One compressor, six tested characters
Nebula Compressor is built on a gain design with no attack and release interaction, with six styles from Clean to Vari-Mu. Around it are true-peak detection, a sidechain EQ, lookahead, upward compression and a panel that shows what it is doing.
Also in Nebula Complete and All Access.
Highlights
What sets it apart
Six styles that behave differently
Clean, Feedback, VCA, Opto, FET and Vari-Mu each change topology, knee, attack law, release memory and harmonic flavour. Colour adds the style's saturation, oversampled up to 8x.
A detector you can shape
Peak, RMS or true peak, with stereo, mid/side, mid-only or side-only detection. The sidechain has its own EQ with high-pass, low-pass and a bell, so a de-esser is two moves.
More than downward compression
Ratios run from 1:1 to infinity and below zero, with a range control and upward compression that has its own ratio and range. Lookahead holds the reduction target, so a transient is met by a reduction already under way.
Features
Everything in Nebula Compressor
Gain and timing
- Threshold down to -80 dB
- Negative ratios that make loud parts quieter
- Lookahead, hold and automatic program-dependent release
- Release synced to the tempo
Sidechain
- External sidechain key
- Detector EQ with 12 or 24 dB/oct high-pass, low-pass and a bell
- Listen to the key
Output and panel
- Make-up or loudness-matched auto make-up
- Parallel mix kept aligned through every delay, and delta to hear what is removed
- Scrolling history of input, output and gain reduction
- Live transfer curve with a dot for the music
- Undo/redo, A/B, user presets, 75-200 % scaling, keyboard and screen-reader friendly
Claude
Claude can help
It has no Claude connector of its own. In Nebula DAW, Claude can read and set its parameters through the DAW's general plug-in tools, and the Mastering Assistant adds Nebula Compressor as glue when asked to match a reference's feel (set_mastering_options, matchFeel).
Measured
What the tests show
- Core: 179 checks; plug-in: 100 checks
- auval -strict and pluginval at strictness 10, AU and VST3 (scripts/validate.sh)
- ASan, UBSan and TSan runs over both test suites (scripts/sanitize.sh)
- An instrumented AU that aborts on any audio-thread allocation, run under auval (scripts/rt-check.sh)
- Clean style nulls against the paper's equations to -110 dB
- The original eleven controls match the earlier core bit for bit
Questions
Nebula Compressor FAQ
Which formats are included?
AU, VST3 and a standalone app on the Mac. AAX and CLAP are not built. Windows and Linux are not built or tested yet.
Can it work as a de-esser?
Yes. Set the sidechain EQ's bell or high-pass so the detector listens to the sibilance. There is a De-Esser factory preset with the detector at 6.5 kHz.
Does the bypass change my latency?
No. The bypass keeps the latency, and the latency from lookahead and oversampling is reported to the host.
Can I compress only the sides of a mix?
Yes. Detection can be stereo, mid/side, mid only or side only. The Side Tamer preset compresses only the side.
What does it need?
macOS 11 or later, on Apple silicon or Intel. It loads as AU or VST3 in Logic, Ableton Live, Bitwig, Cubase, FL Studio, Reaper and Nebula DAW, and runs on its own as a standalone app.
Try Nebula Compressor free for 30 days
Download, install, and every product runs fully for 30 days. No account and no card needed. Buy the ones you keep.