We tested two £15 Amazon ocarinas against a Night by Noble
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The £38 Night by Noble was the only one of the three that played every note well. We put two of the cheapest 12-hole ocarinas on Amazon UK, an Ohuhu and an AKLOT at about £15 each, through our tuning test next to it, on the same evening. The Ohuhu never sounded its high D, E or F: each came out about a semitone lower, however hard it was blown. The AKLOT reached every note, but read 45 to 64 cents flat from high C up.
Which ocarinas did we test?
Three 12-hole alto C ocarinas, one copy of each. The prices are as Amazon UK showed them on 4 November 2026:
- Ohuhu 12 Hole Alto C, blue ceramic, £14.44 on a deal (list price £16.99), 4.4 stars from 8,511 ratings.
- AKLOT 12 Holes Alto C, smoke-fired ceramic, £15.99, 4.3 stars from 1,682 ratings.
- Night by Noble Plastic AC, black, £38.20 on Amazon UK, 4.5 stars from 3,391 ratings. Amazon US sells it as the Night By Noble Plastic Ocarina AC.
How did we test the three ocarinas?
One player played all three, one after the other, through "Test my whole ocarina" on our tuner, set to A = 440 Hz. The test asks for each note in turn and listens to the softest breath that still sounds clean, so the numbers are what a gentle player gets, not the best each ocarina can do. We didn't log the room temperature. A cold ocarina reads flat, by about one cent per degree Celsius in Pure Ocarinas' figure, so a cool room would pull all three down together, which doesn't change how they compare.
| Note | Night by Noble | AKLOT | Ohuhu |
|---|---|---|---|
| Low A | -9 | +58 | +9 |
| Low B | +52 | -55 | -24 |
| Low C | -3 | +39 | -15 |
| D | -1 | -16 | +6 |
| E | +19 | -26 | +32 |
| F | +25 | -15 | +6 |
| G | +7 | -22 | -14 |
| A | +13 | -13 | -36 |
| B | +5 | -32 | -54 |
| High C | -25 | -45 | -61 |
| High D | -35 | -54 | No note |
| High E | -44 | -64 | No note |
| High F | -26 | -53 | No note |
Each figure is cents from concert pitch, rounded to the nearest cent. 100 cents is one step between notes, so 50 cents is halfway to the next one.
How in tune is the Night by Noble?
Close through the middle of its range. From low C to B, all seven notes read within 25 cents of concert pitch, and four of them within 10. Its weak spots were low B, 52 cents sharp, and the top four notes, 25 to 44 cents flat at the test's soft breath. Low A and low B are the two notes that use the small sub-holes, where a finger that doesn't quite seal the hole makes the note sharp, so we will play that one again before blaming the ocarina.
The flat top notes are mostly breath. With every hole open, a normal breath on the Night gave high E and a firm one gave high F. That is how ocarinas work: Pure Ocarinas measured one that needed more than twice the breath pressure for high F as for low C. Our guide to airy or flat high notes explains how to find that breath with a tuner.
Why couldn't the Ohuhu ocarina play its top notes?
Our copy wouldn't climb past high C. On the high D fingering it read between C and C#; on the high E and high F fingerings it read D#, and blowing harder didn't move it up to the note. So the test skipped all three. Below them the notes drift: E read 32 cents sharp, and from A to high C they fall further and further flat, ending 61 cents flat on high C.
It also hissed. Every note had a faint "shhh" under it, like the static of an untuned TV. One copy isn't a verdict on every Ohuhu, since cheap ceramics vary from piece to piece. But it was the second one we had owned: the first, bought about six months earlier, was also poor above high C.
Is the AKLOT ocarina in tune?
With itself, mostly; with anything else, no. Our test grades each note against the line the other notes follow, and it called seven of the AKLOT's 13 notes fine, because most of them are flat by a similar amount. Against concert pitch it reads 13 to 32 cents flat from D to B and 45 to 64 cents flat from high C up, a quarter of a note or more. You could play a tune alone on it and it would sound like a tune. Next to a piano, a backing track or another ocarina it would sound off.
The bottom of the range is uneven: low A read 58 cents sharp and low B 55 cents flat, so the step between them is less than half its proper size. The top is hard work. Its high F needed a very hard breath and then began to whistle, and at the breath that gave high F on the Night, the AKLOT played high E.
Can these ocarinas play the Ocarina of Time songs?
The Night and the AKLOT can; our Ohuhu couldn't play half of them. Of the 12 songs Link plays, six reach high D, and our Ohuhu had no high D. Our post on choosing an ocarina for the remake lists which songs need it. Whether the game accepts the AKLOT's flat notes, we can't say yet: the remake is out on 5 November 2026, and we will play these three into it and add what we find here.
Is a cheap Amazon ocarina worth it?
Not to learn on, from these two. For about £23 more, the Night played every note and sounded smoother. The AKLOT is playable alone if you don't mind it being flat, and needs a strong breath at the top. Our Ohuhu couldn't play its top three notes at all. If the Zelda look is the point, our guide to Zelda replicas compares the ones from specialist makers, and our guide to choosing an ocarina covers the rest.
If you already have a cheap one, put it through the same test before you decide. It takes a couple of minutes, and if it arrived recently, our return-window check tells you whether to send it back while you still can.