Cell cell communication, which enables cells to coordinate their activity and is essential for growth, development and function, is usually ascribed a chemical or electrical origin. However, cells can exert forces and respond to environment elasticity and to mechanical deformations created by their neighbours113. The extent to which this mechanosensing ability facilitates intercellular communication remains unclear. Here we demonstrate mechanical communication between cells directly for the rst time, providing evidence for a long-range interaction that induces long-lasting alterations in interacting cells. We show that an isolated cardiac cell can be trained to beat at a given frequency by mechanically stimulating the underlying substrate. Deformations are induced using an oscillatory mechanical probe that mimics the deformations generated by a beating neighbouring cardiac cell. Unlike electrical eld stimulation, the probe-induced beating rate is maintained by the cell for an hour after the stimulation stops, implying that long-term modications occur within the cell. These long-term alterations provide a mechanism for cells that communicate mechanically to be less variable in their electromechanical delay. Mechanical coupling between cells therefore ensures that the final outcome of action potential pacing is synchronized beating. We further show that the contractile machinery is essential for mechanical communication.