It’s a selection with free virtual analog synths, organ emulations, epiano emulations, drum synth, bass synth, FM synth, emulation of Oberheim / NordLead / DX 7 synth, chip synth, guitar emulation. And here a list of 25 free synth plugins for Mac OS X: 1.
These are the best free realistic instrument plugins for Windows and Mac!
- Best Free Synthesizer Plugins For PC & Mac (VST/AU) (August 2021) August 15, 2021 SYNTH ANATOMY 13 Here is the SYNTH ANATOMY list of the best free Synthesizer plugins for PC & Mac ranging from virtual analog, FM, percussive to modular synthesis concepts!
- AfroPlug – Afro Keyz Lite x64 x86 VST VST3 AU WiN MAC Free Plugin. Afrokeyz is a Synth VST (Mac,Windows) designed for making great african beats: Dancehall, R&B, Reggaeton, Lo-fi, Afrobeats and more. Free Plugins News.
- Download the Best Free VST Audio Plugins for Mac OSX. Synths, Reverbs, Compressors.and much more. Just click and download.
- Related: Best Free Vinyl VST Plugins. Best Free Tape Emulator VST Plugins. Instructions: Click the images below to visit each tape emulator VST plugin. Tape Cassette 2 Tape Cassette VST Plugin. The Tape Cassette VST is an emulation of a vintage analog tape, capturing its warmth and character with precision.
So, if you're looking for free virtual instruments that can be used for composing orchestral or realistic music, these 5 plugins will help you do just that.
And all but one will work on both Windows and Mac, but I do mention an alternative for the one that doesn't plus a bonus free sound library at the end.
Chart of the best free realistic instrument plugins
This table includes all of the free realistic instrument VST plugins that are mentioned in the article below.
| Plugin Name | Available Plugin Formats | Supported OS |
|---|---|---|
| LABS | 64 & 32-bit VST, AAX, and AU | Windows & Mac |
| Cloudrum | 64 & 32-bit VST, AAX (Mac only), and AU | Windows & Mac |
| Sonatina Orchestra | 64 & 32-bit VST | Windows |
| SSD5 Free | 64-bit VST, AAX, and AU | Windows & Mac |
| Virtual Playing Orchestra | WAVE & SFZ | Windows & Mac |
| (Bonus) Taiko Drum Samples | WAVE & SFZ | Windows & Mac |
1. Spitfire LABS
The first one I want to mention is Spitfire LABS, a great resource to get free orchestral instruments and they add a new one every month, at least that's what they say.
So hey, save the article and check back in a couple of months, they might have a new one available.
From this, you can use an array of different instruments like strings, guitar, piano, and choir that all sound great.
Each instrument allows you to control expression, dynamics, and reverb. Some even come with more control.
2. Ample Sound Cloudrum
The next instrument I'd like to highlight is Cloudrum by Ample Sound.
This one sounds pretty cool and is quite different from their regular approach to making plugins as they almost entirely stick to stringed instruments.
With this one being the only exception. Even though it's slightly out of their expertise, this one really hit the mark.
3. Sonatina Orchestra
Now if you're looking for a robust library of orchestral instruments including percussion, strings, and brass, you might really like Sonatina Orchestra.
Unfortunately, this is the one that doesn't work for Mac. But, is very similar to one that does, called VSCO2.
These two plugins seem to have a lot of the same instrument samples and you can find the free download link for VSCO2 in this article.
Check it out, I also demo how it sounds in a video available on the article.
4. SSD5 FREE
If you're looking for a fully functional deluxe drum kit, SSD5 FREE has many different drums for you to use.
With this plugin, you get more control compared to just using samples such as mixing directly in the plugin.
5. Virtual Playing Orchestra
The last one is a bit of a process to get set up but it does sound good and I suggest that you at least listen to the demo I made before you decide not to give it a go.
Virtual Playing Orchestra does require you to download the wave files, sfz scripts and a separate sfz player such as sforzando made by Plogue.
And there are other orchestral libraries that have sfz format so it won’t be a waste of your time.
6. (Bonus): Taiko Drum Samples
Finally, the bonus sound library. If you're looking for some free Taiko drum samples, you can get them from this pay-what-you-want resource.
If you feel that it's worth some money, the option is there for you but you can get them for free.
In this library, you'll find some nice drum one-shots to use in your music or even sound effects.
I hope these free plugins will help you make better orchestral music or just music in general.
Share it with someone so they don't miss out on these sweet freebies. As always, thanks for reading.
Virtual instruments are software emulations of traditional instruments or hardware electronic musical instruments.
There is a staggering range of virtual instruments available nowadays, covering multi-timbral rompler modules to dedicated emulations of guitars, basses, drums, keyboards, and more.
Some of these VSTi plugins (as they’re also called) are free. So in this article we’ll take a look at some of the best free virtual instruments you can download today. Many of which are pro worthy.
Win, Mac, VST, AU, 64 bit. Our Picks For Top 3 Free EQ VST Plugins. With all of that said, grabbing all 17 plugins wouldn’t do you any harm, but we want to break down our top 3 picks! DDMF Colour EQ Review. In our top spot, we have Colour EQ by DDMF. This plugin brings so many features that you would expect from pay to use plugins but all.
Find more great gear here:
Intro: About Virtual Instruments
The benefits of virtual instruments are fairly obvious. They take up much less space than their hardware equivalents, they don’t overheat, and many of them have virtually unlimited polyphony. They are also much easier to edit and they almost never break down.
Here we run down some of the most intriguing virtual instruments currently available. Although some purists may scoff at the idea of these replacing their well-loved guitars or keyboards, there is no denying that they provide a surprising range of great sounds at a price that even professional musicians will appreciate.
Best Free VSTi Plugins
The List
The Roundup
Native Instruments’ Kontakt Player is arguably the Don of all free virtual instrument plug-ins. Based on the company’s own hugely successful Kontakt sampler, Kontakt Player effectively hosts all sample-based instruments developed for its more fully-featured big brother.
Best Free Vst Plugins Mac Os X
The compatibility goes the other way as well. All free instruments developed specifically for Kontakt Player will load up and play in the full version of Kontakt. Between the two, there is a staggering assortment of free and paid instruments, all boasting of the trademark Native Instrument quality.
To get budget-savvy musicians and producers started, NI offers a free Kontakt Factory Selection consisting of 50 premium instruments. Some of these are slightly cut-down versions of the instruments developed for Kontakt, while some are full versions developed specifically for Kontakt Player.
While Kontakt Player focuses mainly on standard instrument libraries, Native Instruments’ Reaktor Player is geared more towards the synthesis side of things.
Demonstration
Reaktor is of course the full-blown modular synthesis environment that gives users unparalleled and unlimited opportunity to design virtually any type of synthesizer, sequencer, or signal processor they could think of from scratch. With Reaktor Player, users are able to play back a wide variety of instruments and effects developed in and for Reaktor, with a more modest set of editing capabilities.
As with Kontakt Player, there is a huge range of ready-made instruments available for use in Reaktor Player. NI even offers two free devices to get you started: the Blocks Wired pre-patched modular synth and the Mikro Prism synthesizer.
Reaktor Player obviously doesn’t come close to providing the depth of power and customizability offered by the full version of Reaktor. Free drum kits vst and samples. Nevertheless, it is a good introduction to modular synthesis. Furthermore, the availability of hundreds of Reaktor instruments cover a board range of sound-crafting options.
Ample Guitar M Lite is the free version of Ample Sounds’ popular AGM guitar simulator. Emulating the warm, rich tones of the Martin D-41 acoustic guitar, Ample Guitar M Lite is now on its second version.
For the price of a free download, you get an enhanced set of features that now match the capabilities of the full version. The note range now spans E1 – C5, and the plug-in now works as a standalone instrument. Even if you do opt to use the instrument in your DAW, multiple instances will take up much less resources than before, and they will load up faster as well.
Demonstration
As you may have guessed from the name, Ample Bass P Lite is Ample Sound’s free bass guitar sample player plug-in. A cut-down version of the full Ample Bass P II component of the company’s Bass Series product line, this plug-in has fewer samples and fewer round robin variations than the full version. It also has a smaller note range than the paid product, covering D1 to F4. Nevertheless, the Ample Bass P Lite does a good job of cranking out the distinctive tones of the Fender Precision Bass, which it models.
Manda Audio’s MT Power Drum Kit is a free drum sampler that has a fairly wide selection of acoustic drum kit sounds. Great care has been taken to record and process the original samples, giving users a range of high-quality drum sounds perfectly suited for pop, rock, and even metal.
Those who wish to process their drum sounds with their own plug-ins might not appreciate the fact that the MT Power Drum’s sounds are already processed. Nevertheless, EQ and compression were applied quite tastefully, and the sounds should fit in well in most mixes.
Demonstration
Togu Audio Line has garnered quite a bit of acclaim for its excellent line of synthesizers and effects processors, a number of which are free. NoiseMaker is one of these, and it compares favorably to the company’s own paid emulation of the Roland Juno 106 analog synth, the TAL-U-NO-LX.
The NoiseMaker incorporates some of TAL’s more popular effects processors on board. There is the Juno-derived chorus with two modes for starters, along with a reverb, a delay, and a bitcrusher, all of which exist as free standalone plug-ins.
DistroCore’s DC Bazz::Murda is a bass and kick synthesizer that is capable of a surprisingly wide array of sounds. Although aggressive and distorted industrial sounds are its forte, it can be dialed back for more subdued tones as well. Even so, this is one plug-in that was obviously designed to get as loud and nasty as possible. For some users, that could be a good thing!
Top Pick
Free Vst Download Mac
Native Instruments’ Kontakt Player and Reaktor Player are a couple of the best free virtual instruments that you can get, without a doubt. They provide a superb one-two punch that simply can’t be beat.
Between the two, you pretty much have all your bases covered, whether you need bread-and-butter rompler sounds, exotic World Music libraries, or synthetic sounds ranging from vintage to cutting-edge.
Given the wide range of sounds they cover and the trademark NI quality, these two are neck-and-neck as our top picks for best virtual instrument plug-ins.
Virtual instruments are software emulations of traditional instruments or hardware electronic musical instruments.
There is a staggering range of virtual instruments available nowadays, covering multi-timbral rompler modules to dedicated emulations of guitars, basses, drums, keyboards, and more.
Some of these VSTi plugins (as they’re also called) are free. So in this article we’ll take a look at some of the best free virtual instruments you can download today. Many of which are pro worthy.
Find more great gear here:
Intro: About Virtual Instruments
The benefits of virtual instruments are fairly obvious. They take up much less space than their hardware equivalents, they don’t overheat, and many of them have virtually unlimited polyphony. They are also much easier to edit and they almost never break down.
Here we run down some of the most intriguing virtual instruments currently available. Although some purists may scoff at the idea of these replacing their well-loved guitars or keyboards, there is no denying that they provide a surprising range of great sounds at a price that even professional musicians will appreciate.
Best Free VSTi Plugins
The List
The Roundup
Native Instruments’ Kontakt Player is arguably the Don of all free virtual instrument plug-ins. Based on the company’s own hugely successful Kontakt sampler, Kontakt Player effectively hosts all sample-based instruments developed for its more fully-featured big brother.
The compatibility goes the other way as well. All free instruments developed specifically for Kontakt Player will load up and play in the full version of Kontakt. Between the two, there is a staggering assortment of free and paid instruments, all boasting of the trademark Native Instrument quality.
To get budget-savvy musicians and producers started, NI offers a free Kontakt Factory Selection consisting of 50 premium instruments. Some of these are slightly cut-down versions of the instruments developed for Kontakt, while some are full versions developed specifically for Kontakt Player.
While Kontakt Player focuses mainly on standard instrument libraries, Native Instruments’ Reaktor Player is geared more towards the synthesis side of things.
Demonstration
Reaktor is of course the full-blown modular synthesis environment that gives users unparalleled and unlimited opportunity to design virtually any type of synthesizer, sequencer, or signal processor they could think of from scratch. With Reaktor Player, users are able to play back a wide variety of instruments and effects developed in and for Reaktor, with a more modest set of editing capabilities.
As with Kontakt Player, there is a huge range of ready-made instruments available for use in Reaktor Player. NI even offers two free devices to get you started: the Blocks Wired pre-patched modular synth and the Mikro Prism synthesizer.
Best Free Vst Plug-ins Ever
Reaktor Player obviously doesn’t come close to providing the depth of power and customizability offered by the full version of Reaktor. Nevertheless, it is a good introduction to modular synthesis. Furthermore, the availability of hundreds of Reaktor instruments cover a board range of sound-crafting options.
Ample Guitar M Lite is the free version of Ample Sounds’ popular AGM guitar simulator. Emulating the warm, rich tones of the Martin D-41 acoustic guitar, Ample Guitar M Lite is now on its second version.
For the price of a free download, you get an enhanced set of features that now match the capabilities of the full version. The note range now spans E1 – C5, and the plug-in now works as a standalone instrument. Even if you do opt to use the instrument in your DAW, multiple instances will take up much less resources than before, and they will load up faster as well.
Best Free Vst Synths
Demonstration
As you may have guessed from the name, Ample Bass P Lite is Ample Sound’s free bass guitar sample player plug-in. A cut-down version of the full Ample Bass P II component of the company’s Bass Series product line, this plug-in has fewer samples and fewer round robin variations than the full version. It also has a smaller note range than the paid product, covering D1 to F4. Nevertheless, the Ample Bass P Lite does a good job of cranking out the distinctive tones of the Fender Precision Bass, which it models.
Manda Audio’s MT Power Drum Kit is a free drum sampler that has a fairly wide selection of acoustic drum kit sounds. Great care has been taken to record and process the original samples, giving users a range of high-quality drum sounds perfectly suited for pop, rock, and even metal.
Those who wish to process their drum sounds with their own plug-ins might not appreciate the fact that the MT Power Drum’s sounds are already processed. Nevertheless, EQ and compression were applied quite tastefully, and the sounds should fit in well in most mixes.
Demonstration
Togu Audio Line has garnered quite a bit of acclaim for its excellent line of synthesizers and effects processors, a number of which are free. NoiseMaker is one of these, and it compares favorably to the company’s own paid emulation of the Roland Juno 106 analog synth, the TAL-U-NO-LX.
The NoiseMaker incorporates some of TAL’s more popular effects processors on board. There is the Juno-derived chorus with two modes for starters, along with a reverb, a delay, and a bitcrusher, all of which exist as free standalone plug-ins.
DistroCore’s DC Bazz::Murda is a bass and kick synthesizer that is capable of a surprisingly wide array of sounds. Although aggressive and distorted industrial sounds are its forte, it can be dialed back for more subdued tones as well. Even so, this is one plug-in that was obviously designed to get as loud and nasty as possible. For some users, that could be a good thing!
Top Pick
Native Instruments’ Kontakt Player and Reaktor Player are a couple of the best free virtual instruments that you can get, without a doubt. They provide a superb one-two punch that simply can’t be beat.
Best Mac Vst Plugins Free
Between the two, you pretty much have all your bases covered, whether you need bread-and-butter rompler sounds, exotic World Music libraries, or synthetic sounds ranging from vintage to cutting-edge.
Free Vst Plugins For Mac
Given the wide range of sounds they cover and the trademark NI quality, these two are neck-and-neck as our top picks for best virtual instrument plug-ins.