Who has the worst plugin manager/install experience?

[Harry_HH]

inMusic BFD is the clear winner.

Close the thread, we have a winner.

Several minutes to phone home and authorize all of the expansions (on a separate http call for each expansion) every time you open the plugin, freezing the DAW. Abysmal. I'm not hater, it's my favourite drum plugin by far, but an absolute atrocity for paid up users.

Is this thread still going on.

[aMUSEd]

The AAS All Plugins/packs installer is still pretty stupid - no options for what it installs so it always installs the AAS Player and I have to delete that, along with a bunch of AAX versions.

[Aloysius]

You can delete the crap you don't want before running the installer.

[jamcat]

Softube Central sucks pretty hard.
You can't select which plugin format(s) you want to install. It just installs all of them, with no option to skip any of them. Who needs VST3, VST2, AU, and AAX on the same machine? Who would even want that?

And then there's the issue that every time there are Softube plugin updates, Softube Central itself needs to be updated first before it can install the plugin updates. That kind of misses the point of a plugin manager making the update process quick and easy and hassle-free. Especially since you have to then hunt down and delete all of the plugin formats you didn't want installed.

Softube Central: C-

[Aloysius]

63 updates waiting for me in Softube App'. Glad I don't have to download everything individually.

[jamcat]

But you will have to manually delete 63 x 3 plugins, unless you want every plugin format clogging up your hard drive.

It wouldn't be hard for them to give you the option of which plugin format(s) to install, like many other developers do. It is what thoughtful developers who are considerate of their customers do. Not giving users a choice of formats to install reveals a sloppy, half-baked product that wasn't fully thought through, or a lazy developer who just doesn't care.

[knob_monster]

The fact that in 2026 we are still dealing with desktop managers that force-feed you VST2, VST3, AU, and AAX all at once is mind-boggling.

[HardFloorJamm3r]

It’s already been said, but Native Access is kinda annoying, and now that they own iZotope it’s going the same route. Really any developer that makes you use a proprietary install manager kind of sucks. Just give me a challenge / response and let me download from the site like the old days.

[jlgrimes11]

Personally? Waves, but fck Waves and their update plans anyway.

I ran into this a while back however:

https://vi-control.net/community/thread ... ng.144394/

I've seen some interesting IK stuff on sale, but the horror stories are too much.

Waves got a horrible policy and upgrade plan. On the plus side alot of their plugins can be had for cheap if you wait out on deals but once you get sucked in an upgrade plan that's when they can get nasty.


In terms of plugin managers, most work pretty well but Ik gives me a bit of heartburn because those plugins tend to be hard to manage.


NI gets a bad rap, I think in terms of plugin managers they do a pretty good job. The exception is if you own plugins in the NI umbrella that are not 100% NI like Izotope and Plugin Alliance. But 100% NI plugins work well I think.

[Aiynzahev]

Waves. Wtf is even going on. I have like 3 or 4 waves folders because of different versions. If it weren’t for some unique tools I’d remove the lot.

Second worst is NI for their kontakt stuff.

That said IK can be annoying to figure out too for some things.