# Audacity Audacity-4.0.0 - Product: Audacity (https://whatsnew.fyi/product/audacity) - Vendor: Muse Group - Date: 2026-09-03 - Version: Audacity-4.0.0 - Original notes: https://github.com/audacity/audacity/releases/tag/Audacity-4.0.0 - Permalink: https://whatsnew.fyi/product/audacity/releases/audacity-4.0.0 What's New is an index, not a publisher: every entry below links to the vendor's own release notes, which are the authoritative source. Entries are labelled where they are hand-curated sample data, pre-releases, or drawn from a secondary source such as a developer blog. Reuse: the summaries, labels and curation here are © What's New. Quote freely with attribution and a link back; wholesale republication of the corpus is not permitted — terms: https://whatsnew.fyi/terms. The vendors' own release notes remain their publishers'. --- - **changed** — Rebuilt application interface on Qt with native high-DPI rendering - **added** — Clips can be selected directly by clicking clip headers or Shift-clicking for multiple selection - **added** — Multiple clips can be edited together with moving, trimming and time stretching applied to all selected clips - **added** — Clips can be grouped and remain together when moved, copied, pasted or duplicated - **changed** — Clips can be placed more freely between mono and stereo tracks with overlapping clips replacing instead of blocking - **added** — Dedicated splitting tool available by pressing or holding S then clicking the waveform or clip header - **changed** — Paste now handles more cases automatically including creating tracks when needed and adapting compatible channel layouts - **added** — Alignment guides, sample-boundary snapping and per-project snap settings - **changed** — Toolbars and panels can be moved, docked, floated, shown or hidden - **added** — UI layouts can be saved as Workspaces with Modern, Classic and Music workspaces included - **added** — Light, dark and high-contrast themes available along with accent colors, track colors and several clip styles - **added** — New Home screen shows recent projects with preview thumbnails - **removed** — Separate Select, Envelope, Draw and Multi-tool modes removed in favor of context-sensitive functions - **removed** — Sync-Lock removed with delete, cut and paste now having explicit variants for leaving gaps or preserving timing - **changed** — Volume envelopes now displayed in Clip gain mode - **changed** — Sample drawing becomes available when waveform is zoomed to individual samples - **changed** — Playhead remains visible during navigation and can be dragged to a new position - **changed** — Playback can seek to another position without stopping - **changed** — Recording can start anywhere on the timeline and creates a clip at that position - **changed** — Punch and Roll, lead-in recording, latency compensation, software playthrough and per-track input monitoring rebuilt for new interface ##### Audacity 4.0 Audacity 4 rebuilds the application interface on Qt and introduces many new quality-of-life improvements, including a new clip-editing model. Most Audacity 3 workflows remain available, but some controls have moved or changed. ###### Watch the video: ##### Editing clips - **Clips can be selected directly.** Click a clip header to select it, or Shift-click to select multiple clips. - **Several clips can be edited together.** Moving, trimming and time stretching apply to all selected clips. - **Clips can be grouped.** Groups remain together when moved, copied, pasted or duplicated. - **Clips can be placed more freely.** They can move between mono and stereo tracks. Moving a clip over another replaces the overlapped part instead of blocking the move. - **Splitting has a dedicated tool.** Press or hold `S`, then click the waveform or clip header. Split, split-cut, split-delete, split at silences and split to a new track are also available as commands. - **Paste handles more cases automatically.** Audacity can create a track when needed, adapt compatible channel layouts and paste audio files from the operating-system clipboard. - Alignment guides, sample-boundary snapping and per-project snap settings have been added or expanded. ##### Interface and tools - The interface has been rebuilt on **Qt**, with native high-DPI rendering. - Toolbars and panels can be moved, docked, floated, shown or hidden. - UI layouts can be saved as **Workspaces**. Audacity includes Modern, Classic and Music workspaces. - Light, dark and high-contrast themes are available, along with accent colors, track colors and several clip styles. - The new Home screen shows recent projects with preview thumbnails. The separate Select, Envelope, Draw and Multi-tool modes have been removed. Their functions are now context-sensitive: - Volume envelopes are displayed in the **Clip gain** mode. - Sample drawing becomes available when the waveform is zoomed to individual samples. - Splitting is available by holding `S`. - Track and effect parameters use consistent rotary controls with fine adjustment and double-click reset. - Sync-Lock has been removed. Delete, cut and paste now have explicit variants for either leaving a gap or moving later material to preserve timing. ##### Playback and recording - The playhead remains visible during navigation and can be dragged to a new position. - Playback can seek to another position without stopping. - Recording can start anywhere on the timeline and creates a clip at that position. - Loop boundaries and the interaction between playback, selections and loops have been revised. - Punch and Roll, lead-in recording, latency compensation, software playthrough and per-track input monitoring have been rebuilt for the new interface. - Audio Setup now includes system-default devices, refreshable device lists and custom channel mapping. Audacity can follow operating-system device changes automatically. - Official Windows builds include ASIO playback and recording support. ##### Tracks, meters and effects - Track headers now contain live playback and recording meters. - Preset handling is consistent across built-in, destructive and realtime effects. - Built-in effects, generators and analyzers have been rebuilt for the Qt interface. - Supported plugin formats are VST3, Nyquist, LV2 on Linux and Audio Units on macOS. Audacity can display generated controls when a plugin's own interface is unavailable. - Spectrogram has been redesigned with clearer guides and rulers, and faster rendering. ##### Projects, import and export - Audacity 4 uses the new **`.aup4` project format**. - `.aup3` projects open and convert to `.aup4` without changing the original file. Converted projects cannot be saved back to `.aup3`. - Ol _[Truncated at 4000 characters — full notes: https://github.com/audacity/audacity/releases/tag/Audacity-4.0.0]_