Ableton Live has been voted “Best DAW In The World” by readers of Synthtopia.com, one of the leading Internet destinations for electronic music information.
Over 5,000 votes from around the world were cast in Synthtopia’s Best DAW In The World Poll. This poll is thought to be the largest poll of its kind.
The top position was hotly contested by FL Studio, which garnered 24% of the votes, compared to the 25% of Ableton Live.
Other popular DAW’s included Apple Logic, Cockos Reaper, Cubase, Propellerhead Reason/Record & Cakewalk Sonar.
The Top 10 DAW’s In The World
- Ableton Live - 25%
- FL Studio - 24%
- Apple Logic - 13%
- Cockos Reaper - 12%
- Cubase - 6%
- Propellerhead Reason + Record - 5%
- Cakewalk sonar - 3%
- Avid Pro Tools - 3%
- Apple GarageBand – 1%
- Sony Acid – 1%
Other options, including Steinberg Nuendo, Renoise, PresSonus Studio One, MOTU Digital Performer, Ardour, Adobe Audition, Dr T’s Keyboard Controlled Sequencer, Nanoloop, Mackie Tracktion, got 1% or less of the votes.
Write-ins were also allowed. (See the complete list below.) Some of the stranger write-in options were “iDunno”, “the one you use” and “mama’s cake.”
The Best DAW poll results are sure to be controversial – so weigh in with your thoughts on the results.
And if you’ve got ideas on how we could improve future polls, let us know!
About The Best DAW Poll
This poll represents the subjective opinion of readers of Synthtopia.com, rather than an objective comparison of features of the various DAWs. As such, it is influenced by the makeup of the readership of Synthtopia & the relative strength of each DAW’s online user community.
For the purposes of this poll, options were presented in random order for voting.
Some evidence of ballot-stuffing was identified early on, so voters were limited to one vote, by cookie & IP address, for the majority of the poll.
Write-ins included:
- amplitude 6
- Orion 6
- Samplitude 5
- Audacity 4
- Reaper 3
- Fork 2
- reaper 2
- Bhajis Loops 2
- EnergyXT 2
- Buzz 2
- Mixcraft 5 1
- lmms 1
- Mixcraft 1
- Question is non sensical 1
- reason 1
- Protools 1
- Sawstudio 1
- sequoia 1
- Studio Vision Pro 1
- Energy XT 2.5.2 1
- ars ‘n’ Pipes (amiga) 1
- maschine 1
- bars and pipes 1
- iDunno 1
- synapse orion platinum 1
- proppellahed 1
- Mu.Lab 3 1
- only know ableton, but it’s not a base for decision 1
- lsdj 1
- Jeskola Buzz 1
- orion 1
- Cool Edit Pro 2.1 1
- Acoustica Mixcraft 1
- presonus studio one 1
- Orion Platinum 1
- the one you use 1
- Maschine 1
- Nuendo 1
- Zynewave Podium 1
- Sensomusic Usine 1
- Audiomulch 1
- cock 1
- SawStudio 1
- there is no ‘best’ 1
- iSequence for iPad 1
- Podium 1
- soundscape 1
- MINE! 1
- TESTasto 1
- gary numan 1
- Synaspe Orion 1
- The Law Of Miracles 1
- mu lab 1
- energy xt 1
- soundation studio 1
- DAWson’s Creek 1
- pro tools 1
- ensoniq Paris 1
- Magix Music Maker 16 Premium 2009 1
- RaXnTraX 1
- LMMS 1
- Project5 1
- The DAW Of The Dead by Romero 1
- Sequoia 1
- mixcraft 1
- Mixcraft5 1
- Sony Soundforge 1
- max/msp 1
- Pro Tools 8 1
- cooleditPRO 1
- Opcode Vision 1
- Accessible for blind people. Sonar and Reaper come close but not great. 1
- Propellerheads Record 1
- mama’s cake 1
What crock. You seem to be conveniently ignoring that the FL Studio user will get FL Studio10, 11, 12, 13 etc FREE. While all the other platforms you mention will have cost the user $500-$1400 over that same period just to keep their program bug-free. It's these paid updates for what are mainly bug-fixes that suck. Thank you Image-Line (FL Studio user since FL3 now 9, 6 years of awesome free updates THANK YOU!)
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for $129 you get both programs updated from propellerheads. let's see image-line charges $189 for one of their synths and you get…
kong vs drumaxx demo (corny name btw)
dr. octo-rex vs nothing
neptune vs vocodex (closest attempt)
blocks vs removing blocks
what are you actually getting free year after year? old hand me down, outdated plugins now made free. cut down versions of vsts or even better demos. you get a bunch of minor bug fixes. and lastly you get major changes every few years. it took them over 7 years to get auto pdc. they are scrambling like mad to get their 32>64 bit crutch, i mean bridge down. also disk streaming. all to help with the elephant in the room, 32 bit host/platform/source code. how long until 32 bit is extinct? what then?
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I am glad to see you agree that FL Studio is awesome.
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someone has to much time to try and blow smoke up your #@#$! check out which daw got the longest review and which one was the finally punch. fl studio? it's funny how he dodges the fact that the host/platform/source code is all 32 bit FOREVER in an outdated 90's delphi programming language that does not support 64 bit. the developers at image-line have already vowed not to translate millions of lines of code that will take years to get converted, compiled and stable. you can only use so many crutches (bridges) before it takes a toll on the processor and ram. you can only bandaid something so much. let's just keep everyone truthfully informed.
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[youtube tN2TBprg6Rw&feature=player_embedded http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tN2TBprg6Rw&feature=player_embedded youtube]
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Ableton has done a great job of marketing. I'm new to Ableton and the whole DAW world but … every music store I went into raved about Ableton. And I visited a bunch of stores all over California. We could debate if these music store people knew anything but they all knew Ableton was cool and the thing to use. Congrats Ableton.
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I wonder how many comments came from people who use multiple daws and are proficient at them…. Probably almost none.
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I used Cubase (5 and then SX2) for 10 years before dabbling in Sonar for a year and then finally moving to Ableton for the last 2.
When I switched to Ableton, it suddenyl became instantly clear to me that Cubase and Sonar have been made for the traditional Audio Engineer sort of user, and I am just not that kind of user at all.
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it's all about learning the environment's structure, workflow and hot keys. just be sure to choose wisely from the start… trying to unlearn fl studio's hokey… hodge podge way of working can actually develop poor habits due to limitations and workarounds. it's nice having all the useful and current tools at your disposal. no wonder so many have trouble using a real professional daw after being infected with the fruity virus.
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Oh look it's Peaches from KVR everybody.
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This should be: “What is the most pirated DAW in the world”.
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wow…
I searched for this too find out which would be best to use…
Ive tried, FL, Live, Cubase, Sonar – so far – I like Live interface but Sonar is the one for me – so far..
I agree with previous comment "it depends what you want to use it for, music, film, type of music, band production..etc etc"
I dont know what to believe if the results are rigged by teenagers but it does sound about right, but again someone said that Live is best for electronic music which is what Iam wanting to create..
I will keep trying
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I am using Live now. Before i used Protools. Now i Love LIve because of its simplicity. It is really simple, cool and user friendly software. I use only for music arranging, not for scoring for film etc. Creating music is really easy with Live. It must be the best daw for arranging music and recording instrument and vocal tracks. it is my experince. you have right to disagree with me anyway.
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Isn't there some entity that tracks software sales the way record and car sales are tracked? I would just like to see quarterly sales break downs.
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'fl studio is mainly drum n bass producers'??
i don't think so…its not a toy anymore, and its quickly surpassing any other daws that are out there…
i use cubase, logic, reason and fl…and i can tell you that fl is the easiest to operate and does things that the other mentioned daws haven't even thought of yet.
of course they need to step up their fx processors, coz those kinda suck….but that's what using protools to mix is for…
and oh yeah, i don't do 'drum n bass' or hiphop….i actually write 'real' music..you might have heard some of it on tv..
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please help i just got my internet back on before i was having no problems but anyway for some reason while in abelton i cant pull up whatever cd i have in my drive when i go to workstation no disc shows up as it usually does
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FL STUDIO IS TOO BAD TALKING ABOUT USE EXTERNAL SYNTHS. IS JUST A GOOD ONE IF WE SEE THE VIRTUAL WORKFLOW
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Mike oldfeild luses Fl !!!
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repe looks amateurish aesthetically because the emphasis is on usability rather than looks.
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I’ve tried SONAR X1, ACID 7, Studio One, Cubase, Reaper, Live, and Energy XT, and I personally am a fan of FL Studio for sequencing and SONAR X1 for recording audio. I’m not sure why so many people bomb on FL Studio just because it’s easy to use. Yeah sure, a lot of youngsters use it, but it’s precisely because it’s easy to use (and get good results from) that it’s so popular with them. I don’t make D&B with it, or Techno, or any of that electronic BS. I compose classical/game music with it. Anyone bombing on FL Studio either hasn’t tried it yet, or is a fool who assumes the DAW they’re using is better.
I will say this, though. FL should REALLY go 64-bit, ‘cuz all that 32-bit BS is pissing me off. I can’t utilize all my RAM in a 32-bit environment.
Ultimately, this poll is subjective, so it should be noted that this poll is really “Top 10 (favorite) DAWs (of the limited amount of people that I’ll allow to take this poll before I’m unhappy with the results) in the “world”.
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Also important to note is that everything ultimately comes down to personal preference. FL Studio is not for everybody, but neither is Live, or Logic, or Cubase.
I’ve heard great works come from EVERY DAW listed there.
DAWs are merely tools. In the right hands, they can do great things.
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This is a joke. After years on the grind (and i mean serious grind) ive come to realize ableton is an Amateur DAW trying to mask itself as one of the big boys. Fact is its so easy to use it makes you feel your your the best producer intown!….when really your just throwing stuff together….. Trust me, When you start getting into heavy Modulation using 3rd party (top-of-the-line) Plugins (…I say top of the line cause if its not hardware…then it really has to be the best there is in digital “soundtoys” “Sonnox” “ssl” “softube” etc etc., or its really just playing rather than approaching it profesionaly)
When you stack 3-4 or 5 Top-of-the-line plugins in a row Ableton completely falls apart…. …then your sitting there (not making music anymore) and trying to find away around the amateur problems (Latency-Slight Timing issues Witch leads to a muddyness etc etc) ……. more and More youll find these issues bieng discussed (same issues) ….I believe its because everyone that started getting there groove on with Ableton is actually maturing into serious Producer/Engineers and were all waking up ruffly @ the sametime, …….”Shit this program actually sucks?!!” Dont get me wrong I love it…Its fun! But really nothing serious can be made from it. I know you can make some great music with it …of course, thats a no brainer, But when you want to go beyond your own limits (continuously evolving) LIVE only reaches a certain point…… Then its just a pain in the ass to even ‘try’ to get the results you need (worflow-sound quality-etc etc) …Logic doesnt ask any question and tells no lies… You can just tell its STRONG …1 thing, I can probly through in 3 times as many plugins before it shows signs of CPU faults. “3 times” thats alot in plugin land
Fuck Ableton….. So many people are Trying really hard to get used to Logic/Cubase/Protools after investing so many years in this pretenda daw. Im not even gonna go through the list of things Ableton “HIDES” from its users… its pathetic. …I swear its built off of some free template or something haha. seriously though. What year is it??? really, you can only assign half of the features to a command….. frikin joke.
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People . Please use Fl studio like “pro” , not “Pro”tool or Logic “Pro” . Fl studio is best DAW for making music
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Ableton Live is the best software daw because it makes you creative.Most of the people who bash live have never used live.These same idiot still get on the fourms,and tell everyone it’s a dj only daw.live is more than a dj daw you freakin morons.It’s also a live instrument because it has something called session.Arangement view in live is where all other daws start.I can take everything I did in session view,and it’s all placed in arangement view to mix and master.Understand session view is any musical idea thats placed in clips,and you can build drum patters,and any other kind of musical idea in real time.Live is no slouch when it comes to building a massive beat.Live is really special because it’s a build a beat from nothing kind of daw that just works.Live 8 Suite is your meat and potatoes daw with tons of sounds and cool effects it’s limitless.I’m still blown away by live and it’s capabiltys.Any producer that has ideas in his head all the time owns live.It’s by far the best daw to transfer ideas from your head into a working song.It’s just click and drag with live.You have too many steps in other daws like cubase,reason,logic,pro tools,and ect that ruins creative ideas because of it’s workflow.Like i said live is click and drag your done,and your makin awsome ideas because your ideas are easy to transfer from your head.True Story live is the best daw for anyone with a creative mind.People don’t like live because they still think it’s a dj only daw,and it’s their ignorance that makes them miss out on a really creative piece of amazing daw software.
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Great review!.. I personally have used FL first (2yrs), then Live (3yrs) and now Logic, Ive seen that FL has improved so much since the last I used it, it’s an awesome DAW, really simple, but the FX are bogus :/ But it’s improving faster than other DAWs, and the affordability of it is great!. .. Live is like, a funner way of making music, it adapts so well to DJs, (to me, at least) I’m a DJ and I like how I can narrow down ideas quickly from Ableton… I recently got Logic because of its features mostly.. I love Logic, although it can work on its Editing workflow.. I’ll just have to get used to it since I don’t have so much time learning key commands
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This is much more useful than a simple countdown of the most popular ones. Thanks!
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What about Digital Performer (7.2)
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