If you need to do anything elegant or delicate, it's probably not going to be the best software to help you, but if you need to do a quick polish of a podcast, for example, or take some blank spaces out of a recording, it will do just fine. It's great, but it's not polished and most of the edits you can perform are destructive. In all, Audacity is never going to replace professional audio studio software. Once you get to grips with the program it will make the editing process much faster. If you’re old-school, Audacity offers 2 features you’ll likefirstly, the program lets you convert tape and record.um.recordings into digital tracks (if you have the correct equipment), and offers really good keyboard support for commands. In the long run, it will save you lots of time. It takes a little wading around but talks you right through many of the most common (and less common) tasks you might want to do with the program. While you’re over there, check out the tutorials section. To deal with more modern files, like MA4, you’ll have to convert them online or download additional libraries from the Audacity site. It will take a fairly sharp learning curve to decipher what, exactly, all the buttons do, but the Audacity developers have predicted this and offer a lot of help and educational resources online.Īudacity natively deals with WAV, AIFF, FLAC, MP2, MP3 and Ogg Vorbis files which is an ok selection, but not superb. We’ve already touched on how it’s not the most attractive program, but does offer a very familiar interface, so anyone who has used a computer program in the last 10 years will probably be able to find their way around pretty quickly. It cuts, copies, splices and mixes audio adds effects to tracks, (like silences, fades, and reverbs) and supports a variety of plug-ins, including LADSPA, LV2, Nyquist, VST and Audio Unit. It can edit audio, record live and computer playback.

What Audacity lacks in looks, it makes up for in pure functionality. This open-source software looks dated, old-fashioned, and frankly unattractive, but can edit an audio file professionally and quickly despite the fact that it’s entirely free. A classic audio editor that deserves its good reputationįor quick and dirty (and free) audio editing, you couldn’t ask for moreĪudacity has held a spot at the top of the audio editing charts since 1999 (!) and with good reason.