Audacity is a digital sound recording and audio editing software. It is a completely free program. Furthermore, this open-source software is available for Windows, macOS, Linux, and other Unix-like operating systems.
Audacity was formed in 1999 by Dominic Mazzoni and Roger Dannenberg and was officially released in May 2000 in version 0.8. As of November 2019, it has become the most downloaded software on FossHub, with over 80 million downloads.
Previously, Audacity was downloaded from Google Code, and SourceForge was up to that point. It reported statistics of more than 100 million downloads in total.
Audacity won the “SourceForge Community Choice Award for Best Project for Multimedia” in 2007 and 2009. Audacity’s success evidencing by its massive user usage and multiple awards.
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Features and Uses of Audacity
In addition to allowing audio recording from multiple sources, Audacity can be used for post-processing all audio files, including podcasts, by adding effects such as normalization, trimming, and fading.
Audacity is also well known for allowing the recording of entire music albums like Tune-Yards. It is also using for the ICT OCR Level 3 English national exam in its specific unit on sound creation.
How does Audacity Work?
Audacity is perfect because it can offer a simple but complete graphical interface focused on more professional use. This software has managed to find a place both in the computers of many beginners with particular needs, as well as in the workstations of independent professionals and other professionals specialized in audio editing.
Audacity’s graphical and user interface is Characterizing into the following 17 elements:
1) Menu bar
2) Transport tools
3) Main toolbar
4) The recording
meter bar
5) The playback meter bar
6) Mixing tools
7) Editing toolbar
8) Reading speed
9 ) Device Toolbox
10) Record Marking and Playhead
11) The Timeline
12) The Scrub Ruler
13) Track Control Panel
14) Audio Track
15) Track Label
16) Selection Tools
17 ) Status bar
As you can see, all the tools are in the right place, which makes Audacity a complete video editing software but also very simple and easy to use.
Audacity FAQ
Is Audacity Free?
Yes, Audacity is entirely free as it is open-source software. Therefore, you can use this application for both personal and professional use. We recommend it for sound schools and wish the software remains as popular as it is to date.
Audacity license terms are under the GNU General Public License. And it is that the creators of Audacity decided to use a GPL license for several reasons.
Some of them do it out of generosity. Others do it for moral reasons because they campaign for all software to be free.
Audacity offers a donation system to power the open-source project supported by dozens of volunteers working on Audacity worldwide.
Is it legal for Someone to sell Audacity over the Internet?
It is legal to sell Audacity if the seller makes the source code available to everyone under the GNU Public License (GPL). If a vendor modifies the Audacity code, the brand requires that they give that software a different name than the original.
Sometimes, some vendors sell Audacity simply after changing the application’s name and without linking to our project’s website, which is difficult to fight when one is under the GPL license.
If you purchased a version of the software and later discovered that it was a standard version of Audacity, we recommend that you request a refund.
Will a Version of Audacity for iPods, iPad, Smartphones, and Tablets exist?
Current versions of Audacity work with uncompressed audio internally to allow high-quality audio editing with a broad spectrum of effects. It requires a lot of processor and disk space that a smartphone cannot currently have.
Also, the wxWidgets library that allows you to create interfaces for different versions of Audacity (on other platforms Windows, macOS, GNU/Linux) is minimal in terms of display support on mobile operating systems, generally also on peripherals with screens. Low resolution.
It would take a near-complete reprogramming of [Audacity] software to create an interface that works on mobile devices like an iPod, a smartphone like an iPhone, tablets like the iPad, or any Android device.
However, Audacity should have no problem running on Windows tablets (including “Surface with Windows 8 Pro” for tablets). On the other hand, [Audacity] will not run on Windows RT operating systems.
We can offer you some Alternatives to [Audacity] to work on Mobile Devices:
– Windows Mobile: WavePad fr CE (free)
– iPhone, iPod Touch, and iPad: VC Audio Pro, Hokusai et I said what ?!
– Android: TapeMachine Recorder
– Symbian: Mixx Mobile
Can I use Audacity on my Chromebook?
Although, will not be able to use Audacity on a Chromebook because [Audacity] is not supported on the Chrome IS platform. Although Chrome OS is based on Linux, it is not complicated to be able to install an Ubuntu Linux distribution on the Chromebook version.
You can then use the official Ubuntu packages to install Audacity via Synaptic or the Ubuntu Software Center; or by compiling [Audacity] yourself from the source code.
Note that the Audacity 2.0.6 provide with Ubuntu 15.04 and 15.10 are built with the three wxWidgets versions that Audacity version 2.06 does not support. For Instance, in 15.04, or 15.10, you can install [Audacity] from version 2.1.0.
Always remember to uninstall a previous version of [Audacity] on Ubuntu!
Another alternative: You can use the support offered by WINE by releasing an official version of Audacity for Windows on Ubuntu. Note that [Audacity] can be very slow in WINE compared to an Audacity package designed for Linux.
WINE should work fine with Intel Chromebooks, but they won’t work under the ARM of Chromebooks like the entire Samsung Chromebook series.
Is there a 64-bit Version of [Audacity]?
Since, there is no 64-bit version of Audacity, except for 64-bit Linux systems. In any case, the 32-bit versions of [Audacity] should work just fine on 64-bit operating systems.
The most significant thing is that you have the correct drivers for the audio devices on your system. You only need enough RAM to get the most out of [Audacity].
For example, it requires more RAM to run [Audacity] on a 64-bit system than on a 32-bit system to compensate for not using the additional processor resources your 64-bit system provides.
[Audacity] on Windows 64-bit version
In 64-bit versions of Windows, audio device drivers are specific to the 64-bit operating system.
When upgrading from a 32-bit to 64-bit operating system, a 64-bit compatible computer requiring, and the audio device drivers must also upgrade to a 64-bit version.
[Audacity] on Mac 64-bit Version
OS X 10.6 and higher support all 64-bit and 32-bit processors; however, some driver issues may arise, but it is far from the scope of pure [Audacity] use on a 64-bit Mac.
[Audacity] in GNU / Linux 64-bit version
If you are installing a 64-bit version of Linux on a 64-bit computer, the performance of [Audacity] that will be offered in the package should be 64-bit by default.
If you build or configure [Audacity] yourself from its source code with the default value, you should make a 64-bit version.
How can I help the [Audacity community]?
The [Audacity community] still needs all kinds of professionals like translators, documentation staff, testers, and developers working with C++.
Users who report bugs or make suggestions for interesting improvements are also welcome. If you like using Audacity, you can donate to this page.
Review Audacity Free Audio Editor.