I try to do this, but I find that I’m having a really hard time hearing the different tracks (especially the difference in beats) when I’m listening with one ear in my headphones, and the other to the speaker
You can have them both playing in the cans mate.
You need to start the track on the first down beat of the phrase. Make sure you start your incoming track on its down beat too.
So as the beat drops you press play at the same time.
Then tap or bop up and down to the beat of the main track. do it so you not concentrating on tapping your foot.
Then listen to the new track…is it too fast or too slow.
If its behind …nudge the jog wheel forward to allow it to catch up to the main beat.
If it drifts again…its either too slow or too fast. Then adjust the pitch fader and keep using the jog to keep the beats aligned.
Once it no longer drifts…stop and go back to the start of your incoming track.
Then drop it again on the first down beat…
Now it should not drift as much as before. you might have to make slight adjustments.
When its perfect…restart the track.
It should now stay in time.
now MIX!
there’s so much stuff out there to help you, and a lot of these posts have been really useful - i say just keep practicing and you’ll get it eventually.
beatmatching is often seen as the super skill that makes you a DJ and puts you a cut above the rest. IMHO, it’s the absolute bare minimum skill to have in order to mix dance music, even if you use sync to match the bpms and all that (like i do).
more than anything, it’s fundamental to be able to hear when a beat’s in or out - period.
so dude, just keep trying and you’ll get there
as you already have the turntables, why not buy two identical 12" 's (or a remix version of the same song), start from there.
Once you have the BPM’s the same, it’s a matter of long hours of practice. When you have matched them, adjust the speed of one and try again. Gentle movement always, if you are heavy handed you will never get it.
Only when you can beatmatch vinyl, should you think about “non sync” DJ’ing in digital, it can get a little confusing if you can’t grasp the basics …
You can cheat like my mate does, he’s the worst DJ in the world (sorry), he just doesn’t get beatmatching at all. So i showed him the bars in traktor that show beat position and now he DJ’s visually but he can only handle two songs at a time. … at least it doesn’t sound like a train crash anymore,
one trick that really helped me when i was learning :
Drop the pitch fader as slow as it will go on the track you are trying to mix IN. This way you pretty much know it will be too slow. Cue the song, listen… do they stay in time? if not , speed it up a notch and re-cue it, listen again… are they in time yet? repeat this until they sound in time.
the mixing 2 identical tracks is only really useful in learning to cue the songs imo, so if youve mastered cueing , then try what ive suggested. if you still need practice with throwing them together, then 2 identical tracks works good for this.
+1 for a good explanation.
That’s sort of how I learned, except that I set the incoming track to be too fast. I found this video to be very helpful.
Not everyone can! I can’t play the trumpet. Tried once, and failed BADLY, nor can I do handstands. “Failure Is Always An Option”
here’s a hint that may not make sense whatsoever to you
if it goes b-bump you nudge it up, if it goes br-ump! you slow it down
(weird explanation but sooner or later you will get what i mean)
+1
And great to see you back belch! 
Get a large bag of amphetamine, two crates of records and a set of decks and a mixer. It’ll all make sense somewhere around the 36hr mark.
we need a like button!!!
That, with the best will in the world, is utter bollocks. Playing the trumpet is a lot, lot harder than beatmatching.
THERE IS NO EXCUSE FOR NOT BEING ABLE TO BEATMATCH.
I refuse to beatsync!
Another old trick that people did is just basically pull the pitch down one direction. All the way. That way you can only go one direction. I never really did this but I know many who do this. If I’m totally clueless on a track I’ll rely on this. It can help.
And try mixing in your headphones. Have both play in your headphones, you should be ables to hear a difference pretty easily. Learning to mix in tour headphones is a real asset. I’ve been in so many situations where I’ve had no monitors, if I didn’t know how to mix in my headphones I would have been pretty screwed. Now it’s the only way I like to mix because it’s always works.
+1
Also, don’t use the headphones to start with. Just have the crossfader set in the middle and do it that way. It will sound trainwreck but is easier to learn to beat match. If you get confused about the tracks have the one you are mixing in slightly louder that the other.
Also starting slow then just getting faster is good advice.
I think it took me about a month of practising to get it. I was on direct drive soundlabs that basically had no torque so you had to be super delicate. First time I used technics after the soundlabs it was actually a doddle
And I daresay all the examples are false. Trying and failing once on the trumpet doesn’t mean you can’t learn to play the trumpet. It only means you didn’t really try. There isn’t a musical instrument existing that you can learn to play on the first try. Practice practice practice. And don’t listen to the fools who post that they learned beatmatching in 45 minutes. Take your time, be patient, and listen to your tracks when you practice. Eventually you will be able to distinguish which beat is from which record, and which is going faster than the other. But it’s not going to happen overnight.
Learning to beat match techno/minimal/house et rest is easy. Learning to beat match and transition classic funk and similar ‘human centric’ recordings takes a lot of practice.
As already said its just practice. Why waste time though? One press to sync and you’re done. After years of nudging a fader i find sync to match very liberating. Hate playing locked into sync but as a time saver for tempo match it’s ace!
Sig’d 
a little bit of music theory can help give you context here, especially via text.
ok, so most dance music is in 4/4 time. that means a bar is 4 beats (aka quarter notes) (the bottom number), and the top number (the first 4) represents how many quarter notes are used per bar.
now, that said, first thing to do is load up 2 of the same track. then play one and just start counting off. when youre comfortable with that, with the pitch sliders in the same place, start track 2 between beats 1 and 2 on purpose with sync disengaged.
now what we have here is 2 of the same track and the same bpm, with the 2nd track out of time with the first.
we have 2 options here.
- using the outside edge of wheel 2 or the outside edge of wheel 1 to either nudge track 1 forward 1/8th note (half a quarter note), or use the outside edge of the wheel on track 2 to nudge track 2 back 1/8th note.
or
- you can do the same with just the pitch fader. this is known as “riding the fader”. to do this, you use a quick motion moving the ptch fader from the middle position (+0) up and then back down to the +0 position. or down.
try that, and try to think about that little music theory lesson. it will really help you keep context of what the music is doing in a logical way.