar over. A shaker joins in bar 2. Nothing swings, nothing varies in velocity across the bar; techno hats are a machine part, and the variation is meant to come from a filter on the master, not from the pattern.
Try
- Mute the tight 16th hat: it goes from techno to house without the kick changing at all.
- Move the offbeat hat onto the beat with the kick for one bar - that squarer, more industrial feel is the harder end of the genre.
- Automate the master filter instead of editing the hats; that is how the records do it.
8. Drum and bass: 8ths under a breakbeat
Offbeat hats at 174 that the snare pattern is really carrying, with tips on the odd 16ths
At 174 BPM the hats cannot be the busy part, because the ghost snares already are - ten of them in two bars, under five real snares. The closed hat marks the "and" of 1, 2 and 3 at 0.55 to 0.7, a hat tip whispers at 0.25 to 0.3 on every "e", a shaker sits on the "a"s, and an open hat on the "and" of 4 answers the loop point. 8 swing - just enough to stop the tips sounding quantised. Listen to the break underneath, and notice the hats are drawing the beat the break skips.
Try
- Mute the snares and the hat part sounds thin - it was written to sit inside the break, not to carry a bar.
- Double the closed hats to straight 8ths and it stiffens into a 90s techstep feel.
- Halve the tempo to 87 and the same hats read as a boom bap part. Drum and bass is hip hop played twice as fast, and the hats prove it.
All eight hat lanes side by side
The same eight patterns as numbers, counting only the hat lane - closed and open hats, hat tips and shakers. "Finest grid" is the smallest subdivision the lane uses anywhere; "loud" and "quiet" are the shares of hat hits at or above 0.7 and below 0.45 velocity.
| Pattern | BPM | Swing | Hat hits / bar | Finest grid | Open hats / bar | Loud (0.7+) | Quiet (under 0.45) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Trap: 8ths that burst into 32nds | 140 | 0 | 16.0 | 16ths + 32nds + triplets | 1.0 | 41% | 12% |
| Drill: triplet stutters and gaps | 140 | 0 | 12.5 | 16ths + 32nds + triplets | 1.0 | 0% | 24% |
| Boom bap: swung 8ths | 90 | 24 | 12.0 | 16ths | 4.0 | 33% | 33% |
| Lo-fi: hats that barely tick | 78 | 34 | 16.0 | 16ths | 1.0 | 0% | 72% |
| House: the offbeat open hat | 124 | 0 | 24.0 | 16ths | 4.0 | 17% | 67% |
| UK garage: skipping pairs | 133 | 34 | 14.0 | 16ths | 1.5 | 29% | 50% |
| Techno: offbeat 8ths over 16ths | 134 | 0 | 11.0 | 16ths | 1.0 | 36% | 64% |
| Drum and bass: 8ths under a breakbeat | 174 | 8 | 11.0 | 16ths | 1.0 | 9% | 64% |
Read across and "busy" turns out to mean two different things. House has the most hat hits a bar (24) and plays 67% of them under 0.45 - the hats are texture, a pulse under a kick that is already on every beat. Trap has 16 a bar and plays 41% of them at 0.7 or louder - the hats are the event. Lo-fi and drill play 0% and 0% of their hats loud and get their movement by opposite routes: lo-fi with 16 soft hits a bar and 34 swing, drill with 12 and triplets. The finest-grid column isolates trap and drill from the other six, and what separates those two is whether the burst is 32nds (trap, rolling) or triplets (drill, stuttering). Then swing: 0 for house, techno, trap and drill, 8 for drum and bass, 24 for boom bap, 34 for garage and 34 for lo-fi. Nobody in the dance family goes past 16ths; nobody in the hip hop family plays a hat on every 16th.
How to write a hi-hat pattern from nothing
- Straight 8ths first, louder on the beat (0.8) than off it (0.5). This is the hat part of half the records ever made, and it is finished.
- Decide what the hats are for. If the kick and snare are sparse (hip hop), the hats can be busy and loud. If the kick is on every beat (house, techno), the hats must be quiet and regular or the bar has no space.
- Put one open hat on the "and" of 4, choked by the next closed hat. Every genre on this page does some version of this; it is how a bar says it is about to end.
- Add movement with velocity before adding notes: a hat tip at 0.3 on the "a"s does more than doubling the 8ths to 16ths.
- If you want rolls, change subdivision for one beat only and go back. 32nds for trap, triplets for drill, 16ths for a funk feel. A roll that never stops is a texture, not a roll.
- Swing last, and only if the genre allows it: 0 for house, techno, trap and drill; 16-24 for boom bap; 30-40 for garage and lo-fi. Swing delays only the odd 16ths here, so the 8ths never move.
Frequently asked
What is the most common hi-hat pattern?
Straight 8th notes, accented on the beat. It is the default in boom bap, trap, funk and most rock, and it is where every pattern on this page starts before its genre adds something - rolls, an offbeat open hat, swing, or gaps.
How do you make trap hi-hat rolls?
Keep the 8ths and replace one beat with 32nds, then return to the 8ths. On this machine, hold the roll pad with REPEAT set to 32 for one beat and release. Let the velocities climb through the roll (0.45 up to 0.75) so it sounds like a push into the next beat rather than a machine gun. The trap pattern above does it twice in two bars; the trap hi-hat page takes it apart hit by hit.
What is the difference between trap and drill hi-hats?
Trap rolls in 32nds and keeps rolling; drill stutters in triplets for one beat and leaves a hole. Load the two patterns in turn and listen to what happens on beat 3 - trap fills it, drill hesitates. The drill hi-hat page has the triplets counted out.
Should hi-hats be on every 8th or every 16th?
8ths when the hats are the event (hip hop), 16ths when they are the pulse (house, techno, a sampled break) - and in the 16th case the odd 16ths must be quiet, 0.25 to 0.35, or the bar turns into a hiss. Lo-fi gets both by layering a soft 8th-note hat with a softer 16th-note tip.
Where does the open hat go?
On an offbeat, almost always. House puts it on every "and"; nearly everything else puts one on the "and" of 4 as a turnaround; drill puts it on the "e" of 4. The one place it never goes is on the beat with the kick, because the kick already has the downbeat and the open hat's job is to lift the gap after it.
How loud should hi-hats be?
Quieter than you think. In the eight patterns here the hats peak at 1.0 only in trap; house, techno and drum and bass never exceed 0.9 and spend most of the bar under 0.5. A hat line at one volume is the clearest sign of a beat that was programmed rather than played - vary the velocity before you vary anything else.
Can I download these as MIDI or a PDF?
Both. Each pattern has a MIDI ↓ link - General MIDI drums on channel 10, the whole beat rather than the hats alone, with swing written into the timing - and the PDF is all eight grids on three printable pages.
More rhythms
- Boom bap drum patterns: eight dialects, with MIDI and PDF80-94 BPM · cheat sheet
- Hip hop drum patterns: all eight, with MIDI and PDF78-140 BPM · cheat sheet
- The Jungle Break: Syncopated Snares at 172172 BPM
- Boom Bap at 90 BPM: the dusty backbeat90 BPM
- Dilla-style drunk swing87 BPM
- Drill Hi-Hats: Triplet Stutters, 32nd Flicks and Gaps140 BPM
- Four on the Floor124 BPM
- The Full House Groove: Four on the Floor, Offbeat Hats and a Rolling Shaker124 BPM
- The Dembow Riddim96 BPM
- Trap Hi-Hats: 8ths, 32nd Bursts and a Triplet Turnaround140 BPM
- UK Garage 2-Step Drum Pattern: the Kick That Skips Beat 3133 BPM
Try another kit
- Boom Bap drum machine88-94 BPM
- Trap drum machine130-150 BPM (half-time feel)
- Lo-Fi Hip Hop drum machine70-85 BPM
- House drum machine120-126 BPM
- Techno drum machine130-140 BPM
- Drum and Bass drum machine172-176 BPM
- Afro House drum machine120-124 BPM
- UK Garage drum machine130-135 BPM
- Funk drum machine100-110 BPM
- 808 drum machine100-130 BPM
BAP Studio is inspired by classic 16-pad sampler and drum-machine workflows. It is an independent project and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or connected to Akai Professional, Roland, or any other manufacturer.
Made by Max Berggren.