Ableton Live Intro Software

Ableton Live Intro gives you the essentials of Ableton Live at a great price. Whether you're a talented newcomer or a seasoned professional, Live Intro has got what you need for writing songs, making beats, recording, remixing, DJing and performing your music live on stage.

If you're just starting out, Live's fluid workflow, real-time audio manipulation and an impressive 7 GB audio content package provide a smart step into the world of music production and digital DJing. Start as you mean to go on.

For established DJs and producers, Intro provides studio-quality sound and an opportunity to plug Live's renowned composition and performance features into your current setup. A whole new way to write and perform for less than the price of a plug-in.

Start making music: Get started quickly with intuitive composition tools, beats, samples, instruments and interactive lessons.

Enhance your studio setup: Inject your sequencer with Ableton Live power via ReWire. Plus full AU and VST support, and up to 32-bit/192-kHz quality.

Play live on stage: Perform, improvise and remix live: Intro plays like an instrument and it's completely stable.

DJs, get creative: Enter the world of digital DJing or power-up your current DJ set with live remixing, effects and recording.

The sound of Intro

Intro's audio package proves that quality and quantity can go hand-in-hand. 7 GB of loops, beats and instruments from renowned sound designers cover the whole style spectrum from gritty hip hop through soul to edgy, avant-garde electronica. 500 instruments and drum kits, arranged in Ableton's Rack format, provide inspiring sounds that you can tweak and manipulate for perfectionist sound-shaping. If you're just starting out, all the sounds you need are right here.

All about Intro

Create and compose

Ableton Live Intro offers a unique, non-linear approach to songwriting and beatmaking. Record and sketch out ideas as they hit you, record different versions of a riff and select the best one later, try out new ideas, experiment and improvise: Intro's fluid workflow won't get in the way of your creativity.

Freedom on stage

When you're performing your music, Intro is stable and reliable. More importantly, you're free to improvise, respond to the crowd and other musicians, re-work your songs, speed up, slow down and remix live in real-time: Intro plays just like a "real" instrument. Go beyond simple playback and be one of the band.

Enhance your DJ sets

For DJs, Intro does two key things: firstly, it makes life easier and allows additional flexibility. Intro features BPM-based audio warping, automatic tempo-matching and it's easy to integrate your music library. Secondly, Intro lets you go far beyond simply "spinning tunes"—creative effects, integrated sampling and live remixing tools let you get into the tracks on your set list and make them your own.

Perfect mixes
Record your DJ set live and open it up later as a multi-track session for fine-tuning, detailed editing and erm... correcting any mistakes you made. Intro lets you capture the vibe of your performance AND iron out the details giving you, your fans and your friends perfect mixes.

Ultimate remixes

It's simple to sync up audio files, loops and entire songs—Intro allows the most brutal tempo changes without sacrificing audio quality. Intro's effects provide an arsenal of sonic fireworks ranging from standard EQ techniques to serious audio manipulation, re-sampling and live remixing.

Full ReWire support

Inject your current sequencer with the best of Ableton Live via ReWire. Add Live's unique, non-linear recording and playback to Reason, Logic, Pro Tools, Cubase or your personal digital audio weapon of choice, and run a new way to compose and perform alongside the tools you know. Intro can be a ReWire Master or Slave, so your options are open.

Loves your hardware

Intro, like all versions of Live, lets you plug in your hardware and get playing right away. Intro offers instant mapping for most popular controllers and dedicated Ableton Live controllers, like the Novation Launchpad and Akai Professional's APC40, work seamlessly with Intro. Want to create custom mappings or set up personal control settings? Intro's intuitive mapping mode makes it easy.

Supports your plug-ins

Intro supports all VST and AU instruments, effects and plug-ins. You can use any software instruments you already own and your favorite effects will work just fine with Intro. Intro lets you use up to 4 virtual instrument plug-ins and up to 6 effect plug-ins in one Live Set.

No compromises
The bottom line of any recording is sound quality. Intro makes no compromises here, with studio-quality multi-track recording up to 32 bit/192 kHz. Enough said.
What's the catch?

This is a valid question and we don't believe in hiding things. Live Intro obviously isn't the same as Ableton Live or Ableton Suite; there are limitations. We've made sure that the limitations won't affect the sound or the quality of the music you make with Intro, though. The limitations are "quantitative" rather than "qualitative," i.e. you're limited to 64 audio tracks, 2 effect sends, 12 Ableton effects at once and so on. Basically, Intro provides everything you need to compose, record and perform a track.

See the details in this feature comparison chart.

Key features

* Multitrack recording up to 32-bit/192 kHz
* Powerful and creative MIDI sequencing of software and hardware instruments
* Advanced warping and real-time time-stretching
* Nondestructive editing with unlimited undo
* Supports AIFF, WAV, MP3, Ogg Vorbis and FLAC files
* Full ReWire support; runs as Slave or Master
* Top-grade content package with loops and beats from premium sound designers
* 500 built-in Instrument Racks and Drum Racks plus Simpler (a sampler) and Impulse (a virtual drum machine)
* 200 built-in audio and MIDI effects
* New groove engine; apply and extract grooves in real time
* VST and AU support; automatic plug-in delay compensation
* Simple MIDI mapping plus instant mapping for selected hardware
* Single-screen user interface for simple, creativity-focused operation
* Multicore and multiprocessor support

Also includes

* 7 GB of loops, instruments and beats (boxed version)
* 1 GB selection of loops, instruments and beats (download version — a selection of content from the boxed version)
* Printed Getting Started Guide in English, French, German or Japanese (boxed version only)
* Built-in interactive lessons
* Practical "Construction Kits"
* Localized software menus, tutorials and PDF reference manuals in English, Spanish, French, German and Japanese

System requirements

Mac: 1.25 GHz G4/G5 or faster (Intel Mac recommended), 1 GB RAM (2 GB recommended), Mac OS X 10.4.11 (10.5 or later recommended), DVD-ROM drive

Windows: 1.5 GHz Pentium 4 or Celeron compatible CPU or faster (multicore CPU recommended), 1 GB RAM (2 GB recommended), Windows XP or Windows Vista, Windows compatible sound card (ASIO driver support recommended), DVD-ROM drive, QuickTime recommended