Record with GarageBand

Get into the groove and record a song with Apple’s free music-making app

As part of the iLife family, GarageBand used to paid-for, and given away with all new Macs. Recently, Apple made it, along with iWork and iMovie, free for all Mac users running recent operating system versions, regardless of whether you’ve just bought new hardware. In GarageBand’s case you only need a Mac running OS X El Capitan or later.

That’s great news as the app is more powerful than you might expect a free one to be. Sharing much of its underlying technology with Apple’s more advanced Logic Pro X, it puts a friendly face on music-making tools, and shouldn’t be daunting even if you’re a beginner.

It comes with a lot of premade loops, instruments, and effects, and building up your first track is surprisingly simple. Best of all, you don’t necessarily need any extra equipment to start making music – with just your Mac and this app, you can write tunes right now!