How much money have you spent on plugins?

[808fate]

Hi, how much have you guys spent on software?
I am a newbie and it seems quite expensive. I am wanting to start with Logic Pro or Ableton Live, but liking Logic more from videos.

Also, how much money if any have you made with music?

[LocalTrack19]

Hi 808fate. You can spend tons on plugins, but I would recommend to choose a DAW that you like working with, start with stock plugins and get the hang of it before you are going to buy a bunch of plugins. If you run into the limitations of some stock plugins after a while, you can always start to buy plugins. Probably by that time you will have caught a bad case of GAS anyway.
As for your other question: I have not made any money, it is a passion for me not work

[Bombadil]

a few thousand. I shudder when I think about it. The biggest chunks go to VSL SEs, and IK. Most of what I've bought over the years still works fine on my M1 Mini.

[Michael L]

You don't need ANY plugins.
Totally master your DAW for the first few years!
OR: $60/month x 3 years = $2100!

[empphryio]

Maybe 2k. But spent more on a cello and piano each.
Get Reaper as your DAW and just download Dexed, Odin2, Vital, Surge, Supermassive Valhalla, MCharmVerb, TD Kotelnikov, OTT. I don't know what Reaper costs now.. maybe 100 dollars. The rest is all free.
Check out the OSC. https://sites.google.com/site/kvrosc/
Monthly contest made entirely with free stuff, other than a DAW and computer of course.

[FapFilter]

Reaper is $60 for users who won't use it for a living. For professionals it's 220 i think.
And i agree. There is so much AWESOME free stuff, that you don't have to spend anything on software at all. Even some great DAWs are free

[Michael L]

Include in your calculations the amount of TIME to master each new plugin.
TIme cost often exceeds money cost.

[cdbaksu]

Logic's package for the $200 is quite ridiculous IMO. And then if you add all the great free software floating around you can just get going with that initial investment, and it'll keep you going for quite a while, until you develop a sense of what you need next.

I've spent nothing on DSP plugins, but quite a lot on virtual instruments (thousands).

[projectdan]

I can not be exact but fairly accurate, most of it is recorded in a spreadsheet, time period is from the end of 1997 to present.
Approx £600 on sequencers & upgrades
Approx £2300 on VSTs

Doesn't come to much per year, but the buying tends to be concentrated in certain periods and then nothing for years.

Made zero money doing it, never tried.

[fese]

Loads, don’t know exactly how much. Most likely not as much as in computers, audio interface, monitors, guitars and basses.
Also, plugins are so cheap now. Fifteen years ago, paying 150 bucks for an effect plugin was considered a bargain, theses days you get that quality for thirty to fifty bucks or even free. Children today don’t know how good they have it with all these plugins for nothing, when I was your age, I had to make do with bricks to compress a signal… (and now get off my lawn!)

[fese]

Also, starting with what your DAW has included and freeware and whatnot is not completely wrong, but if you find something that really speaks to you in terms of sound and workflow, just buy it. If you can afford it, that is. If not, maybe save up for a bit. Some software is really worth the money, and you are the only one that can decide that. Don’t let other people tell you what you should or shouldn’t like.

But for the beginning, starting small without spending big money isn't the worst advice, take your time to get to know stuff so that you can be sure in your judgement should you decide to buy something.

[ztrauq]

I mean... you can go completely free, for sure - grab the free version of Waveform, for example. Cakewalk by Bandlab is a full free DAW on PC, if you have a Mac Garageband is already built in and more capable than most people think. If you want to get more modular/experimental MuLab is a pretty capable modular DAW for about 80 Euros.

If you're on a Mac, you can spend the $200 on Logic Pro and legitimately not need to buy anything else, possibly ever. Not only does it come with instruments that cover just about every synthesis type under the sun, and a full suite of pro effects, but an extensive loop and sample library. It really is probably the most comprehensive all-in-one solution out there today. Downside of course is Mac only, and more limited plugin support, but if you're just using what's built in it's not an issue.

As to how much I spend... well, for me music at this point is first and foremost a hobby to have fun with when taking a break from my day job, which brings in... I would say infinitely more money than my music (which should also indicate how much money I have made from my music So, I give it a slice of my fun/discretionary budget, usually a fairly big one. It's not always a ton per year, but buying things consistently year after year for well over a decade now, I would say cumulatively definitely into the thousands of dollars. That, though, is sometimes less about making music per se and more about having fun playing around with new toys...

If you are serious about making music, though, I would say figure out what you want to make, what instruments are needed to make it, then check if your DAW has it and shop around for something if it doesn't. Certain things, like realistic cinematic orchestral... probably going to be pricey, but anything synth-based or even pop/rock can probably be fleshed out in well under a thousand with carefully considered purchases.

[Kalamata Kid]

I have limitations to avoid overspending, but even with these limitations over the years I have spent thousand$$$.
I try not to buy instrument plugins.
I prefer sample based instrument plugins.
I avoid buying FM and AM synths.
I prefer audio fx.
I am willing to spend more on midi fx and such.
I don't spend on drum plugins, libraries and such.

I have nearly every plugin I need or want so I have finally become a more discriminating buyer. I now pass up deals that even as a year or two ago I would have grabbed.
I almost exclusively buy on big sales such as when 90% off. I am in no hurry so now I wait for the big sale.

[Aloysius]

One million dollars

[WasteLand]

One million dollars

3 gold bars