The middle tone Sheng (pinyin: zhōng yīn shēng) is a kind of Sheng, and the most commonly used traditional Sheng is 17 springs. After the liberation, new varieties such as amplifying sheng, plus key sheng, turntable sheng, low-pitched sheng and row sheng were successfully trial-produced, with a variety of reeds.

There are many kinds of alto sheng, some are the traditional sheng, and some are the elongated version of the 36-reed sheng. But at present, the alto sheng improved by the principle of reed is the most commonly used. That is to say, no bamboo saplings are used, but all copper resonance tubes, so they look golden.

There are three forms commonly used. In Suzhou, there is an alto Baosheng, an alto Taiwan sheng, and a Beijing-style alto taisheng. Among them, the Beijing-style has a lower range and uses lever-type buttons. The first two are button-type.