Native Instruments Komplete 26 released

[jamcat]

They want a lot of money for stuff you’ll never use.

[bmanic]

Yeah.. 400€ for me to upgrade from KU 14.. and the only thing I'd be interested in for the sake of preservation and future proofing is Absynth 6.

Nope. They ain't getting a penny from me yet again.

[VitaminD]

A lot changed here in terms of licensing. It used to be the same price to upgrade for the last version or a few versions. Now there seems to be differently prices depending on which prior version you are on.

I find that disappointing.

I'm signed in to my account and see this page

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https://www.native-instruments.com/en/catalog/music-creation/bundles/komplete/

shows me 149 to update Komplete Standard

Yet when I click on it it takes me to this page

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https://www.native-instruments.com/en/pricing/komplete-26-standard/

which shows me 199 to update the same.

They can keep it!

[wagtunes]

What a train wreck. Hard pass and I've been buying Komplete since 2014. They have really jumped the shark with this one.

[bermudagold]

They are extolling the "breadth" of Komplete 26. Ok, but how many musicians are actually scoring using choirs, then moving on to country music, then ambient, then dystopian, then pop, then chamber music and R&b? If you're that good (or that scattered?) there's probably some session musician gigs for you but otherwise too much is too much.

KEv

Even then there are probably better solutions than spending all the money on all these Kontact Libraries

If I am ever hired to score a movie where hyper realistic violins are super important I would then have the budget just to hire an actual violinist to do so and if the budget isn't there for that than the violins in HALion7 will have to do. Or I can spend $25 and rent UVI Sonic Pass for a month

You certainly don't need expensive and vast libraries any more

that doesn't seem to be the case...the sync musician community constantly states how you reach a point fairly quickly where you cant get access to a lot of work without spending the money on high end libraries...you don't have to believe me of course there are lots of podcasts on it

Sure, and that's a world I actually know decently well. How big do you think that market is however? There thousands of people fighting for the same handful of jobs most of which are not going to pay well, a world where tons of people are willing to work for nothing except "exposure"?

Don't think for a second lots of people making podcasts like that are not acting as gatekeepers trying to discourage competition for the same jobs they are trying to get by telling noobs hey you need to buy all these super expensive high end libraries so you too can score a low budget film or documentary where the caterer will make far more than you.

Not to mention every six months more and more students graduate from Full Sail, Berklee, and endless University film school programs with all the expensive high end libraries they took out massive debt to buy. You will see them begging on a bunch of scoring and foley forums looking to score TV, or films for peanuts or even free because they are so desperate to do anything and build a resume

That is something the podcasters won't tell you, they also won't tell you that AI is destroying any chance you think you might have to break into that business. Why would any producer or director of any project that doesn't have a massive budget hire anyone when Suno and other AIs can score it without high end libraries. That situation is only going to get worse over the next few years as those AI tools get better and better

Anyone dropping serious cash in 2026 on high end libraries in the hopes of getting good paying film score jobs should just take that money to the casino or buy a bunch of scratchers. You will have much better odds of making money. There is already thousands of people in front of you that already have them, and already have a resume far better than you working for free because that's all they can get

And if you are scoring a film, documentary, or whatever for free it even for peanuts why own high-end libraries to make the pain sting even more?

valid points and some truths in there for sure

[JasonSpatola]

Worst Komplete ever.

EvilDragon made it sound like they were working on something actually cool.

WTF EvilDragon?!

[Echoes in the Attic]

Yeah nothing here appeals to me other than the Absynth upgrade. Think I'll just wait for a half off sale on that.

[zvenx]

Worst Komplete ever.

EvilDragon made it sound like they were working on something actually cool.

WTF EvilDragon?!

But did he say it was part of Komplete?
rsp

[VitaminD]

Worst Komplete ever.

EvilDragon made it sound like they were working on something actually cool.

WTF EvilDragon?!

But did he say it was part of Komplete?

So it is in MoreKompleter?

[DrGonzo]

Worst Komplete ever.

EvilDragon made it sound like they were working on something actually cool.

WTF EvilDragon?!

No love for NI here, but turning around a company like NI that has been mismanaged for decades is not going to happen overnight. If there is any light in the tunnel I don't expect to see it until the end of the year.

[Harry_HH]

”turning around a company like NI that has been mismanaged for decades is not going to happen overnight”

If this is true, how come this ”mismanaged company” pre 2024 been able to produce and implement and launch decades so great products?

The downhilll started from the acquisition of the iZotope. That fusion was really unfortunate because of the overlapping clientele.

NI started to bundle NI products and Izotope products for the customers which already had most of main iZotope products. At the same time NI stopped /reduced developing /deliver major innovations such as the Reaktor and major high quality instruments and effects, concentrating on the preset libraries and ”atmospheric sample players”.

The add on value of the Komplete series products for the existing loyal customers has decreased dramatically at the same time as their pricing has rocketed.

[DrGonzo]

”turning around a company like NI that has been mismanaged for decades is not going to happen overnight”

If this is true, how come this ”mismanaged company” pre 2024 been able to produce and implement and launch decades so great products?

The downhilll started from the acquisition of the iZotope. That fusion was really unfortunate because of the overlapping clientele.

Yeah, that's the problem. I don't agree with you the downturn started around 2024. Most people I talk to see the downturn began much earlier. Perhaps the first major point was Kore when things started to go south.

[dayjob]

I’d rather pay for à la carte updates of the few ni products I actually care about than download 70gb of sample libraries I will never use. I don’t care about the included izotope products. I bought the things from izotope long ago that I was interested but now don’t care to pay their ridiculous update prices anymore. The daws and other environments I work in, not to mention 3rd party plug ins that do everything and more, are more than satisfying for sound design and dsp.

[mumpcake]

What's New? (for me 15 -> 26)

Absynth 6
Electric Neon Essentials guitar library
Jade and Teak electric pianos
Nectar 4 Elements
Ozone 12 Elements
FXEQ
Play Libraries
- 24k Drums
- 24k Keys
- Discoteca Drums
- Discoteca Keys
- Halo Vox
- Hypr
- Luxa
- Marco Polo Drums
- Roux
Some "expansions"
Some Leap expansions
8 Massive X expansions

The play libraries add 2 hip hop drum instruments to however many are already there. The Italo-disco are at least something that hasn't been done to death, but all of the other new Play libraries seem redundant.

the problem with the play libraries is they don't have a ton of appeal beyond casuals and newcomers because they aren't deeply sampled...they are mostly made from one shots and wavetables...they rely on signature branding like drake producer "noah 40" etc...similar to what waves was all about for a while...but to be fair casuals and newcomers is what they're aimed at and that is what they want

After all of my complaints of how bad the Play series is I managed to put together a few decent bars of an IDM/chill track with a couple of patches from Hypr and 24k Drums. On the other hand, this came after going through a few play libraries and being disgusting at not having found anything interesting...

The thing about the Play Libraries, for me, is that they don't always suck for the same reasons. For example, I thought most of the R&B libraries didn't have anything that the factory library could not have done better. On the other hand they have a couple of Lo-Fi libraries and I think most of those patches were unlistenable due to overuse of distortion, vibrato, or low pass filters.

[freshalex]

”
The downhilll started from the acquisition of the iZotope. That fusion was really unfortunate because of the overlapping clientele.“

Absolutely right! But to this day, NI still hasn’t managed to create proper offers for customers who own both.

Instead, they sell ridiculous iZotope MPS upgrades — 8.5 and 9 — at completely unjustified prices by integrating Komplete content that many of us have already paid for long ago.

In the end, I’m buying from neither of them anymore and will shift my focus almost entirely to Spectrasonics, where real upgrades are actually being released.