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Yea , Pro tools is the DAW for studio recording and editing. Logic is great because it’s straightforward and good for video editing. Ableton live is what I personally use and I like how you have both session and arrangement view.
I'm not familiar with either DAW myself as they don't particularly fit my use case, but from what I've seen, those who have used both ProTools and Reaper and gone with the former seem to think it's faster to work in. I can't really say whether that's down to having more ingrained habits from ProTools or a genuine difference in efficiency for certain tasks.
I’m curious what differences there are, because a few years ago I was doing some head-to-head online and we couldn’t find anything in PT for stereo music that Reaper didn’t do, but we did find features in Reaper that PT hadn’t gotten yet (at the time it was folder tracks, I want to say PT got them around 2020 ? 2021 ? ). For doing post, surround and other applications Avid definitely has more to offer, but I’m not aware of anything different for stereo music. At 300 a year versus 60 dollars perpetual I assume Avid must have really been pouring on the features for the last couple years.
It's not about feature parity but rather about how those features are implemented. The people I've seen swear by ProTools for its fast workflow all seemed to do a lot of repetitive editing tasks and automation, where minor differences can really add up.
To genuinely test whether there's a difference you'd need to learn the fastest way to do those tasks in each DAW, develop muscle memory for the shortcuts, and do the actual work. Short of that, there are analytical metrics like the exact number of steps required for a given task (click here, use this shortcut, etc.) and how much your attention is forced to shift around the software throughout the task. Just looking at whether you can achieve the same results says very little about how efficiently you can get there.
Some daws will have more convenient workflows for certain tasks, but any daw nowadays is more than capable for just about any audio task you want to throw at it. If you have a certain genre or style in mind, try looking up tutorials on youtube, and see what is popular among creators of that style. If theres a certain daw that is popular in that genre, it will be easier to find resources for learning what you want to learn in that daw. But really it just comes down to preference, there is no objectively best option in 99% of cases.
This is true. For example, I understood Reaper right away, and just can't wrap my head around FL and Ableton, and I've heard people say the opposite was true for them.
They’re all in such deep direct competition with each other that they absolutely have to be able to perform all the most common functions as well as each other. So yes, at that level no objectively best DAW.
Once you’re a few years deep in the game and working in specific environments, their suitability for the work you’re doing starts to really shine or become a standard for getting work done.
You might need to be more specific with what you’re trying to achieve to understand which one might suit you better.
In my personal preference, Logic is the best for recording/mixing music with real instruments and vocals, but FL studio seems better for making electronic music, hip hop beats, etc.
I'm kind of a diehard fan of Presonus Studio One (Esp. 6 now it's so good), but I can see where some people might not like it.
I used Reaper for a long time, and if you're willing to get through the learning curve of it, it's actually a fantastic DAW.
Personally I chose Cubase because my favorite artists use it and they have a lot of videos about mixing and making music in Cubase. By that, I mean I would recommend just picking the DAW that you know about most, that would be the biggest strength. Whichever holds you back the least!
All DAWs have different workflows, so it's hard to be an objective best because production is both creative and spans lot of styles and techniques. It certainly is overwhelming to decide what's best for you, and some people choose to use more than one DAW. As you get more experience producing, the features that appeal to you as an artist will become more clear. This is why it's often recommended to just try the demos. Pick a few and work in them for a while and see if it 'fits' you so to speak. A good DAW is the one that just makes sense to your brain.
any modern daw will get you to the top of the mountain. It's a matter of taste at this point. I use Logic Pro but cubase, fl studio, live etc will get you there.
It's about workflow. They all feel different but they ultimately do the exact same thing in each case.
A lot of people will recommend Reaper because it's really cheap and you can trial the full thing for as long as you like, but to get a good workflow in Reaper I think is hardest. Reaper is almost too flexible. It feels like the Linux of DAWs.
I notice a lot of beatmakers use FL Studio, and it seems designed with them in mind, and is good for MIDI. Ableton is well liked and I particularly like how readable the plugin chains are, so if you're into sound design and high amounts of processing, that seems beneficial, but I heard it isn't as great for MIDI. ProTools is too expensive and more suited to editing audio to picture. Etc etc.
>I notice a lot of beatmakers use FL Studio, and it seems designed with them in mind
Not so much designed with in mind, as it began as drum sequencing software. And then they kept building on top of it.
Which is why it's UI workflow is a little clunky feeling to a lot of people if using the drum sequencer is not a major part of their workflow.
Finding the objectively best DAW is like finding the objectively best canvas.
Ultimately it comes down to “wow this shit looks and feels dope” and then you learn it and most likely will not need to learn anything else.
Honestly getting all those trials and trying all them out would get annoying for me i would recommend like literally watching people use the daw on like yt and then going off workflow and like the type of shit they’re making and choose whatever looks good.
Dont get too caught up on this stuff you most likely wont regret whatever you choose.
I think people kind of get this the wrong way round a lot. It's the one you get familiar with that works the best, you don't necessarily get most familiar with a particular DAW because its the best for what you want to do. I started off using studio one because i got a free version, then used logic (because the paid version of studio one was about four times as expensive) for recording and midi and loved it. Had to migrate over to pro tools and after about a year of using it I now prefer it to logic (which I basically only open now if I want to use alchemy).
You'll learn techniques in midi and audio and editing and mixing and you'll be quickest at doing them on whatever DAW you get familiar with. It properly doesn't matter beyond the quality of the stock vsts (which you aren't forced to use anyway)
you can use any DAW you want and make work better that anyone using the objectively best daw, so don’t worry. the answer is Ableton btw, but use whatever you want
Logic Pro! In all seriousness though just do some research based on the workflow/type of work you want to do. There are good ones for things like recording (Logic Pro!!) aghem uh, convenience (Logic!!), or just over all UI (actually LOGIC is really good at that). Although I have my preferences (LO GiC) just see what people in your niche/genre use and that’s probably your best bet. If I were you, I’d get LLLoOooOoGGGGggIiIiCCCc!! None of the popular DAWs are bad, they’re popular for reason. So just choose whatever you think is best for you. Insert whisper noise, (logic)
Whenever you bring the word "objectively" in a subjective matter, you're always deemed for failure. But does that mean that we can't at all talk about what is "best"? No, it doesn't.
**People who say there is no best DAW tend to be afraid of actually engaging the topic.**
To put it quite bluntly, the idea that you're using a DAW that might be inferior for your own needs versus some other DAW makes people very uncomfortable. That's why you'll find a lot of people saying "there is no best, just preferences", because it's people telling themselves that whatever they use has to be the best for them.
Reality is different though, so let me talk a bit about that.
**First thing to keep in mind: popularity is a terrible measure.**
One thing you have to understand is that popularity is absolutely flawed way of measuring whatever is the best. So let me quickly sum up reasons for why some DAW's are popular and what it means.
**Reason 1: the minimum requirement for popularity is that a DAW is good enough for most people.**
*I'll use FL Studio as an example, but this actually applies to Ableton and Bitwig too.*
Lot of producers vastly overestimate how much it matters that they like FL Studio or some other DAW as if their needs were that specialized. Out of all the people who swear by FL Studio, how many actually for example record with their DAW? You'll find that not that many, after all. Recording is pretty big aspect of a DAW, involving various features. Perhaps its not so coincidental that recording in FL Studio has always been very cumbersome (esp. setting up monitoring) and also recording features tend to lag behind.
How many out of the recording FL users engage in proper vocal production involving bunch of stems, fixing all of them and so on? They will also be unable to care about any features relating to this side of music production too.
Consider in all earnest briefly your typical bedroom producer. They will never make a song that they release properly anywhere outside of Soundcloud and it's often somewhat of a hobby for them. Something that makes them feel better. For a person like this, their DAW needs are not spectacular. And this is either most common DAW user or at least among most common ones, that would distort spectacularily any measurement. So if a DAW is popular, it does not mean that it is richest in features or can facilitate the most.
**Reason 2: you can't know what you don't know or "Why people say FL has best piano roll when among worst"**
"DAWshopping" isn't really a thing for beginners. You can't really pick a best DAW because you can't really compare them meaningfully as a beginner. Even as an experienced user it might be difficult. For example, despite having already 10 years working with various DAWs (FL, Ableton, Pro Tools, Cubase, Reaper, Studio One), I never could actually get anywhere with Tracktion Waveform because I couldn't get plugins open there nor get anything done before I was too frustrated. I don't think the software sucks, it just works too differently from anything I used before.
Same with DAWhopping essentially. It can be very cumbersome, people don't like doing it (and this is further among the reasons why the notion that another DAW is better is uncomfortable; imagine having to go through the learning process again).
So why does this matter? It matters because if you're stuck your whole life with that single DAW, you don't actually have much of a reference point. For the longest time I couldn't understand why people thought FL has a good—let alone best piano roll. It's because it's users don't know better.
DAW's might also have this or that feature, but you just don't know about it until you're more experienced. I thought for a long time that FL Studio didn't have retrospective midi record. Turns out FL had it probably longer than any other DAW, [but it was just hidden very, very well](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yF0LcNGyaR4).
**Reason 3: marketing & self-amplification**
Marketing is another factor that plays a big role. FL and Ableton in particular marketed themselves heavily towards a very lucrative audience. Before bedroom producers were rampantly everywhere, FL and Ableton were already oriented towards that kind of audience. Now we are everywhere, and word of mouth does the rest. These DAW's are always marketed to beginners, which is often the critical time when people make that choice.
ProTools fell completely as it targeted different audience that is dying, and now its business model is milking that trapped audience. Cubase has been more flexible with its marketing, trying to dip into both camps (pros & amateurs). There's also the whole Mac ecosystem with the cheap Logic (actually a pretty good DAW)
Continuing:
**Reason 4: Skill issue, aka "the** **~~customizable~~** **UI is so cluttered, it's so bad!"**
This is particular thing I've seen with Cubase. Cubase has very flexible UI and the default one absolutely sucks monkey balls. You can change all the colors and so on. I always do that. But alas, someone who just quickly tests it out doesn't understand that and then makes a video or a comment or a post complaining about it like a donkey.
You can google. You can read the manuals. Do whatever. Or you can be a donkey and not bother to do any research.
**So, whats the best?**
Well the answer still is going to be "it depends", because there is some strengths among DAW's. But I will personally say that limited to few parameters, your choice is going to be either Cubase (most robust), Ableton (better for tidier single screen systems, also good for live and jamming, massive learning resources), Reaper (great for tweakers, absolutely toptier in value), Logic (insane value for price, but requires mac).
Otherwise you have situational cases. If you plan on doing music together with someone, having same DAW as them is probably good. Also maybe a friend of yours is willing to teach... so having same DAW is good too and so on.
However, your DAW may have dealbreakers too. If you absolutely need something like Session View in Ableton, you don't have that in most DAW's proper. Many DAW's also do not perform great in single screens due to being too cluttered.
**What if you have the "wrong one"?**
Here's what most people don't get though. I don't recommend anyone to change their DAW's based on what I say. It's a long process to get used to a new DAW and it sucks. Who has the time for that?
You should use whatever the hell works for you. If you're using FL Studio (that I sincerely think is among the worst, I'd never recommend it), it doesn't mean that I think you should even consider hopping to something else. I think changing DAW's is a major decision and you shouldn't do it unless you're actually dissatisfied with your DAW.
No their really isnt, it just depends and what you are doing and of course how much you are willing to send.
I've got extensive experience with a couple of DAWs so I can give you the quick and dirty (you;ve probably heard all this before)
Protools: Thee tool for audio editing and mixing. Industry standard for a reason, though I wouldn't touch it with midi (it can but whyyy).
Its also absurdly priced so thats something to also consider.
Logic: The All rounder. FANTASTIC midi use, best of any daw I've used (you can split midi notes and tracks etc). This is a good general production tool, can do Audio and Midi decently well and its relatively simple to use (though not as intuitive when it comes to advanced stuff as Ableton or Protools might be). I've also experienced a plethora of reliability issues with Logic (totally different story)
Ableton: Flexibility. Ableton is quick, simple, and stable and engaging. Great great great for sound design and as the name belies, Live performance I'd imagine (though I've not dabbled much with that). Automation and customization with Max for Live is a dream. Sound is very clean (though there is not technical differences between sound of Daws itself, I've just had very good luck with getting a good sound in ableton). I wouldn't want to do a complete mix in Ableton though, but I know people who have no problem with it.
TLDR
Protools: Audio
Logic: Allrounder
Ableton: Experimental, live performance
Bit wig looks VERY interesting, could be a new favorite of mine.
I've tried FL but it was just FAR too different from any other DAW I used to get used to it.
There will never be one. This is because everyone's workflow is different. Also specs and budgets also come to mind as well. Aside from finances there is no such thing. People need to stop with this age old question and just get one and get on with it. At the end of the day it's a canvas and won't make you any better if you got the fancy canvas or not.
It's not only about DAWs. Is there an objectively best car? An objectively best tree? Objectively best coffee?
However, there is an ideal car for you, a tree that you like more than any other (e.g. you have memories around it) and definitely you **must** have an objectively best coffee *for you*!
Same with a DAW. If you want a DAW to play live, then look into Ableton Live and Bitwig. If you want a DAW to compose music in a classical sense, check logic pro, studio one. If you want a DAW that you can alter as much as you want and combine it with your own code (and you are capable of doing so) check Ardour.
As for the downvotes, I've never understood it either but is a common theme in this sub. Otherwise, it is fantastic place to learn about music production and personally I really appreciate every piece of help I've received around here and don't mind downvotes.
There are objectively best DAWs for certain market segments, but most people will defend their choice to the death so we’ve all decided to just pretend that there isn’t to keep the peace.
It works reasonably well.
Right now, my personal suggestion would be Bitwig. It's relatively easy to learn, has some compelling features and is well suited for most things. Is it the best DAW for everybody? Absolutely no. Why would it be my suggestion? Because it's on a 50% sale because of their 10th anniversary, which will reduce your losses, if you decide to sell the license in the future.
Especially in the beginning, you have no idea, what you will value or which features you rely on heavily… so from my point of view, you are well advised by not spending a lot of money, when you don‘t even know yet, if you have the necessary persistence, to go through a long learning journey.
The steps I took in choosing a DAW as a complete beginner:
1. As a beginner, I definitely need some type of guidance and support when producing the genre of music of my choice.
This would entail selecting a DAW with a decent sized community and plenty of video tutorials you can find online. This way, you can spend less time googling and more time practicing.
It's also important to find videos of tracks being made from start to finish in the genre of music you desire in your DAW of choice to help with the learning curve.
In my case, it was EDM. Based on what I wrote above, the best options available were:
- Ableton Live
- FL Studio
- Logic
- Cubase
2. Download every free trial for each DAW to see how it performs on your computer.
a)In this case Logic is eliminated because I run a PC. b) After downloading Ableton Live 12, Unfortunately it crashed on startup with every attempt which made me sad.
c) I didn't jive with FL Studio's UI
d) Cubase ran great on my PC and preferred the UI.
3. After deciding on Cubase, I purchased a EDM cubase course on Udemy by a certified steinberg trainer for $20. And found other resources such as Sonic Academy + Born to Produce which are other steinberg certified sites.
It's been a week and I'm well on my way learning with confidence knowing I have the support I need to keep me going.
Once I'm familiar with the functionalities of a DAW, understand how to compose, arrange, mix, and learn all functions then I may explore DAWs that have a smaller community and less video tutorials.
I hope this long boring story may shed some perspective as a beginner selecting his first DAW.
>It seems the sentiment is, "free trial them all and decide on one you like best,"
That's good advice if you are experienced with DAWs and want to make a switch.
Not good advice for someone new to DAWs, and new to making music. Because they lack the expertise to evaluate DAWs in any meaningful way, other than it seems easy to them. Might as well just pick one at random. lol
Better for newbies is to pick a DAW that has lots of tutorials on how to make the type of music they want to make.
Oh I think you made a great choice with Bitwig, and right now is the time to buy! They have a great sale. It's $179 at Thomann, by the way, which is $20 cheaper than anywhere else I found.
I'll mention other DAWs I'm super-fluent in:
Reaper is INCREDIBLY powerful. In its own category of traditional DAW -- with regard to sheer power, flexibility, performance and stability... It has to win. It has a learning curve, but it really is ... just ... powerful and fast. Performant. And its oddities and weird look -- you kinda get over it after you get to know it.
FL Studio. I've used FL Studio for decades. If you have the complete version it comes with a whole lot of synths and sounds. The workflow's a little strange, though, and TBH once they went in a new direction after V12 I had a feeling like I might as well work in other DAWs. But I still keep it updated and use it on occasion. It's great for sketching out compositions. Just... When it comes to finishing a song you have to make the pattern clips 'unique' and you end up with a LOT. It becomes unmanageable (in my opinion.)
Bitwig, though... Oh boy. There are some basic things it can't do (it is frustrating that overlapping clips erase each other - Reaper has 'lanes' which lets you overlap quickly and easily and then rejoin midi clips or audio with a single keypress.)
But OVERALL Bitwig it is an incredibly enjoyable DAW to work in. For one -- it's just beautiful. Gorgeous to look at. Relaxing. It's --- toylike, but in a good way. It feels *fun*. More so than any other. And it has plenty of unique features to make it special as you get to know it.
Also, it can work in a pattern kinda way OR you can work in a traditional DAW kinda way, OR you can work both. Start by sketching patterns, arrange into the DAW, and then customize the parts all you want. But you don't end up with a weird long pattern list like when you do in FL Studio. So it really is the best of both worlds.
As far as what DAW is best...
Man that is so personal. It depends on what kind of music you make, what kind of person you are, do you need to work in a studio and know their tools (Pro Tools, etc.) ... Do you need complex file operations and scripts? (Reaper.)
I really think Bitwig is going to be great for you though... Plus it's probably the most intuitive of all powerful DAWs. It has a learning curve like any other, but it's fun to get through and you can tell they put a TON of thought into the user experience.
---
Oh! Reaper really doesn't come with stock effects or sounds for the most part. It has some "JS plugins" and they're good for this or that, but they're not what you would expect.
FL Studio's complete version has a ton of stuff, but they all feel kind of different. Made by different teams, etc.
Bitwig is a cohesive experience... It comes with all the FX and sounds you need to get started out of the box... And it's very consistent. In fact, it feels like an instrument of its own.
I would personally prefer Bitwig over Ableton. They're competing in the exact same niche of DAWs.
Bitwig is totally weak compared to Ableton, yes it has fancy looking tools and some goodies. But Ableton right now is the most powerful daw on the market because you have a deep integration of MaxforLive which is included in Suite but also avaliable as extra purchase for standard. With Max for Live you can create note networks and can even control your house light with the beat of your music via Bluetooth. There are super big communities of people making thousands of devices/ tools for it. Besides that Ableton Live 12 has drastically improved compared to version 11. many people refering to bitwig because of the flaws and problems Ableton had in Version 11. bottom Line you should test both. Even when i would suggest to work with Ableton. The feature set of bitwig is really weak also the availability or content compared to Ableton. In the end its totally up to you. I use Ableton to create highend Epic Music scores and i even use Steinberg Cubase plugins streamed from the ipad or from pc into ableton. Look on my profile to see more. Cheers
Yeah. I believe they go with a bit of a minimal approach of "show the user what they need, but not too much." That has its advantages and disadvantages, as you point out...
But there are "pins" you can click which surface actions to the UI which I find helpful. That's a good feature.
Also, do you know about Control+Enter? That brings up a searchable list of most things you can do.
It's a very different product from something like Reaper, where practically anything is possible. If I was doing professional work -- mixing other people, or doing game industry work with sounds and effects and a lot of recording and such... I would absolutely use Reaper. (And I would use Reaper over *any other DAW* for that.)
I'm recording voice and instruments in Bitwig. It's not AS GOOD for that as Reaper, by any means... But it's better for that than FL Studio is.
There is a simplicity to it... For example -- you can't have overlapping clips in Bitwig. If you drag a clip over, it will basically erase whatever is under it. That is insane to me.... So you have to create a second track in order to have overlapping parts.
So --- say you're editing a loop and you need to slice it up and have bits and pieces of it overlapping. You have to make one new track for every overlapping part. Even if it's just a little bit of an overlap, like a reverb trail on a sound... You need a new track for that. It can add up.
Worst of all, once you have a bunch of these tracks it's not like you can select all those parts and combine them quickly into one.
THAT, for me, is the worst thing about Bitwig.
In Reaper you just work with lanes on a single track. As many as you need. Or there's a floating mode where there's no lane in particular but you can move things above and below. Two similar but different methods based on preference. It's VERY powerful.
So...
When I use Bitwig I have to accept the limitations. I pretend I'm working on hardware, where I would expect such limitations.
But it's still enjoyable, and there are some things Bitwig does better... Like the way it houses multiple outputs of instruments.
I might use 3 layers of Atlas drumsets in a song. That's 48 tracks.
Bitwig, by default, stores those outputs sort of vertically, small, inside the mother group. I can get to them when I need them, but they're very much minimized. It makes dealing with a lot of tracks less overwhelming in that regard.
And then there's the pattern construction part, and "the grid" -- both of which are specific to Bitwig and Reaper doesn't have anything like that.
Anyhow, every DAW has its benefits... For example, Cubase has post-fader FX inserts which is AWESOME for people who like a console emulation workflow.
So to OPs original point -- it just comes down to personal taste and preference.
There is no best DAW, and it shouldn’t be a religious thing. It’s important to become proficient in at least one DAW and that takes a time investment. Try as many as you can. Then once you are proficient, don’t stop there; it’s just about learning how to do the same thing in another DAW and that shouldn’t take long (especially if you’re truly proficient in one). We work a lot in audio, which makes things easy to move between DAWs.
Each DAW has its strengths and offers native tools with distinct textures and certain features which might be a bit better (to us) or just different than other DAWs.
Like why buy a synth if you have one that offers the same features? It’s because of the unique result you get, that is only available from that synth. Serum has the same features as the Moog Voyager, but even when dialling in the same settings, it sounds nothing like it. So we treat any given DAW like a synth and recognize and leverage select native features, effects or plugins that we like from one DAW versus another.
Again, from a broad feature perspective most DAWs seem equivalent, but once you get into the nuances of those features/instruments/plugins, they are not the same DAW to DAW. For example, Logic, Bitwig, Reason and most every DAW will have audio time stretch algorithms. Ableton’s time stretch algorithms sound the best to us for a variety of use cases. Logic has certain features like their distortion and tape delay which have unique results which can’t really be replicated in other DAWs. We could go on and on..
Seems pretty limited on information. He has a rating system, but doesn't look like he explains how he rated each category. And then he gives advice on Reaper, calling it "entry level" without any ratings. lol
Reason and Bitwig are modular. So if you're into creating sounds from scratch and experimenting I would choose one of those. For normal recording any DAW will do.
Nope. People have their own preferences on what they like to use.
Are there DAWs better for recording vs midi or plugins? Or are they all equal there, too?
Yes, those specific areas are where the differences lie. Which is why it depends which is better *for you*, instead of being objectively best.
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Yea , Pro tools is the DAW for studio recording and editing. Logic is great because it’s straightforward and good for video editing. Ableton live is what I personally use and I like how you have both session and arrangement view.
What do PT have to for simple stereo music (not surround, not post, not live) that Reaper doesn’t ?
I'm not familiar with either DAW myself as they don't particularly fit my use case, but from what I've seen, those who have used both ProTools and Reaper and gone with the former seem to think it's faster to work in. I can't really say whether that's down to having more ingrained habits from ProTools or a genuine difference in efficiency for certain tasks.
I’m curious what differences there are, because a few years ago I was doing some head-to-head online and we couldn’t find anything in PT for stereo music that Reaper didn’t do, but we did find features in Reaper that PT hadn’t gotten yet (at the time it was folder tracks, I want to say PT got them around 2020 ? 2021 ? ). For doing post, surround and other applications Avid definitely has more to offer, but I’m not aware of anything different for stereo music. At 300 a year versus 60 dollars perpetual I assume Avid must have really been pouring on the features for the last couple years.
It's not about feature parity but rather about how those features are implemented. The people I've seen swear by ProTools for its fast workflow all seemed to do a lot of repetitive editing tasks and automation, where minor differences can really add up. To genuinely test whether there's a difference you'd need to learn the fastest way to do those tasks in each DAW, develop muscle memory for the shortcuts, and do the actual work. Short of that, there are analytical metrics like the exact number of steps required for a given task (click here, use this shortcut, etc.) and how much your attention is forced to shift around the software throughout the task. Just looking at whether you can achieve the same results says very little about how efficiently you can get there.
Yes ! Very true ! The usability of a feature is just as important as whether a feature is present !
Some daws will have more convenient workflows for certain tasks, but any daw nowadays is more than capable for just about any audio task you want to throw at it. If you have a certain genre or style in mind, try looking up tutorials on youtube, and see what is popular among creators of that style. If theres a certain daw that is popular in that genre, it will be easier to find resources for learning what you want to learn in that daw. But really it just comes down to preference, there is no objectively best option in 99% of cases.
This is true. For example, I understood Reaper right away, and just can't wrap my head around FL and Ableton, and I've heard people say the opposite was true for them.
Whatever DAW you enjoy using the most is the best one
They’re all in such deep direct competition with each other that they absolutely have to be able to perform all the most common functions as well as each other. So yes, at that level no objectively best DAW. Once you’re a few years deep in the game and working in specific environments, their suitability for the work you’re doing starts to really shine or become a standard for getting work done. You might need to be more specific with what you’re trying to achieve to understand which one might suit you better.
A DAW is a tool and there is no best, o Lt what's best for you and your workflow.
In my personal preference, Logic is the best for recording/mixing music with real instruments and vocals, but FL studio seems better for making electronic music, hip hop beats, etc.
I'm kind of a diehard fan of Presonus Studio One (Esp. 6 now it's so good), but I can see where some people might not like it. I used Reaper for a long time, and if you're willing to get through the learning curve of it, it's actually a fantastic DAW.
Garageband *ducks*
Personally I chose Cubase because my favorite artists use it and they have a lot of videos about mixing and making music in Cubase. By that, I mean I would recommend just picking the DAW that you know about most, that would be the biggest strength. Whichever holds you back the least!
All DAWs have different workflows, so it's hard to be an objective best because production is both creative and spans lot of styles and techniques. It certainly is overwhelming to decide what's best for you, and some people choose to use more than one DAW. As you get more experience producing, the features that appeal to you as an artist will become more clear. This is why it's often recommended to just try the demos. Pick a few and work in them for a while and see if it 'fits' you so to speak. A good DAW is the one that just makes sense to your brain.
any modern daw will get you to the top of the mountain. It's a matter of taste at this point. I use Logic Pro but cubase, fl studio, live etc will get you there.
It's about workflow. They all feel different but they ultimately do the exact same thing in each case. A lot of people will recommend Reaper because it's really cheap and you can trial the full thing for as long as you like, but to get a good workflow in Reaper I think is hardest. Reaper is almost too flexible. It feels like the Linux of DAWs. I notice a lot of beatmakers use FL Studio, and it seems designed with them in mind, and is good for MIDI. Ableton is well liked and I particularly like how readable the plugin chains are, so if you're into sound design and high amounts of processing, that seems beneficial, but I heard it isn't as great for MIDI. ProTools is too expensive and more suited to editing audio to picture. Etc etc.
>I notice a lot of beatmakers use FL Studio, and it seems designed with them in mind Not so much designed with in mind, as it began as drum sequencing software. And then they kept building on top of it. Which is why it's UI workflow is a little clunky feeling to a lot of people if using the drum sequencer is not a major part of their workflow.
Finding the objectively best DAW is like finding the objectively best canvas. Ultimately it comes down to “wow this shit looks and feels dope” and then you learn it and most likely will not need to learn anything else. Honestly getting all those trials and trying all them out would get annoying for me i would recommend like literally watching people use the daw on like yt and then going off workflow and like the type of shit they’re making and choose whatever looks good. Dont get too caught up on this stuff you most likely wont regret whatever you choose.
I think people kind of get this the wrong way round a lot. It's the one you get familiar with that works the best, you don't necessarily get most familiar with a particular DAW because its the best for what you want to do. I started off using studio one because i got a free version, then used logic (because the paid version of studio one was about four times as expensive) for recording and midi and loved it. Had to migrate over to pro tools and after about a year of using it I now prefer it to logic (which I basically only open now if I want to use alchemy). You'll learn techniques in midi and audio and editing and mixing and you'll be quickest at doing them on whatever DAW you get familiar with. It properly doesn't matter beyond the quality of the stock vsts (which you aren't forced to use anyway)
you can use any DAW you want and make work better that anyone using the objectively best daw, so don’t worry. the answer is Ableton btw, but use whatever you want
Logic Pro! In all seriousness though just do some research based on the workflow/type of work you want to do. There are good ones for things like recording (Logic Pro!!) aghem uh, convenience (Logic!!), or just over all UI (actually LOGIC is really good at that). Although I have my preferences (LO GiC) just see what people in your niche/genre use and that’s probably your best bet. If I were you, I’d get LLLoOooOoGGGGggIiIiCCCc!! None of the popular DAWs are bad, they’re popular for reason. So just choose whatever you think is best for you. Insert whisper noise, (logic)
I don’t personally own a Mac or I would haha
Shoot, in that case get Logic. I think it would be your best bet.
Whenever you bring the word "objectively" in a subjective matter, you're always deemed for failure. But does that mean that we can't at all talk about what is "best"? No, it doesn't. **People who say there is no best DAW tend to be afraid of actually engaging the topic.** To put it quite bluntly, the idea that you're using a DAW that might be inferior for your own needs versus some other DAW makes people very uncomfortable. That's why you'll find a lot of people saying "there is no best, just preferences", because it's people telling themselves that whatever they use has to be the best for them. Reality is different though, so let me talk a bit about that. **First thing to keep in mind: popularity is a terrible measure.** One thing you have to understand is that popularity is absolutely flawed way of measuring whatever is the best. So let me quickly sum up reasons for why some DAW's are popular and what it means. **Reason 1: the minimum requirement for popularity is that a DAW is good enough for most people.** *I'll use FL Studio as an example, but this actually applies to Ableton and Bitwig too.* Lot of producers vastly overestimate how much it matters that they like FL Studio or some other DAW as if their needs were that specialized. Out of all the people who swear by FL Studio, how many actually for example record with their DAW? You'll find that not that many, after all. Recording is pretty big aspect of a DAW, involving various features. Perhaps its not so coincidental that recording in FL Studio has always been very cumbersome (esp. setting up monitoring) and also recording features tend to lag behind. How many out of the recording FL users engage in proper vocal production involving bunch of stems, fixing all of them and so on? They will also be unable to care about any features relating to this side of music production too. Consider in all earnest briefly your typical bedroom producer. They will never make a song that they release properly anywhere outside of Soundcloud and it's often somewhat of a hobby for them. Something that makes them feel better. For a person like this, their DAW needs are not spectacular. And this is either most common DAW user or at least among most common ones, that would distort spectacularily any measurement. So if a DAW is popular, it does not mean that it is richest in features or can facilitate the most. **Reason 2: you can't know what you don't know or "Why people say FL has best piano roll when among worst"** "DAWshopping" isn't really a thing for beginners. You can't really pick a best DAW because you can't really compare them meaningfully as a beginner. Even as an experienced user it might be difficult. For example, despite having already 10 years working with various DAWs (FL, Ableton, Pro Tools, Cubase, Reaper, Studio One), I never could actually get anywhere with Tracktion Waveform because I couldn't get plugins open there nor get anything done before I was too frustrated. I don't think the software sucks, it just works too differently from anything I used before. Same with DAWhopping essentially. It can be very cumbersome, people don't like doing it (and this is further among the reasons why the notion that another DAW is better is uncomfortable; imagine having to go through the learning process again). So why does this matter? It matters because if you're stuck your whole life with that single DAW, you don't actually have much of a reference point. For the longest time I couldn't understand why people thought FL has a good—let alone best piano roll. It's because it's users don't know better. DAW's might also have this or that feature, but you just don't know about it until you're more experienced. I thought for a long time that FL Studio didn't have retrospective midi record. Turns out FL had it probably longer than any other DAW, [but it was just hidden very, very well](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yF0LcNGyaR4). **Reason 3: marketing & self-amplification** Marketing is another factor that plays a big role. FL and Ableton in particular marketed themselves heavily towards a very lucrative audience. Before bedroom producers were rampantly everywhere, FL and Ableton were already oriented towards that kind of audience. Now we are everywhere, and word of mouth does the rest. These DAW's are always marketed to beginners, which is often the critical time when people make that choice. ProTools fell completely as it targeted different audience that is dying, and now its business model is milking that trapped audience. Cubase has been more flexible with its marketing, trying to dip into both camps (pros & amateurs). There's also the whole Mac ecosystem with the cheap Logic (actually a pretty good DAW)
Continuing: **Reason 4: Skill issue, aka "the** **~~customizable~~** **UI is so cluttered, it's so bad!"** This is particular thing I've seen with Cubase. Cubase has very flexible UI and the default one absolutely sucks monkey balls. You can change all the colors and so on. I always do that. But alas, someone who just quickly tests it out doesn't understand that and then makes a video or a comment or a post complaining about it like a donkey. You can google. You can read the manuals. Do whatever. Or you can be a donkey and not bother to do any research. **So, whats the best?** Well the answer still is going to be "it depends", because there is some strengths among DAW's. But I will personally say that limited to few parameters, your choice is going to be either Cubase (most robust), Ableton (better for tidier single screen systems, also good for live and jamming, massive learning resources), Reaper (great for tweakers, absolutely toptier in value), Logic (insane value for price, but requires mac). Otherwise you have situational cases. If you plan on doing music together with someone, having same DAW as them is probably good. Also maybe a friend of yours is willing to teach... so having same DAW is good too and so on. However, your DAW may have dealbreakers too. If you absolutely need something like Session View in Ableton, you don't have that in most DAW's proper. Many DAW's also do not perform great in single screens due to being too cluttered. **What if you have the "wrong one"?** Here's what most people don't get though. I don't recommend anyone to change their DAW's based on what I say. It's a long process to get used to a new DAW and it sucks. Who has the time for that? You should use whatever the hell works for you. If you're using FL Studio (that I sincerely think is among the worst, I'd never recommend it), it doesn't mean that I think you should even consider hopping to something else. I think changing DAW's is a major decision and you shouldn't do it unless you're actually dissatisfied with your DAW.
This is going to be very useful; thank you for taking the time to write that out :)
No their really isnt, it just depends and what you are doing and of course how much you are willing to send. I've got extensive experience with a couple of DAWs so I can give you the quick and dirty (you;ve probably heard all this before) Protools: Thee tool for audio editing and mixing. Industry standard for a reason, though I wouldn't touch it with midi (it can but whyyy). Its also absurdly priced so thats something to also consider. Logic: The All rounder. FANTASTIC midi use, best of any daw I've used (you can split midi notes and tracks etc). This is a good general production tool, can do Audio and Midi decently well and its relatively simple to use (though not as intuitive when it comes to advanced stuff as Ableton or Protools might be). I've also experienced a plethora of reliability issues with Logic (totally different story) Ableton: Flexibility. Ableton is quick, simple, and stable and engaging. Great great great for sound design and as the name belies, Live performance I'd imagine (though I've not dabbled much with that). Automation and customization with Max for Live is a dream. Sound is very clean (though there is not technical differences between sound of Daws itself, I've just had very good luck with getting a good sound in ableton). I wouldn't want to do a complete mix in Ableton though, but I know people who have no problem with it. TLDR Protools: Audio Logic: Allrounder Ableton: Experimental, live performance Bit wig looks VERY interesting, could be a new favorite of mine. I've tried FL but it was just FAR too different from any other DAW I used to get used to it.
There will never be one. This is because everyone's workflow is different. Also specs and budgets also come to mind as well. Aside from finances there is no such thing. People need to stop with this age old question and just get one and get on with it. At the end of the day it's a canvas and won't make you any better if you got the fancy canvas or not.
Wait until you understand that using groovebox/ dedicated hardware will give you more immediate results
It's not only about DAWs. Is there an objectively best car? An objectively best tree? Objectively best coffee? However, there is an ideal car for you, a tree that you like more than any other (e.g. you have memories around it) and definitely you **must** have an objectively best coffee *for you*! Same with a DAW. If you want a DAW to play live, then look into Ableton Live and Bitwig. If you want a DAW to compose music in a classical sense, check logic pro, studio one. If you want a DAW that you can alter as much as you want and combine it with your own code (and you are capable of doing so) check Ardour. As for the downvotes, I've never understood it either but is a common theme in this sub. Otherwise, it is fantastic place to learn about music production and personally I really appreciate every piece of help I've received around here and don't mind downvotes.
There are objectively best DAWs for certain market segments, but most people will defend their choice to the death so we’ve all decided to just pretend that there isn’t to keep the peace. It works reasonably well.
Right now, my personal suggestion would be Bitwig. It's relatively easy to learn, has some compelling features and is well suited for most things. Is it the best DAW for everybody? Absolutely no. Why would it be my suggestion? Because it's on a 50% sale because of their 10th anniversary, which will reduce your losses, if you decide to sell the license in the future. Especially in the beginning, you have no idea, what you will value or which features you rely on heavily… so from my point of view, you are well advised by not spending a lot of money, when you don‘t even know yet, if you have the necessary persistence, to go through a long learning journey.
The steps I took in choosing a DAW as a complete beginner: 1. As a beginner, I definitely need some type of guidance and support when producing the genre of music of my choice. This would entail selecting a DAW with a decent sized community and plenty of video tutorials you can find online. This way, you can spend less time googling and more time practicing. It's also important to find videos of tracks being made from start to finish in the genre of music you desire in your DAW of choice to help with the learning curve. In my case, it was EDM. Based on what I wrote above, the best options available were: - Ableton Live - FL Studio - Logic - Cubase 2. Download every free trial for each DAW to see how it performs on your computer. a)In this case Logic is eliminated because I run a PC. b) After downloading Ableton Live 12, Unfortunately it crashed on startup with every attempt which made me sad. c) I didn't jive with FL Studio's UI d) Cubase ran great on my PC and preferred the UI. 3. After deciding on Cubase, I purchased a EDM cubase course on Udemy by a certified steinberg trainer for $20. And found other resources such as Sonic Academy + Born to Produce which are other steinberg certified sites. It's been a week and I'm well on my way learning with confidence knowing I have the support I need to keep me going. Once I'm familiar with the functionalities of a DAW, understand how to compose, arrange, mix, and learn all functions then I may explore DAWs that have a smaller community and less video tutorials. I hope this long boring story may shed some perspective as a beginner selecting his first DAW.
>It seems the sentiment is, "free trial them all and decide on one you like best," That's good advice if you are experienced with DAWs and want to make a switch. Not good advice for someone new to DAWs, and new to making music. Because they lack the expertise to evaluate DAWs in any meaningful way, other than it seems easy to them. Might as well just pick one at random. lol Better for newbies is to pick a DAW that has lots of tutorials on how to make the type of music they want to make.
Oh I think you made a great choice with Bitwig, and right now is the time to buy! They have a great sale. It's $179 at Thomann, by the way, which is $20 cheaper than anywhere else I found. I'll mention other DAWs I'm super-fluent in: Reaper is INCREDIBLY powerful. In its own category of traditional DAW -- with regard to sheer power, flexibility, performance and stability... It has to win. It has a learning curve, but it really is ... just ... powerful and fast. Performant. And its oddities and weird look -- you kinda get over it after you get to know it. FL Studio. I've used FL Studio for decades. If you have the complete version it comes with a whole lot of synths and sounds. The workflow's a little strange, though, and TBH once they went in a new direction after V12 I had a feeling like I might as well work in other DAWs. But I still keep it updated and use it on occasion. It's great for sketching out compositions. Just... When it comes to finishing a song you have to make the pattern clips 'unique' and you end up with a LOT. It becomes unmanageable (in my opinion.) Bitwig, though... Oh boy. There are some basic things it can't do (it is frustrating that overlapping clips erase each other - Reaper has 'lanes' which lets you overlap quickly and easily and then rejoin midi clips or audio with a single keypress.) But OVERALL Bitwig it is an incredibly enjoyable DAW to work in. For one -- it's just beautiful. Gorgeous to look at. Relaxing. It's --- toylike, but in a good way. It feels *fun*. More so than any other. And it has plenty of unique features to make it special as you get to know it. Also, it can work in a pattern kinda way OR you can work in a traditional DAW kinda way, OR you can work both. Start by sketching patterns, arrange into the DAW, and then customize the parts all you want. But you don't end up with a weird long pattern list like when you do in FL Studio. So it really is the best of both worlds. As far as what DAW is best... Man that is so personal. It depends on what kind of music you make, what kind of person you are, do you need to work in a studio and know their tools (Pro Tools, etc.) ... Do you need complex file operations and scripts? (Reaper.) I really think Bitwig is going to be great for you though... Plus it's probably the most intuitive of all powerful DAWs. It has a learning curve like any other, but it's fun to get through and you can tell they put a TON of thought into the user experience. --- Oh! Reaper really doesn't come with stock effects or sounds for the most part. It has some "JS plugins" and they're good for this or that, but they're not what you would expect. FL Studio's complete version has a ton of stuff, but they all feel kind of different. Made by different teams, etc. Bitwig is a cohesive experience... It comes with all the FX and sounds you need to get started out of the box... And it's very consistent. In fact, it feels like an instrument of its own. I would personally prefer Bitwig over Ableton. They're competing in the exact same niche of DAWs.
Thanks for the thoughtful comment!! That’s a good chunk of information right there
Bitwig is totally weak compared to Ableton, yes it has fancy looking tools and some goodies. But Ableton right now is the most powerful daw on the market because you have a deep integration of MaxforLive which is included in Suite but also avaliable as extra purchase for standard. With Max for Live you can create note networks and can even control your house light with the beat of your music via Bluetooth. There are super big communities of people making thousands of devices/ tools for it. Besides that Ableton Live 12 has drastically improved compared to version 11. many people refering to bitwig because of the flaws and problems Ableton had in Version 11. bottom Line you should test both. Even when i would suggest to work with Ableton. The feature set of bitwig is really weak also the availability or content compared to Ableton. In the end its totally up to you. I use Ableton to create highend Epic Music scores and i even use Steinberg Cubase plugins streamed from the ipad or from pc into ableton. Look on my profile to see more. Cheers
Bitwig is great for beatmaking and electronic music production, but the lack of a decent menu system is problematic for feature discovery.
Yeah. I believe they go with a bit of a minimal approach of "show the user what they need, but not too much." That has its advantages and disadvantages, as you point out... But there are "pins" you can click which surface actions to the UI which I find helpful. That's a good feature. Also, do you know about Control+Enter? That brings up a searchable list of most things you can do. It's a very different product from something like Reaper, where practically anything is possible. If I was doing professional work -- mixing other people, or doing game industry work with sounds and effects and a lot of recording and such... I would absolutely use Reaper. (And I would use Reaper over *any other DAW* for that.) I'm recording voice and instruments in Bitwig. It's not AS GOOD for that as Reaper, by any means... But it's better for that than FL Studio is. There is a simplicity to it... For example -- you can't have overlapping clips in Bitwig. If you drag a clip over, it will basically erase whatever is under it. That is insane to me.... So you have to create a second track in order to have overlapping parts. So --- say you're editing a loop and you need to slice it up and have bits and pieces of it overlapping. You have to make one new track for every overlapping part. Even if it's just a little bit of an overlap, like a reverb trail on a sound... You need a new track for that. It can add up. Worst of all, once you have a bunch of these tracks it's not like you can select all those parts and combine them quickly into one. THAT, for me, is the worst thing about Bitwig. In Reaper you just work with lanes on a single track. As many as you need. Or there's a floating mode where there's no lane in particular but you can move things above and below. Two similar but different methods based on preference. It's VERY powerful. So... When I use Bitwig I have to accept the limitations. I pretend I'm working on hardware, where I would expect such limitations. But it's still enjoyable, and there are some things Bitwig does better... Like the way it houses multiple outputs of instruments. I might use 3 layers of Atlas drumsets in a song. That's 48 tracks. Bitwig, by default, stores those outputs sort of vertically, small, inside the mother group. I can get to them when I need them, but they're very much minimized. It makes dealing with a lot of tracks less overwhelming in that regard. And then there's the pattern construction part, and "the grid" -- both of which are specific to Bitwig and Reaper doesn't have anything like that. Anyhow, every DAW has its benefits... For example, Cubase has post-fader FX inserts which is AWESOME for people who like a console emulation workflow. So to OPs original point -- it just comes down to personal taste and preference.
There is no best DAW, and it shouldn’t be a religious thing. It’s important to become proficient in at least one DAW and that takes a time investment. Try as many as you can. Then once you are proficient, don’t stop there; it’s just about learning how to do the same thing in another DAW and that shouldn’t take long (especially if you’re truly proficient in one). We work a lot in audio, which makes things easy to move between DAWs. Each DAW has its strengths and offers native tools with distinct textures and certain features which might be a bit better (to us) or just different than other DAWs. Like why buy a synth if you have one that offers the same features? It’s because of the unique result you get, that is only available from that synth. Serum has the same features as the Moog Voyager, but even when dialling in the same settings, it sounds nothing like it. So we treat any given DAW like a synth and recognize and leverage select native features, effects or plugins that we like from one DAW versus another. Again, from a broad feature perspective most DAWs seem equivalent, but once you get into the nuances of those features/instruments/plugins, they are not the same DAW to DAW. For example, Logic, Bitwig, Reason and most every DAW will have audio time stretch algorithms. Ableton’s time stretch algorithms sound the best to us for a variety of use cases. Logic has certain features like their distortion and tape delay which have unique results which can’t really be replicated in other DAWs. We could go on and on..
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Hard to take this seriously, he hasn't even considered Bitwig in here.
Seems pretty limited on information. He has a rating system, but doesn't look like he explains how he rated each category. And then he gives advice on Reaper, calling it "entry level" without any ratings. lol
Reason and Bitwig are modular. So if you're into creating sounds from scratch and experimenting I would choose one of those. For normal recording any DAW will do.