Every tool in Oxtave, from the first take to the final master. No add-on packs, no tiers — it all ships in the one app.
- Features
- 249
- Areas
- 11
- Effects
- 31
Recording
Stay in the take. Sort it out later.
Cycle recording into takes
Loop a section and every pass lands on its own lane, ready to compare.
Comping
Click a take to make it the one you hear; the others stay muted, not deleted.
Swipe comping
Drag across a take to hear just that stretch of it and build one performance from the best moments.
Click-free comp switches
Every switch between takes gets an equal-power crossfade, added for you, with its length in Preferences.
Punch in and out
Drop in at punch points of their own, separate from the loop, with pre-roll and post-roll so you hear the lead-in.
Record modes
Keep every take, replace what was there, or keep only this cycle's takes. MIDI can make new parts, merge or replace, and cycle passes can mix, overwrite, keep the last or stack.
Pre-record
While a track is armed, up to a minute of input is kept, so the note you played just before pressing Record is in the take.
Your file format
Record to WAV with Broadcast Wave information, Wave64 or AIFF, at 16 or 24 bits or 32- or 64-bit float.
Any sample rate in and out
Input and output devices can run at different rates; the input is converted as you record.
Recording safety
Lock Record asks before a take is stopped, the status bar shows how much record time the disk has left, and Record from Selection and Re-Record start takes where you want them.
Metronome and count-in
A click while you play, with a count-in before recording starts.
Click patterns and click track
Set the accent of every beat, add eighths or triplets, choose the sound, and give the click its own track with pattern changes along the song.
Input monitoring
Hear the input through the track and its effects while you play: by hand, while armed, while recording, or tape-machine style.
Direct monitoring through your interface
On Windows with an ASIO interface that supports it, monitored inputs go straight to your headphones through the interface, with no delay from the computer.
Multichannel recording
Record a 5.1, quad or other wide input bus onto a track of the same layout as one multichannel take, and hear every channel in its speaker while you record.
On-screen keyboard
No MIDI keyboard? Play and record notes with the mouse or the computer keys.
Group editing
Comp several tracks at once, so a multi-mic drum take stays together.
Track versions
Keep alternative sets of clips on one track and switch between them, like playlists.
MIDI recording
Cycle laps merge into a single part per pass, or enter notes one at a time with step input.
Latency compensation
New takes move earlier by what your audio device adds, so they land where you heard them. A loopback test measures the real delay.
Retrospective record
Forgot to press record? What you just played on your keyboard becomes a part, right where you played it.
Your choice of audio driver
Core Audio on Mac, the low-latency interface drivers on Windows, JACK or PipeWire on Linux. Pick one in Audio Settings and it’s remembered; 16- and 24-bit devices work too.
Editing
Fast hands, forgiving history.
Editing tools
Select, range, split, glue, erase, zoom, mute, comp and draw — each a single key away.
Line tool
Draw straight lines, curves, sine, triangle and square shapes on automation lanes and clip volume envelopes, or set the gain of several clips along a line.
Range editing
Drag across any span of time on any tracks, then cut, copy, paste, delete, split, crop or mute just that span.
Insert and delete time
Open up room for a new section or close a gap, on chosen tracks or across the whole song; markers, tempo and time signature changes move with it, so everything stays on its bar.
Move, copy, repeat
Trim, Alt-drag to copy, duplicate, repeat and nudge clips on or off the grid.
Fades and clip gain
Fade in and out with curve shapes, crossfade overlapping clips and set gain per clip.
Clip volume envelopes
Draw a volume curve over a clip to ride one word or breath; it stays on the audio when you trim or split.
Snap and audio quantize
Snap to the grid you choose and quantize audio events to it.
Snap modes
Snap to the grid, keep a clip's offset from the grid, snap to other clips and markers, or to the playhead. Shuffle mode pushes neighbouring clips aside, and cuts can land on zero crossings so they never click.
Shared copies
Repeat a clip or part as linked copies: edit the notes or audio processing of one and every copy follows. Convert any copy back to a real one when it needs to differ.
Crossfade editor
Pick separate fade-out and fade-in curves (linear, equal power, S-curve or your own shape), move or resize the overlap, and listen before you commit.
Auto fades
Short fades on every clip edge and crossfades where clips overlap, for the whole project or per track, so cuts never click.
Slip, lock, group and colour
Slide the audio inside a clip with Ctrl/Cmd+Alt-drag, lock clips so they can't move, group clips that belong together, and colour them by hand or with the Color tool.
Event naming
Rename many clips at once from a pattern with the track name, a number and the take.
Scrub and Time Warp tools
Drag over audio to hear it at your hand's speed, or drag a beat line to where the music really is and the tempo map follows.
Tempo tools
Tap the tempo in, make a span of bars last an exact number of seconds, and insert or remove whole bars across the song.
Undo history
Up to 500 steps or unlimited, with a history panel you can jump to any point in. Optionally saved with the project, so you can undo after reopening it.
Markers
Drop markers on the ruler and manage them from a list.
Marker tracks and cycle markers
Up to ten marker lanes with position markers and named ranges. Number them 1 to 9 to jump there from the number pad, or click a range to loop it.
MIDI & instruments
Notes you can shape down to the last tick.
Key editor
A piano roll with a velocity lane and controller lanes for CC, pitch bend and aftertouch.
Note chase
Start playback in the middle of a long note and it still sounds, with the latest controller values.
14-bit parameter lanes
Edit RPN and NRPN controllers with their full 16,384-step resolution; recorded sequences fold into single events.
Drum editor
Hit-based editing with drum maps you can rename and extend, with input and output notes, channels, and a grid and note length per sound.
List editor
Every event as an editable row, with type and channel filters, value bars, and events you can insert by hand.
MIDI 2.0 devices
MIDI 2.0 keyboards and controllers connect at full resolution on Mac and Linux: 65,536-step velocities and finely graded controllers reach the instruments and plugins, are recorded, saved and played back as played.
SysEx
Keep synth setup dumps in a part, record them from your hardware and send them to MIDI outputs as the song plays: edit the bytes, import and export .syx files, and carry them through MIDI files.
Editing tools
Range, Trim, Split, Glue, Mute and Scrub tools in the key and drum editors, alongside Select, Draw, Erase and Line.
Chord tools
Draw whole chords that fit the scale, turn them into inversions or drop-2 and drop-3 voicings, and see the selection's chord named.
Editor scale
Shade or show only the notes of a key, fix notes to it, and snap what you play on a MIDI keyboard into it.
Note details
Mute single notes, and set release velocity, velocity variance and play probability per note for patterns that breathe.
Note colours
Colour notes by velocity, pitch, channel, part, timing against the grid, or whether they're in the scale.
Step input
Enter notes from a MIDI keyboard or the computer keys, with lengths, dotted and triplet values, rests, ties and insert mode.
Edit in place
Draw, move and resize notes right on the timeline in a small piano roll inside each part.
Editor in its own window
Move the MIDI editor to a second screen; parts you open follow it there.
MIDI copy and paste
Copy, cut and paste notes with their controllers inside the editor, and whole MIDI parts in the arrange view.
Edit several parts at once
Open a selection of parts together; the others show as dimmed notes, and a click switches which one you edit.
Multiple controller lanes
Up to six CC, pitch bend and aftertouch lanes on screen at once, each with its own controller.
Lines and curves
Draw velocity and controller ramps and waves: line, parabola, sine, triangle or square, on the grid.
Parts on the timeline
Move, resize and split MIDI parts right in the arrange view, with a mini piano roll inside each.
Quantize
Grid (with tuplets up to septuplets), swing, strength, catch and safe ranges, humanize and length quantize, with presets and Auto Apply.
Reset and freeze quantize
Put quantized notes back exactly where they were played, or make the new timing final.
Groove quantize
Take the timing and accents of a MIDI part or a drum recording and give that feel to other parts.
Auto-quantize recording
New MIDI recordings snap to your quantize settings when you stop.
MIDI functions
Fixed lengths and velocity, legato, delete doubles and overlaps, pedals to note length, velocity shaping, restrict polyphony, thin out data, reverse, mirror and invert.
Transpose setup
Transpose with scale correction from one key and scale to another, and keep notes inside a range.
Dissolve and merge
Split a part into one part per drum or channel, or print what the MIDI effects play inside the loop as notes.
MIDI inserts
Fourteen real-time MIDI effects: arpeggiator, chorder, transpose, echo, step designer, quantizer, density, compressor, context gate, note to CC, auto LFO, micro tuner, transformer and monitor.
Transformer and input transformer
Logical-editor rules applied as you play, or to incoming MIDI before it is recorded.
MIDI monitor
A live list of every note and controller passing a point in the MIDI chain.
MIDI modifiers
Transpose, velocity, length, random and range settings plus a track delay, without editing the parts; freeze them in when you're done.
Per-track MIDI input
Each track listens to all inputs, one keyboard or one keyboard's channel, so two players can record at once.
MIDI sends
Play a track's MIDI on up to four other tracks, before or after its MIDI effects.
Record the effect output
Record the arpeggio or echo a MIDI effect plays instead of the keys you pressed.
Built-in instruments
A subtractive/wavetable synth, a drum machine and a sampler you load your own sounds into — drag in files and map them across the keyboard.
Sampler track
Drop any audio, or turn a clip into an instrument, and play it on the keyboard: loops with crossfades, slices at each hit, tempo sync, envelopes, glide and clean high notes.
Drum machine
128 pads in eight banks with up to four velocity layers each, per-pad filter, drive, bitcrush, EQ and choke groups, separate outputs per pad, and kits you save and load.
Granular synth
Build evolving textures from tiny grains of any file or a built-in sound, with size, density, spray, freeze and scan.
Preset library
About 160 synth sounds and 29 drum kits, searchable by name, category and tag, plus twelve wavetables and sixteen reverb spaces — all generated, no downloads needed.
Sound Library
Optional open-licence sample packs — pianos, an organ, bass, drum kits and a full orchestra — downloaded on request and listed with their licences.
SFZ import
Load SFZ sample instruments into the sampler, with velocity layers, round robins, loops and envelopes.
MIDI files
Import and export Standard MIDI Files with every tempo and time-signature change.
Composition
From sketch to score.
Score editor
Notation display and editing, printed or exported as PDF and MusicXML.
Lyrics
Type lyrics straight onto the notes, several verses deep, with hyphens and extender lines placed for you.
Slurs, hairpins, pedal, ottava and ornaments
Slurs, crescendo and diminuendo hairpins, dynamics, pedal and 8va lines, trills, mordents, turns, fermatas and breath marks.
Repeats, endings and jumps
Repeat barlines, first and second endings, D.C., D.S., Coda, Fine, rehearsal marks and tempo text, and playback can follow them.
Layouts and part extraction
A full score plus a part for each player, with its own page setup and multi-bar rests; transposing instruments at written or concert pitch.
Grace notes, tremolos, voices and tuplets
Grace notes, tremolos, up to four voices per staff, notes crossing between piano staves and any tuplet ratio.
Guitar tab
Tab under the notation or on its own, with tuning presets, capo and automatic fingering.
Page layout control
Paper, margins, staff size, bars per line, lines per page, line and page breaks, title block and page numbers.
Expression maps
Articulation switching for orchestral libraries, drawn on their own lane.
Expression map groups and sound slots
Combine articulations from separate groups, give combinations their own key switch, compensate slow attacks and import key-switch lists.
Microtuning
Play any track in a Scala scale with keyboard mapping, or let adaptive just intonation retune each note to the chord track.
MPE recording and note expression
Record expressive controllers per note, edit many notes' curves at once, and send them to plug-ins as native note expression.
Pattern sequencer depth
Lanes with their own length, rate and direction, ratchets, Euclidean fills, variations in a play order, melodic patterns that follow the chords, and conversion to notes.
Project logical editor
Rule-based batch edits on tracks, parts, clips and markers, saved as commands you can bind or use in macros.
Note expression and MPE
Per-note parameters, with MPE support for expressive controllers.
Chord track
Add, audition and edit chords on their own lane, with a chord assistant, voicings, chord pads and a scale track.
Extended chords
Sixths, ninths, elevenths, thirteenths, half-diminished and altered chords like G7♭9 — pick them or just type the symbol.
Follow the chord track
Change the chords and your MIDI parts follow while they play — as chord tones, scale notes, root notes or new voicings.
Chords from what you played
Name the chord under your selected notes, and turn MIDI parts or audio clips into chord events in one step.
Chord pad players and patterns
Pads voiced like a pianist or a guitarist, playing rhythms, strums and arpeggios — or any rhythm from your own MIDI part.
Circle of fifths and proximity
Find the next chord by key relationship or by which chords sit closest to the one you just played.
Live arranger
Play a chain of song sections without touching the timeline, and jump to any section on the next beat, bar or section end.
Logical editor
Rule-based batch edits across a part or the whole project.
Arranger track
Name song sections and chain them into playback orders.
Step sequencer
Pattern-based beat programming alongside the timeline.
Global tracks
Transpose and ruler tracks that apply across the project.
Macros
Chain commands, logical editor presets and project logical editor rules into one, each step with its own repeat count or scope, and bind it to a key.
Audio processing
Bend time, tune pitch, pull a song apart.
Tempo and signature tracks
Tempo changes and ramps, with time signatures that follow along.
Musical mode
Audio follows tempo changes at once with real-time time-stretch, and a high-quality render takes over in the background.
Stretch quality per clip
Choose how each clip stretches: standard, high quality for mixes, solo voice, or drum slices that keep every hit sharp.
Audio warp
Place warp markers and quantize the timing of recorded audio.
Tempo and beat detection
Find the tempo, detect hitpoints and slice audio on the beat.
Pitch and formant correction
Detect monophonic notes, then edit pitch and formant note by note.
Audio to MIDI
Extract a melody from audio as MIDI notes.
Stem separation
Split a mix into vocals, drums, bass and other with a neural model that runs on your Mac.
Offline processes
Normalize, reverse, gain, DC removal, resample and pitch shift, all with non-destructive history.
Any plug-in as an offline process
Print a built-in effect, a plug-in or a whole chain onto a clip or just part of it. Listen first; later, change its settings, reorder it or remove it from the history.
Sample editor
A detailed waveform and spectral view, with spectral editing.
Spectral repair
Box, lasso or brush a noise in the spectral view and turn it down, erase it or heal it from the sound around it. De-click, de-hum, de-noise from a learned noise profile and de-clip, all as steps you can remove later.
Spectral unmix
Pull a sound out of a recording: extract a spectral selection, the harmonic or percussive part, or AI stems onto new tracks lined up to the sample, or remove them from the clip. One step you can undo or remove later.
Audio follows the chord track
Retune a recorded vocal or bass line to the chords: chord tones, scale notes or root notes.
Harmony voices
Make up to four backing harmonies from a lead vocal, each on its own track and following the chords.
Sample editing
Cut, copy, paste, delete and insert silence inside a clip, or redraw the waveform with a pencil to fix a click. Every edit is a step in the clip's history you can undo or remove later.
Regions and statistics
Name parts of a recording as regions and turn them into clips, and measure peak, true peak, RMS, DC offset and loudness.
Detect silence
Preview where the sound is, then split a recording into one clip per sound with short fades.
Hitpoints to drums and grooves
Turn a drum recording into MIDI drum notes, with a pitch per sound and velocities from how hard each hit was, or into a groove to quantize to.
Quantize together
Quantize a multi-mic recording as one: every track moves by exactly the same amount, so nothing goes out of phase.
Pitch editing extras
Per-note volume, tilt the pitch curve around any point, straighten just part of a note, and quantize to any scale or follow the scale track.
Audio alignment
Line up the timing of multiple takes against a reference.
Mixing & automation
A full console, without the clutter.
Mixer console
Full channel strips, several mixer views and channel zones, in up to four mixer windows that each keep their own view and can sit on another screen.
Channel strip
Gate, compressor, saturation and limiter in fixed slots at the front of every channel, plus EQ; switch each on with one click, and they travel with snapshots, copied settings and track presets.
Input gain, phase and cut filters
Every channel can trim its level by ±24 dB, flip its phase and cut lows or highs at 6 to 48 dB per octave, before any effect.
Built-in channel EQ
Four bands on every channel and the master, before or after the inserts, sounding exactly like the Parametric EQ.
Pan modes and pan law
Balance, width or independent left and right panning per channel, with a 0, −3, −4.5 or −6 dB pan law; width and the right side can be automated.
Routing
Group and FX channels, VCA faders, pre/post sends and sidechains with loop protection.
Direct routing
Up to eight destinations per channel, switched with a short crossfade instead of a click, by hand or from an automation lane: ideal for stems and alternate versions.
Hardware inserts
Put outboard gear in an insert slot: send to an output pair, return from an input pair, measure the round trip with one click so it stays in time, and blend dry and wet.
Automation
Read, write, touch, latch and trim modes, with curves on lanes for any mixer or plugin parameter.
Copy and paste automation
Copy points and paste them at the playhead onto any lane, even a different control; range copies bring their lanes along.
Automation pass tools
Punch out, fill a pass to the start, end or cycle, hold a latch until it meets the old curve, preview changes before writing them, and suspend reading or writing per kind of control.
Metering
Peak, RMS, LUFS loudness and phase correlation meters.
Meter types
Peak, RMS, peak plus RMS, K-20/14/12 or VU on any channel, with adjustable peak hold and input metering for armed tracks.
Modulators
LFOs, envelope followers, step sequences, envelopes, macros, random sources and crossfaders that move any mixer, channel strip or plugin value, and render the same every time.
Sample-accurate plugin automation
Automation and modulation reach plugin parameters on the exact sample, not once per audio block.
Surround and immersive
5.1, 7.1, 5.1.4, 7.1.2 and 7.1.4 buses with a 3D panner (position, height, divergence, LFE), and built-in effects on surround buses process every channel.
Ambisonics
First- and third-order ambisonic buses: pan into them, decode to any speaker layout or to headphones.
Multichannel instrument tracks
Give an instrument track a surround layout: an instrument that plays in surround fills every speaker, a stereo one plays the front pair, and the track's effects and fader work on all channels.
Multichannel audio tracks
Audio tracks in LCR, quad, 5.0, 5.1, 7.1, 5.1.4, 7.1.4 or ambisonics play every channel of their clips, with clip gain, fades and stretching, and freeze or export in their own width. Wide files keep all their channels on import.
Audio objects
Make any track an object: move it in 3D with left/right, front/back, height and size lanes, and an ADM export writes it as its own channel with its movement next to the bed.
64-bit mix summing
Sum every bus in double precision for the cleanest possible mix, or keep the standard summing that renders bit for bit as before.
Binaural monitoring
Hear a surround, immersive or ambisonic mix in 3D on headphones, with Oxtave's own head model.
ADM Broadcast Wave
Export an immersive master as an ADM BWF file: the speaker bed with standard object-based metadata, ready for delivery.
Control room
Cue mixes, talkback and monitor source switching.
Presets
Save and recall track and mixer channel settings.
Mix snapshots
Save the whole mix and bring it back later, choosing which parts return: levels, pan, sends, effects, routing, channel strip or modulators.
Mixer visibility
Show only selected, armed or busy channels, or one kind of channel.
Link groups
Link channels so their faders, mutes and solos move together, keeping their balance; hold Alt to move one alone.
Solo safe, clear solos and listen
Keep reverb returns audible while soloing, clear every solo in one click, and listen to a channel before or after its fader without muting the mix.
Copy channel settings
Copy one channel's effects, sends and channel strip, and paste them onto another.
Channel pictures and notes
Give a channel a picture and a notepad for mic choices, settings and ideas; both are saved with the project.
Built-in effects
Sixty-two effects, each with its own editor and factory presets.
EQ
8-band parametric, 31-band graphic, dynamic EQ and linear phase, plus a passive program-style EQ and a console-style EQ with drive.
Spectral comparison EQ
See this channel's spectrum and another track's on the same graph, then cut where they overlap so both parts come through.
Dynamics
Compressor, multiband compressor, limiter, gate, expander, de-esser and transient shaper.
Character compressors
A smooth tube-style leveller and a fast vintage-style compressor with selectable ratios.
Upward compression and multiband expansion
A three-band squasher that lifts quiet detail and tames peaks at once, a three-band expander for hiss and rumble, and a three-band envelope shaper for attack and sustain.
Reverb
A 16-line FDN algorithmic reverb, zero-latency convolution with built-in impulse responses, and a shimmer reverb whose tail rises in pitch.
Delay
Stereo, ping-pong, tape and multi-tap, plus a modulated delay, a studio delay with ducking and character, and a reverse delay, all synced to tempo.
Modulation
Chorus, flanger, phaser, tremolo and rotary, plus auto-pan, vibrato, ring modulator, chopper, cloner and frequency shifter.
Distortion
Oversampled saturation, tape saturation and bitcrusher.
Amp and bass amp
A guitar amp with compressor, overdrive, fuzz and chorus pedals and five cabinets, and a bass amp with clean and driven models and its own cabinets.
Filters and pitch
Auto-filter, envelope filter, step filter, morph filter, wah and a one-knob dual filter, plus pitch shifter and harmonizer.
Vocal tools
A vocoder (with a built-in synth carrier or any track as the carrier) and a one-insert vocal chain: gate, de-esser, EQ, compressor, saturation and limiter.
Mastering
A maximizer that makes a mix louder without passing the ceiling, and dither for 16- and 24-bit exports.
Utility
Gain, stereo imager, tuner, spectrum analyzer and oscilloscope, plus a test tone generator and a timecode generator that sends timecode as audio.
One framework
A consistent look, presets and A/B compare across every built-in effect.
Plugins
Bring your favourites. Lose nothing when one falls over.
VST3, AU and CLAP
Effects and instruments in all three formats, including AUv3 through the component API.
ARA 2
Open a clip in an ARA-capable editor straight from the timeline: it reads the whole recording, its edits play back in place, are saved with the project, and can be rendered to audio.
Crash-proof sandbox
Plugins run in a helper process with deadlines; a crash is recovered without stopping the session.
Safe scanning
Each bundle is scanned in its own throwaway process, with a blacklist and a plugin manager.
Native and generic editors
Plugin windows open natively on Mac, Windows and Linux; plugins without one get a generic parameter view.
Plugin presets
Browse, save, rename and step through any plugin's presets, saved as standard preset files other music apps can open. Loading one can be undone.
Favourites, hidden plugins and collections
Star the plugins you use, hide the ones you don't, and group the rest into your own named collections to filter the plugin picker.
Plugins in surround
Plugins on 5.1, 7.1, immersive and ambisonic channels get the exact speaker layout, each speaker where the plugin expects it. Stereo-only plugins run as a linked copy per pair of channels, following every knob, automation and preset.
Delay compensation
Plugin latency is compensated automatically across the whole graph.
Constrain delay compensation
One click while recording switches off slow plugins on the tracks you play through, so what you hear comes back instantly.
Separate instrument outputs
Give each output of a multi-output instrument its own mixer channel, so every drum gets its own fader, effects and routing.
Multiple sidechain inputs
Plugins with several sidechain inputs can listen to a different track on each one.
Audio connections
Name your interface's inputs and outputs, and choose which outputs the whole mix plays on.
Direct outputs
Send any track straight to its own outputs, skipping the main mix, for outboard gear or a separate feed. Exports still include it.
MIDI output on the strip
Pick the MIDI device and channel a MIDI track plays right on its mixer channel.
Multi-core
Lock-free graph scheduling spreads processing across worker threads.
Anticipative processing
Tracks you aren't playing live are processed ahead on spare cores, so small buffer sizes play big sessions without dropouts. Sounds exactly the same.
Freeze and render in place
Print a heavy track to audio and get the CPU back.
Export & interchange
Finish here, hand off anywhere.
Mixdown
WAV, AIFF, FLAC, MP3 and OGG, rendered faster than real time.
Stems and batch export
Export every track or group as its own file, one file per output bus, and queue several formats to render in one go.
Export per cycle marker
One file per named range, each named after its marker, queued in the batch. WAV files carry your markers as cue points.
Loudness normalisation
Hit a loudness target on export.
Audio to video
Write the mix straight into a video file.
File naming templates
Build file names from the project, track, bus, marker, number, date and format, with a preview before you export.
Export by arranger chain
One file per arranger chain, its sections played in order with their effect tails.
Quick Export
One command writes the whole song to your export folder, tail included, never overwriting a file.
Real-time export
Play the mix through your interface and record it, for outboard gear and plug-ins that only work live, including stems, selected tracks and output buses captured in one pass.
Surround and split mono files
Keep a 5.1 or 7.1 mix as one multichannel file with its speaker layout, or write each channel as its own mono file.
Broadcast Wave and iXML
Description, originator, timeline position and a unique ID in every WAV, plus project and track names for post-production tools.
Export selected clips
Each selected clip as its own file, with its gain, fades and the track's effects.
DAWproject
Open and save whole projects in the open DAWproject format: tracks, routing, clips, MIDI, tempo, markers, plug-ins with their settings and automation.
AAF and OMF
Exchange audio sessions with other studios, with nested sequences flattened; volume and pan automation and clip volume envelopes travel both ways in AAF.
MusicXML and MIDI
Move scores and parts in and out of notation software and other music apps.
Track archives
Export tracks with their media and bring them into another project.
Sync, video & control
Score to picture. Drive it with your hands.
Video track
Import video with frame-accurate sync and thumbnails on the timeline.
Any video format
Professional editing formats the player can't show directly get a playback copy made for you, with identical timing.
Two videos
Open a second video in its own window and its own thumbnail lane on the timeline, with its own offset, for alternate cuts or a reference picture.
Video follows edit
While you drag or trim a clip, the picture shows the frame at its edge.
Every timecode rate
23.976, 24, 25, 29.97 (drop and non-drop), 30, 50, 59.94 and 60 fps for timecode, display and video.
Varispeed chase
When following external timecode, small drift is absorbed by gently changing speed instead of jumping.
FFmpeg included
Video import, thumbnails and exporting your mix into the video work out of the box, with an LGPL build of FFmpeg.
MIDI clock and timecode
Send and receive MIDI Clock, MIDI Timecode and MMC.
Network tempo sync
Keep several Oxtave machines on the same tempo over your local network.
Control surfaces
Mackie Control with extenders, flip and V-pots on pan, sends, plugins or EQ; HUI with banks, sends and meters; and generic MIDI remotes with MIDI learn.
Quick controls
Eight knobs per track mapped to your controller, following the selected track or the plugin you're editing.
Controller scripts
Teach Oxtave any MIDI controller with a short JavaScript file: knobs, pads, lights and displays, in a safe sandbox.
OSC
Control the session from OSC apps and devices.
Wi-Fi remote from any phone browser
Transport, markers, faders, pan, mute, solo, arm, meters and quick controls on your phone. Scan a QR code to pair; it stays on your local network, with no app and no cloud.
Workflow
Your studio, arranged your way.
Workspaces
Save window layouts and detach the mixer or control room onto a second screen.
Key commands
Over 400 commands, every one rebindable, with conflict detection and ready-made presets.
Preferences and profiles
Accent colours, transport and metering settings, and profiles that switch every preference at once.
Safe mode
Start with default settings or without third-party plug-ins when something misbehaves, then put everything back.
Track visibility
Find tracks by name, filter by type and show or hide many at once.
Zoom presets and history
Save zoom levels, step back through earlier zooms and fit the whole project in one key.
Overview line
A thin strip of the whole project above the tracks: drag the box to scroll, drag its edges to zoom, click to jump.
Divided track list and track pictures
Pin tracks to an upper zone that stays put while the rest scroll, show channel pictures in the track headers, and lock tracks so nothing on them can be moved or changed.
Lock and disable tracks
Lock a track against edits, or switch it off to free memory and processing without deleting it.
Whole-channel track presets
Save a channel with its instrument, effects, MIDI, sends, routing, strip and modulators, and choose what to load.
Start panel and templates
Pick up a recent project or start from a template the moment a project is empty, and drop in track presets.
Media browser
Preview, tag and search your sounds without leaving the project.
Pool tools
Convert files to mono or stereo, cut them down to what clips use, find and relink missing files, clear unused audio from disk, and import audio CDs on macOS.
Previews in time and in key
Hear files and loops through your audio device at the project tempo, starting on the beat, optionally moved to the project key — never in the mix or the export.
Loop browser
Filter loops by tempo, key, genre, type, instrument and character, preview them in time, and drop them on the beat.
REX loops
Open .rx2, .rex and .rcy loops on Mac and Windows: hear them at the project tempo, drop their slices on a track where they follow the tempo without stretching, or load them into a sampler one slice per key.
300 loops included
Drums, bass lines, chords, arpeggios and melodies in ten genres, written for Oxtave; render them as audio loops with the built-in instruments.
Built for big sessions
Tested with 200+ track projects, with anticipative prefetch and a GPU-drawn arrange view.
Performance monitor
DSP time per channel and insert, threads, disk, memory and plugin processes.
Accessibility
Keyboard navigation throughout and screen reader support.
English and French
The whole app in English or French, switched in Preferences; menus and command names follow.
Crash recovery
If Oxtave closes unexpectedly, it offers to restore your unsaved changes next time it opens.
Help built in
A user manual and “What’s this?” help for any control.
Oxtave is in alpha on macOS. Be one of the first in the studio.