Simple question: What do you want a DAW to do that it doesn’t do well already?
Huge fan of Bitwig. Love the creative possibilities.
Re: Cubase and Studio One, I stay up to date on both (and actually a bunch of other DAWs), a strategy which I am NOT pushing on anyone, it’s just my situation, dealing with clients, etc… So my approach is not going to work for some other folks.
I have favorites among the DAWs, though, and I use Win, Mac, and Linux DAWs, but just between Cubase and Studio One, it’s a tough call for me in some areas if I had to choose JUST ONE… but in all honesty, I don’t have to choose just one, so I am fortunate to live in a world where I can use both.
Maybe one day I’ll choose just one, if I no longer need to work with clients, but both are outstanding DAWs, we are very lucky and perhaps even spoiled with all the amazing features both have.
There are some really outstanding features in both that I enjoy, and that I wish the other DAW also had.
For Studio One, some of my favorite features include:
- superior clip gain envelopes (done right, big workflow issue for me)
- basic ripple editing (still missing in Cubase)
- scratch pads (extremely useful in my workflow)
- event FX (better than DOP IMO, better for my workflow for sound design)
- splitter for great FX routing and multi-instrument options (all DAWs should have this, it’s great)
- integrated mastering features (don’t use this often, but it has been very helpful)
- superior articulation management (“sound variations”, I now prefer this approach to Steinberg “expression maps,” Cubase needs an overhaul in this area IMO, YMMV)
- lyrics features (done right, bravo!)
- the new open DAWproject file format (currently makes project exchange with Bitwig and even Reaper much easier) - great idea that I hope Steinberg and other DAW developers will adopt as well, super helpful for me
- very good implementation of immersive sound (I like it better than how Cubase currently does it)
- Linux beta (I’m a huge Linux fan, very excited about this – the beta will take a long time, but this will be a game changer for Linux DAW users like me)
- in general, I prefer the more consistent workflow and design approach to Studio One, although to be fair Steinberg has been making (slow) progress in this area
For Cubase, some of my favorite features include:
- in general, the entire Steinberg ecosystem is good to excellent, I have almost every Steinberg app and plugin, and where they integrate between each other to some degree, I find that very helpful, plus I like the vertical integration of their plugins like HALion, etc
- for example, sampler track workflow is excellent IMO, especially how seamless it is to move from a sampler track to HALion, Groove Agent, Backbone, etc… well done, simple and elegant, great for sound design, you can go from simple to very advanced very quickly - nothing against Studio One which is great for sound design too, but the Steinberg workflow is very good if you also have the full versions of HALion, etc.
- better plugins out of the box - this is not a huge deal to me since I use mostly third party plugins, but there are times when this has come in very handy on a laptop and I don’t have time to install third-party plugins, and I can therefore get more done with Cubase out of the box, by itself, than just about any other DAW
- example of continuous improvements in plugins also include things like Vocal Chain in C13 - while I have third party plugins that are better in every respect, it’s nice to have something like this already included… again, great when I’m stuck on a laptop when I don’t have time to install third-party plugins
- integrated VariAudio also comes in handy when I don’t have time to install Melodyne or ReVoice Pro
- slightly superior MIDI tools overall, notwithstanding inferior articulation management IMO
- project logical editor, still love it
- I like what they’re doing with chord pads, don’t use it very much, but I think it might come in handy, I like what they did with C13
- historically and generally superior video engine of Cubendo (I work with a lot of media and film stuff), although in all fairness, Presonus greatly improved their video engine recently
Overall, both DAWs are really impressive, both could handle pretty much anything you could throw at them. And some of their strengths/weaknesses can easily be mitigated by third party plugins. For example, Studio One’s great splitter feature could be compensated for by using Waves StudioRack in Cubase, which has nice splitter-like features. And likewise, the advantage of VariAudio in Cubase is compensated for by using Melodyne or ReVoice Pro, etc… and so forth…
In the end, it really comes down to you and what you need and prefer. There is no perfect DAW. Just use what you need to use to get the job done and make your best music! If that means using Cubase, then use Cubase. If that means using something else, then use something else.
For me, if Steinberg would do the following five things, Cubase/Nuendo would be my top DAW:
- Ripple Editing
- Improve clip gain envelopes to the level of Studio One or Pro Tools!
- Integrate Dorico!
- Overhaul articulation management
- DAWproject file format support (already so helpful for me with Studio One, Bitwig, and Reaper!)
Bonus points if Cubendo added:
- FX splitter features (see Studio One, and also Reaper FX containers)
- Improve DOP (see Studio One Event FX and Reaper Take FX with envelopes, etc.)
- Modulation features (just hang out in Bitwig for a while and borrow any of their hundreds of brilliant modulation ideas)
- Scratch pads!
- Great lyrics features!
Dream features for Cubase that will probably not happen any time soon, if ever:
- Add Subprojects feature like Reaper
- Linux support
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I’ve seen other software companies go through the same problem in this Cubase vs. Studio One dynamic. The software company that does something “first” is not always the one that succeeds for the reasons I mention. Steinberg has a more burdensome project while Studio One is lighter on its feet.
Here’s one way to put it. Studio One lacks tons of features compared to Cubase BUT many of these features may not have much demand.
I often compare Cubase and S1 similarly to Microsoft and Apple. Microsoft has innovated and invented interesting features and they’ve done so before Apple. However, Apple takes it’s time and observe whether the marketplace needs or wants those features and tries to find the best way to bring the product to the public.
A perfect example is how Steinberg approaches Expression Maps compared to Presonus’s Sound Variations. Cubase (possibly) invented the idea. They innovated. However Studio One improves it. Makes it easier.
That’s where we’re at right now.
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This is a composer-heavy forum, so producers or beat makers are likely to value a lot of the composer and film workflow-oriented features less than most here. If you need those features, then a move to Cubase is worth it. That’s necessity, not FOMO 
Studio One does have some nice features that Cubase lacks, though. The Pattern Editor, Multi-Instruments, Splitter, Mix Engine FX… But really the biggest disparity is experienced when you use the software…
Wholistically speaking, it’s just a faster, more efficient workflow than Cubase. Features have nothing to do with it, because even pretty simple things are better implemented into the workflow than in Cubase. It’s was a clear design goal for PreSonus.
Generally, Cubase is great for studio work and composition/film scoring, but I would choose Studio One over it for producing other genres because the workflow disparity is pretty large in its favor.
I’d move from Studio One to Cubase for the features (out of necessity), not for the workflow.
IMO, it’s impossible to not have a noticeable drop off in productivity or workflow efficiency making that switch.
I also avoid using Cubase if I’m laptop-bound, because the UX is simply inferior on that form factor. Studio One was designed to be as usable as possible on a single laptop display. PreSonus has stated this as a design goal when developing their DAW.
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I moved from Sonar in 2016 to Studio One, and after 7 years, I recently got the crossgrade to Cubase.
There’s a lot of great features in Studio One and it is amazing for ease of use. But my experience in recent years is that bugs have started creeping in alongside new features which remain half-baked. Things like:
- The built-in mastering renders each track separately, resetting the audio engine each time, meaning you can’t produce gapless/continuous playback without it introducing clicks or pops at the track markers if you have any non-trivial mastering chain
- Another mastering bug is that it purports to be able to master directly from song files without rendering down the track first, but it sometimes messes up the song automation when you do this, meaning you can’t trust the feature
- Track freeze similarly isn’t reliable because it works on a per-event basis, and reverb or delay tails get prematurely cut off
- The support for editing audio in S1 is virtually non-existent, it provides no way to send audio to an external editor, and it doesn’t support workaround plugins like RX Connect.
All of these contributed to a frustrating experience when using S1 for my last couple of releases. Incidentally they’re all features and functionality that tends to get used towards the end of a serious recording project - perhaps S1 just has more bedroom users or electronic music producers who don’t really use these features much. It was the Studio One 6.6 release coming out with no fixes for any of these that convinced me to give Cubase a proper try.
So now I’m here to see which parts of the grass are greener. No doubt in time I will start to discover the ways that Cubase has annoying bugs too!
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Welcome to Cubase! With the recent confusing rollout of Studio One 6.6 “hybrid” licensing and the mixed messaging from Presonus about add-ons, etc., you’ve frankly got another reason to spend time in Cubase.
As I mentioned before in this thread, I really like Studio One too, and I stay up to date with it along with a bunch of other DAWs (for a variety of reasons)… however, v6.6 has given me pause not only with the Presonus messaging (until that gets resolved properly), but I was quite surprised to see they didn’t resolve the efficiency core issues with Apple Silicon. I didn’t mention this in my prior post, but Cubase (and Reaper and even Pro Tools) currently all perform better on Apple Silicon than Studio One does, I’ve run my own tests to confirm this, and Presonus are also fully aware of that, but Studio One 6.6 had NO significant improvements in that area from what I can see so far. That was disappointing. It’s a known big deal, along with other fixes they neglected to do, and it doesn’t make sense to me they spent so much time on some rather dubious new features like TuneCore integration, etc… rather than deal with the fundamentals. Anyway, I am starting to think they are losing their way. I really hope not, but the next few weeks/months will be very telling about how Presonus shows its priorities.
In any case, you will find lots to love about Cubase 13, and also a certain amount of annoyances too! The grass isn’t always greener on the other side of the hill, as you know. However, Cubase is enormously powerful, it has been going from strength to strength in recent releases, and while the workflow is inferior in some ways to Studio One, and you may miss your favorite Studio One feature here and there, Cubase also has many great, deep features that Studio One lacks. Take your time to explore it. It’s one of the great DAWs for a reason, but there will not be a 1 to 1 correlation of feature and workflows for you.
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Agree with most of this but have a slightly different angle:
I have and have had most DAWs installed over the years, the original reason being that before I retired I supervised many PhD and Masters students at my old university /conservatorium. Of course they brought with them any and all platforms they used and apart from easily being able to examine their work & their claims ongoing, I also found it interesting to better understand their reasoning for using & working with what they chose.
Standouts included Reaper which so many used not only beacuse of the cost but also truly excellent sound (turns out that really was the case). Gone now, but was very nice. Still, a bit too ‘open source’ like for my ongoing use.
Digital Perfomer was & is so common with composers but personally, never really like the thing or MOTU at all. Still, ease of file exchange & export & all of that …
Ableton Live, unique killer app and is still installed but have remained at v10 because they dropped Rewire after that. Brilliant giant plugin with Nuendo /Cubase. I likely would update this if Steinberg ever adds support for the newwe Abelton Link protocol.
Logic Pro, am not a fan at all but many, many friends use it, plus pay once & all the plugs /VIs is excellent value & so it stays. Also helpful I guess because most of those users I’ve worked with have less than ideal tech knowledge when it comes to asking for specific things for mixing & mastering etc. Just as easy to open up the native session to export or do what I will with it.
ProTools of course, don’t like Avid at all but again, so many sessions come this way. These days I’m just using the free Pro Tools Intro version and that’s quite enough to export tracks or stems to another DAW (limited to 8 tracks at at time).
Studio One, never ever had anyone come to me with that one. I owned it for a while and the code /sound was very nice indeed & the background of original developers was also impressive (PhD grad for the audio engine & ex-senior Steinberg coder). The round-tripping to its own mastering app was also impressive but still, I got rid of it. Can’t say I liked the GUI at all.
LUNA. A very interesting and great sounding free DAW from Unversal Audio. Some things going on here & essentially replaces the far more dodgy Harrsion MixBus. LUNA sounds very analogue and does it alll quite easily - assuming you’re into that old-school pop /tape thing.
Otherwise, what I’m left with these days:
Nuendo has been my main squeeze for a very long time & essentially replaced Pro Tools Ultimate at some point. Staying at version 12 becuase I don’t really have the need for all those post tools anymore. If I do, I do that in Resolve Studio (which is also ‘pay once’).
Cubase 13 is now the main DAW along with the ever brillant Wavelab 12 & the lastest set of Absolute VIs. Only gripe is all of this requires separate payment and tends to cost a bom to maintain each year (but sure, much better than Avid’s awful subscription model). From this perspective, Logic Pro and perhaps LUNA are far better value (with the latter, assuming you are already in the UAD ecosystem).
Current install on a 7,1 Mac Pro mac os 14.4.1 & all good:
Cubase 13 + Wavelab 12 (and still installed Nuendo 12)
Ableton Live 10 - for rewire to Nuendo or Cubase (hoping for C13 Link support soon)
LUNA 1.5.4 - the faux analogue sound, stems in & out etc
ProTools Intro 2024.3 - for exporting tracks and stems
I find thats not a bad collection, they interact well & actually serve practical workflow purposes (tho dont really need Nuendo any more)
Otherwise:
Logic Pro 10.8, well, because its there, pay once & have owned for a long time
And not to mention DaVinci Resolve Studio 18.6 which of course has its .Fairlight DAW on board. Still, most of that work has been in round-tripping between Nuendo & Resolve.
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I was a dedicated user of Studio One from version 1 through to 5. In 2022, I bought Cubase 12 and now I’m running v13. I did not upgrade to S1 6 because the upgrade was boring and the company seems intent on ridding itself of people who want to buy it rather than rent it. I know they’re making some gestures right now to give away a pro license with their Hybrid program, but if you read between the lines, they’re squeezing people like me out. And that’s fine. And, it’s just my opinion, so no one should get upset about it.
When I started using Cubase, I realized that many of the S1 shortcuts came from Cubase, as did many of its features. It’s a much deeper program and I think the people behind Cubase are somehow more in tune with musicians as opposed to “producers” — don’t get me started.
My history is as a live performer and former studio owner. I use a few DAWs, but Cubase is the one I’m going to stick with given that it’s being constantly upgraded and improved from what I’ve seen in the last 1.5 years.
No regrets. I still use Studio One for some things, but I’m using Cubase more and more for everything I do; I especially like it for writing and preproduction.
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I assume you are aware that the mastering in the Steinberg suite is a separate product, Wavelab, which is quite expensive, but seems quite elaborate.
I also used Sonar for a long time, and moved to S1 and then added Cubase several years ago.I only use a small fraction of the capabilities of any DAW, so I could never really justify the cost of Wavelab. For the kind of products I do, it is usually OK to work through the mix, then at the end stage, simply drop Izotope Ozone on the stereo out bus. But I’m not producing commercially.
If you like the Redbook stuff in S1 mastering, you can certainly use that with mixes you do in Cubase.
My only real advice is that Cubase is quite deep in features affecting the UI (console setup control room setup and scripting). Some people do an enormous amount of customization and shortcutting to fit their workflow. It is work learning about some of those capabilities. They really aren’t talked about much. They are a deep part of the Cubase culture, but aren’t really obvious to newcomers. It seems to be a dimension of flexibility beyond what other DAWs present.
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Yes, I’m not a professional mastering engineer so I can actually do almost all of my mastering directly in a typical DAW project without needing specialised mastering tools, and there are other ways to produce DDP files easily enough. The problem with Studio One is that it advertises that it gives you this specialised environment for mastering, but it’s not reliable enough to actually use. I think it’s a symptom of Presonus throwing in new features to get market share but not really having the ability to support those features as well as they need.
I’m looking forward to spending some time getting to learn the Cubase UI and customisation. I’m a software engineer by trade so I’m probably more tolerant of having to customise my tools than the average user. Studio One goes too far the other way in my opinion, being a bit inflexible.
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Hey Guys Im The OP Here…Been awhile since I posted here.
Im digging in a Light Dive Into Cubase 13 Pro Trial Version.
The learning Curve In Cubase is a Bit Steep Compare To My Primary DAW Studio One…
I moved allot faster The Learning Curve Process In S1 Than Im Currently Doing in Cubase. I just Love S1 Layout…D&D,The Plugin Inserts,The Sends,Bus Routing Etc; S1 is so much fun and I also can quickly Making Music in a short amount of Learning Time When I First Got S1 V4
S1 Cons ** Hardly any, although it might not match the level of included content that Cubase Has.
Cubase Cons** Relatively Expensive
Im hearing that Cubase Arguably the most well-rounded DAW out there in terms of content and features…Im really want to Move From S1 To Cubase So With That, Any X Or Current S1 Users Find Themselves with some Learning Difficulties in Cubase? Thx Rob
For Me Its a Cubase Learning Curve Con…
Thoughts?
think yourself lucky you’re not learning Reaper
Actually reaper is great
Any new DAW will need a period of aclimatisation , sometimes that means learning a new way of doingf the same thing you did in another DAW .
You can D and D in Cubase actually, it’s not something that I’ve ever done so D and D doesn’t really interest me in S1 either.
Just keep watching videos and learning and you’ll get there. I’m still learning new stuff after 30 years of Cubase!!! I started in the 80’s with an ATARI 1024 ST
M
Every DAW has a learning curve to get the most out of it. Cubase has a steeper learning curve than Studio One to get the most out of it IMO. And as already mentioned, Reaper has an even steeper learning curve, for example. And so forth. We are all very fortunate to have so many good options. But there is always going to be friction in any kind of transition and only you can determine if that friction is WORTH your time and energy (and potential stress and gray hairs).
Having said that, the gap between Cubase and Studio One is not that significant in terms of the overall generalized paradigms inherent in their designs. There are lots of little things that don’t correlate precisely, of course, but the big picture concepts are in a similar zone. The gap between Cubase and Bitwig is much larger, for example.
My advice, considering where you already are in the process, is to shut down your DAW right now, clear your head, go outside the studio to your favorite place nearby where you like to ponder things (your favorite park bench, your favorite pub, your favorite coffee shop in your favorite seat with your favorite latte, etc.), and try to get to the CORE reasons why you want to switch to Cubase in the first place, in the larger context of WHAT you really want to do with your music.
Ask yourself questions like:
- WHY do you want to leave Studio One behind?
- WHAT attracts you specifically to Cubase? (Especially knowing what you now know.)
- HOW MUCH friction and learning curve are you willing to go through to make the move?
- WHAT are your most important music composition/production goals?
- HOW will using one DAW over another DAW help you achieve those goals?
Once you get some more clarity on all that, you can make the right decision for YOU. Fortunately, we live in amazing times with amazing tools with which to make music. You’ll figure it out. And then the learning curve won’t be that annoying if you decide to stick with Cubase.
Good luck!
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Cubase does have many things that are not so friendly to new users. But if you learn those things most of them will become super handy and make sense.
There is a bunch of resources you can learn from such as Steinberg and Cubase Youtube channels (and Dom Sigalas’ own channel, he shares a lot of useful tips).
Also never forget you can check the official manual from https://steinberg.help/ . Steinberg does documentation work really well. They write procedures super clear.
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Just Learned Last Night From what I’ve Seen With Mendel, Cubase MIDI Is So Much More Advanced Than S1…Thoughts?
I can’t recommend Cubase over Studio One really. I mean, I love Cubase, but the stability just isn’t there vs S1. I used S1 for a few years and then moved to Cubase 10 Pro. I upgraded to 10.5 and then dropped it again after I got really fed up of silly bugs, and sold my licence.
Cubase 12 tempted me back in, but still S1 was more stable and more regularly updated. 13 was an improvement for me and saw a lot of the niggles ironed out, but the time between updates is still too slow IMO, especially given the magnitude of some of the bugs.
Cubase is the most feature-rich DAW. That can be fabulous or horrible depending on you.
What do you really want? There are no shortcuts when learning. Most users, when realizing every feature in Cubase, I would guess maybe use 10- 20% of of all Cubase features…if that.
You can read the 1,443 page manual (not including the Cubase VST, quick start, midi devices and remote control devices manuals)
You can pay for tutorials. You can watch free tutorials.
IMO, a couple good free ones are from Dom Sigalas & Chris Selim.
When you have specific issues in Cubase try this:
or this:
Searchable database of Cubase video tutorials on YouTube (be patient)
This is good for shortcuts
But ultimately you may want to progress to something like Metagrid for the above.
Hope that helps…
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I don’t know if this will help or not, but I’ll share my experience.
I’ve been a Cubase user for a very long time. I tried Studio One pretty deeply for a couple of months (V6 while on Cubase 12) and here’s my generalized takeaway:
Studio One is superior when it comes to workflow. It’s just more modern that way. Cubase is older and slower in many ways, and there are many issues that haven’t been made faster in years, probably because it’s old code. It’s slowly getting there, and hopefully they’ve been rewriting the code for a brand new version, which I would welcome as long they keep the extremely deep feature set. I don’t have time to go into the details about what makes Studio One faster and more intuitive because it would be a very long post. And there are some ways Cubase is better, of course. But again, overall Studio One takes the lead here.
Cubase is superior because overall it has a much deeper feature set that works for me as a composer, and that’s why I decided to stay for now. The tradeoff is that the workflow suffers compared to Studio One, but for me it’s worth it overall to stay with Cubase (also considering I know Cubase so deeply) for now. I’m hoping Cubase is up to par soon overall when it comes to speed and workflow, it really needs to be in order to stay competitive IMO.
Once you get deeply familiar with Cubase’s workflow it of course significantly helps, and things like Metagrid do make a difference. But as I said, there are many old ways it’s stuck in, which are gradually improving (at a very slow speed).
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The MIDI in Cubase helped me to make the switch. I use a lot of virtual instruments, so I need features related to writing with them. S1 didn’t have enough flexibility in that regard. It’s good, but more basic.
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I’ve gone the other way - mostly because the S1 UI is more facile (especially after the v13 misfire) but mainly because getting from Elements to Pro would have cost way more than I spent in S1 getting from Artist to Pro. Of course, I then spent the differential and then some on libraries, some from Steinberg. From a creative and business standpoint this left me in a better position.