The Best Free Reverb Plugins (and the Good One Already in Your DAW)

The best free reverb plugins right now are Valhalla Supermassive for huge, ambient spaces, TAL-Reverb-4 for a smooth plate with a vintage flavor, and Dragonfly Reverb for natural rooms, halls and plates. All three are genuinely free, not trials, and the reverb that came with your DAW deserves more credit than it usually gets.

This list is short on purpose. Plenty of free reverbs have come and gone, or stopped working on newer systems. These are established, still available and worth the download.

Free reverb plugins at a glance

Valhalla Supermassive

Valhalla DSP is known for its paid reverbs, and Supermassive is its free one. It's built for massive spaces: long, dense, heavily modulated tails and echoes that blur into each other. A mode selector switches between quite different algorithms, and a few controls, including feedback and density, take it from a big wash to a slowly evolving cloud.

Use it on pads, ambient guitars, synth leads and vocal throws, or as a sound design tool for transitions. It's not the one to reach for when you want a believable small room behind a drum kit. For that, see Dragonfly below.

TAL-Reverb-4

TAL Software makes some of the most-loved free synths and effects, and TAL-Reverb-4 is a plate-style reverb with a slightly vintage character. The controls are few, including pre-delay and modulation, so you can get a usable sound in seconds.

It's a great default on vocals, snares and synths, where you want a smooth, flattering tail rather than a realistic room. Low CPU use means you can run it on several returns without thinking about it.

Dragonfly Reverb

Dragonfly Reverb is an open-source bundle by Michael Willis. Rather than one plugin with many modes, it's a set of separate plugins: Dragonfly Hall Reverb, Room Reverb, Plate Reverb and Early Reflections. Each one focuses on doing its own space well.

This is the most natural-sounding set on the list. Use the Room on drums and acoustic instruments, the Hall on strings and piano, and the Plate on vocals. Because it's open source, it also runs on Linux, which makes it a common pick for Linux-based studios.

Don't skip the free reverb already in your DAW

Before downloading anything, try what you have. Stock reverbs have gotten very good, and they're tightly integrated with your DAW.

• Ableton Live: Reverb is a flexible algorithmic reverb. Live Suite adds Hybrid Reverb, which combines a convolution engine with an algorithmic one.
• FL Studio: Fruity Reeverb 2 is a capable algorithmic reverb. Fruity Convolver, available depending on your edition, loads impulse responses for realistic spaces.
• Logic Pro: ChromaVerb is a modern algorithmic reverb with a clear visual display, and Space Designer is a convolution reverb.
• Pro Tools: D-Verb is a simple algorithmic reverb that covers basic rooms, halls and plates.

Not sure what algorithmic and convolution mean, or the difference between a plate and a hall? Our explainer on what reverb is covers all six main types.

How to choose a free reverb VST

Pick based on the job, not on which free reverb VST has the most fans. A good starting set is one short, natural reverb for depth and one longer, more obvious reverb for character.

• For realistic depth on drums and acoustic parts: Dragonfly Room, or your DAW's reverb set to a small room.
• For lead vocals: a plate. TAL-Reverb-4 or Dragonfly Plate.
• For pads, ambient music and big transitions: Valhalla Supermassive.
• For a specific real space: a convolution reverb such as Space Designer or Fruity Convolver.

What to listen for when you test one

Every list of the best free reverb VST plugins sounds convincing on paper. The real test is your own material. Load each candidate on the same send, match the levels, and listen for these:

• Metallic ringing. Hit it with a snare or a percussive vocal. A good free reverb VST gives a smooth tail; a weaker one rings or flutters.
• Graininess in long tails. Set the decay to five seconds or more and listen to the end of the tail. It should fade smoothly, not break up.
• Low-end build-up. If the plugin has no low cut, put an EQ after it. A reverb you can't keep out of the bass gets old fast.
• CPU on several instances. You'll probably run two or three reverbs per song. Check the load with all of them active.

How to get more out of any reverb

1. Use sends. Load the reverb on a return track at 100% wet and send several parts to it, so they share one space.
2. Low cut the return. Removing everything below 150 to 300 Hz from the reverb is the easiest way to stop a mix getting muddy.
3. Add pre-delay on vocals. 20 to 40 ms lets the words land before the tail starts.
4. Match the decay to the tempo. If the tail from one hit is still ringing loudly at the next, shorten it.
5. Check it in the mix, not solo. Reverb always sounds better on its own. Set the level with everything playing.

Where Lumen fits (ours, and paid)

Lumen is our reverb, and it costs €29, so it's a different category from everything above. It's an algorithmic reverb built on an eight-line feedback delay network, with plate, hall and room presets and a shimmer engine that pitch-shifts the tail up a fifth, an octave or two octaves, or down an octave.

The Infinite Pad preset shows what the shimmer stage is for. It runs a 20-second decay with octave-up shimmer and heavy modulation, so a short chord turns into a slow, rising drone. Press play and listen to the tail keep building after the notes stop.

If the free picks cover what you need, use them. If you want a shimmer engine and presets aimed at vocals, snares and ambient pads, every Lumen preset plays in the browser on its product page. Mixing vocals on a budget? Our list of the best free vocal plugins covers the rest of the chain.