Sounds.com

Www.sounds.com

Backed by the weight of industry giants Native Instruments, sounds.com offers royalty-free samples from over 200 soundware designers, with new sounds and packs added daily. Browsing and downloading one-shots and loops is a breeze thanks to the service’s familiar Spotify-style web interface – when searching, you can filter selections by Style, Instrument, Loop/One-Shot, BPM and Key. Like Splice, there are no real auditioning features to speak of, although we’re told that DAWsynced browsing is coming soon.

PROS

> You start with a free 14-day trial, and 75 credits will be deposited into your account. > The website is easy and intuitive to use – if you’re a Spotify user, you’ll feel right at home. Open sounds.com in your browser, log in, search for samples, then download them to your computer. > The sounds are of a high standard as you’d expect from NI, and there’s plenty of content exclusive to sounds.com. > The various playlists (Staff Picks, Trending, etc) and charts are kept current. > Click a sample’s + icon to save it to your ‘Saved’ playlist – simple but effective.

CONS

> The quality of the preview audio is noticeably low-res compared to the actual file you download, making it difficult to discern a sample’s suitability at the auditioning stage. > Unlike Loopcloud or Noiiz, you can’t temposync or transpose samples when auditioning – you simply have to download the original sample and try it in your project. Thankfully, NI tell us that more browsing features are in the works. > If you like the bigger-name soundware labels, be aware that there are no real ‘headline’ brands to choose from aside from Native Instruments.

Price/tiers

£8.99/month for 150 credits £17.99/month for 500 credits £26.99/month for 1000 credits