Are you not appeased due to noise in the background?
- Once you click, ‘edit with Adobe Audition’, Audition will load with your audio file in it. Within Audition, I use can use it’s built-in noise reduction effect to remove the noise from the audio clip. However, I prefer using iZotope RX Denoiser as it gives me better control over the noise that I want to reduce.
- AudioDenoise 2™ is sample-based, which means you can select the precise noise you want to focus on. It's very easy - just move the playhead to the problem area, and click the 'Sample' button. And you can keep sampling until you like what you hear - all during realtime playback.
Bertom Denoiser is a free noise reduction plugin designed for music and post production / dialogue. A simple user interface which doesn't rely on 'learning' a static noise profile.; Fully automatable.; Low CPU usage so it can be used on many tracks.; Works in the time domain with zero latency.; Doesn't simply react to the raw input signal but tracks how the noise is evolving in each.
Want to get rid of it, but don’t know how?
When producing music, noise reduction is an essential part; it’s like butter to its bread, can’t go on without it.
Being more specific, buzzless, and noiseless audio is what everyone is looking for.
If you are someone who deals with sound recordings on an everyday basis, you know that the struggle is real when even after complying with all the rules, you have to edit the recording to clear out the noise in the background.
However, there is a way you can save yourself from this long and boring task: get a noise reduction plugin.
A sound reduction plugin helps you get rid of the unwanted noise or sound that ends up in your audio tracks.
With such software application, you can easily remove sounds like clicks, hums, ground buzzes, and crackles from the audio.
But how are you going to find one of the best ones that suit your needs?
Lucky for you, we’re going to talk about some of these top-rated plugins.
So sit back, relax, and read away.
iZotope RX 7
Before the release of version 7, iZotope RX 6 was widely used and loved by the music producers all over the globe.
The reason being is that it can clean up the foulest recordings.
Hence proves that version 7 is no far behind.
RX 7 comes in with better features that help you in audio repair.
It has a spectrum of spectral repair tools and analyzers, which enables you to keep a check and remove noise from the audio tracks.
Features:
- Repair Assistant software to cleverly identify the noise, clips, clinks, whir, and other audio oddities
- AudioSuite plug-in, Music Rebalance, for quick identification and adjustments of each element of a mix.
- Pitch and Time Changer lets you set the pitch without harming the audio time, and contrariwise
- Save yourself from ADR sessions with Speech Contouring
- Speech De-Reverb for reducing echo in speech track
- Can assist Multichannel
- Spectral repair for in-depth audio analysis
- Amplified UI
Sonnox Oxford DeNoiser
Sonnox Oxford DeNoiser is specifically designed to eliminate unwanted noises.
Many of the features it possesses are considered useful since it cleans up even the slightest of noises such as a merged de-hisser.
It comes in with three noise reduction effects Oxford DeClicker, DeBuzzer, and DeNoiser.
With the DeClicker plugin, you can edit the audio without disturbing the rest of it.
Whereas, the DeNoiser comes in with a ‘warmth’ feature that is where you can fill in some of the frequency that vanishes as soon as you apply the noise reduction to the audio.
Features:
- Partitions to remove the hissing sound can detect and remove noise
- Spot on resolution layout of sound profile and input signal
- Can fine-tune the noise threshold and reduce it by using the frequency bias curve
- Mid-side feature
- After the process, audio warmth can be restored by using warmth control
- A/B comparison is facilitated by Make-up gain
ReaFIR by Cockos
Cockos is widely known for a feature called Reaper.
Reaper gives outstanding shareware free of cost that would normally cost hundreds of dollars.
This stands tall from many other plugins due to its flexibility and wealth pro features.
The features make it capable for ultra-precise sound shaping.
Users tend to find it very useful for mixing processes and different stages of production.
Features:
- An FFT-based plugin with a size range of 128-32768
- FIR gives out a variety of functions revolving around FFT spectrum analysis.
- EQing and dynamics processing for reducing noise circuitry
- Serves as a gate, a compressor, and a dedicated EQ
- Flexibility of the operating system
- Responsive UI
Redunoise by Voxengo
This one is a high power noise reduction plugin that comes with a good range of controls to eliminate and reduce the noise.
The capabilities that this plugin possesses goes beyond the borders than an average noise-reducing plugin.
It can be of great use in your production process.
Redunoise focuses more on repairing the noisy single tracks, although it also works well with mixes.
You would be surprised by the result; it won’t let you down.
Features:
Denoiser In Adobe Audition
- High-resolution audio spectrum assessment
- Eliminates the sound without affecting the rest of the signal.
- Redunoise comes with two types of filtering: analog-prototype and linear-phase.
- Sound learn function for easy and quick cleanup of audio material.
- Both type of scale switches, linear and logarithmic
- Reverse option with every parameter
- Comparison features
Waves W43
An audio engineer would surely know about this one.
Waves have been around for quite a while and is a major plugin used across the globe.
The design of this software was inspired by the legend Dolby Cat43, a prototypical hardware noise reduction unit back in the 70s.
Like its ancestor, it would be wrong if you wouldn’t set your standards high for Waves.
W43 belongs to the Waves suit ‘intelligent’ plugin; it comes with a feature that allows you to distinguish the sound and catch it from the audio signals.
The difference between the manual and intelligent plugin is that the intelligent plugin works faster with zero latency.
In much simpler words, it means if you use it on your audio track, you won’t lose the sync, which is an obvious time saver.
You can set your thresholds high for this one.
Features:
- Relatively low priced
- Don’t have to be a pro to play around with it
- No latency at all
- Possibility of more than one instances
- 24-bit/192kHz resolution
Antares SoundSoap 5
An app that stands alone. Antares has come a long way since it’s past owned by BIAS back in 2012.
Antares is the cheapest and fastest option on the list for noise reduction.
If you are having trust issues since the switch of the owner, you should know that the CEO of Antares is the very same genius behind BIAS.
Antares has a wide range of audio processing tools that also includes Auto-Tune.
This is an excellent noise reduction solution that can work with any professional audio and video processing software.
Since it joined hands with SoundSoap, you can expect even better and higher results.
Features:
- New and improved removal of the ‘hum’ sound
- Can detect noise automatically*
- It can set the location of the noise*
- A waveform video exhibit *
- Better versions of media controls*
- Can underwrite FLAC and MP3*
- Full bypass can facilitate A/B comparison*
- Reset button
Waves Z-Noise
This is another sound reduction plugin that works under the banner of Waves.
This one comes in with new algorithms that clear the background noise without adding in artifacts or damaging the sound quality.
The Z-noise is part of the ‘manual’ plugin from the Waves suit.
The version is a little older, but it does justice to sound control.
It wants you to identify the targeted sound print, which will then allow you to ride off the unwanted sounds with the start point and band controls.
Features:
- Improved algorithms for music
- Active sound profile
- Has a 5-band EQ
- Can create a noise profile from any audio by using Extract mode
- Operates in Real-time
- Saves low frequencies
- Enhances the high-frequency details
- Can extinguish “smearing”
- A true broadband processor
Accusonus ERA Bundle
This audio restoration plugin bundle includes the ERA-N feature.
Accusonus is one of those unheard companies in terms of audio repair; however, they offer affordable and easy to use features with quick results.
Accusonus provides you with the distinctive capability to reduce the sound through a single knob control.
The benefits of its tools are that you can work with them in real-time and end up with instant results.
Even if you are new at this, the knob feature is very easy to handle by almost anyone out there.
It’s surely worth it for video editors and indie filmmakers, even audio engineers who require the fastest solutions to their problems.
Besides the ERA bundle, it also has the ERA-D bundle.
The difference between the two is that ERA-D works as a 2-channel ‘intelligent’ sound reduction.
This means you can add in 2 channels such as boom and lav, and the two channels would work together, making it an easier and denoising process with minimal artifacts.
So, don’t confuse the two versions of doing the same thing.
There is a slight upgrade in the ERA-D version.
Features:
- New algorithms for de-noising
- Five types of presets that can be used to focus on specific frequency bands
- Reflex sound profile estimation
- Reduce sound with a single knob
Conclusion
To sum it all together, all these noise reduction plugins come with their very own unique features for you to explore and work with.
The iZotope RX 6 tops them all since it meets all the high standards of what a noise reduction plugin should possess.
It’s flexible, fast, and convenient to use.
However, the rest of them follow through as well.
It all depends on your taste and what you are comfortable with the most.
Last Updated on October 15, 2020
If you deal with sound recordings on a daily basis, you are probably keen on the numerous issues that can come along with making them sound good. Whether the sound was recorded by a professional recordist or a complete novice, sometimes there are anomalies and noise problems that you simply can’t get away from, even if you follow all the rules to getting great sound on set.
Noise reduction software is your saving grace. There are a few really solid tools out there, some you’ve certainly heard of, and others you may not have. Let’s break down some of your best options.
Accusonus ERA (N/R/D) – Noise Reduction Magic
Accusonus is one of those companies that has gone largely unheard of in respects to audio repair, which is a shame as their offerings are affordable, easy to use, and capable of producing quick results. Here’s a quick overview of their comprehensive ERA Bundles. The ERA Bundle Standard ($149) contains 4 single-knob plugins, each one solving a different audio problem:
● ERA Noise Remover
● ERA Reverb Remover
● ERA Plosive Remover
● ERA De-Esser
The Accusonus ERA Bundle Pro ($499) contains the 4 single-knob plugins as well as ERA D, a joint noise & reverb reduction plugin for post professionals.
You may be wondering about the steep upgrade when ERA-D does essentially the same things as the ERA Noise Remover and the ERA Reverb Remover. The secret here is that ERA-D does something that other tools don’t: 2-channel intelligent noise reduction. This means you can feed in 2 different channels (boom and lav, for instance) and the 2 channels will inform each other of the content, making for a much cleaner denoising process with fewer artifacts. If this fits your situation, I’d say it’s worth the small splurge for the top tier version.
The benefits of Accusonus’ tools is that you can run them in real-time and get results quick. The one-knob style functionality makes them extremely simple for non-audio geniuses to use. It’s definitely worth it for video editors, indie filmmakers or audio engineers who need a clean and quick solution.
Try it out for free and see for yourself.
Denoise Audition
iZotope RX (Standard/Advanced) – King of Audio Repair
RX is possibly the most well-known sound restoration software out today. Ever since version 1, iZotope has been pouring R&D into making this software unbeatable.
RX gives you a fully featured waveform and spectral editor with numerous ways to view and select your sound and a complete host of tools including:
- De-Noise
- De-Click
- De-Crackle
- De-Hum
- De-Clip
- De-Bleed (uses
- De-Plosive
- De-Ess (removes vocal sibilance with ease)
- De-Reverb
- De-Rustle
- De-Wind
- Interpolate
- Dialogue Isolate (algorithms shaped to lighten noise without introducing artifacts)
- Spectral De-Noise
- Voice De-Noise
- Mouth De-Click
- Deconstruct (the ability to filter and separate between tonal and broadband sounds)
- Ambience Match & Extraction (no room tone? no problem!)
- EQ Match
- Auto Leveler (time saver, helps you audio sound consistent without compression)
- Time & Pitch Manipulation
- Center Content Extraction
- Find Similar (uses machine learning to find sonic events in the recording that are similar to the one you’ve highlighted)
- Common Tools including: Gain, Phase, Normalize, Azimuth Correction, Panning, Resampling, signal Generator, etc
- Batch Processing (this is key if you have a lot of bad audio on a consistent basis)
Needless to say, iZotope’s flagship software can warrant an entire blog series on its own. If you are an indie filmmaker, video editor, sound engineer or sound designer, this software surely has a handful of tools that will be immediately useful in your everyday work. The advanced version will cost you a pretty penny, but if you can afford the standard version, you still get most of the available tools, minus just a few awesome ones.
Elements RX: $99
Standard RX: $299
Advanced RX: $999
Adobe Audition CC – The Editor’s Go-To Sound Tool
Many video editors will be quite familiar with Audition, as it comes bundled with the Creative Cloud suite (meaning many of you already have this available to you without spending an additional dime).
Audition is not just a noise reduction software, but a complete digital audio workstation, capable of multi-track editing, mixing, sound design, mastering and spectral audio editing. While the noise-reduction tools are relatively bare-bones compared to some other options, it likely has the tools you need the most:
- Click Removal
- Pop Removal
- Hum Removal
- Sound Removal (for odd, random sounds)
- Adaptive Noise Reduction (for constantly changing sounds, like an airplane fly-by)
- Hiss Removal
- Volume Leveling
- Pitch Correction
- Plus the entire suite of tools and plugins that Audition has to offer
These tools, along with their spectral editor (complete with photoshop-like selection tools), give you the ability to clean out most common sonic problems.
If you are a Premiere Pro editor on a budget, this is a no-brainer. Learn to use Audition as well as you do Premiere or After Effects, and you are golden. If you don’t have the Adobe CC suite, but you want Audition, it’ll cost you $20.99 per month.
Cedar Studio – Serious Audio Restoration
Cedar is the grandfather of noise-reduction, the first major competitor in the industry, and what most of the professionals use when lives are on the line, like in the case of forensic investigations.
Cedar’s tools are available in both software and hardware, with different tools for different purposes, such as live event noise-reduction where a zero-error and zero-latency solution is absolutely necessary, or in server setups where huge bulk processing must happen 100x faster than real-time to keep up with the huge amount of audio that needs to be processed.
But most studio professionals on this level would rely on Cedar Studio; their comprehensive set of software that works inside DAWs like Pro Tools. Of course, this bundle of tools will cost about $13,000, with each module costing no less than around $3,000 each. While many of the benefits of these tools can be found in cheaper software, the added top level of quality, speed and efficiency is a need reserved for a select few.
It’s likely that if you need Cedar, you aren’t reading this article, but it’s good to have knowledge of the software by which all the others will be judged in terms of quality and reliability.
Waves (WNS/W43/NS1/X-Noise/Z-Noise) – Quick Audio Cleanup
If you are an audio engineer, you likely know all about Waves plugins. They’ve been around a long time and have been a staple in every major music and post house all over the world. In that time, they’ve released some pretty great noise reduction plugins, which I’ll parse into 2 categories:
Intelligent:
- NS1
- W43
- WNS
Manual:
- X-Noise
- X-Hum
- X-Click
- X-Crackle
- Z-Noise
The manual plugins are their older suite of tools and have parametric features to dial in the threshold, band control, and more after you’ve taught the plugin what the noise print looks like.
The intelligent plugins are their newer tools that use advanced DSP logic to differentiate between signal and noise, allowing you to dial in the threshold and, in the case of W43 and WNS, adjust that threshold for multiple bands to dial it in a bit more.
The greatest part of their intelligent plugins is that they work really fast, with almost zero-latency. This means you can throw it on your audio track and not lose sync, which can be a huge time saver.
Of this toolset, W43 may have the best bang-for-the-buck, only costing $49 (depending on the day, as Waves is always having sales) and giving you a 4 band control. If you are in need of not only noise but click and hum removal, those plugins are priced around $89, or you can buy the entire intelligent set for $399.
SOUND FORGE Pro 14 – Formerly MAGIX Spectral Layers Pro
A completely unique tool, Magix (who bought this software from Sony) offers what some may call the ‘photoshop-for-audio’. The software gives you a spectral view of your audio, advanced selection, brush, clone (yes, clone stamp for audio!) and erase tools, and the ability to extract separate items into ‘layers’ and process them individually.
While Sound Forge Pro gives extreme granularity to editing your audio that no other software really offers (even RX doesn’t offer some of these features, like drawing in frequencies, pitch shifting a single selected harmonic, or spectral casting/molding), this tool hasn’t quite caught on yet with professionals.
Of course, they also include tools for noise ‘fingerprinting’, but you won’t find the number of intelligent algorithms available for noise removal like you see in iZotope RX. Spectral Layers is all about manual control, and if you know how to view the spectrogram to find sound, and use the tools to manipulate it, you may be just as well off with this software.
For $399, Sound Forge Pro is an impressive tool that offers features unique in their own right and makes itself a valuable component in a sound editor’s toolkit.
Antares SoundSoap – Legendary & Simple Sound Cleaner
Soundsoap from Antares (yes, the auto-tune company) has come a long way since it was owned by BIAS (pre-2012) and has made itself one of the simplest, fastest and cheapest options for noise reduction. Despite BIAS no longer being around, the genius behind BIAS’ legendary tools is now CEO of Antares, so you can trust that the development of the software is in good hands.
With its most basic version starting at a one-time fee of $74.50 (none of that subscription nonsense), you get an intelligent noise reduction solution that will work in any professional audio or video editing software environment. While their $250 Soundsoap+ software offers some better algorithms and more fine-tuned control, for a down and dirty solution in the middle of a fast-paced video editing project, Soundsoap might be all you need.
Zynaptiq ‘Un-Series’ Repair Tools – Unique Sound Fixes
If you are looking for a more specific set of repair tools, you might want to look into Zynaptiq. Since its inception, this company has been focused on making tools that nobody else has made before. For their audio repair products, they offer the following tools:
Un-Veil: learn and reduce the effects of natural reverb in recordings
Un-Chirp: remove ‘watery’ artifacts caused by low bit-rate encoding and noise filtering
Un-Filter: ‘un-EQ’ your audio from things like resonances, comb-filtering, roll-offs and more.
If you don’t know much about audio restoration, know that these tools are making strides towards capabilities previously unseen in the industry. While not perfect, they do work surprisingly well considering the mathematical engineering feats required to create tools like these. Worth checking out if you have the money. The bundle for all 3 will run you about $799.
Additional Noise Reduction Tools
If you haven’t found anything in your price range, you’re in luck! There are lots of noise reduction plugins available. Many are similar to ones we’ve listed, but just didn’t make the cut, and are likely capable of doing what you need. Many others (usually bare-bones basic plugins) are also often included in software already, like Premiere Pro, Final Cut Pro X, and Audacity (a free audio application).
Do your research and find what works best for you in your price range and what is compatible with your software and your workflow. Know the difference between what intelligent reduction, manual noise-print reduction, and gating have to offer your sound. And keep in mind, not all of these plugins will work equally as well. Use your ears and listen for when you’re reducing too much noise. Nothing sounds worse than over-filtered audio files.
Remember, if you pick the right gear from the start, like low-noise microphones and recorders with low-noise preamps, your likelihood of needing noise-reduction will probably decrease a substantial amount. Check out our guides on buying a budget microphone or recorder to get you started.
Soundsnap
Chances are that if you work as an editor, sound designer or the like, you’re in need of a great source for sound effects for your projects. Soundsnap has 360,000+ professional sound effects (and music loops) across every category and is used by companies like HBO, Pixar, Vice, and more. We make purchase options flexible, allowing you to buy a few at a time or to pay for an entire year of unlimited downloads for just $199.