Ableton Live 13 hands-on: ARA 2, Drum Synth, new effects, more

Ableton Live 13 is now in limited public beta. That includes a lot of what you’ve asked for, like multi-band Racks, overhauled preset navigation, and ARA 2 support for tools like Melodyne. And it’s packed with new goodies: a very Ableton step sequencer, a multi-engine Drum Synth with some nice twists, new effects, a new ambient looper, and more. Also, I know some of you will like this: no mention of AI. It’s like we just get to talk about music-making tools again.

West Coast, with penguins: Aaltoverb on Linux; Aalto 2 coming soon

Madrona Labs’ patchable West Coast synth is one of the most playable, exploration-friendly, unique instruments around — a piece of software to last. And it comes with a reverb companion, now on Linux, too as a free demo you can beta-test. The big news: Aalto 2 is coming this fall for macOS, Windows — and Linux, too.

Peter Kirn - October 4, 2026

This free Ableton Extension slices up chunks of audio for Move, Live

MID continues to make cool stuff for Ableton Live, with a special emphasis on Ableton Move. Ever wished you could quickly chop up a track or other longer material into bar-aligned loops — especially for easy triggering on Move? Move Loop Slicer does just that, and it’s free now.

Peter Kirn - July 17, 2026

There are already some great uses of Ableton Extensions, and more coming

Peter Kirn - June 12, 2026

Ableton Extensions will let you code your own tools and actions for Live

Peter Kirn - June 2, 2026

Reason 14 beta: new Track Panel, reverb, Dark Mode, more

Peter Kirn - April 8, 2026

Move 2.0 adds Audio Tracks with clip warping, live processing; more

Peter Kirn - February 10, 2026

OB-Xf, free and open-source Oberheim-inspired synth, is now in beta

Peter Kirn - January 2, 2026

FL on the Web: hands-on, Image-Line tells us what it all means

Peter Kirn - December 22, 2025