Which DAW is Best For Church Broadcast?

Mar 29

There’s just so many options. Many of these options are actually incredible. One thing is for sure, church broadcasting isn’t what it used to be. Things like Dante and USB Audio have completely leveled up the church world of broadcasting. So with so many DAWs out there, which one is best for church? Here’s my personal list, in order.

5: ProTools

Please don’t picket outside of my home with fire and pitchforks. I just personally feel like ProTools can be a bit more system heavy and less volunteer friendly. It also doesn’t have great stock plugins. Sorry, not sorry. I also hate the monthly subscription payment model.

4: Ableton

I absolutely love Ableton and I know people who mix much better that I do that use it. I just personally feel that it still doesn’t hold the user-friendly value that some other DAWs offer for broadcast audio. For tracks however, this is all I use.

3: GarageBand

Yes, I would use GarageBand over ProTools or Ableton for THIS USAGE. That doesn’t mean it’s better than those two by any stretch of the imagination. This is a great alternative to Logic if your goal is to eventually switch. I do recommend only using this as a starting point though.

2: Studio One (PreSonus)

This one may start a riot but I honestly don’t care. I have my reasons. The first reason is the price point. You can get it from Splice.com and do a rent-to-own situation-ship. Super handy if your budget is in a pinch. The other cool feature is that, like Logic Pro X, you can remap your keyboard shortcuts. This is particularly handy. Especially if you want to get down to a one-hand workflow. To me the platform is just really simple to use, until midi is involved. Since most people are using midi in their broadcast I give this one a huge thumbs up.

1: Logic Pro X

The underrated monster. I use Logic for studio work but love it in a church broadcast situation. As mentioned before, I prefer to not move my left hand from the keyboard to do a hot key, so the easy remapping is a great feature. If you’re on a Mac, which you really need to be for broadcast audio, this program runs with such ease that it just makes the heart giddy. There’s also a ton of valuable Logic Pro X templates out there to make broadcast mixing from a DAW so much easier and consistent. Bonus points for it being $200 on the App Store. Just make sure you use a CHURCH Apple ID and not an individual.

Maybe I’m Biased

I expect the pitchforks. I know this will probably not sit well with many techs. The truth of the matter is that any of these DAWs will make for a great control point for your team. Everyone has their own preferences. As matter and fact ProTools is the industry standard, so that’s worth taking into consideration. Ultimately, this really just comes down to what you and your team is comfortable with.