These are MusicTech’s favourite free plugins of 2024The quality and variety of free music making software on offer never ceases to amaze us. We’ve rounded up some of our favourite free plugins and tools from 2024 so you can craft amazing tracks without breaking the bank.

READ MORE: These are the best new plugins of 2024, according to MusicTech’s reviewers

Techivation – T-Saturator

Techivation has made a name for itself by releasing a range of powerful but focussed processing tools. T-Saturator is a level-independent saturation plugin that can be used to add anything from subtle warmth through to shrieking distortion.
As it’s level independent, you can easily add the same harmonics to the quiet and loud portions of your signal. You get tube, tape, clip and fold modes that all provide slightly different flavours of distortion. You can use the Crunch control to change the character and the Smash dial to shape how much the transients are affected. On top of this, there’s frequency range adjustment, a Mix dial, Mid-Side control, Auto Gain and up to 8X oversampling.
Download: Techivation – T-Saturator
Newfangled Audio – Obliterate

If you prefer your audio on the screaming and distorted side, then this free over-the-top distortion effect is for you. Obliterate started off life as a bug in the code, but Newfangled Audio decided to develop it further into a unique sounding resonant distortion plugin.
Obliterate can deliver extreme digital distortion that can destroy drums, create incredibly aggressive basses, or be used for intense horror sound design. There are two destruction algorithms to choose from, with built-in frequency and resonance controls. You get two resonant multi-mode filters that are morphable between lowpass, highness, bandpass, all pass and notch settings, plus the ability to control all frequencies and resonances at once.
Download: Newfangled Audio – Obliterate
RARE/DSP – Drumclone
RARE/DSP Drumclone. Image: Press
Although technically still in beta, this superb tool allows you to load in any drum sample to have it created in synthesis for you to further tweak and edit. You can even load in full track audio where the drums are buried in the mix and Drumclone will spit out a clean approximation of the original kick sound.
It works by isolating the elements of the original kick drum and spectrally breaking it down into several layers for the transient, noise and body of the sound. These are then fed into various re synthesis engines and recombined and processed to give a clean sounding final kick. Multi-segment envelope editors let you further sculpt the underlying layers. In theory, you could try this with other percussive one-shot sounds, but the current model is optimised to work with kick drums.
Download: RARE/DSP – Drumclone
Wave Alchemy – Magic7
Wave Alchemy Magic7. Image: Press
When it comes to pristine, high-end reverb, the hardware Bricasti M7 is up there with the best. Wave Alchemy has captured all 234 presets from the M7 and packaged them into this free plugin. It includes a range of styles, from clear ambiences and intimate rooms, to expansive cathedrals, nonlinear spaces and sublime plates.
You get controls for tempo-synced pre-delay, low and air EQ, a smooth control to reduce the transient, and a built-in ducker. It also has Flux or Ensemble modulation modes to add additional stereo spatialisation and pitch variation.
Download: Wave Alchemy – Magic7
Audija – OScope
Audija OScope. Image: Press
OScope is an incredibly useful tool that lets you see the waveform of your audio signal in real-time. You can set the length to zoom and show fine detail, or zoom out and show longer beat and bar sections. You also have the ability to freeze the oscillogram and zoom right in to check individual peaks or details alongside a dB scale.
This kind of tool has numerous uses, including checking peak levels of certain sections, and seeing the effects of processing in realtime. It’s particularly useful for helping to visualise what effects a compressor is having on the shape of the waveform as you tweak it, and we often use an Oscilloscope to make judgements when using clippers to shave off wayward peaks. The main version is free, but if you pay an extra €8 then you can add sidechain input. This lets you visualise two signals at once, which could be useful for refining a kick and bass relationship.
Download: Audija – OScope
Full Bucket Music – Broken Mini
Full Bucket Music Broken Mini. Image: Press
Full Bucket Music has made countless plugins based on old synths, but this new one is arguably one of its most unique free releases. Broken Mini emulates a classic Minimoog, but adds in a few surprises.
There are missing keys and knobs, certain dials don’t function exactly how you might think, there’s wonky tuning, unexpected hums, and the Oversample options go downwards from 1 instead of upwards. There’s even the sound of a radio when you use the Noise oscillator. It’s a bit like a fun puzzle, with little notes from the developer when you hover over certain controls. Although a broken synth might seem like an unusual choice, it could be a great way to come up with some unusual sound design.
Download: Full Bucket Music – Broken Mini
PSPaudioware – PSP Chamber

PSP Chamber is a free reverb plugin that uses a single algorithm taken from its big brother PSP EasyVerb. It can be used to add depth and dimension to any audio signal, with rapidly developing, dense reverberations and a smooth, natural decay.
The algorithm itself has three variations, plus Small, Medium and Large modes. You then have controls for Decay, Damp, Predelay, Width, Mix and output volume. If you want to tailor the sound further, then there’s an EQ section with low and high shelf filters, plus an adjustable mid band.
Download: PSPaudioware – PSP Chamber
U-he – Zebralette
U-he Zebralette. Image: Press
Ahead of the long awaited release of Zebra 3, u-he has updated Zebralette with bug fixes, improved performance and plugin support, and new browser features. It also includes an experimental new Key Command function that lets you edit synth parameters using the qwerty keyboard.
These things aside, Zebralette remains an excellent free synth that has one powerful oscillator capable of morphing between 16 different waveshapes. It includes a waveform editor with four different drawing modes, plus 24 spectral effects, oscillator stacking, ADSR, 2 LFOs, a 32-stage MSEG, built-in chorus/phaser, EQ and delay effects, polyphonic aftertouch and 300 factory presets.
Download: U-he – Zebralette
AudioThing – Moon Echo

Now for something a little different. Moon Echo is an experimental frequency shifted delay effect that simulates the technique of bouncing radio waves off of the moon. It was developed alongside Berlin-based musician Heinbach, and can be used as a musical lo-fi effect with unique artefacts.
There’s a lot going on under the hood, but the front end has been simplified to make it easy to use. You have Input, Output and Mix dials, alongside a Doppler control, and Time, Feedback and Moon Dust dials to adjust the signal modulation. As a nice touch, if you’re online and click the Ping Moon button, then the plugin will attempt to contact NASA and get the exact distance of the moon, which will then set the delay time.
Download: AudioThing – Moon Echo
Venus Theory – Auras Series

Musician, sound designer and content creator Venus Theory has released a series of three exceptional cinematic instruments that load into the free Decent Sampler. This includes an A-B layer system, fine-tuned velocity settings and custom impulse responses.
The first instrument is called auras:polyscape, and it captures some rich and complex patches from Arturia’s PolyBrute 12, recorded through analogue tube preamps. The second is auras:volts, with recordings chaotically sampled from $200,000 worth of synths. And finally, there’s auras:eraphine, which includes ethereal vocal layers alongside a down-tuned ‘frost’ viola and an array of ornate granular accompaniments.
Download: Venus Theory – Auras Series
Baby Audio – Warp
Baby Audio Warp. Image: Press
Our last entry is the most recent and comes from Baby Audio, who have a history of releasing excellent freebies just in time for Christmas. This time round we have Warp, which takes a popular effect module from Transit 2, the recently released effects plugin that was co-developed with Andrew Huang.
Warp offers high-quality, artifact-free varispeed control to speed up or slow down your audio in real-time. Alongside the Speed dial there’s a Stretch control that affects pitch independent of the time, allowing you to do things like slowing down whilst pitching up. There’s also a Mix dial to balance the wet and dry signals.
Download: Baby Audio – Warp
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