How to EQ Drums: Kick Drum and Snare EQ, With Frequency Charts

To EQ a kick drum, keep its weight between about 40 and 100 Hz, cut boxiness around 200 to 500 Hz, and add click between 2 and 5 kHz so it cuts through on small speakers. To EQ a snare, low cut below about 80 Hz, set the body around 150 to 250 Hz, tame ring in the mids and add crack around 2 to 5 kHz.

Those are starting points, not fixed numbers. Every drum, room and sample is different, so the method below matters more than the chart.

Kick drum EQ frequencies

How to EQ a kick drum

1. Listen with the bass playing. A kick EQ'd in solo almost always ends up with too much low end once the bass comes in.
2. Low cut the rumble. Set a low cut around 25 to 35 Hz. You lose nothing you can hear and gain headroom.
3. Find the weight. Sweep a bell between 50 and 100 Hz and pick the spot where the kick feels biggest. Give it 2 to 4 dB with a low shelf or a wide bell.
4. Remove the box. Sweep a narrow boost through 200 to 500 Hz until the kick sounds like cardboard, then turn that into a cut of 3 to 6 dB. This one move does more for punch than any boost.
5. Add click. Boost 2 to 4 dB somewhere between 2 and 5 kHz. This is what lets a kick be heard on laptop and phone speakers that can't reproduce the low end.

Contour's Kick Punch preset follows exactly that recipe: a 30 Hz low cut, a 3 dB low shelf at 60 Hz, a 6 dB cut at 350 Hz and a 4 dB lift at 4 kHz. Play the beat loop and toggle it to hear the box disappear and the click come forward.

Kick and bass: who gets the low end?

The kick and bass share the same octave, and if both fill it, neither sounds clear. Pick an owner. In a lot of hip hop and trap the 808 carries the sub and the kick lives a little higher, around its punch and click. In house and techno the kick usually owns the sub and the bass sits just above it.

Then make complementary moves: a small cut in the bass where the kick peaks, or the other way round. Sidechain ducking does the same job in time instead of frequency, turning the bass down for a moment on every hit; our sidechain guide covers the setup. If you build kicks from scratch, tuning the kick to the song's key avoids a lot of clashes before EQ even comes into it. Thump lets you tune its synthesized kick in Hz for exactly that reason.

Snare EQ frequencies

How to EQ a snare

1. Low cut first. Around 80 to 100 Hz removes kick bleed on a miked snare and stray low end on a sample.
2. Decide on the body. Sweep 150 to 250 Hz. If the snare sounds thin, boost there. If it's flabby, cut a little instead.
3. Kill the ring. Many acoustic snares have a ringing overtone somewhere in the mids. Sweep a narrow boost until it whistles, then cut it 3 to 6 dB with a fairly narrow Q.
4. Add the crack. A wide boost of 2 to 4 dB between 2 and 5 kHz brings out the stick hit.
5. Check the top. If the wires feel dull, a gentle high shelf brings them up. If the snare is already harsh, skip this step.

Contour's Snare Crack preset is a typical snare curve: an 80 Hz low cut, 3 dB of body at 200 Hz, a 3 dB cut at 900 Hz with a narrower Q to take out the honk, and 4 dB of crack at 5 kHz.

How to EQ hi-hats, toms and overheads

• Hi-hats: low cut generously, often 200 to 400 Hz or higher. Tame harshness around 3 to 6 kHz if they're tiring, and add a high shelf only if they're dull.
• Toms: find the fundamental (usually somewhere between 80 and 250 Hz depending on size) and the attack around 3 to 5 kHz. Cut the boxy area between them.
• Overheads: treat them as a picture of the whole kit. Low cut to leave the kick to its own mic, and use broad, gentle moves rather than narrow surgery.
• Room mics: cut the low mids if they're boomy, and remember compression on rooms will exaggerate whatever is left.

Drum bus EQ

Once each drum sounds right, a drum bus EQ should only do small, broad things: a decibel of low shelf if the kit lacks weight, a gentle dip in the low mids if it's cloudy, a little top if it's dull. If you find yourself making big moves on the bus, go back and fix the individual drums. For more on the controls themselves, see how to adjust EQ.