Magic Mastering™ FAQs

What's included with Magic Mastering?

Smart Adaptive Leveling
Have you ever listened to a podcast where one person was louder than the others? How about a podcast where the intro music was super loud and then you could barely hear the speakers? This fixes those problems. It corrects the level differences between speakers and music, and applies dynamic range compression to achieve a balanced overall loudness.

Perfect Loudness and True Peak Targeting
Since listeners move from one podcast to the next (and may even mix in some music), it’s important that your podcast is mastered at the correct loudness.
The Apple Podcasts Authoring Best Practices states that podcast episodes should be "pre-conditioned in such a way that the overall loudness remains around -16 dB LKFS, with a +/- 1 dB tolerance and a true-peak value that doesn’t exceed -1 dB FS." Magic Mastering does this for you!

Audio Sweetening (Filtering + Noise, Hiss, and Hum Reduction)
It’s hard to keep every unwanted sound out of your recording. Sometimes these noises are easy to notice (A/C or power line hums), and sometimes your audio just sounds bad and you don’t know why (electromagnetic interference). Audio Sweetening classifies regions with different backgrounds and removes the noise in each region, then cuts disturbing low frequencies.

Filler Killer
Cautiously detects and removes filler words like "ah" and "uhm" to achieve a high-quality listening experience!

Optimize for Talk or Music
By letting us know if your podcast is mostly talking or music, we can better optimize the encoding. Podcasts with mostly speaking can benefit from reduced file sizes, which means faster downloads. For music-heavy podcasts, we will prioritize audio fidelity.

Power Clean
This feature focuses on removing background noise while preserving speech and music. It can remove external sounds, including reverb. This will be best only on particularly rough recordings, and you'll see the option to turn it on when you're uploading your audio file.

Should I choose Music or Talk setting?

It's likely that your podcast has some music in it— maybe in your intro and outro, or in occasional music beds throughout the episodes. Even if a podcast contains some music, we would consider it a Talk podcast as long as it's mainly people speaking.

Music podcasts are the opposite. These are shows that feature more music than talking. They would also include shows like audio dramas, which use the stereo effect as part of the production. For example, if the audio only plays through the left speaker when a character enters from a room. These shows need to be encoded in stereo, which is the main benefit of selecting Music and enabling the 192k stereo encoding.

Note: If your show is Talk, selecting Music will not be a better choice. This will needlessly double the size of your episode files, which consumes additional bandwidth— increasing the time it takes your listeners to download episodes and the storage space it takes up on their devices.

What if I just want my file to be Stereo (192k)?

Under Episodes > Magic Mastering, you'll want to toggle the setting to Music instead of Talk. This will make sure your files are encoded at 192k. If you deselect the options for Automatic Audio Enhancement and Filler Killer, then Magic Mastering's other features won't be applied to your episodes.

Why does my episode sound louder/quieter?

One of the main things Magic Mastering does is set the loudness of your audio file to match the Apple Podcasts Authoring Best Practices. So it's very possible that, if you upload an episode that's too loud, Magic Mastering will reduce the overall volume. Conversely, if you upload an episode that's too quiet, Magic Mastering will increase the overall volume.

Our targets are -19 LUFS for a mono (single channel) recording and -16 LUFS for a stereo (two-channel) recording - both with a -1 dB FS true-peak value. Not sure what that means? You don't have to! That's why we built Magic Mastering!

What if I don't want Buzzsprout to alter my file at all?

No problem! Without Magic Mastering enabled, you can simply upload an MP3 encoded at 96k or less, mono (1 channel). Buzzsprout will NOT re-encode these files.

To have your file untouched and in stereo, simply uncheck Automatic Audio Enhancement and Filler Killer, and switch the slider to Music (192k stereo). Now, when you upload an MP3 encoded at 192k (or less) stereo, Buzzsprout will NOT re-encode these files.

Why is Magic Mastering an additional charge?

Ensuring an audio file is correctly leveled, filtered, pre-conditioned, and encoded requires significant processing power since the audio file must be analyzed multiple times. Buzzsprout also has licensed advanced algorithms from Auphonic to provide you with the best results possible. For these reasons, we must charge a small fee to cover these additional expenses!

Can I try Magic Mastering for free?

Yes! You can test it out on an episode for free! When you head to Episodes > Magic Mastering in your account, you'll see where you can "Try for free". And, if you haven't used the option yet, you'll be prompted to try it when you're uploading your file as a new episode!
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How is Magic Mastering billed?

When you add Magic Mastering to your account, you won’t be billed immediately. Unlike your subscription, it’s billed at the end of each billing cycle—after it's been used.

If you've used Magic Mastering on any episodes during your current billing cycle, you won’t be able to turn it off mid-cycle. However, the account owner can schedule a downgrade by going to Settings > Subscription > Magic Mastering. This will ensure the feature is turned off when your billing cycle renews. You’ll still see one final charge for the month it was used, but Magic Mastering will be disabled moving forward.

Can I adjust settings per podcast?

Yes, when Magic Mastering is enabled, it covers all the podcasts in your subscription. But you can adjust the settings for each podcast! To turn off or customize your settings for just one podcast, follow these steps:

Head to Settings > Subscription > Magic Mastering.
Click Settings next to the specific podcast.
Customize or deselect the boxes as needed!

Note: Unchecking Automatic Audio Enhancement and Filler Killer and selecting the Talk option will essentially disable the feature for that podcast. Then new episodes on that podcast won't be mastered, while keeping Magic Mastering active on your other podcasts!

Can I run Magic Mastering on my past episodes?

No. Because it is applied to your episodes during the audio uploading process, Magic Mastering isn't designed to run on your back catalog of episodes. But once you enable Magic Mastering, you'll see it on all your episodes moving forward!

Is Magic Mastering an Auphonic alternative?

Buzzsprout has licensed the Auphonic algorithms to power much of what you are getting with Magic Mastering. If you're using Auphonic to get the correct loudness, true-peak, adaptive leveling for your audio, and for noise/hum reduction, then Magic Mastering can serve as a suitable replacement. If, however, you are using Auphonic for one of its many other capabilities (intro/outro, speech recognition, etc), you'll want to continue with your existing workflow!

Is Magic Mastering a FixMyLevels alternative?

Yes. In most cases, Magic Mastering will produce a better result. Plus, Magic Mastering has the added benefit of a simplified workflow (just upload to Buzzsprout and you're done).

Did we cover everything?

If we missed anything, please feel free to email our Podcaster Success team at support@buzzsprout.com.

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