How to Play the Open Position E Chord and CAGED E Shape
We’re building all CAGED chord shapes in this video series. So far, we’ve looked at the C chord, the A chord, and the G chord—now it’s time for the E chord.
The E chord is one of the most commonly used shapes on the guitar. Because it’s so easy to fret, with obvious finger placement, you can quickly move on to a more important task: learning the intervals.
The intervals in an E major chord are as follows: root, 5th, root, 3rd, 5th, and root.
The next step is turning this into a barre chord—or, as I prefer to call it, an E shape. You can see what that looks like in the Chordacus image above.
E chord extensions
The E chord is a bit large, so when we begin extending it, we often drop strings. Below are all the possible extensions you can create from an E-shaped chord.
Try experimenting with these by identifying the intervals in order, from the lowest string to the highest.
- E major chord (root, 5th, root, 3rd, 5th, root)
- Eadd9 (root, 5, 9, 3)
- Esus4 (root, 5, root, 4, 5, root)
- E7sus4 (root, 5, b7, 4, 5, root)
- E6 (root, root, 3, 6)
- E13 (root, b7, 3, 6)
- E7#5 (root, b7, 3, #5)
- Emaj7 (root, 3, 5, 7)
- Emaj7 (root, 7, 3, 5)
- E7 (root, 5, b7, 3, b7, root)
- Emaj9 (root, 3, 5, 7, 9)
- E9 (b7, 9, 5, root)
As interesting as these shapes are, you need songs to make them musically meaningful.
Roxanne is a perfect example for working with sus4 and 7sus4 chords in an E shape.
In Whistle for the Choir, we use an open-position E chord in the original key. When playing it in A for a female vocalist, we instead use the E-shaped A chord.
My favourite E-shaped 13 chord appears in Red Baron by Billy Cobham, where it moves from G13 to C9.
For 6 chords in an E shape, you’ll find plenty of examples in the intermediate electric course—Son of a Preacher Man stands out as a great one.
Building Scales and Arpeggios Around the E Chord/Shape
We can use the E-shaped chord as a framework to build the maj7 arpeggio, dom7 arpeggio, major pentatonic, Ionian (the major scale), Lydian, and Mixolydian modes.
Below are all the intervals used to construct these arpeggios and scales around the E-shaped chord.
If you can visualise all the intervals surrounding the chord shape, you’ll be able to play every one of these arpeggios and scales.
When comparing the E shape with the other CAGED chords, you’ll notice that the diagram of intervals is exactly the same. That’s because the intervals used to build arpeggios and modes don’t change—what changes is how they’re laid out around each chord shape in the CAGED system.
The E Chord | Related Pages
Guitar chords
You can learn how to build all major and minor guitar chords using the so-called CAGED system.
This forms the foundation not only for building more complex chord voicings, but also for extending chords and constructing arpeggios and modes around each shape.
The Em chord
The Em chord is the easiest minor chord to understand and fret, making it a natural starting point for exploring minor shapes.
With all six strings available and no awkward finger placements, it provides a perfect introduction to the sound and feel of minor chords.
Once it’s turned into a barre chord, it becomes clear how useful this shape really is. You’ll start to see that the key to navigating the fretboard lies in thinking of it as an Em shape—not as position 1.
This mindset shift helps you connect chords and scales more fluently across the neck, using the Em shape as a reliable reference point.
Beginner Acoustic
This collection of beginner acoustic tunes teaches you how to arrange for one guitar and create a supporting part.
Playing songs will help you transition between open-position chords and give you the context you need to understand how music works theoretically.
