In this blog, I’ll explain some of my top mixing and mastering tips for Audacity.
Mixing
First, to mix two tracks together, you can use the time shift tool to move the tracks up and down the timeline. You might need to tweak the dB levels to make sure it’s nicely mixed and not distorting.
Mastering
Once you’ve sorted the mixing part, it’s time to move on to the mastering.
First, you need to extract your audio as a single WAV form so you can get started with some Audacity mastering tricks.
To do this, go to File > Export as WAV and hit Save. This is the format to go for to ensure you save it lossless, in as high-quality format as possible.
It will mix your tracks into one stereo file, so click OK on the warning that pops up, as well as the Edit Metadata Tags pop up.
This will give you the final mix, ready to do some mastering.
To get started, cross out or mute any other tracks in your display, grab the selection tool, select the entire newly mixed track, and hit cmd/ctrl + C to copy it.
Then, head to Tracks > Add New > Stereo Track where you can paste your copied track, so you now have two exact copies that you can go between and listen to as you add your mastering effects.
Add Your Effects
To add your first effect, select one of the tracks and go to Effect > Limiter. In the window, make it a Hard Limit and -3 dB, so that no audio can go above -3 dB.
Next, you can add in some EQ if needed by going to Effect > Graphic EQ. Click Flatten and then Preview to listen to your audio. You can then play around with the high and low ends by moving the dashes up and down as required.
If bringing up the high end causes some more overly high spikes to form, add another limiter to bring them down using the same settings as earlier.
If you’re mastering to upload online, as a podcast, streaming or YouTube, make sure you go to Effect > Loudness Normalization and, for YouTube, set the perceived loudness to -14 LUFS, and for podcasts, set it to -16 LUFS.
Your audio should now be mixed, mastered and ready to upload online! You can then compare the two tracks and delete the original mixed track once you’re happy with the mastered version.
Finally, go to File > Export and save it as whatever you like (I suggest MP3 for online uploads) and there you have your mixed and mastered audio file!
Learn More About Editing In Audacity
- How To Make Your Voice Sound Better in Audacity
- How to Use Audacity for Beginners
- Vintage Voice Effect in Audacity (Old Radio Effect)
- How to Completely Remove Vocals from a Song Using Audacity
Audacity Course For Beginners
If you are a podcaster, voiceover artist, audio editor or YouTuber, check out my Audacity course for beginners here.
