SAMPLED#plugins
11 stories
Stories tagged #plugins on Sampled — sound, style, and scenes, all in one place.
Why Are Producers Leaving VST2 for CLAP in 2026?
VST2 is officially retired, VST3 is still the default, and the open-source CLAP format is quietly winning over plugin makers. Here's what that means for your studio.
How Is AI Changing the Way Audio Plugins Are Made?
Producers who never wrote a line of code are describing effects in plain words and hearing them in their DAW minutes later. Here is why that is good news for indie creators.
What Is AutoTune Advanced, and Does It Finally Keep Vocals Sounding Human?
Antares just released its new flagship tuner, with an engine built to keep a singer's vibrato and a live mode under 1 ms. Here's what's new, what it costs, and who should buy it.
What Is a Plugin in Music Production, and Which Ones Do You Need?
VST, AU, AAX, CLAP — what plugins actually are, the difference between instruments and effects, and the handful you genuinely need to start.
The Lane You Are Missing
Hidden Revenue Stream for Music Creatives: how AI coding tools let producers build, sign and sell their own plugins.
Serum 2 has a Linux build now — what to check before you install it
Xfer Records put a Linux beta in front of registered users. It is a real port with real system requirements, not a wrapper.
Best Free VST Plugins for Producers
A practical guide to the best free VST plugins for producers, beatmakers, artists, and home-studio creators.
Best Vocal Plugins for Home Studios
A practical guide to vocal plugins for home studios, covering pitch correction, EQ, compression, reverb, and creative effects.
Best Auto-Tune Plugins for Independent Artists
A practical guide to Auto-Tune and pitch-correction plugins for independent artists, vocalists, and producers.
GForce x Sequential: the first official Prophet-5 plugin, and what 'official' is worth
A soft Prophet-5 with the actual Sequential logo on it dropped today. In a market full of unofficial clones from Arturia and u-he, the question is whether a license still moves the needle.
Why Tracktion's JUCE and Waveform Free are quietly the most generous toolkit in music software
One company maintains the C++ framework that runs most of your plugins and gives away a full-fat DAW with unlimited tracks. The catch: there isn't one.