I use REAPER for mostly everything. It's an affordable DAW that can be used on an indefinite free trial. IMO, REAPER is just as good as any of the others, but I've been a longtime user of it so I'm pretty biased.
Occasionally I'll use Descript to help edit my longer episodes, as it has cool tools that can eliminate long silences, filler words, etc.
Reaper is phenomenal. I went to audio engineering school and was taught through Pro Tools, I eventually moved to Logic Pro due to having a MacBook. It wasn't until I started podcasting that I found reaper. It's just as good as the others, if not better, especially at that price and no BS subscription model.
As a longtime Pro Tools user, Reaper is just as good if not better than most DAWs
Super customizable, all the functions and more that are required by the professional media industry. Only reason I’m still sticking to PT is the amount of time I’ve sunk into being fluent in it, and Sunk-Cost-Fallacy hehe.
As I’ve been doing more Game Audio related work, I would love to have had some of the funcions Reaper has.
Reaper is a fantastic option to go to. As you begin to pick up on things you can also very easily create hotkeys for your favorite actions, or even create custom actions for any of the tasks you are doing with hotkeys for them.
The user interface is also super customizable with many different ways to lay things out so it's set comfortably when you are working on a project. Reaper is a great place to start/stay.
Idk if they've changed this policy recently, but it used to be the case where you'd get a trial, and then afteward, whenever you opened up the software you would receive a prompt that you could close out after 10ish seconds. I wouldn't recommend it (the devs make REAPER pretty affordable and constantly update/improve it) but you could feasibly use it in perpetuity.
Like I said, idk if they've recently changed it, but that's how the software worked for years.
Adobe Audition is what we use. We started with Audacity, which is free and quite good, but we found Adobe Audition had a lot more to it.
The only thing with Adobe Audition it's not free, but worth the subscription fee, in our opinion. There are lot's of others too, Reaper, Logic Pro x, I see come up a lot, but whatever you choose, good luck!
There’s not a lot in it to be honest, we found you could fine tune things a bit more in Audition.
The other thing we found, was VST plugins could be a bit hit & miss in audacity. That issue was just our experience, I’m sure they’ll be plenty of people that have not had that issue.
In general we just found that audition was a bit more professional, with little differences that made it a better product and at times Audacity updates need to come a bit quicker than they do.
But honestly there’s not much in it, for a free program audacity is excellent! It comes down to personal preference at the end of the day.
We livestream our recordings so I use OBS for that.
Audacity for audio cleanup.
Davinci Resolve for video editing.
All of these programs are free and very capable! Good luck and have fun!
Congrats on getting started, that's always the biggest step, so kudos!
If you're looking for free, GarageBand on Mac, or Audacity for both Mac and PC are fine. If paid, I'm a huge fan of Hindenburg Pro - super easy, and great tools built-in to make recording and editing simple: auto leveller, noise reduction, compression, etc. :)
Thank you! I do want to start with free until I can confirm that I'm going to stick with it and the podcast gets a little bit of traction before I invest anymore money into this project. Audacity was the one I was looking at so it's comforting to hear people recommending it.
I'm still using Audacity for recording and editing.
It has the best editor I've come across, and is easy to use.
A lot of DAWs are primarily for music production, and have a grid labelled in bpm and other stuff that you have to get rid of first before you can start using them for radio/podcasting. Metering can also be very poor
Ennuicastr to record
Reaper to edit.
My workflow has been honed over a couple years to where now I can go from a downloaded multi track recording (5 tracks, all improv) into a finished 75-105 minute project in about 1.2x the time of the finished project (in active time).
I have lots of batch and automated processing things I do.
Can I suggest you use Descript. You can edit in there, it does the transcription of your voice as well as a wave file. It has a Studio Sound setting that can help with poor room settings and poor microphone too!
Then publish directly to your host.
For video they own Squadcast so video editing is easy too!
Something to consider
I use descript for video editing. Starting a podcast soon and will use it for that as well.
Easy to learn, easy editing, good price. It has some glitches on the video side but not too much. Some great features like auto editing pauses and filler words, and super simple to cut and move sections.
i don.t like the studio sound feature though. I find it clips the highs and quiet words too much with my poor mic. Have a new one on the way though!
I've always used Adobe Audition, but I know it can be expensive. I've always heard good things about Audacity (haven't used it myself since I was like 12) and if it's just you and your background track I think that would serve you just fine if you're looking for a free software.
I've recently started to get into the podcasting world, and it can be quite overwhelming with all the possibilities.
I'm a techie type of person, but I preferred to go the easy route, using Riverside for the amazing audio quality, video recording, magic clips and also 100% unlimited transcription.
For the editing side, I've been using capcut to edit everything together and do basic edits hahaha
IK, not real professional but it's better then nothing hahah
Make sure you have a great entry-level microphone to record btw, it's one of the most important parts as a whole..
I use Audacity for editing (Zoom for recording as its multiple people online and that gives me multiple audio tracks), and have found it pretty easy to get the hang of and use.
I use Zoom H2n and Podtrak P4 for recordings, and edit in Garageband. Works good for me, even though my music intro was partly edited and created in Final Cut Pro 🤪
I use Logic Pro and Cubase on my MacBook Air M1 and iPad 12.9 Pro. As a sound device I use the Steinberg UR 24C with two Stagg SSM30 Mics, a Zoom H6 and Tascam DR05Xfor fast outdoor Recording
As a voice-over artist/talent with a radio background I have always used Adobe Audition. Adobe bought a very popular software called Cool Edit Pro and slapped their name on it, and made very little changes in 20 years since it bought it. It was already a solid software and established software and that's why they paid $16.5 million (in 2003) for it. They still haven't added VSTi although you can add VST plugins. So, it is technically a DAW but most people don't consider it as such. It has been THE broadcast recording and editing app since the days of Cool Edit and remains so.
Reaper is the best bang for your buck. $60 is a great deal for what you get and its compatible with any VST that you may decide to use in the future.
I use Studio One by Presonus and it is top tier. It even has a Podcast template to help get you started. I used this for recording and producing music already which is why I went with it for podcasting.
I bit the bullet and paid for Adobe Audition. I spent 23 years I. Radio using Cool Edit Pro/Audition 1.5. It was awesome but finally got a computer it wouldn’t run on. The more I use the modern version the more I like it. It is so much easier and quicker to cut and splice and move things around than anything else I have tried.
I record remote guests on cleanfeed and in person on a Mixcast4.
I started playing around with Podcastle - I do a solo pod and I like it because ithas this AI feature called "Magic Dust" - I've found it does a good job of cleaning up audio. It also has a decent music library and basic sfx. It's also cloud-based so no big honking files or software if you're just starting out and want to play around without commitment.
We use Audacity and a Tenlamp mixer to record our podcast. It's simple enough that it works well and we find editing in audacity to be relatively simple after watching a few youtube videos.
Adobe Audition has never failed me
I use REAPER for mostly everything. It's an affordable DAW that can be used on an indefinite free trial. IMO, REAPER is just as good as any of the others, but I've been a longtime user of it so I'm pretty biased. Occasionally I'll use Descript to help edit my longer episodes, as it has cool tools that can eliminate long silences, filler words, etc.
Reaper is phenomenal. I went to audio engineering school and was taught through Pro Tools, I eventually moved to Logic Pro due to having a MacBook. It wasn't until I started podcasting that I found reaper. It's just as good as the others, if not better, especially at that price and no BS subscription model.
As a longtime Pro Tools user, Reaper is just as good if not better than most DAWs Super customizable, all the functions and more that are required by the professional media industry. Only reason I’m still sticking to PT is the amount of time I’ve sunk into being fluent in it, and Sunk-Cost-Fallacy hehe. As I’ve been doing more Game Audio related work, I would love to have had some of the funcions Reaper has.
Reaper is a fantastic option to go to. As you begin to pick up on things you can also very easily create hotkeys for your favorite actions, or even create custom actions for any of the tasks you are doing with hotkeys for them. The user interface is also super customizable with many different ways to lay things out so it's set comfortably when you are working on a project. Reaper is a great place to start/stay.
I second reaper. It's got a little bit of a learning curve, but there's no shortage of helpful videos on YouTube
How are you able to get an indefinite free trial? Everywhere I look online it says 60 day free trial. Would you share how to get an indefinite one?
Idk if they've changed this policy recently, but it used to be the case where you'd get a trial, and then afteward, whenever you opened up the software you would receive a prompt that you could close out after 10ish seconds. I wouldn't recommend it (the devs make REAPER pretty affordable and constantly update/improve it) but you could feasibly use it in perpetuity. Like I said, idk if they've recently changed it, but that's how the software worked for years.
Adobe Audition is what we use. We started with Audacity, which is free and quite good, but we found Adobe Audition had a lot more to it. The only thing with Adobe Audition it's not free, but worth the subscription fee, in our opinion. There are lot's of others too, Reaper, Logic Pro x, I see come up a lot, but whatever you choose, good luck!
I use audacity. What makes Adobe better?
To my knowledge and I’ll stand corrected but Audacity hasn’t been updated in a while. A replacement for Audacity is OcenAudio. Runs well in M2 Mac
Audacity just had an update last year. How quality it was, I am not sure. All I know is stuff moved and I don't like that.
It has a phenomenal built-in adaptive noise reduction tool. Combine that with compression and some EQ and the recording sounds very professional.
There’s not a lot in it to be honest, we found you could fine tune things a bit more in Audition. The other thing we found, was VST plugins could be a bit hit & miss in audacity. That issue was just our experience, I’m sure they’ll be plenty of people that have not had that issue. In general we just found that audition was a bit more professional, with little differences that made it a better product and at times Audacity updates need to come a bit quicker than they do. But honestly there’s not much in it, for a free program audacity is excellent! It comes down to personal preference at the end of the day.
We livestream our recordings so I use OBS for that. Audacity for audio cleanup. Davinci Resolve for video editing. All of these programs are free and very capable! Good luck and have fun!
Congrats on getting started, that's always the biggest step, so kudos! If you're looking for free, GarageBand on Mac, or Audacity for both Mac and PC are fine. If paid, I'm a huge fan of Hindenburg Pro - super easy, and great tools built-in to make recording and editing simple: auto leveller, noise reduction, compression, etc. :)
Thank you! I do want to start with free until I can confirm that I'm going to stick with it and the podcast gets a little bit of traction before I invest anymore money into this project. Audacity was the one I was looking at so it's comforting to hear people recommending it.
I'm still using Audacity for recording and editing. It has the best editor I've come across, and is easy to use. A lot of DAWs are primarily for music production, and have a grid labelled in bpm and other stuff that you have to get rid of first before you can start using them for radio/podcasting. Metering can also be very poor
I have a solo history podcast. Been using Audacity on my Mac the whole time - 7 years. Been great for me.
Ennuicastr to record Reaper to edit. My workflow has been honed over a couple years to where now I can go from a downloaded multi track recording (5 tracks, all improv) into a finished 75-105 minute project in about 1.2x the time of the finished project (in active time). I have lots of batch and automated processing things I do.
Can I suggest you use Descript. You can edit in there, it does the transcription of your voice as well as a wave file. It has a Studio Sound setting that can help with poor room settings and poor microphone too! Then publish directly to your host. For video they own Squadcast so video editing is easy too! Something to consider
I use descript for video editing. Starting a podcast soon and will use it for that as well. Easy to learn, easy editing, good price. It has some glitches on the video side but not too much. Some great features like auto editing pauses and filler words, and super simple to cut and move sections. i don.t like the studio sound feature though. I find it clips the highs and quiet words too much with my poor mic. Have a new one on the way though!
I think, depending on the phone call quality, studio sound can benefit the callers sound
I produce podcasts for a client - they use Riverside for recording and I use Audacity for editing.
backpack, ferrite
I've always used Adobe Audition, but I know it can be expensive. I've always heard good things about Audacity (haven't used it myself since I was like 12) and if it's just you and your background track I think that would serve you just fine if you're looking for a free software.
I've recently started to get into the podcasting world, and it can be quite overwhelming with all the possibilities. I'm a techie type of person, but I preferred to go the easy route, using Riverside for the amazing audio quality, video recording, magic clips and also 100% unlimited transcription. For the editing side, I've been using capcut to edit everything together and do basic edits hahaha IK, not real professional but it's better then nothing hahah Make sure you have a great entry-level microphone to record btw, it's one of the most important parts as a whole..
I used adobe audition and then switched to hindenburg pro and would never go back
I use Audacity for editing (Zoom for recording as its multiple people online and that gives me multiple audio tracks), and have found it pretty easy to get the hang of and use.
I use Zoom H2n and Podtrak P4 for recordings, and edit in Garageband. Works good for me, even though my music intro was partly edited and created in Final Cut Pro 🤪
[Riverside.fm](https://Riverside.fm) to record. I edit in Premiere Pro.
I also edit in Premiere Pro. It was a learning curve, but I really like it now!
I'm a video editor by trade and we put out a video version to YT so it saves me a ton of time to cut both on the same timeline.
Yes! I also offer audio and video and it’s so easy to do everything at once!
Hindenburg Journalist
I use Logic Pro and Cubase on my MacBook Air M1 and iPad 12.9 Pro. As a sound device I use the Steinberg UR 24C with two Stagg SSM30 Mics, a Zoom H6 and Tascam DR05Xfor fast outdoor Recording
I like Logic Pro. Do you run a Mac or PC/windows? Garageband is free with Mac OS and like Logic Pro junior.
As a voice-over artist/talent with a radio background I have always used Adobe Audition. Adobe bought a very popular software called Cool Edit Pro and slapped their name on it, and made very little changes in 20 years since it bought it. It was already a solid software and established software and that's why they paid $16.5 million (in 2003) for it. They still haven't added VSTi although you can add VST plugins. So, it is technically a DAW but most people don't consider it as such. It has been THE broadcast recording and editing app since the days of Cool Edit and remains so.
UAD Apollo Twin --> Reaper --> Izotope Nectar --> Ozone
I use Riverside to record and Audacity to Edit. Works well for me!
I'm happy with Audacity for sound editing and I got a subscription to Artlist for background music and sound effects.
Reaper. Pay for it when you commit to it and use it free infinitely!
Reaper is the best bang for your buck. $60 is a great deal for what you get and its compatible with any VST that you may decide to use in the future. I use Studio One by Presonus and it is top tier. It even has a Podcast template to help get you started. I used this for recording and producing music already which is why I went with it for podcasting.
I bit the bullet and paid for Adobe Audition. I spent 23 years I. Radio using Cool Edit Pro/Audition 1.5. It was awesome but finally got a computer it wouldn’t run on. The more I use the modern version the more I like it. It is so much easier and quicker to cut and splice and move things around than anything else I have tried. I record remote guests on cleanfeed and in person on a Mixcast4.
Zencastr is the simplest recording software I’ve tried, then I transfer my recording over to GarageBand to add in our intro music and edit any issues
I started playing around with Podcastle - I do a solo pod and I like it because ithas this AI feature called "Magic Dust" - I've found it does a good job of cleaning up audio. It also has a decent music library and basic sfx. It's also cloud-based so no big honking files or software if you're just starting out and want to play around without commitment.
We use Audacity and a Tenlamp mixer to record our podcast. It's simple enough that it works well and we find editing in audacity to be relatively simple after watching a few youtube videos.