Latency Calibration

Measure how long your own setup takes from the sound leaving openDAW until it comes back through your input, so recordings land exactly in time.

Why measure

When you record, openDAW shifts every take by the time your audio needs to travel out and back in. The browser only reports part of it.

• The output part is reported, but often wrong. Bluetooth headphones and speakers are the worst case: the browser may report 90 ms where the real delay is 300 ms.
• The input part is not reported at all.

A measurement replaces both numbers with the real one. Takes recorded afterwards sit on the beat, also with Bluetooth outputs.

Setting it up

The measurement plays three short noise bursts and listens for them on the input. The input therefore has to hear the output while it runs.

• Laptop speakers and built-in microphone: works as it is. Keep the room reasonably quiet.
• Headphones: hold one ear cup against the microphone.
• Audio interface: connect an output to an input with a cable, or put the microphone in front of the monitors.
• Instrument inputs (a guitar into a DI input, for example): connect an output of the interface to that input for the measurement.

If the input cannot hear the output, openDAW tells you so and changes nothing.

Running it

1. Stop playback.
2. Open the menu of the audio track you record on, and choose Capture Audio and then Measure Latency...
3. Click Measure. You hear three bursts of noise, about three seconds in total.
4. openDAW shows the measured round trip. From then on, the menu shows it next to Measure Latency...

The result belongs to this browser and to this pair of output and input device at the current sample rate. It does not travel with the project.

When to measure again

• After you switch the output or the input device, including plugging in headphones
• After you change the sample rate of your audio device
• When recorded takes start to sound early or late

Measuring again replaces the earlier result for the same devices.

What it does not change

• Your own input latency setting on a track takes priority. Leave it on "inherit" to use the measurement.
• MIDI recording is not affected. MIDI notes are placed by the browser's own clock for what you heard, which a round trip cannot correct.
• Monitoring keeps its delay. To play along without any delay, use the direct monitoring of your audio interface.