For recording, cutting audio files, adding fade-ins and fade-outs, or applying effects, Audacity is a great choice. I’ve been using it for years (it’s one of the first audio-related apps I’ve ever installed) and it’s always been a very reliable and stable piece of audio editing software. The audio editors featured in this article are listed in no particular order.įor recording and basic audio editing, Audacity is still considered to be the best freeware audio editor by most users. As always, I would advise you to test all the available audio editing software listed below but stick to using only one or two programs once you decide which ones suit your workflow the best. My goal with this article was to make a selection of professional-quality freeware tools that can be used for recording, editing, and mastering audio with ease. If you need more functionality, check out our article about free music production software. With that in mind, we paid special attention to only include the best and 100% clean audio editing software on this list. There was also (and still is, unfortunately) a considerable amount of free audio editing programs of questionable quality that include toolbar installers, and various bloatware.

There were other free alternatives out there, of course, but many of those were either designed for fairly basic use (making MP3 ringtones or performing the simplest of audio edits) or were severely limited trial versions of commercial software.

In this article, we are focusing on the best free audio editing software for PC, Mac, and Linux.įor the past several years, the only two notable freeware audio editors in existence (probably a few more if we include Linux, though) were Audacity and Wavosaur. For sound design, mastering, or editing a bunch of audio files, an audio editor is often a more suitable choice than a digital audio workstation.

10 best free audio editor software