Is ‘tone deafness’ a real condition or is it something that one can overcome through practice?

Eventually you will be able to hear the strings sound in your head. When you play it longer you will be able to hear when the guitar is out of tune. Try one time to tune the guitar to the best of your ability with out the tuner. And then see how close you are. If you are close then keep trying this and you will get better and eventually you might be able to tune it without the tuner. In time this skill will come just try not to rely on the tuner too much and you will hear the strings eventually! GOOD LUCK!

just as anyone who starts out, by continuing to practice and expose oneself to tones, inherently you will come to recognize
true pitch and inflection.some people are born with this skill, but its not something you cant learn. as long as your reference
to tones and notes is correct, you will eventually pick it up. if you learn from someone who doesn’t know their stuff, you will
pick up their bad habits.

This is a real condition and may be worked through. My choir director in middle school was tone deaf as a child and he took voice/piano lessons in college and became an amazing singer and teacher.

Relying on a tuner does not mean you are tone deaf. After a while you may be able to remember the sounds. If you were tone deaf you wouldn’t be able to tune with a tuner! I have had true tone deaf friends - I know!

Yes it is a real condition ( but not permenant) and you can overcome it though practice. Be Patient

i think the term is used incorrectly a lot. a very small amount of the entire world population actually have the condition in any kind of serious form. enough practice does generally allow greater sound sensitivity. you probably can tune the guitar without the tuner. perhaps try doing that more often?

A good way to develop your ear would be to untune your guitar, retune by ear and then check it with your electronic tuner. Leave one string in tune, then tune the guitar to itself. While a small percentage of people are truly tone deaf, the vast majority are just not trained. When I first started guitar I could tell when it was out of tune, but I couldn’t fix it. There was no such thing as an electronic tuner at the time.