Your fav Amp Sims as of 2023?

[electro]

Surprisingly, Studio One’s built-in Pedalboard plugin has the best Wah model I’ve come across.

Amplitube has a new Morley collection
https://www.ikmultimedia.com/products/m ... ube-morley

[billinder33]

Does AXE FX 3 count? Not a VST, but that wasn't specified in the OP.

On the rare occasions I reach for a VST, it's usually Helix native, but quite frankly I don't think it's all that great. I'm usually dropping it on a clean tone that I didn't personally record. If I was forced to use a VST and not my AFX3, it would probably be ML Sound Labs ML5... that one just sounds incredible. Most authentic Mesa Mark Series VST to my ears.

[Amon1973]

Latest acquisition is the Aurora DSP Laboga Mr. Hector, I'm loving it and recommend anyone into high gain to at least give it a try. It sounds quite unique, probably not everyone's cup of tea, but it's a gain behemoth. One can seriously play death metal with the gain halfway. I'm finding it extremely useful layered on my main sound.

My favourites are still the Neural DSP Nameless and NTS, which I'm using combined.
Also using the Nembrini a lot for tracking / writing / training: they sound great and are lighter on the CPU (Engl, JCM, Mesa and 5150, plus some pedals and the racks).
Used to love TH-U, Amplitube 5, STL, Brainworx, Kuassa, but I use them rarely these days.

For bass I'm liking the Neural Darkglass Ultra, PA Ampeg SVT3 Pro and Nembrini Bass Driver. Still like the IK Ampeg collections and Mark Studio 2 a lot, though.

[questionaire]

I was disappointed with all Guitar amp VST's i have tried a lot Amplitube, Guitar Rig, Studio Devil, Kuassa, Line 6 until Neural DSP came along. Neural DSP archetype Nolly was really convincing and made me buy a good telecaster. Running my telecaster through Nolly now. And really convincing tones come out. I really never had fun with running guitar into pc, now i have.
Neural DSP made guitar amp vst modelling at a higher level for me.

Just my opinion but really glad guitar amp modelling is getting there.

[Bombadil]

I'm sure this has been asked before, but whatever.
Tonex. I am re-doing template patches to take Tonex out of Amplitube and use 3rd party fx in the chain. The big thing coming, for me, is a Surfybear spring reverb, because I have yet to hear a plugin do it convincingly. I like Fender amps, and a Fender capture without a proper spring isn't quite 'there.'
There's pretty much any tone I could want on Tone.net.

[miloszz]

My real amp is a two hole JMP clone, my tastes run to cleanish British (Orange OR, Laney, Marshall Super Bass, Hiwatt etc.).

Softube - I struggle to make this sound decent, it seems worse after the latest amp room updates
Brainworx - I bought a Friedman sim on sale, sounds terrible IMO
Helix Native - sounds great after whatever update changed the IRs to where you reposition mics visually, effects have been improved over time.
NeuralDSP - didn't really give them a chance because prog-metal is not remotely my thing but I've got trials of the Asato and Henson suites going and they sound nice. My chief complaint with them is the fixed effect racks - you can turn them off and use other plugins but it just seems dumb to have them tied together so tightly.

Tonocracy/NAM - heavily depends on the captures used of course but the best captures (from someone like Amalgam Audio) sound fantastic. NAM or Tonocracy + Fractal's new Cab Lab will probably be my go-to plugin choice.

[kranick]

I have Helix Native, all Kuassa amps, some Nembrini’s Marshall and Waves. But my first choice is Amplitube 5. First of all this one has a great sound and very useful feature set for practice. I don’t like to use a DAW so standalone version is very important. Amplitube’s standalone has the best tuner, a metronome and simple 8-tracks recorder so I can play and record myself within one app. Also I joined the classroom on ArtistWorks and usually I made recordings for my teachers (Paul Gilbert and Keith Wyatt) within Amplitube without any DAW.

Also I like Bias FX2. I like how it sounds and feels, and I like all additional features like YouTube player with chord recognition, great looper, a useful recorder that records everything you play during last 5, 10 or 15 minutes.

Overloud TH-U very simple to use and tweak sounds but I don’t use it much.

[Echoes in the Attic]

Pretty much just Amplitube 5 for me and a little Klevgrand Stark. Though once I eventually upgrade to a new NI Komplete bundle I'll check out Guitar Rig again at V7. Currently at V6 I don't bother with it.

[zerocrossing]

I'm sure this has been asked before, but whatever.
Tonex. I am re-doing template patches to take Tonex out of Amplitube and use 3rd party fx in the chain. The big thing coming, for me, is a Surfybear spring reverb, because I have yet to hear a plugin do it convincingly. I like Fender amps, and a Fender capture without a proper spring isn't quite 'there.'
There's pretty much any tone I could want on Tone.net.

I’m not a Fender super fan, but I have had what I think of as very good results just using the Fender amp models with an Ownhammer cab IR. Amplitube’s reverbs are generally meh, but if I really want something better I’ll run Twangström after it.

[electro]

Overloud TH-U very simple to use and tweak sounds but I don’t use it much.

Its the best

[zerocrossing]

Overloud TH-U very simple to use and tweak sounds but I don’t use it much.

Its the best

It’s the worst.

[Uncle E]

Tonocracy/NAM - heavily depends on the captures used of course but the best captures (from someone like Amalgam Audio) sound fantastic. NAM or Tonocracy + Fractal's new Cab Lab will probably be my go-to plugin choice.

The Cab Lab 4x12 1960TV is quite bad. Strident sounding and lacks the fullness of a real cabinet to balance it out. Fortunately, the AC20 1x12 is a lot better, I would recommend that one. I tried it against the Ox Stomp and found them to be comparable quality. I haven't tried the other two.

The user experience is terrible, as well. The worst copy protection I've ever used. It forces you to log in every time you load the plugin, even when you already have it loaded, and will sometimes even force you to log in again in the middle of a session. Logging in takes over a minute and you can't do anything else while that's happening (DAW is locked, screen can't be minimized).

[miloszz]

Hmm, I haven't had to log into Cab Lab again after the initial install and adding the AC20 pack a few days ago.

[Uncle E]

Thanks, that's good to hear. I'll contact their support.

[Bombadil]

I'm sure this has been asked before, but whatever.
Tonex. I am re-doing template patches to take Tonex out of Amplitube and use 3rd party fx in the chain. The big thing coming, for me, is a Surfybear spring reverb, because I have yet to hear a plugin do it convincingly. I like Fender amps, and a Fender capture without a proper spring isn't quite 'there.'
There's pretty much any tone I could want on Tone.net.

I’m not a Fender super fan, but I have had what I think of as very good results just using the Fender amp models with an Ownhammer cab IR. Amplitube’s reverbs are generally meh, but if I really want something better I’ll run Twangström after it.

For some silly reason, I'm into rockabilly right now. When I was young, I dismissed the Stray Cats as a retro fad (while I was, cough, into 'progressive' rock), but now I enjoy the guitar licks and playing style. I've got Twangström, and it doesn't sound anything like what I would expect from a Spring.
So, I'm gonna try a real spring reverb tank, based on a Fender unit.
I'm also unimpressed with the spring reverb in my VOX AC-15C. It sounds separate from the guitar and I find distracting.
I also want Hawaii 5-0 and the Munsters theme to sound right.