Abdim7 guitar chord
The third voice from the top lowered an octave. The dropped voice becomes the bass, which is why a string is skipped.
- Tap a note to hear it
- Arrows change position
- Fingers, notes or intervals
- Play the chord
About Abdim7 — drop 3 voicings
Abdim7 is Ab, Cb, D and F — Abdim with a diminished seventh stacked on top.
It sounds suspenseful and rootless. Three stacked minor thirds divide the octave evenly, so the same four notes spell four dim7 chords and the shape repeats every three frets.
Leading-tone or passing chord — it can resolve almost anywhere.
Abdim7 notes and formula
| Ab | Cb | D | F |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | ♭3 | ♭5 | ♭♭7 |
Also written Ab°7, Abo7 or Ab diminished 7. The same chord either way; which spelling you meet depends on who wrote the chart.
How to play Abdim7
The same operation one voice further down: the third voice from the top falls an octave and becomes the bass.
That leaves a bigger hole under the top three notes, so a string gets skipped: the muted string in the middle is the shape, not a mistake.
Abdim7 has 10 of them, on strings 5-3-2-1 and strings 6-4-3-2, from open position up to the 13th — every inversion the chord has: Ab in the bass, Cb in the bass, Ebb in the bass and Gbb in the bass. The one to learn first is the Cb shape at the nut.
5 of them sit on strings 5-3-2-1, so you can run the inversions up one set without changing strings — which is the whole reason to learn them as a family rather than as separate grips.
Play Abdim7 as a shell — root, third and seventh — and the spare string takes the 9 (Bb), the 11 (Db), the b13 (Fb) or the maj7 (G).
All 7 common shapes as fret numbers, lowest string first. Hover or tap one to see it drawn.
- xx0101, open position, Ebb, 2nd inversion, top note F, 2 open strings
- 4x3434, 3rd fret, Ab, root position, top note Ab, barred
- 456464, 4th fret, Ab, root position, top note Ab, barred
- xx6767, 6th fret, Ab, root position, top note Cb, all fretted
- x-x-9-10-9-10, 9th fret, Cb, 1st inversion, top note D, all fretted
- x-11-12-10-12-10, 10th fret, Ab, root position, top note D, all fretted
- x-x-12-13-12-13, 12th fret, Ebb, 2nd inversion, top note F, all fretted
How to use Abdim7
A diminished seventh divides the octave evenly, so Abdim7 has no single root and no single destination: it can lead to Db or to A, and it is the same four notes either way.
What to play over Abdim7
Every note of Abdim7 is in Ab diminished and Ab half-whole diminished.
Chords near Abdim7
Change one note of Abdim7 and you have Abdim (drop the diminished seventh), Abm6 (the flat fifth becomes the fifth), Abm7b5 (the diminished seventh becomes the flat seventh) or AbmMaj7b5 (the diminished seventh becomes the major seventh).
Abdim7 is a diminished chord — root, minor third, flat fifth. Diminished and half-diminished chords on every root.
The common shapes and the derived voicings come from different places, and both are explained in how this site is built.