Auphonic vs REAPER Comparison 2026
Both cover audio & podcasting. Here is what separates them on price, billing, what you can take with you, and coverage.
Automatic levelling and noise removal, by the hour
A full audio workstation for sixty dollars
At a glance
- Auphonic starts cheaper, at $11.
- Only Auphonic has a free tier.
Side by side
Auphonic | REAPER | |
|---|---|---|
| Starting price (they differ) | From $11 | From $60 |
| Pricing model (they differ) | Free plan, paid tiers | One-time purchase |
| Free tier (they differ) | Yes | No |
| Billing (they differ) | Monthly or annual | One-time purchase |
| Free trial (they differ) | None | 60 days |
| API | Yes | Not stated |
| Data export | Not stated | Not stated |
| Their cut | None | None |
Shaded rows are where the two answers disagree and both listings have answered. A row where one side has not stated a fact is left plain, because silence is not a difference.
Auphonic
Automatic levelling and noise removal, by the hour
Auphonic does one job on a finished file: loudness normalisation to a broadcast target, noise and reverb reduction, and a transcript if you want one. It is the step between a recording that is done and a file that sounds like somebody mastered it. Billing counts processed audio hours rather than seats, which suits a show that publishes irregularly. Two hours a month are free, and free productions carry a jingle.
Only on this side
- Covers transcription & show notes
REAPER
A full audio workstation for sixty dollars
REAPER is a professional digital audio workstation that costs less than two months of most subscriptions and never expires. It records, edits and mixes as many tracks as the machine can hold, runs the plugin formats everybody else runs, and the whole install is small enough to keep on a memory stick. The interface is famously plain and famously configurable, which means a first session is harder and the tenth is faster. The licence is priced by how you use it rather than by what you get.
Our note
The pricing here is the most honest in this category: two numbers, self-assessed, no upsell. If sixty dollars for a full workstation sounds like a catch, the catch is the first afternoon spent on the interface.
Ratings are the average of reviews readers left. The facts are stated by each tool’s own listing and are not verified by CloutStack. How we make money.