Title says it all... What's the punchiest limiter plugin you've come across?

Define “punchy” ? In what context?

Well, I'm not a pro mastering engineer but I tend to notice a loss of punch or transient impact when hitting a limiter. But yesterday I tried Izotope Ozone Maximizer with the transient emphasis engaged at various settings and I noticed some additional punch which was enjoyable.

I thought to enquire with the pros here if there's an even punchier limiter, one that handles transients well, and possibly even improves their definition.

Pro-L 2 in Modern mode is pretty punchy. bx_limiter TP with the XL turned up a bit sounded punchy when I demoed it. I haven't tried Ozone Maximizer so I can't compare.

Thing is, each limiter comes with it's own compromises. Some treat the stereo image differently. Some sound gritty or pumpy on certain material. Transient enhancers can sound unnatural. So punchiness isn't the sole factor to consider when choosing a limiter.

You tend to lose a lot of punch, the keyword being “loss” find out why and you have your solution

Just recently got Sonible smart:limit. It can be pretty punchy with long attack settings.

One thing that I like about it compared to most other limiters is that it respects the music as far as sound stage go and the releases moves nicely along with the song each and every time.
You get smart features which are a nice addition but ultimately it’s the sound that made me get it.
Along with UAD Precision Limiter I find it to be the most natural sounding limiter of the ones I tried, but compared to the UAD you can push smart:limit A LOT more if need be.

Every limiter will inevitably eat some transients though, especially with ISP turned on. Some can help you recover them transients with enhancement features of sorts.

As far as I’m aware limiters with transient enhancement feauters are:

- iZotope Ozone Maximizer
- Newfangled Elevate
- Slate FG-X

Hope this helps!

Peace and peaches,
Andy

Newfangled Elevate, specifically because you can directly adjust the transients across the frequency spectrum.

Smart:limit can also get pretty punchy.

Ozone 8(+) Maximizer in IRC IV transient mode. The transient emphasis in my tests barely did anything.

I'll definitely go with the Sonnox limiter regarding "punch"

Ozone Maximizer is good, but I can get better results with Newfangled Elevate. Punchy too. I can do a lot with its transient, EQ and clipping tools.

It's also something one can spend hours fiddling with.

I really like IK Stealth, even at high gain reduction it sounds so transparent in the bottom end. A really underrated plugin.

Limitless is nice too, but rather more complicated.

To add to this list:

- DMG Audio Limitless (has a separate transient feature in the settings)

- Pro-L and Pro-L2 when set to 'dynamic' algorithm. Attack knob has a built in transient separation and enhancement under the hood. You can go really overboard with large attack values (and easily distort it heavily too).

Hi Henrik would you share what your approach to clipping is with Elevate. I have experimented but do not like the results. I hear a perceived loudness increase but don't like the sound. Seems to go a bit gritty to me even with less than a dB. Seems punchier without.
It may just be a taste thing?

The "dynamic" mode in Pro-L2 is, I think, very underrated!

I will also nominate (the also VERY underrated) Boost by Ursa DSP, as it's "punch" knob can really knock, to the extent that only ever dial it more than about 5%, unless I'm using the plugin in parallel (using the wet/dry knob).

-TKB

I have Boost and use it a bit. Great tool but a light touch definitely is best when used on the 2buss.

Which version of Elevate are you using? I've heard that it sounds a lot better since version 1.7.0

It may very well be a taste thing. And genre dependant. And your ability to hear clipping. I stop increasing well before punch is being affected.

When you say less than a dB, I don't know what you mean, but perhaps you mean ~1 dB of reduction? I can usually get away with 1-3 dB of reduction before I hear the signal being affected too much.

Furthermore, I don't necessarily rely on clipping to make the entire mix louder. Usually, I can make the mix loud enough for streaming purposes, with only slight use of clipping or even none. I often use the clipper on single tracks to make dynamic signals "behave", before I then proceed to further sculpt the signal with other processors. The clipper acts like a fairly transparent "controller", to make subsequent processing more gentle/transparent. I dislike hard working compressors and that may be the reason I like the addition of clipping.

And remember, Elevate can restore transients fairly well. I think that's one of the ideas with the plug-in.

They added in a "detail presevertaion" feature in 1.7
I like elevate a lot but i agree with the clipper tending to sound gritty fast even with 1.7 update

Thanks Henrik I have come to the same conclusion. Those three things. I really can hear even tiny amounts of it. I guess if there were no saturation at all in your mix it may help lift it a bit but... I just don't seem to like it.
May try a little hard clipping on individual tracks. I use the soft clipping on NFA Saturate quite a bit sometimes but that's to give me some distortion. To stop some things hitting the mix buss limiter too hard like kicks I am using a slow release Kotelnikov setting that really does the trick, transparent on the actual sound but stops the weird low squidgy fart thing happening when it fights the mix buss.

the punch happens BEFORE the limiter - the key is to prepare the signal in such a way that it then gives really good punch with limiting

After all these years, I've STILL yet to find anything to improve on the clarity and ability to preserve transients
as the TC Brickwall Limiter.

So fantastic is this plugin I go to a lot of hassle to keep an old Powercore 6000 running just so I can use the one Limiter plugin.

Does the new plug-in versions come anywhere close? I too loved this limiter back in the day.

Unfortunately, the answer is no.

Amen! Especially with heavy and quick kicks. Preparing it in such a way to preserve those micro dynamics!!

You can also get good results using two limiters.

Even so, the TC Brickwall HD Native plugin is one of the punchiest limiters I have tried. It is a - 8.5 db RMS limiter max unlike the Sonible Smart:Limiter, which can get to -6.5db RMS max and still sounds relatively punchy.

I prefer the TC Brickwall HD at -9 db RMS compared to the Sonible Smart:Limit -7 RMS if they are volume matched.

Also, as mentioned you may want to get the punchiness of the sound happening before the limiter and I find the TC MD4 HD Native (limiter disengaged) to be very good in combination with the TC Brickwall HD (lmiter).

For maximum punch from the TC Brickwall HD try a little SOFT CLIP type set SMOOTH inside the TC Brickwall HD with the release set to Adaptive.

This statement doesn’t make any sense. It’s all about what you feed it, how loud you feed it and how that loudness is distributed.
Also this perfectly explains what’s wrong with this topic. You don’t shave off 7-9dB, let alone twice.
7-9dB shaved off is distorted mush. You should have achieved target loudness BEFORE and shave off the ‘occasional 1-4dB max.

Any love for the Nugen true peak?

Right! I’m not sure if this was directly at my comment about targeting dynamic range values of 8.5 db RMS minimum, but certainly no where was I indicating that you would want to shave off 7-9db. I stand by my statement that if you are targeting a dynamic range of no less that 8.5 db RMS (though 9 db RMS dynamic range or more sounds better) the TC Brickwall HD limiter is one of the punchiest limiters out there.

My bad, I misunderstood that, but -8dB is also still quite loud, what genre are you targeting?
also if the loudness is already there and the limiter barely kicks in there should not be much of a difference.
Limiters only start to show their true colours when put to work.