manual/_manual/11_working-with-plugins.html

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layout: default
title: Working With Plugins
---
<p>Plugins are bits of software that get loaded by Ardour in order to:</p>
<ul>
<li>Create various audio or MIDI effects
</li>
<li>Generate audio by functioning as "software instruments"
</li>
</ul>
<p>Ardour does not come with any built-in signal processors of its own
(other than volume faders) and it also generally doesn't ship with any
plugins. They are written by 3rd parties, though we do provide <a href="/working-with-plugins/getting_plugins/">some
information on how to get them.</a>.
</p>
<p>
Ardour supports a variety of different plugin standards:
</p>
<dl class="narrower-table">
<dt>LADSPA</dt>
<dd>An early, simple, lightweight plugin API, audio effects only,
plugins have no editors/GUI of their own (Ardour provides one, however).</dd>
<dt>LV2</dt>
<dd>An extensible, full-featured plugin API, audio and MIDI, plugins can provide their own editors/GUIs</dd>
<dt>AudioUnit</dt>
<dd>OS X only, full featured, audio and MIDI, plugins can provide their own GUI</dd>
<dt>Linux VST</dt>
<dd>Plugins using Steinberg's VST plugin standard but compiled specifically for Linux</dd>
<dt>Windows VST</dt>
<dd>Plugins using Steinberg's VST plugin standard but compiled for
Windows. <em>Support for this plugin format is not available in
regular builds of
Ardour. <a href="/working-with-plugins/windows-vst-support">Read
more...</a></em>
</dd>
</dl>
<h2>Adding/Removing/Copying Plugins</h2>
<p>Within Ardour, plugins are just another type
of <code>Processor</code> and so the techniques for
adding/removing/copying/moving processors apply to plugins as
well. These techniques are covered on
the <a href="/working-with-plugins/the-processor-box">Processor
Box</a> page.</p>
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