Anybody can modify the collection of melodies and enter MIDI files, bitmaps with sheet music (possibly generated by the Musipedia server after entering LilyPond or abc source code), lyrics or some text about the piece, or the melodic contours as Parsons Code.

For the first two, users can draw notes, play them on a keyboard, or type out an ASCII version of a melody.

The similarity is measured by determining the editing steps (inserting, deleting, or replacing a character) that are needed for converting the query contour into that of the search result.

Since only the melodic contour is relevant, one can find melodies even if the key, rhythm, or the exact intervals are unknown.

The latter can identify short snippets of audio (a few seconds taken from a recording), even if it is transmitted over a phone connection.

Before the Wikipedia-like collaboration features were added (editing and deleting existing entries has been possible only since 2004), he called the music search engine "Melodyhound".