Studio One goes from strength to strength and version 6 is a phenomenal piece of recording software. The single-window approach, with the ability to drag-and-drop audio, plugins, instruments, and ideas, makes it simple to navigate and quick to build up your tracks. The interface is completely customisable so you only need to see the tools you’re using for a very clean and streamlined experience.

With Scratch Pads, it can let you try out new ideas without messing up your mix. You can add in song markers, key changes, chords, and structures around all your parts. You can undo changes in the mixer and work on multiple ideas and try them out against each other. It’s such a forgiving piece of software it makes you feel you can always come back to a place where it was working before you went off down some crazy avenue.

It comes with a great range of virtual instruments that covers most of what you’ll be using all the time. The audio plugins compete with some of the best third-party ones and have some really fun and creative options. You can edit your MIDI as patterns, piano roll and as a full score with integrated lyrics, so you are never short of another view. And for sound-to-picture composers, the integrated video track makes it a breeze.

Studio One also pushes outside of the DAW by giving you a Mastering Suite for completing your album and a performance space where you can work up and gig an entire set using the same tools you use to craft your music in the first place.

Studio One can take you from the initial idea through to a finished product and onto performing it live. The latest update of Studio One includes the Dolby Atmos Renderer which lets you build mixes in surround sound and spatial audio. You can put instruments into a space and move them around. It’s perfect for games, vital for soundtracks and a requirement for Apple music streaming with full support for binaural headphone monitoring. No other DAW offers such a complete package and it feels completely competent throughout.

Street Price: $399 (subscription options are available)
presonus.com

Often seen as the industry standard in creative music production software, Cubase has now reached version 12 and consolidates itself as one of the best in the business.

Steinberg invented most aspects of the DAW which everyone else copies and adapts to their own software. So, what you’ll find in here should be familiar to anyone who has ever used any other DAW software. All the major elements of recording audio and sequencing MIDI have been taken care of and Steinberg focuses on constantly re-evaluating the workflow and building in additional functionality.

It has some really cool features like the ability to pull in selected tracks from other projects or that it can retrospectively record MIDI so that you never miss a thing even if you weren’t in Record. Tools are combined within the mouse pointer and change depending on what you’re pointing at and you can build macros to control multiple things at once.

Cubase comes with an excellent array of virtual instruments and some seriously professional audio plug-ins. The Channel Strip in the Mix Console is amazingly good for crafting the tone of your audio tracks and the mixer history lets you go back and forth throughout all our mix changes. The Sample Track is a very creative way of pulling any audio from any place and using it as a sampled instrument complete with integrated modulation, slicing, and gliding.

Studio One only tops this list because it innovates more, whereas Cubase is rock solid and dependable. If I could have a tie, then they would share first place.

Pros & Cons

Street Price: $579
steinberg.net

Waveform Pro just gets better and better. It pioneered the single window approach way before Studio One thought it was a neat idea, but has often felt complicated. That’s because there are some very deep features in here, but with every new version, these get massaged into a much more approachable interface. Tracktion Waveform is no longer scary; it’s brilliant.

Waveform likes to give you full control over everything. Every single clip can be messed with in its own little word of editing, probability, modulation and change. There are no separate editing windows you just zoom into what you want to focus on and get busy. You can load up plugins and processes on a clip that would normally only be available per track in other DAWs.

For MIDI, you can generate patterns, resequence ideas, add randomisation and modulate the possibilities. They’ve just added the ability to pull chords into strums, right there in the clip. You’ve now got a specialised drum clip editor with pattern selection and arranging. And if you want to get into details there’s a full MIDI event editor.

The layout is smooth and stylish. It favours drag and drop and is deeply interested in building whole arrays of plugins and networks of processes. You can wire up things in Waveform that other DAWs could only dream of. And all the time, everything can be moved and modulated, connected and mixed. The effects and instruments have all improved dramatically while the complexity has been streamlined, and now Waveform is a very strong contender.

The latest update 12.5 adds proper video support, a suite of DJ-style mixing tools and stem extraction.

Pros & Cons

Street Price: $99 With lots of optional expansions
tracktion.com

Bitwig tends to go in a lot of different and interesting directions. While it offers the same multitrack recording with all the audio processing tools you need it has some extraordinarily creative engines going on inside which transforms it into a modular playground of sound design and musical possibility. It’s less of a blank canvas and more of an experimental instrument.

Along with the regular timeline Bitwig has a clip launching performance page where you can fire off loops and arrangements on the fly. You can build scenes for performances and stack up loops for remixing and finding new ways to express your tracks. If you’ve heard of Ableton Live, which would be the next DAW on the list, then this is a similar idea.

It’s in the building of instruments, modulation and manipulation that Bitwig really shines. The ability to attach modulators to every parameter, the get things moving, to vary and change the function of a track. You can dive into the Grid environment and build synthesizers, samples and complex CV based instruments that sound like nothing you’ve ever encountered. And it’s all under your command.

New in version 5 is the ability to transform envelopes into multi-segment modulation shapes that can scale and curve their way into any other parameter. You can pour modulation into the mixer to graphically design your entire mix. The clip launching engine has been reworked to bring in alternative gestures and programmable outcomes. And the Browser has been upgraded to help you explore everything that’s on offer.

Bitwig is different, refreshing, exciting and the right choice if you’re looking for a new way to approach music production.

Pros & Cons

Street Price: $399
bitwig.com

Reaper is the underdog, the pretender, the one snapping at the heels of the big guns and the famous names. And yet Reaper has a passionate following and is where a lot of people end up once they get frustrated with the slow pace of change and convoluted workflows of the more popular DAWs. Reaper is fast, streamlined and gets straight to the business of making music with all the same tools, all the same effects and instruments but without feeling like you’re part of a mechanical corporation. Reaper is for the rebels and it’s only 60 bucks.

Reaper is a complete digital audio workstation with multitrack audio and MIDI recording and a suite of professional mixing and mastering tools. It supports a vast range of hardware and software configurations and can be hugely extended and modified by the user and community. It doesn’t have the glamour of other DAWs but it has the grunt of a hard working music production studio.

New features that landed with version 7 include vocal comping and track lanes for switching between alternative takes, better effects routing, video support and lots of keyboard and mouse tweaks. That’s added to the a lot of features that came along between version 6 and 7 including surround sound panning, retroactive MIDI recording, group editing, new pitch shift and time stretch algorithms and superb metering. Reaper keeps on developing and evolving all the time and is better and sharper than its ever been.

Pros & Cons

Street Price: $60
reaper.fm

Reason is not just a DAW it’s an entire synthesizer workstation that gives you a huge rack of synths, drum machines, samplers and effects for generating multi-layered tracks of epic proportions. Each synth or device is an inspiration, filled with presets and possibilities that take your music to new places. The rack is a playground of electronic sound that is visually stunning and easy to use.

With version 12 Reason adds the Mimic Creative Sampler which is perfect for the modern beatmaker and designed for quick triggering, chopping, slicing and messing things about. You can combine it with drum machines in the style of an MPC or 808, you can run it through classic and modern effects and you can combine it with layers of other synths, samplers and sounds and hide the complexity behind a macro-based Combinator interface.

You have dozens of instruments and effects, all wired together, all with the potential to affect one another while being manipulated by MIDI effects and sequencer devices, LFOs and CV utilities

The rack can also be taken out of Reason and dropped into another DAW as a huge electronic sound-generating plugin so it’s great as your only DAW but also for running with other ones. All the time it has a full audio engine for sound recording with a huge console-style mixer with audio processing. In the arranger, you can lay out your tracks, re-arrange audio alongside your rack of synths.

The latest version has gone high-definition so it looks amazing on any type of screen and they also offer a subscription service so you’re never run out of content or get left behind as the software evolves.

Pros & Cons

Street Prices: $499
reasonstudios.com

FL Studio is a great DAW because it works differently. The whole vibe of this software emerges from the simple form of a step sequencer. It has been step sequencing way before anyone thought it was cool and has been the favorite music software of underground electronic artists for decades.

In the mixed media of the DAW it can’t all be about step sequencing and Version 20 bears little resemblance to the early incarnations but it carries a lot of what makes it awesome through to today.

It’s a very visual program using color in unexpected places, animated displays, and the fabulous plug-in picker which throws up a scattering of thumbnails to help you choose the right effect or instrument. And it comes packed with both. There are more included instruments than any other DAW, from fierce synths to glowing pads, authentic instruments, drum machines, and samplers. It’s a dance music paradise and so much more.

The last few years have seen FL Studio embrace and build up the audio production side. The mixing console goes from strength to strength with innovative routing and combination options. The track view is never-ending and completely adaptable. You can treat audio as linear or as clips, loops, or one-shot samples. It doesn’t have the tight structure of other DAWs and prefers to give you the freedom to layout and process your audio and MIDI in whichever way you choose.

There are performance elements that let you take this on your laptop and remix your music in a live environment. But that also encourages a way to remix and generate new ideas in the studio.

FL Studio doesn’t perhaps have all the hardcore audio production tools of Cubase or Studio One but it oozes creativity and encourages experimentation. It refuses to be a blank canvas or a tape machine, it’s your partner in music production.

Pros & Cons

Street Price: $189+ depending on bundle
image-line.com

Pro Tools considers itself to be the industry standard in recording software and with good reason.

It is probably the DAW most widely used in professional studios. It was designed to replicate a hardware studio and integrate with it to become the recording center and so the way that it works is comfortingly familiar to people who are used to working with professional recording gear.

Pro Tools works with two views; the Mixer and the Arranger/Editor. Everything you ever want to arrange or edit can be done in the same view that lists all the tracks and all the recorded audio and MIDI. You have a simple toolset that tackles all the most common tasks and the workflow is very fast and logical.

The Mixer is fast and powerful with multiple inserts and routing options a button click away. It doesn’t have the slick looks of many other DAWs but it has the power to handle huge projects with ease.

It comes with a wide range of professional-grade plugins to process and sculpt your audio and a handful of virtual instruments for sound sources. Although Pro Tools’ forte is audio it does have a comprehensive MIDI creation and editing side that has come along in strides over the last few versions.

AVID has pioneered the online Cloud Collaboration format where you can share projects online securely with other Producers so that they can add to your work wherever they may be.

Pro Tools is a comprehensive recording and producing solution that’ll always be a good choice for experienced engineers and producers.

Pros & Cons

Street Prices:
• $34.99 Monthly subscription
• $299 For 1 year upfront
• $599 If you just want to buy it
avid.com

All street prices listed at the time of writing.