Audacity is a fast, cross-platform multitrack audio editor and recorder that supports WAV, AIFF, Ogg, and MP3 formats. Using the software, you can envelope-edit your audio files, do a bit of mixing using built-in effects and plug-ins and, if you mess up, at any point, you have unlimited undo.

Basically, what we've picked here is a free audio editor for Mac OS X 10.4 (Tiger) or later (Leopard 10.5.4 and lower). As an incurable audiophile, or a fan of music solutions, such as Ableton Live, you can use this software as a sidekick to record sounds, play sounds, import and export WAV, AIFF, and MP3 files, and more. This makes things easier for you, than having to fire up a big program that does so much more, and confuses you with all the available options. Built-in effects include Bass Boost, Wahwah, and Noise Removal, and it also supports VST plug-in effects.

The latest release of Audacity is 1.3.5, which is currently in Beta. Since the guys at the Audacity Development Team are still coding hard to iron out the bugs, it does not yet come with complete documentation or translations into foreign languages, so it is recommended for more advanced users. Nevertheless, if you want the latest “stable” version, you can grab it using the same download links we usually provide in the introduction and at the end of the article.

Also, be advised that, although the Beta version contains “dozens of new, exciting features,” as the team notes, “very occasionally, these might need final polishing or not be retained in later versions.” Thus, you should take into account that some features, which worked well in previous versions, might not perform as expected in the Beta release, or may even be disabled altogether.

All this being said, we hope you enjoy using today's freeware pick, Audacity. The audio-editing application is a Universal Binary, good for both Intel and PPC Macs.