Audacity 3.0.0 is released!

[chk071]

Let's not makes this about Melda. They have their own dedicated topics with unequivocally opinions about their UI and workflow...

I like Audacity for literally opening up without loading time. Other wave editors need to preload stuff or initialize it. I recently needed to create DTMF tones and only knew Audacity for being able to create those nice and easy. The dark theme indeed is already an improvement.

people who have a clue what they are doing use tools that work.
others like pretty things.

I would agree, if a good UI wouldn't be something which not only can be very inspirational to work with, but also make things a lot easier than a bad UI.

So, basically... I don't think I agree at all. Unless you dumb down "good UI" to "pretty things". Which is not what this is about. A good UI can be functional, and not very pretty. Or, it can be both functional AND pretty, which makes it an even better UI. Audacity is none of those.

[antic604]

people who have a clue what they are doing use tools that work.
others like pretty things.

Luckily there's overlap and it's not an either/or situation

[arkmabat]

I would have used Cool Edit for. Its seriously a wonderful piece of software...

Audacity is a very clean, free, Cool Edit clone.

[AKJ]

I would have used Cool Edit for. Its seriously a wonderful piece of software...

Audacity is a very clean, free, Cool Edit clone.

No way. Even though it's free I would never use Audacity: it misses crucial features, has a horrible workflow and it looks awful. Cool Edit was the opposite - and it still lives as Adobe Audition.

[anarchophora]

I would have used Cool Edit for. Its seriously a wonderful piece of software...

Audacity is a very clean, free, Cool Edit clone.

No way. Even though it's free I would never use Audacity: it misses crucial features, has a horrible workflow and it looks awful. Cool Edit was the opposite - and it still lives as Adobe Audition.

What "Crucial Features" is it missing? Its been a while, but from my memory I can't think of much that CoolEdit could do that Audacity can't.

[codec_spurt]

;pp;p;;

[myca77]

How does this work on Catalina and/or Big Sur. IIRC the previous version wouldn't let you use the machines inputs without launching it via the terminal. We were planning on using it last year to do the local part or remote recordings* but that stopped us and we had to shift to something else that didn't involve actors having to input terminal commands.

*track in Pro tools remotely using IPDTL and have the actor record the stem locally, then comp the session.

[classic]

Is it possible to make such things like a tape stop effect with it, or strech parts of the audio or shorten them?
Or something like a pitch drop?

[Erisian]

Is it possible to make such things like a tape stop effect with it, or strech parts of the audio or shorten them?
Or something like a pitch drop?

It has stretch functions and it can change tempo without changing pitch, pitch without tempo or both together and many other effects, plus it supports vst effects.

[nachenko]

This. If you need a very simple, straightforward wave editor with an interface that makes actual sense, Ocenaudio is your thing.

I could never get past the hideous UI, especially when the buttons were done in pastels.

I prefer this, for when I don't want to open SoundForge, and wait for it to load my insane amount of plugins:
screenshot_win01.png
https://www.ocenaudio.com/features
screenshot_win02.png
https://www.ocenaudio.com/download

[Dirtgrain]

Or, it can be both functional AND pretty, which makes it an even better UI. Audacity is none of those.

Audacity is quite functional--and it has never been hard for me to use.

[sambaji]

Audacity has been with me for years. I have a soft spot for open-source. Sure Audacity may not have a modern look to it but it is user-friendly in its multi-functionality as a wave editor, which is what ultimately matters--substance over style. However, unlike Windows, Audacity is available as 64bit on Mac, which is the system I work on.

[rasmusklump]

The only problem I have with it is that I cannot set a path to the vst plugins, so I would have to duplicate the ones I like to use in audacity. Is there a solution for this?

[quikquak]

I wish they would compile a 64 bit Windows version. They've done a 64 bit Mac version, so it's hard to understand the motive behind 32 only for Windows.

[Trensharo]

I needed to edit an audio file, so I downloaded Audacity on my iMac. I moved one of the toolbars and the entire UI got miffed up. I could never get it back to the way it was. There is probably a reset mechanism somewhere, but I never bothered to find it.

I went straight to Amazon, bought Sound Forge Audio Studio for my PC Laptop and never looked back.

UI design has always been the Achilles heel of FOSS. Fu ctionally the software is good, but the design and usability is in the toilets.

Blender had this issue, and it took them well over a decade to do a decent UI Revamp.

And honestly as a wave editor it isn't even that impressive compared to something like WaveLab, Samplitude Pro X, or Sound Forge Pro. In any case, its more of an Audition clone than a pure Wave Editor, anyways. Basically, a DAW without Virtual Instrument support.