Free Sonar Tier

[joegyork]

Interesting news from Bandlab! I assume they will retire Cakewalk soon and this will be it’s replacement

(Sorry my phone won’t let me copy the link but it is at the Cakewalk forums)

4

[patrickwichrowski]

We’re pleased to announce the release of Sonar 2025.06! This release introduces a free tier of Sonar and new features/bug fixes.

Please note that in order to automatically keep your activation status up to date, Sonar will renew your activation status whenever a new version of the application is installed and run for the first time, and when you sign in to BandLab from within Sonar. If you have never signed in to BandLab from within Sonar, you will be prompted once to sign in.

 

Thanks,
The Bakers
PS: The easiest way to get the latest version of Sonar is by downloading the Cakewalk Product Center application.

Please note: Cakewalk Sonar requires a BandLab account. Premium features require a BandLab Membership.

Very interesting!

 

New in 2025.06

Sonar Free Tier
Native ARM64 Support
Track Manager
Jump-to-Track
BandLab Sounds Integration
Color Theme Improvements
Cakewalk Product Center Update
Sonar Tier Comparison
Introducing the Sonar Free Tier

We are thrilled to announce the launch of a comprehensive free tier for Cakewalk Sonar, making its powerful and robust core features widely accessible to a broad and diverse community of music creators. Aspiring artists, hobbyists, and professionals alike are free to experience the acclaimed workflow without any initial investment. The free tier provides a solid foundation for recording, editing, mixing, and mastering, ensuring that creative ideas can be brought to life with professional-grade tools.

For those seeking to unlock the full potential of Cakewalk Sonar, including advanced tools, an expanded library of content, and a host of exclusive benefits and more plugins, we offer a premium tier accessible with a BandLab Membership. This premium offering is designed to cater to the needs of dedicated producers and engineers, providing an unparalleled creative environment to push the boundaries of their musical endeavors.

 

https://discuss.cakewalk.com/topic/85290-current-sonar-release-202506/

New album soon!

https://linktr.ee/patrickwichrowski

2

[patrickwichrowski]

Yes you can –  thank Meng, it’s not too good to be true indeed. Today, the core application itself is free to use with no track or effects limits whatsoever. Some new features, plugins and BandLab membership exclusives are behind the membership paywall.

We do appreciate it however if you support future development by paying for a licence  There are some great deals coming so keep your eyes out.

 

https://discuss.cakewalk.com/topic/85289-sonar-202506-feedback/#comment-598254

New album soon!

https://linktr.ee/patrickwichrowski

[LinkedMusicians]

I predicted yesterday that BandLab would probably begin offering a perpetual license for Cakewalk Sonar soon, as all signs indicate that Cakewalk Sonar is failing to make a dent in the market. While this isn’t a perpetual license they’re selling, it’s very similar from a strategic perspective. It’s still a big red flag that the product (okay, technically the products, Sonar and Next) is floundering. So the risk here is that you’ll be creating projects with a DAW that’s very likely to soon be phased out — I would guesstimate — within 12 months, and at most, 24 months, but I think the former is much more likely. A $450 million valued company isn’t going to be that patient with a product line that is clearly a failure. Investors aren’t that generous.

This is exactly the kind of stuff that I used to write about at my marketing and branding strategy publication. I did enjoy writing those articles, I just didn’t enjoy having to be prolific.

The problem started with using a brand (we’ll just call Cakewalk “the brand” and Sonar the subbrand to keep things simple). That brand and subbrand are seen by most of the market as (1) outdated, and (2) connected to their failures and the eventual closure of the brand under Gibson ownership before their intellectual capital assets were purchased by BandLab. Even more, BandLab did a very confused brand strategy in the original naming of the DAW. They first called it Cakewalk by BandLab, then went further into the past by calling it Cakewalk Sonar. It looks a lot like BandLab lacked a clear brand strategy and just made it up as they went along. They could have done much better by naming the new DAW something like BandLab Sonar. That would have paid tribute to the old DAW without confusing the market and also, conveying this product is fresh and exciting, taking this legacy brand into a new era. However, at this point, the naming not only confuses people — even the big AI platforms are confused over Cakewalk by BandLab and Cakewalk Sonar, and Google AI overviews currently says that BandLab has ceased making Cakewalk Sonar. Good thing that they’re are so few searches globally that not many people probably see that.

If the branding strategy wasn’t bad enough on its own, add to it that when BandLab resurrects the brand name, it does it with the subscription-only model, a model which every developer in this industry should know — without having to spend a cent on primary research — is not at all popular with this market. And when the market tries to tell BandLab that it wants a perpetual license version, what does BandLab do? It not only plugs its ears, it mocks and censors them.

BandLab is truly worthy of an MBA case study in brand, marketing, and social media mismanagement. I think a fraction of the former Cakewalk by BandLab users will pick this up and a similar amount of BandLab users that would have otherwise used the free Cakewalk by BandLab.  But for those who’ve moved on after the company went subscription-only, I think most will not return. IMO, this freebie is only worthwhile for those who can’t afford a paid DAW and can accept the risk that this DAW will very likely not be around two years from now in any form. It’s a significant sign that even the micro influencers that were promoting Cakewalk by BandLab have moved on, and the only ones that are now promoting Cakewalk Sonar are seeing extremely low view rates — often struggling to get to 1,000 views. Google searches on ‘cakewalk sonar” are similarly low (I would cite AI mentions, but I actually ran the numbers on Google searches before writing this, and they’re very low) .

Mark my words. Easily gone in less than two years, but very likely, gone within the next 12 months. This move tells you that they’ve failed and are so desperate to gain market share that they feel the only viable path is to give the product away. But they already did that and then retreated. It’s a symphony of brand, product, marketing strategy and customer relations mistakes that I don’t think they can realistically turn around at this point. They’ve made too many mistakes.

Even so, I will likely still be putting this on a list of the best free DAWs in the future, as I think it is. I just don’t think it will be around long.

The official LinkedMusicians account

6

[superabbit]

Ah, Peter.

You’re making the mistake that I did for so many years, even after the way premature announcement of Sonar: you’re evaluating and predicting the actions of BandLab management in the context of how you would be thinking. Which is, I think, “what would I do if I wanted my investment in IP and subsequent development to deliver the greatest ROI?” Whether that ROI be in measurable cash taken in or brand good will.

When it became obvious that the first objective was being ignored, I assumed that they were going for the second objective.

In my own many decades of observing corporate and brand management successes and failures, starting with being the stepson of a management consultant who worked for Booz, Allen, and Hamilton and Stanford Research as well as being a fairly successful freelancer.

This relationship began in the 1970’s, when large corporations “diversifying” by buying up companies that had only passing connections to their own core businesses was all the rage.This is the period that gave us CBS-owned Fender Musical Instruments, AMF Voit-owned Harley Davidson (the world needed lightweight Harley dirtbikes, didn’t it? Didn’t it?), Baldwin-owned Gretsch, ad nauseum.

These acquisitions may have seemed like good ideas at first, after all, how different can piano manufacturing and marketing be from guitar and drum manufacturing and marketing? (spoiler: PLENTY, if you stop and think about it for more than 60 seconds).

With few exceptions (and none that I can think of), the only successes are when the acquiring company is serious about keeping the management and staff that made the acquired company desirable in the first place. This is now better understood, but 50 years ago there was a more macho mentality of “our people are obviously smarter; if they knew what they were doing, they would be buying US, haw haw haw.”

This attitude afforded much in the way of schadenfreude, but at the cost of many great brands whose absence is still felt (Slingerland, Rogers, Rhodes, etc.). Even Fender was on virtual life support for most of the 1980’s.

One of the first business biographies I ever read was the autobiography Clive Davis wrote after leaving Columbia Records. I learned a LOT from that. Columbia/CBS was a company that worked miracles as a New York-based producer, distributor, and manufacturer of movies, TV, radio, and music. At some point, someone decided that they weren’t diversified enough, so they went shopping for entertainment-related businesses they might acquire.

Leo Fender was deep into a hypochondriac response to his company having grown bigger than he felt comfortable with and was looking to sell. Apparently Rogers Drums was as well, so CBS snapped them up and moved Rogers design and manufacturing to the Fender plant in California. CBS apparently thought that making and selling musical instruments had synergy with producing and selling musical entertainment.

The big problem was that it actually didn’t. One of the worst miscalculations was around who CBS would appoint to manage the MI division. While you might think that ambitious executives would line up for such an opportunity, you would be wrong wrong wrong. CBS was full of ambitious young management hopefuls who had gotten jobs there because they wanted a glamorous career in the entertainment business in New York. To be sent to Anaheim, California to run a guitar factory was seen as career-ending punishment. Especially in those days when New York was still the broadcasting capital of the world. It was 30 years before the public would hear of the Internet, so to be given that post was to become invisible to the folks back in New York. It was being sent down to the minors.

Which is why CBS Musical Instruments didn’t even get the best that CBS could send, they got people that the New Yorkers wanted to get rid of. The ones who wound up running the place believed that the only way they could be seen as any kind of successful would be to maximize profits by cutting every possible corner. This despite the fact that Fender products were already efficiently and frugally designed and made. There wasn’t much fat to cut off the bone.

The experiment yielded results that are utterly predictable in hindsight. Within a few years, instruments produced post takeover were seen as very inferior. Not too long ago I worked on an early 70’s Precision Bass for a friend and I was appalled at the low quality. I had heard things were bad, but I had no idea they were THAT bad. I wouldn’t have sold that piece of crap as a factory second. The design was still good, it was still a Fender P-Bass, but the finishing work was just awful. Like saw marks in the wood that were then sprayed over with finish, fasteners the wrong length, etc. It had a maple fretboard and i could tell that they put the neck together, put the frets in and then sprayed the finish on. I guess they buffed the poly off the fret surfaces and called it ready to ship. If you turned it in as a project in high school shop class you might get a C-. $90 basses from Temu look better than this thing did. WAY better.

This story played out in many other corporations, and it still plays out in corporations who aren’t smart enough to have learned from the mistakes of others. For an example of it working out pretty much okay, look no further than the reborn Fender’s acquisition of PreSonus. They kept the PreSonus crew that made the company successful to begin with and the business wasn’t so far removed from their core business that nobody from headquarters wanted to go work there. The synergy was actual, not imaginary.

It’s easy to imagine similar goings-on in the relationship between BandLab and Cakewalk. One of Meng’s “things” for a while, don’t know if it still is, was buying up famous old brands that had either failed completely or fallen on hard times. Harmony Guitars, IIRC? He also has or had Heritage Guitars, What he was doing with Harmony showed promise half a dozen years ago, but never really went anywhere. Remember those BandLab-branded audio interfaces? I guess that was a dead end.

If you’re going to buy up a great old brand, it’s good to have a plan for what you’re going to do with it, As far as I can tell, BandLab’s plans for Cakewalk didn’t go much further than rehiring a handful of staff, then setting that staff to work on polishing Sonar and developing a standalone program that could act as a more integrated desktop version of BandLab DAW. That was about it. No big plans to return the Cakewalk name to greatness.

Cakewalk/Sonar iwouldn’t seem to fit very well into the BandLab scenario. Adobe Audition tells us what we need to know about the prospects of a DAW that’s only available along with a bunch of other programs/services via subscription. When you try to sell it like that, your user base is going to consist of either people who are okay with paying for a bunch of other products and services along with their DAW, or people who will use a DAW just because it came free with a bunch of other products and services they were already buying.

AND both of those groups have to be comfortable with the possibility of losing access to the DAW in the event of personal financial difficulty. As I’ve said before, subscription-only licensing is NOT “where the industry is headed” (assuming that we’re talking about the same industry). Audio software isn’t Netflix or Amazon Prime or AppleTV+ or cable TV or Time magazine or Costco or any number of other things that people have happily bought via subscription for decades. The most popular DAW on the market isn’t sold via subscription, it’s the opposite: buy one license and all subsequent updates are free until either you or the company dies.

The person or persons in charge of Cakewalk-related decisions may wish that they could stick to running the web-based services business without messing about with desktop programs. In this day and age, desktop programs are NOT sexy, I imagine that desktop software is not what’s attracting the ambitious young idiots who want to be on the best path to SUCCESS in the fast-paced world of high tech. It’s probably down there with hardware.

My guess is that the Cakewalk team made their recommendations to the head office based on their decades of experience creating and selling a desktop DAW and were told that the way that headquarters wanted to proceed at first was to make Sonar and Next part of the membership bundle. Then if that didn’t work, they’d explore other options. And I suspect, as Peter does, that it didn’t work in a fairly spectacular way, like how the Tacoma Narrows Bridge didn’t work.

Or maybe it’s part of a plan to launder money through the Cakewalk group.

One thing it ain’t is predictable using ideas and indicators known to us.

Maybe Sonar and Next will be completely gone in 12 months. Maybe the employees in the Cakewalk group will buy the IP at bargain basement prices even lower than BandLab paid and continue to develop them and sell licenses via Plugin Boutique or Gumroad. That’s an idea that could get some,,,um,,,Tracktion.

Maybe there will be revived interest due to the free tier and Sonar will continue to limp along like CbB did, as a cult DAW. Waveform seems to be doing okay in that space. Maybe it is too late for that. Maybe maybe maybe. Cakewalk’s history is full of surprises.

-Erik
___________
superabbit.bandcamp.com

6

[Brian]

Fascinating analysis @Peter and @Superabbit.

4

[jude77]

On Brian said

Fascinating analysis @Peter and @Superabbit.

Totally agree.

3

[LinkedMusicians]

Okay, I never wanted to share my bio here or my real name, but consider that my background includes serving as a Fortune 250 business strategist to the CEO and C-level. Beyond the company strategy, I advised on potential acquisitions on pretty large companies like — I’ll name one — Intuit. I wrote on brand and marketing strategies in the publication I ran for around a decade. So I know better than to project my thinking unto others or markets.

Of course, I don’t have a crystal ball, so I  could I be wrong about BandLab and they end up keeping Cakewalk Sonar in the product line for three or more additional years… It’s possible. But I seriously doubt that would happen, unless Meng buys out the current investors. Consider the post I made post yesterday (in another thread in the research forum before I learned about the free Sonar tier) that predicted that BandLab was at a point where they were likely to shift strategy and try something different out of desperation with the Cakewalk-branded lines (Sonar and Next), like a perpetual license. So, why am I so confident that the Cakewalk Sonar brand is likely in the death throes? First, keep in mind that Cakewalk represents a very tiny part of what BandLab does. Most of their focus is on a much younger demographic. BandLab isn’t selling to middle-aged and elderly males, which Cakewalk Sonar aims at. That younger demographic behaves much differently than the demographic that Sonar appeals to. And that demographic (predominantly older males) is very strongly anti-subscription software. Yes, Adobe does stand out as successful with the subscription model, but from a strategy perspective, that is very much apples to oranges. Adobe is the clear market leader in graphic, photo, and illustration software. The DAW market and attitudes in that market are very different. But here’s what you need to keep in mind, a market leader can do what Adobe did. A small player, like BandLab is in the traditional DAW market, cannot easily do the same. And BandLab has really just been about as incompetent at strategy as it gets with Cakewalk products. You can rationalize it and say that they’re being experimental. And yes, the guy running it is the billionaire trust fund son of one of the richest men in Asia, but he also is using private investors, and those investors need to see results, and it’s been quite a while where — although it’s not publicly disclosed — there are enough indicators that make it very clear that Cakewalk is failing. The exodus of influencers is a huge sign. Don’t discount it. If BandLab was still throwing money at them, they’d still be around. But the well clearly has dried up and if you do a search on YouTube, note that recent videos on Cakewalk Sonar are struggling to reach 1,000 views, and there are only a couple of really minor — less than micro influencers — doing videos. That’s not a formula for success. Even the guy’s publication Music Tech writers, will stick in what is probably an obligatory mention of Cakewalk Sonar or Next in an article on the category that still looks like a footnote — yes, this still exists. Then examine Google’s and YouTube’s own data on how many searches per month there are on the product — and it’s anemic. Then use analysis on social media mentions of these products including the big online composer, plugin, and gear realted forums and you won’t find it mentioned much, and when it is it’s not very positive — and when it is brought up, the negative baggage of its history, the view of the product as lagging behind compeitors is there, and the negative views on subscriptions.

What responses have we seen from BandLab that further this? Well, their strategy keeps changing in ways that convey that their failing. The heavy discounting of the subscription and the now free tier. Prediction: Next might stick around for a bit, but Sonar won’t. A traditional DAW is going to overwhelm most of the users of BandLab’s main software, especially one that is, by most estimations a bit behind for the category. It seems obvious — and even more so from my emails with BandLab’s social media manager — that they see the Cakewalk Sonar demographic as legacy users — a much older demographic than their main business. They believed they could bring this demographic into their ecosystem, where they make most of their money, off of services, like

That ecosystem, if you’re not familiar is subscription services like BandLab Pro — that are a signficant source of the company’s income. They have the following key revenue sources:

(1) Marketplace sales of loops, samples, and virtual instruments.
(2) Music distribution fees to release music to the various streaming platforms.
(3) Advertising.
(4) Hardware sales. (This is very low end stuff that, in my estimation, really isn’t a fit for DAW users, so I believe they will need to make modifications if they become serious about the DAW market and the older demographic.)
(5) Partnerships, collaborations and events.

You could call part of the problem is that they don’t understand the older demographic, because they’ve been so focused on the younger demographic. But I think there are an abundance of signs that they’re not learning much about the older demographic — the folks that use DAWs — folks like us.

Now that’s not me with the fallacy of composition. You cannot be a competent business strategist or marketer if you get confused by projecting how you think unto target markets. So when you assumed that I made that mistake, I can assure you, that is not a mistake that I am prone to make. Not even when I started as a strategist. The name of the game is understanding how various groups think, not projecting your thoughts unto others. Again, there is an incredible amount of signs that BandLab is failing in the DAW market. Can the billionaire trust fund kid afford that. Yes, if he was funding this himself, but he’s using investors’ money, so he’s going to need to better manage their money very soon. I stand with my estimate of 1 – 2 years before BandLab gives up on Sonar, with a very high probability that it will be in the next 12 months. Again, I wrote that part predicting that BandLab would soon need to adjust their strategy because they’re failing last night, before I learned about this new free tier. While the free tier isn’t a perpetual license, it is certainly an adjustment to their strategy. And you can say, “Yes, making this free will bring a lot more users into the fold.” Yes, but that strategy only makes sense if they can get them to purchase the various BandLab services. It’s pure instinct, but I don’t think a high percentage of them will purchase BandLab services.

I wrote a blog post on the DAW market last month. It’s estimated to be between $3.1 billion and $4.4 billion in 2024 and its predicted to grow rapidly — between $5.7 billion and $6.7 billion by 2030–2032, with compound annual growth rates (CAGR)  between 7% and 9%. That’s appealing and maybe it will get BandLab’s CEO to have investors give him more time. But let me be clear, I do believe that BandLab can succeed in the DAW market. What I don’t believe is that they will succeed with Cakewalk Sonar. I believe that they need to stay on a path that is more in line with their core product. I think they should be nurturing BandLab platform software and create a DAW based more on that. I don’t think they will ever be successful with Cakewalk Sonar. I think they may end up giving up on the traditional DAW market with the Cakewalk path and abandon it or acquire a successful DAW brand.

The official LinkedMusicians account

11

[LinkedMusicians]

I just ran this (yes, it’s research gathered using AI) . It’s basic demographic info for BandLab’s platform vs Cakewalk Sonar. I thought it would be very useful to flesh out what I’m trying to communicate regarding these two target markets being very, very different. Of course, I would guess that far more than 90% of of BandLab’s revenue is from their platform and primarily Gen Z users.

BandLab vs. Cakewalk Sonar: Target Market Demographics
BandLab Platform Demographics
Age: BandLab’s largest age group is 18–24 years old, indicating a strong appeal to younger users and Gen Z creators. The platform is designed to be accessible and mobile-first, which further attracts a younger, tech-savvy demographic.
Gender: The user base is approximately 63% male and 37% female, with some reports noting nearly 40% women in recent years.
Global Reach: BandLab has a worldwide user base, with the United States being the largest single market (about 30% of users), but significant usage in the UK, Philippines, Canada, France, and beyond.
User Type: BandLab targets a broad spectrum, including amateur musicians, aspiring producers, hobbyists, and emerging artists, as well as professionals. The platform is intentionally inclusive, aiming to democratize music creation for all ages and skill levels.
Interests: Users are interested in music creation, collaboration, and sharing, but also overlap with gaming and other digital creative pursuits.

Cakewalk Sonar DAW Demographics
Age: The typical user base for Cakewalk Sonar (now Cakewalk by BandLab) is older compared to BandLab’s core demographic. Traditionally, Cakewalk has attracted experienced musicians, semi-professional and professional producers, and recording engineers—many of whom began using DAWs in the 1990s and 2000s.
User Type: Cakewalk is a full-featured desktop DAW for Windows and tends to attract users who are more invested in traditional, studio-style music production. This group includes long-time hobbyists, home studio owners, and professionals, often with a higher average age than BandLab’s mobile-first platform.
Platform: Cakewalk is desktop-based, which naturally appeals to users comfortable with traditional PC setups and in-depth audio engineering workflows.

Summary
BandLab’s platform is designed for a young, diverse, and global audience, with a strong emphasis on accessibility and collaboration for new-generation music creators. In contrast, Cakewalk Sonar’s user base trends older and more experienced, reflecting its legacy as a professional-grade desktop DAW favored by long-time musicians and producers.

The official LinkedMusicians account

2

[LinkedMusicians]

Another AI summary of research on Cakewalk’s presence in the DAW market:

Evidence from user forums, industry discussions, and market share estimates indicates that Cakewalk Sonar is struggling to maintain relevance and market penetration compared to leading DAWs.

Market Share: Cakewalk’s market share is estimated to be in the 2–4% range, which is significantly lower than top competitors. Historically, it has never held a large share of the DAW market, and this has not improved in recent years.

Influencer and Community Presence: There is a notable lack of mentions and advocacy from significant influencers and producers. In music production forums and communities, Cakewalk is rarely discussed, and when it is, users often highlight its lag behind in features, development pace, and commercial viability compared to other DAWs.

Search and Media Visibility: Google search interest for Cakewalk Sonar is low, and it is frequently omitted from major music tech press articles and DAW roundups, further illustrating its diminished profile in the industry.

Product and Business Model Issues: The recent move to a subscription-only model has alienated many long-time users, some of whom have publicly stated they are abandoning the platform. The lack of perpetual licensing and perceived slow development have contributed to user dissatisfaction and attrition.

Recent Developments: While the product has been refreshed and rebranded with new features and a modernized interface, these changes have not yet translated into increased buzz or visible growth in the user base.

In summary, Cakewalk Sonar is indeed struggling in the DAW market. Its low market share, declining community engagement, lack of influencer support, and negative reactions to business model changes all point to a product that is currently failing to compete effectively with its peers.

The official LinkedMusicians account

2

[SoulfulKeys]

I don’t think BandLab was ever concerned with marketing or selling this as a separate product, hence no perpetual license. It’s all about completing their BandLab ecosystem so a user can now do everything, from creating to distribution, through them with just one payment. They’ve never pushed it as a separate product and even now don’t seem particularly concerned with going in that direction so they aren’t really losing anything. You’d have to analyze the effect this had on overall BandLab growth. Did adding a full featured DAW draw in more customers and subscriptions? I think they knew there was already way too much competition in the solo DAW market and were never trying to go that route.

2

[LinkedMusicians]

On SoulfulKeys said

I don’t think BandLab was ever concerned with marketing or selling this as a separate product, hence no perpetual license. It’s all about completing their BandLab ecosystem so a user can now do everything, from creating to distribution, through them with just one payment. They’ve never pushed it as a separate product and even now don’t seem particularly concerned with going in that direction so they aren’t really losing anything. You’d have to analyze the effect this had on overall BandLab growth. Did adding a full featured DAW draw in more customers and subscriptions? I think they knew there was already way too much competition in the solo DAW market and were never trying to go that route.

I’m not sure I follow.

Sonar is targeted primarily at 30 and over users, millennials on up. That’s a VERY attractive market because it has far more disposable income than Gen Z that the BandLab platform is targeted at.  BandLab had engaged in targeted advertising, direct marketing, and press outreach for Cakewalk Sonar. I believe that BandLab would is much wiser to focus on step up products (more entry-level DAWs) like Next, but use  BandLab branding. For example, BandLab Next as opposed to Cakewalk Next. BandLab clearly resurrected the Cakewalk brand and Sonar subrand because they believed it mean something to the older demographic. But they picked a brand with such negative baggage, it was bad and not a strategic fit on numerous levels. Then they proceeded to mismanage their strategy and confuse and alienate the small market they started with. That’s easily measurable through sentiment analysis — it is one of the commonly used tools marketers have to understand how consumers think and also from the reaction of influencers. I don’t think there is a serious case that BandLab are some kind of mad geniuses that planned this out. No, their initial strategies — which are easily discerned as failed strategies — failed. They’re not modifying their strategy. That’s why I was able to easily predict that they were overdue for an adjustment right before this news came out. It was highly predictable. This is eleventh-hour stuff. But it costs too much to support/maintain two additional product lines that don’t reach a user base that is going to be profitable, and BandLab has, to date, been unable to reach a large enough base for this product to be profitable to maintain.

Influencers are solopreneurs. They’re opportunists, completely focused on making as much money as they can. If they abandon a brand, it’s only because they don’t see enough revenue potential for themselves there. They won’t flee a brand until they see the money around that brand just doesn’t exist or exist at a level that is similar to that with other brands they could be chasing. A lot can be gleaned by a competitor from these analyses — or when analyzing a potential acquisition target (company)– from analyzing the combination of sentiment analysis from the various music-making related forums and influencer reaction. It is was marketers do to better understand consumers and competitors.

Consider this. BandLab claims its main platform’s user base is around 40 million. They don’t share their paid subscriber base for Cakewalk software subscriptions, but just a wild guess, I would bet it’s under 10,000 — we don’t know because BandLab doesn’t want to share that number (we know it’s not good; they always share positive numbers). Now total free users of Cakewalk by BandLab could be as high as 200,000 by some analysts’ estimates, but it’s likely to be far less. One giant sign that the numbers — free version or paid subscribers are low, is that BandLab loves to boast about its user numbers, but refuses to give these numbers out when asked for them. Older demographic users won’t behave like younger demographic users with regard to purchases of additional services, so BandLab will need to create new service offerings for these segments.

Consider that supporting and nurturing each product line to the various demographic groups is costly. BandLab has NOT committed much in the way of resources to promotion to older demographic users.  CEO, Meng Ru Kuok, has publicly stated that their “deep understanding of the needs and behaviors of our Gen Z demographic, which is our core user base,” has been central to the platform’s growth. The company’s user growth is described as “a steady climb fueled by our deep understanding of the needs and behaviors of our Gen Z demographic.” I don’t see the same kind of understanding or adaptation to the needs of older demographic users. BandLab hasn’t shown a propensity to commit the resources it takes to continue to serve this market.

When you look at all of this as a whole, BandLab’s going back to a free DAW — basically, going back to what they were doing with Cakewalk by BandLab — reveals that their strategy has failed to achieve their objectives, and it seems very clear that this is a move to re-attract users that fled when they went subscription only. But I think the brand has made too many missteps, and won’t be able to recover and build enough in this competitive marketplace and will very soon be closing the Cakewalk Sonar product line. I’m sure if you surveyed 10 strategists who examined this, 10, or at least 9 out of 10, would come to same conclusions. It’s not difficult for a strategist to make any of the observations I made if they were very familiar with the market and strategies of BandLab. It’s simply takes up to many resources for BandLab to continue with pursuing this market with Cakewalk Sonar. I don’t see how a path to making this profitable. It’s why I predicted, last night, that they would be modifying their strategy and may even introduce a perpetual license. But I think that is too philosophically opposed to the company’s principles. Meng wouldn’t allow it. I think he should,  and I think it is one of many things that shows a lack of customer focus and a lack of concern for listening to the market that lies beyond Gen Zers. But even if BandLab did offer a perpetual license for Cakewalk Sonar, I don’t think they can grab enough of a market share to make it worthwhile for them to maintain the Cakewalk Sonar product. I think it’s dead no matter what adjustments they make at this point.

Time will tell. I will leave this thread up here and we can check back in 6 months and then 1 year, if Cakewalk Sonar still exists at that point.

The official LinkedMusicians account

1

[LinkedMusicians]

Also, @soulfulkeys, welcome to the forum! I’d love to know how you found LinkedMusicians. Were you researching Cakewalk Sonar and found this thread and registered or was it something else? It’s also valuable to learn how people found our community.

I’m the guy who started this place, but don’t worry, you never have to agree with me! My kids don’t and I adore them! As you can probably see, I enjoy analyzing and discussing this stuff the way some guys enjoy analyzing sports teams and athletes. I totally geek out on strategy and my publication was just my hobby outlet for my sharing my thoughts on marketing, branding, business strategy and business ethics that unintentionally went viral. I realize it looks less than modest to share my bio, but people here — with the exceptions of some real-life friends — don’t know that is my professional life (analyzing strategies and companies).

The official LinkedMusicians account

2

[superabbit]

Aww, Peter, I was just yankin’ yer chain.❤

I’m fully aware that you have some serious chops as far as market analysis and that you weren’t talking based on a fallacy. I certainly didn’t mean to disparage your skills. I didn’t actually disagree with anything you said. I was trying to goof on the idea that BandLab’s handling of the Cakewalk was fathomable on any level. I’m the one doing the speculating based on my own armchair hunches, not you.

Your analysis is based on actual data and observation. My “analysis” is pure speculation based on my own personal experiences and following the software business as an insider and outsider.

One thing I do differ with you on is that you seem to be working from an assumption that someone, anyone, at the BandLab home offices cares a whit about Sonar and Next’s share of the DAW market. I’m with SoulfulKeys on this. I think the desktop DAW’s are there so that BandLab can tout the membership as being all that you’ll ever need in your musical career. They’re in the business of selling memberships, not DAW licenses. I’m not sure they’d measure Sonar’s “success” in terms of how many people use it or not. Sonar succeeds if it helps sell memberships. To that end, it should seem like a reasonably full-featured DAW. If its presence in the market helps that, then it will be encouraged.

I’d be surprised if the free tiered Sonar doesn’t come with some button(s) you can click to purchase a full membership. If they do this, I just hope it’s not too intrusive.

Caveat: this is all just speculation on my part. Maybe they do want Sonar and Next to grab market share.

Question I have for you as a pro: you say that Adobe have been “successful” with their subscription model. Is that true? Are they continuing to grow as far as revenue? Market share? I’m sure they still have the pro market nailed down as far as photo editing. I don’t have access to that information the way you do and I’m curious.

One thing I have been observing is that viable alternatives to Photoshop and other pieces of the Creative bundle are starting to gain (here’s that word again) traction. Digidesign and Avid threw their weight around with Pro Tools, resulting in their competitors slowly but surely grabbing more and more market share until we now have a situation where Pro Tools is something that seems to be used by mostly legacy users and people who have to use it because they work in Hollywood.

They especially lagged behind on composition-friendly tools, which left room for competitors to overtake them in that area. Among people who compose film and TV music, I think more of them use Cubase or Logic.

Here’s some of my career experiences: I was a software QA engineer at a variety of SF Bay Area software companies, including Informix, Macromedia (pre Adobe), Berkeley Systems, and The Learning Company.

Later I started my own successful guitar stompbox company. My products were reviewed positively in Guitar Player magazine in the US and Guitarist magazine in the UK. Unfortunately, burnout set in and I haven’t sold a pedal in over a decade.

The product that I worked on at Macromedia was xRes, which was intended to be a competitor to Photoshop (as if). It was, I believe, the first such editor to use proxies to be able to edit very large files that couldn’t fit in the memory restrictions of the time.

It was working on xRes that gained me insight as to the challenges of trying to keep a host compatible with plug-ins designed for a different host. xRes was supposed to be able to use Photoshop plug-ins. So when I observe plug-in format politics, it’s from a boots-on-the-ground perspective. It’s why I agree that if your DAW is acting weird, the first thing to do is turn off all plug-ins and see if it stops acting weird.

Macromedia was famous for acquiring and killing once-viable programs. They got it right from time to time, such as their acquisition of Future Splash, later Flash. I was there when that acquisition happened. But they killed xRes, Deck, Fontographer, and more I can’t remember. Most of what was left was nuked by Adobe when they bought the company.

Right before I bailed on Macromedia, they got a new CEO who knew nothing about even using computers. I know this because I had moved into IT and was sent down to his palace in Atherton to help troubleshoot his home office. So, as you mentioned about the importance of people at a company understanding the market, they had tossed this into the bin. This guy knew how to please Wall Street analysts and that was it.

At that point I swore never again to work at a publicly traded company. When my next employer was sold to an international conglomerate, I took the bonus and left, later starting my audio electronics company.

Now I play games, fiddle with my DAW, observe, and, thanks to this forum, speculate. Maybe I’ll make something else happen someday, but for now, (mental) health issues have me pinned down.

-Erik
___________
superabbit.bandcamp.com

3

[LinkedMusicians]

@superabbit Maybe I’ll look up Adobe later, but I do know that they’ve been very successful at the subscription model, and that’s both with the professional, enterprise, and hobbyist markets. It’s pretty much the dream of every software developer, as you know.

I’m sure when anyone shares their bio like I did, it’s a huge turnoff! Mmm.. huge ego!!! I am self-aware and realized, when I share a little of my bio, it can be a huge turn off. But I wanted to convey that this is part of my professional background, and a HUGE part of marketing strategy and I used to actually assesss potential acquisitons to determine their viability and potential fit with the Forutne 250 where I was a director. And I really enjoyed doing that, maybe more than marketing. But I went back into a marketing capacity when the job I always wanted — leading digital marketing for the company opened up, and I was told if I wanted the job, it was mine. The truth is, I was a workaholic at the time. Thank goodness, that changed after I had my first child. Hmm… overshare of the day.  I’ll go back an edit. I’m not a betting man, but let’s just say, if I were, I would  place a very big bet that Cakewalk Sonar will not exist in two years — because I feel 100 percent confident of that. I feel 90% confidence that it will be gone over the course of the next 12 months.

But more interestiing than that stuff, I didn’t know that you had a company that did stompboxes! That is really cool. I would love to learn more about that. While you made clear that your company doesn’t exist anymore, do you still make stompboxes for your own or select parties use these days? I actually just watched a video last week of an artist I’m a huge fan of — singer/songwriter/musician Madison Cunnigham sitting down for an interview with the the founder of a boutique guitar stompbox maker. While I was never a decent guitarist, and my tendinitis makes it not even an option (and still, I haven’t sold my guitars), I really enjoyed her talking about how she gets her sounds and hearing the guy who makes the stompboxes talking about his craft.

The official LinkedMusicians account

1

[SoulfulKeys]

On LinkedMusicians said

Also, @soulfulkeys, welcome to the forum! I’d love to know how you found LinkedMusicians. Were you researching Cakewalk Sonar and found this thread and registered or was it something else? It’s also valuable to learn how people found our community.

I’m the guy who started this place, but don’t worry, you never have to agree with me! My kids don’t and I adore them! As you can probably see, I enjoy analyzing and discussing this stuff the way some guys enjoy analyzing sports teams and athletes. I totally geek out on strategy and my publication was just my hobby outlet for my sharing my thoughts on marketing, branding, business strategy and business ethics that unintentionally went viral. I realize it looks less than modest to share my bio, but people here — with the exceptions of some real-life friends — don’t know that is my professional life (analyzing strategies and companies).

Thank you! I’ve been a long time Cakewalk forum lurker and discovered this sight when Larry left the deals forum there and showed up here. I’ve been using Cakewalk and Sonar for 20 years now. Started with Cakewalk Music Creator 2 when I was a poor high school student and eventually moved up to Sonar 8.5 and the X series. I’ve tried other DAWs but no switch yet.

 

The point I was trying to make about BandLab and Cakewalk is that you’re still looking at Sonar as a standalone product when you have to look at it as a feature. It’s like the air conditioning in a car, car manufacturers aren’t trying to sell you the AC separately, it’s a feature that makes the car more appealing to the buyer. Sonar is a feature BandLab uses to sell their Membership subscriptions, not the main product itself.

You also have to consider the demographic BandLab is aiming for. Their core audience is younger, often just getting into music production, and typically doesn’t have the budget for a $300 DAW, plugin bundles, and paid distribution services. The fact you can start making music on your phone for free with BandLab is a huge draw for that market.

Now, with Sonar added to the subscription, BandLab can say: for $14.95/month you get everything we’ve always offered plus a full-featured pro desktop DAW.
For their target demographic, that’s a perfect value proposition. Most of them probably have little or no experience with pro DAWs and wouldn’t realistically pay for something like Cubase, Logic, or Ableton even if they wanted to.

It’s not about Sonar dominating the DAW market again, it’s about keeping users inside BandLab’s ecosystem as they level up. It’s an ecosystem retention tool, not a standalone money-maker.

1

[peter]

On SoulfulKeys said

On LinkedMusicians said

Also, @soulfulkeys, welcome to the forum! I’d love to know how you found LinkedMusicians. Were you researching Cakewalk Sonar and found this thread and registered or was it something else? It’s also valuable to learn how people found our community.

I’m the guy who started this place, but don’t worry, you never have to agree with me! My kids don’t and I adore them! As you can probably see, I enjoy analyzing and discussing this stuff the way some guys enjoy analyzing sports teams and athletes. I totally geek out on strategy and my publication was just my hobby outlet for my sharing my thoughts on marketing, branding, business strategy and business ethics that unintentionally went viral. I realize it looks less than modest to share my bio, but people here — with the exceptions of some real-life friends — don’t know that is my professional life (analyzing strategies and companies).

Thank you! I’ve been a long time Cakewalk forum lurker and discovered this sight when Larry left the deals forum there and showed up here. I’ve been using Cakewalk and Sonar for 20 years now. Started with Cakewalk Music Creator 2 when I was a poor high school student and eventually moved up to Sonar 8.5 and the X series. I’ve tried other DAWs but no switch yet.

 

The point I was trying to make about BandLab and Cakewalk is that you’re still looking at Sonar as a standalone product when you have to look at it as a feature. It’s like the air conditioning in a car, car manufacturers aren’t trying to sell you the AC separately, it’s a feature that makes the car more appealing to the buyer. Sonar is a feature BandLab uses to sell their Membership subscriptions, not the main product itself.

You also have to consider the demographic BandLab is aiming for. Their core audience is younger, often just getting into music production, and typically doesn’t have the budget for a $300 DAW, plugin bundles, and paid distribution services. The fact you can start making music on your phone for free with BandLab is a huge draw for that market.

Now, with Sonar added to the subscription, BandLab can say: for $14.95/month you get everything we’ve always offered plus a full-featured pro desktop DAW.
For their target demographic, that’s a perfect value proposition. Most of them probably have little or no experience with pro DAWs and wouldn’t realistically pay for something like Cubase, Logic, or Ableton even if they wanted to.

It’s not about Sonar dominating the DAW market again, it’s about keeping users inside BandLab’s ecosystem as they level up. It’s an ecosystem retention tool, not a standalone money-maker.

Yes, I understand your point, but you are mistaken on the strategy, and you can learn that based on BandLab management’s official public statements on the release of the two product lines, Sonar and Next. Even more, BandLab’s strategy is easily discernible when you understand the diffrent features of Sonar and Next.

When BandLab — the company — resurrected Cakewalk Sonar (first called Cakewalk By BandLab, and then it shifted back into Sonar), BandLab didn’t think its young BandLab users would move from their mobile-centric platform to Cakewalk Sonar. Their statements when they released Sonar and Next very clearly made distinctions between the two DAWs for who they were appropriate for. According to their statements, Next was designed to be the next step for BandLab users. [EDIT: I just found the AI summaries, got this wrong. Cakewalk Sonar can import BandLab files. Well, that makes a lot more sense and does change my forecast. I’ll give it two years max. Just because Meng believes that he can successfully keep creators from when they start with the basics to a more sophistacted DAW — that is, Sonar — doesn’t mean that the idea will be supported by the market; it costs too much to support Sonar if the product bombs, if it doesn’t sell well enough to justify its existence. I could see management taking another try at a DAW that is more like the next step up from Next.]

Again, Next was specifically designed and marketed as the next step a BandLab user takes to a more robust, desktop-based DAW. BandLab’s documents and communications are clearly spelled out. Its target audience is the beginning DAW user. Sonar targets “pros, advanced amateurs,” with professional-grade, Windows-only, legacy compatibility, and advanced feature set. (I’m paraphrasing BandLab’s remarks and communications). So there’s no mystery on these basic elements of BandLab’s strategy, it’s a kind of cradle to grave strategy, and what markets Next and Sonar are targeted at. I don’t know if Sonar could survive just from the idea that some users will outgrow BandLab, then outgrow Next, and end up with Sonar. Yes, it would be ideal for the company if that’s how things worked. But clearly, something isn’t going according to plan when the company decides that it needs to create a free tier. I think we can be pretty confident, that is a reaction to poor sales and the market taking very little interest in Sonar.]

• This reply was modified 4 months, 4 weeks ago by peter.

LinkedMusicians Founder. Your friend who keeps the beat.

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1

[SoulfulKeys]

I get what you’re saying, and I’m not disagreeing with how they’ve positioned Next and Sonar, but that still leaves some pretty big holes in the overall strategy. If Next is supposed to be the next step for BandLab users, where do they go once they outgrow it? If there’s no higher-tier option in the ecosystem, you’re basically forcing people to jump ship to another DAW. That doesn’t line up with how smart BandLab’s been about keeping creators in their system.

And honestly, if Sonar was never meant to be part of that long-term plan, then what was the point of keeping it alive all these years and investing resources into it? That would be an odd move for a company that’s made such calculated decisions with BandLab’s growth. If they just wanted a new DAW like Next that could handle BandLab files, they could’ve built that from day one without dragging Sonar along for the ride.

I’m far from a marketing expert, but even I know if you’re trying to grab DAW market share, you’d never limit yourself to just Windows. That would be a rookie mistake. So it’s hard for me to believe BandLab would make a move that short-sighted when everything else they’ve done has been so strategic.

[superabbit]

On SoulfulKeys said

The point I was trying to make about BandLab and Cakewalk is that you’re still looking at Sonar as a standalone product when you have to look at it as a feature. It’s like the air conditioning in a car, car manufacturers aren’t trying to sell you the AC separately, it’s a feature that makes the car more appealing to the buyer. Sonar is a feature BandLab uses to sell their Membership subscriptions, not the main product itself.

 

It’s not about Sonar dominating the DAW market again, it’s about keeping users inside BandLab’s ecosystem as they level up. It’s an ecosystem retention tool, not a standalone money-maker.

This.

Automobile air conditioner comparison is a good one: your car’s manufacturer doesn’t care if you never turn the air conditioner on as long as it helped them sell you the car. Is air conditioning now standard in vehicles? I haven’t bought a new one in 40 years. If not, then maybe the heater.😊

To us, the BandLab membership package is something that we get along with the subscription to our (formerly in some cases) favorite DAW. A $9.95 Sonar-only sub would be more attractive.

To BandLab, the Cakewalk DAW’s are extras that they toss in when you subscribe to their package of services. The Cakewalk name adds a whiff of legitimacy, the DAW’s are made by people who were experienced in the industry long before BandLab came along. They aren’t just slapped together crap. Maybe they’ll get their membership, check out the DAW’s and be pleasantly surprised at how capable they are. Or they’ll never even bother to install them. Who cares as long as the company gets their monthly or yearly fees?

I think the Cakewalk DAW’s will be around as long as BandLab believes that they help sell memberships. How long that will be, I have no idea. Does Adobe care about Audition’s market share? Does Adobe think that being able to use Audition is anyone’s primary reason for subscribing? Probably not, but they keep it in the lineup anyway because it lets them claim that the package covers every kind of content creation.

The Cakewalk DAW’s don’t live or die based on how many YouTube tutorials they inspire or how many influencers talk about them or even how many people use them. They live or die based on how much the people in charge at BandLab believe they help them sell memberships.

At some point the BandLab restaurant might decide to start selling their tasty Sonar salad dressing in bottles, but I don’t know how important that scenario is to the restauranteurs.😏

-Erik
___________
superabbit.bandcamp.com

1

[peter]

On SoulfulKeys said

I get what you’re saying, and I’m not disagreeing with how they’ve positioned Next and Sonar, but that still leaves some pretty big holes in the overall strategy. If Next is supposed to be the next step for BandLab users, where do they go once they outgrow it? If there’s no higher-tier option in the ecosystem, you’re basically forcing people to jump ship to another DAW. That doesn’t line up with how smart BandLab’s been about keeping creators in their system.

And honestly, if Sonar was never meant to be part of that long-term plan, then what was the point of keeping it alive all these years and investing resources into it? That would be an odd move for a company that’s made such calculated decisions with BandLab’s growth. If they just wanted a new DAW like Next that could handle BandLab files, they could’ve built that from day one without dragging Sonar along for the ride.

I’m far from a marketing expert, but even I know if you’re trying to grab DAW market share, you’d never limit yourself to just Windows. That would be a rookie mistake. So it’s hard for me to believe BandLab would make a move that short-sighted when everything else they’ve done has been so strategic.

Well have to agree to disagree. BandLab is a case study in bad strategy with the Cakewalk brand. It’s pure brand mismanagement from the get go. I’m not sure how you see it as “so strategic.” It’s been nothing but branding worst practices, poor communication, false starts and miscues.

I realize how you’re trying to see a fit for a high-end sophisticated DAW, looking at things in a very linear way, but it’s clearly failed. The investment in marketing — if Meng was seriously trying to capture the high end DAW market or if, like it was suggested he’s only trying to keeop people in the same ecosystem, the product clearly hasn’t succeeded based on what is easily observable.

Don’t get me wrong, I realize how someone can see it as — this covers all of the bases. But again, consider that if you’re a brand exec and you’re putting together a strategy for all of the pieces of the puzzle, how a DAW that has no connection in project files, in workflow — anything is connected to the BandLab ecosystem. It’s not. It’s an acquisition. It’s bolted on, and not otherwise connected into the BandLab ecosystem anymore than any other brand of DAW is. Developing a DAW that is actually more of an evolution of Next that accepts the same project files would have made much more sense.

Yes, Meng stated all of the typical billionaire BS that he was democratizing the DAW market. If anyone believes that, I have a bridge for sale. What he was doing was trying to bring users into the ecosystem to hook them into the various related products, services, and goods that BandLab sells. I’m not a fan of billionaires’ faux altruism. That’s pure BS. Apologies to anyone who believes in that. It’s not honest. It’s close to the same strategic reasoning as freemium software. You hook them into the software and get them to spend money later.

Meng made other lofty statements — which really wasn’t consistent with the same guy who decided to later remove his free DAW — before he became desperate with the new / old strategy of making a free DAW (once again), not motivated by altruism, but motivated by the failure of the earlier strategy. If it came out that the new subscription had less than 50,000 subscribers, even less than 25,000, I would not find it surprising. And we’re just going to have to agree to disagree if you think that targeting DAW users with the subscription-only model and then berating them and censoring them from discussing it at the company forum is the sign of a customer-focused company with smart strategy. Yes, Meng clearly knew how to build BandLab up — of course, with dad’s billions and connections — and make that community large.  But he has shown an arrogance, dishonesty in communications, poor strategy and a disregard for the voice of the customer with the high end DAW market that ensured failure, IMO.

Let’s stop there and pick this up in a year — or much earlier — when BandLab discontinues Cakewalk Sonar. I’ve already expressed every thought I have on this to the point where it’s more extensive than when I was writing for marketing, branding, and business strategy professionals. I’m sure not many people are into this anymore. Our points have been made.

LinkedMusicians Founder. Your friend who keeps the beat.

Check out my music. 

1

[fossile]

i think sometimes we attribute “evil” actions / inactions to some ability to scheme… lol. most likely it’s a somple combination of “stoopid” and “more stoopid” combined. having helped giant evil corporations (F100+) attempt to achieve world domination, i can assure you that the majority of those people running things a) simply inherited a good starting position, and b) are as stoopid as the day is long.

meanwhile, i will continue to enjoy my choice of DAW until such a time comes that either me (senility) or the other team (whoever “they” are) become more stoopid…

cheers!

[peter]

On SoulfulKeys said

I get what you’re saying, and I’m not disagreeing with how they’ve positioned Next and Sonar, but that still leaves some pretty big holes in the overall strategy. If Next is supposed to be the next step for BandLab users, where do they go once they outgrow it? If there’s no higher-tier option in the ecosystem, you’re basically forcing people to jump ship to another DAW. That doesn’t line up with how smart BandLab’s been about keeping creators in their system.

And honestly, if Sonar was never meant to be part of that long-term plan, then what was the point of keeping it alive all these years and investing resources into it? That would be an odd move for a company that’s made such calculated decisions with BandLab’s growth. If they just wanted a new DAW like Next that could handle BandLab files, they could’ve built that from day one without dragging Sonar along for the ride.

I’m far from a marketing expert, but even I know if you’re trying to grab DAW market share, you’d never limit yourself to just Windows. That would be a rookie mistake. So it’s hard for me to believe BandLab would make a move that short-sighted when everything else they’ve done has been so strategic.

I did miss addressing your point about the lack of a Mac version for Sonar. That is one thing that is telling. If Sonar’s integration in this beginner to pro strategy, it’s really strange that they would drop Mac support for the pro DAW. Next has Windows and Mac support. I updated it, but I found that Perplexity — the AI I was using to summarize Meng and BandLab statements — was wrong when it stated that Sonar does not read BandLab files. I didn’t have time to verify, but it appears from double checking with Google, that it does. But the lack of Mac compatibility for Sonar when it’s supposed to be so important to this beginner to pro ecosystem doesn’t make a lot of sense. Why was Next made compatible with both OS’s but not Sonar? That, IMO, is just one more sign that Sonar is not a priority, despite the company hype. The fact that there’s a Mac version for Next but they never bothered to invest in one for Sonar tells you something about how important it is to the company.

EDIT: I thought I’d add this important info to give more depth to the conversation regarding Sonar NOT being available for the Mac and BandLab having no plans to ever make a Mac version of Sonar. This is directly from the Cakewalk.com website:

“Is Cakewalk Sonar still PC only/ Will it run on Mac?

March 28, 2025 at 3:31 AM
Cakewalk Sonar will continue to operate solely on the Windows operating system. Although there are no plans to add Mac support, we recommend checking out Cakewalk Next as an alternative, as Next supports Windows and Mac, and the CXF format lets you open your Sonar-Windows projects over to Next running on a Mac. “

• This reply was modified 4 months, 4 weeks ago by peter.

LinkedMusicians Founder. Your friend who keeps the beat.

Check out my music. 

1

[superabbit]

On peter said

If it came out that the new subscription had less than 50,000 subscribers, even less than 25,000, I would not find it surprising. And we’re just going to have to agree to disagree if you think that targeting DAW users with the subscription-only model…

What “new subscription” are you referring to?

AFAIK, there has never been any “subscription” to Sonar and/or Next, only a membership to BandLab that includes those products. How would BandLab be able to determine how many people bought memberships primarily to get the Cakewalk DAW’s?

Do you think that BandLab only have between 25,000 and 50,000 paid members?

You still seem to be assuming that BandLab’s goal in buying the Cakewalk IP was to market Cakewalk’s flagship product, SONAR/CbB/Sonar, as a standalone product, maybe with incidental connection to the BandLab ecosystem. And that BnadLab’s “success” or “failure” with Sonar should be measured in Sonar’s market share.

And for all I know, you may be right.

But what if they don’t and maybe have never cared about how well Sonar did or does in the DAW market? What if the goal was/is to have Sonar just be a small part of a collection of products and services that are marketed as one package?

From the perspective of the Cakewalk faithful, BandLab membership as a product is just a distraction from the important thing: the almighty Sonar. People like me who spent hours a day reading and replying on the forum, who pretty much always have Sonar running on our computers. It would be fine with me if nothing BandLab did apart from Sonar even existed. I’d love it if Cakewalk still had a booth at Winter NAMM and magazine reviews and YouTube channels and all that.

I now think that my perspective was ass backward for a long time. I don’t know if Cakewalk’s loyal following and existing user base ever meant much to BandLab. I certainly never thought they were excited about attracting former SONAR users to BandLab. I now believe that Sonar is just a trinket whose success is about whether its presence in the package makes people more likely to pay their membership fees.

You may think of BandLab as a pack of fools who botched their Cakewalk experiment, but what if SoulfulKeys is right and they’ve never cared about the criteria by which you are measuring “success?”

It’s even possible that making the Cakewalk brand too prominent would be seen as drawing attention away from the main event. You don’t want to be blown off the stage by the opening act.

If a “successful” DAW is one that has a lot of loyal users and gets a lot of attention from influencers, then Sonar is decidedly unsuccessful. Stick a fork in it, it’s done. However, if a “successful” DAW is one that’s a nice little addition to a larger package of services, then maybe it’s already performing that role adequately.

No question, what happened with the premature announcement of Sonar, the relations with what was left of the older user base and the seeming lack of consideration for the value of the ecosystem of YouTube channels, those were botched. As I’ve put it before, it was like watching someone shoot their foot off, then use the severed foot to beat themselves about the head and shoulders. Quite a spectacle.

Even if all Sonar is something tossed in the bag with the main product, a happy and thriving user community does make it a better thing to have in the bag no matter how incidental it is. But in the context of Sonar being an accessory, it’s not the end of the world. Few people who are considering BandLab memberships based on the core features are going to stop and think “I’d pay for these services, but they include Sonar, and BandLab alienated Sonar’s userbase, therefore I must decline.”

Sonar is already part of the BandLab ecosystem; it didn’t take long for CbB to get the rudimentary ability for 2-way transfer back and forth with BandLab DAW. Transfer between Next and Bandlab is even tighter, as is transfer between Sonar and Next. If Sonar becomes better integrated, then it will likely have a better chance of maintaining its place in the BandLab package.

It’s been interesting to watch how SONAR/CbB/Sonar has fared in the BandLab era. It’s not always gone to my liking, but at least the product is still around and not officially under the turf. Development continues. They’re coming out with a new free version, so I can still recommend it to friends who want to get in on making music on their computers on the cheap. BandLab have so far offered a free to use version for 7 years and have announced pans for that to continue. I don’t feel betrayed or hard done by.

I very much wish they hadn’t been so rude to certain loyal long term users that I hold in high esteem, but there’s little I can do about that. The Cakewalk world is lessened by their departure from it and that’s punishment enough, I think. New users coming along will have lost the potential benefit of the advice of people decades of experience with the product and that’s a shame.

-Erik
___________
superabbit.bandcamp.com

2

[peter]

I was referring to the “Cakewalk membership” as a subscription, as that is what it is. An analysts speculated that it has far less than 100,000 paid subscribers. I’m just saying — and no one knows because BandLab doesn’t disclose the number — that it could be very small, and based on the lack of discussion about Cakewalk Next and Sonar in social media, and the abandonment by the influencer community, that I wouldn’t be surprised if the numbers are very low. Every sign that can be discerned that reflects popularity is anemic. Of course, I’m not saying that I have any idea. I just know that it’s not a high number. I’m going on instincts based on everything I just cited. When you have an active, popular DAW, if there were say 250,000 paying Cakewalk subscribers, you’d see a lot more mention in the big forums and the major social media platforms. You’d see a decent among of Cakewalk-related searches at Google and YouTube, and you’d see influencers. Influencers show up whenever there’s money to be made. They bail when there is no money to be made.

Anyhow, I think we can wrap this one up! I’m sure most people have no interest. I’ve shared my predictions. Two years at the absolute most, but most likely, Sonar will be gone within one year. Next, I think will stick around, but again, I think they’d do well to rebrand it as BandLab Next.

LinkedMusicians Founder. Your friend who keeps the beat.

Check out my music. 

[superabbit]

Hot off the presses.

https://discuss.cakewalk.com/topic/85283-sonar-202506-overview/

Some interesting new features even aside from the free tier.

They finally included a pane for the BandLab Sounds Collection in Sonar’s Browser, that’s a good idea, long overdue.

The list of features the premium version has that the free version lacks is pretty short.

-Erik
___________
superabbit.bandcamp.com

[peter]

On June 20, 2025 superabbit said

Hot off the presses.

https://discuss.cakewalk.com/topic/85283-sonar-202506-overview/

Some interesting new features even aside from the free tier.

They finally included a pane for the BandLab Sounds Collection in Sonar’s Browser, that’s a good idea, long overdue.

The list of features the premium version has that the free version lacks is pretty short.

-Erik

I agree. As I wrote earlier, while I strongly believe that this product is failing and will be eliminated/replaced within a year, I’m going to out together a list of best free DAWs and, while I haven’t used this, I will try it out for the purposes of creating the list, but based on everything we see, and my experience with Cakewalk by BandLab, for a free DAW, it easily deserves to be on the best list, and, I would think, at the top of the list, if we’re purely basing that list on functionality.

I’d love to get everyone’s input — their take on the best free DAWs today for a list Im maling. I’d like to put something out very soon. I want LM to have the best curated list of high quality free tools you can find.

LinkedMusicians Founder. Your friend who keeps the beat.

Check out my music. 

[patrickwichrowski]

I love Cakewalk and its sad to see the dubious state of it now.

New album soon!

https://linktr.ee/patrickwichrowski

3

[peter]

Another clear sign of underperforming sales of a product, while Cakewalk subscriptions have constantly been on sale, a Cakewalk Premium subscription has just had the sale price slashed in half to $49 US per year, after having been on sale for $99 for a long time (the list price is $149. A sign that a $450 million valued software company doesn’t have giant hopes for Sonar Premium? The lack of advertising for the product. Even at their own own forum — which is surprisingly low volume for a software company of their size (of course, there’s lots of activity on the BandLab site, their primary business) — most of the posts about the promotion is not positive. One can rationalize that BandLab is more focused on existing BandLab users, but it wouldn’t make a lot of sense.

While BandLab doesn’t release OS stats, consider that the BandLab platform is targeted at Gen Z and Generation Alpha. 93% of Gen Z uses the iPhone. While I don’t have the stats on Windows vs. Mac for Gen Z and Generation Alpha, you can bet that  — depending on household income level — there is a high amount of Mac use. The fact that Sonar is Windows only and that BandLab doesn’t have any plans to make a Mac version makes it very clear that the whole concept of Sonar being an important part of the BandLab ecosystem does not hold water. If it were an important part of the BandLab ecosystem, it would certainly not be Windows-only. Instead, it’s easy to see that Sonar is BandLab’s attempt to bring older pro and advanced amateur DAW users into the BandLab fold. But it’s clear from the erratic strategies and from the desperate discount pricing that Sonar is floundering.

$49 US for a year of Cakewalk Sonar Pro is very cheap. If I believed that the product was going to be around for many more years, I might bite on it, because I already have decades invested in learning Sonar and hundreds of projects. For a free DAW — even with the high likelihood that the product will be gone in the next 1 – 2 years — I’m still going to recommend Sonar Free on the LinkedMusicians best DAWs list. I think it easily earns a place there. But if people can afford it, I would strongly recommend spending more on a DAW that is likely to be around for 3 years. Your projects will add up, and having a bunch of projects for a DAW that is no longer supported is not desirable.

LinkedMusicians Founder. Your friend who keeps the beat.

Check out my music. 

4

[dsteinschneider]

Good thread – I enjoy spirited debate, even online as long as the trolls haven’t arrived 🙂

I expected Bandlab to begin offering a perpertual version-bound license for around the price of Reaper. Sonar Premium for $49/year is almost in that ballpark. For some reason I still don’t want to pay that even though I’m happy re-upping Cantabile and Reaper. I just prefer the freedom of deciding when and if I’ll “re-up” for the latest features.

I also believe they will not feel forced to discontinue Sonar and that it will be around, it just might be with a slow enhancement pace.

I’m hetero-DAW. I track and edit midi in Reaper, then move it over to Mixbus Pro v10 to track guitars/vocals and then mix. I still use CbB at my band’s studio and we’re OK so far with the changes. I recommended the studio move over to a Mac-Mini M4 and Logic for $800 but they didn’t bite on that.

BTW, Fireworks circa 2003 is still my graphics editing program – if it gets the job done, I’m good.

EDIT – Just installed Cakewalk Sonar via the Cakewalk Product Center. Loaded up one of our songs and everything seems to be working. It looks much better on our 4K monitor. This is my first look at Sonar, been using CbB up until now.

 

• This reply was modified 4 months, 3 weeks ago by dsteinschneider.
• This reply was modified 4 months, 3 weeks ago by dsteinschneider.
• This reply was modified 4 months, 3 weeks ago by dsteinschneider.

3

[Cecelius2]

Peter:  Where did/do you see Sonar for $49?

You wrote:  “Another clear sign of underperforming sales of a product, while Cakewalk subscriptions have constantly been on sale, a Cakewalk Premium subscription has just had the sale price slashed in half to $49 US per year, after having been on sale for $99 for a long time…”

I see membership for $99, but don’t see that $49 price.

I just cancelled my membership, but would renew if I could get it for $49.

Thanks

C2

[peter]

On Cecelius2 said

Peter:  Where did/do you see Sonar for $49?

You wrote:  “Another clear sign of underperforming sales of a product, while Cakewalk subscriptions have constantly been on sale, a Cakewalk Premium subscription has just had the sale price slashed in half to $49 US per year, after having been on sale for $99 for a long time…”

I see membership for $99, but don’t see that $49 price.

I just cancelled my membership, but would renew if I could get it for $49.

Thanks

C2

The below link is for the $49 offer.

Of course, it automatically renews at $149. My instincts, described earlier, are that, at best, this product will be around for two more years, but I suspect it will be gone in a year. I’d jump on that deal if I believed that Sonar had a bright future. There are far too many signs that Sonar is failing hard.

https://www.bandlab.com/membership/get-membership?productAttribution=cw-cbb-offer

LinkedMusicians Founder. Your friend who keeps the beat.

Check out my music. 

3

[bapu]

Two things.

1. I cancelled my $69 annual membership (from last December) and even though it was confirmed, they said I can use it until December of this year. Technically I still have a subscription, even though my account says I don’t have a subscription and thus I cannot renew at $49.

2. I still collab with CbB/Soinar users and I like to provide a tracking project with markers etc in their desired format, And so in December 2025 if there is not a perpetual license option (highly unlikely I believe) I’ll just go with the free tier as it will probably have the basics I need to continue to provide tracking projects to my collaborators.

My name is Ed. I Am still bapu though. My Studio

Virtual Bands: Citizen Regen, The Forum Monkeys,  Fizzy Pickle, The Coffee House Band

4

[Cecelius2]

Thanks Peter and Bapu!

Thanks Peter for the link!

Thanks Bapu for sharing about your experience with subscription.  My subscription actually expires in a 2 weeks.  I will wait until it is fully expired and then try the $49 offer if it still exists.  If it works great, but if not, then I too will revert to the free version of Sonar (at least until a nice deal comes along).

Again, thanks for the info!

1

[peter]

On Cecelius2 said

Thanks Peter and Bapu!

Thanks Peter for the link!

Thanks Bapu for sharing about your experience with subscription.  My subscription actually expires in a 2 weeks.  I will wait until it is fully expired and then try the $49 offer if it still exists.  If it works great, but if not, then I too will revert to the free version of Sonar (at least until a nice deal comes along).

Again, thanks for the info!

The $49 offer, like the $99 offer it replaced, is for new subscribers only. It auto-renews at full price. So after the first year at $49, it will automatically renew at the full price of $149.50 each year.

https://help.bandlab.com/hc/en-us/articles/20758981227033-BandLab-Membership-FAQ

LinkedMusicians Founder. Your friend who keeps the beat.

Check out my music. 

2

[Cecelius2]

Peter:  Thanks for this clarification; I appreciate the info.  I had hoped that the link would be for returning customers, but I had suspected that it was only for new members — you have made this clear.  Thanks.

I do not know if I am going to renew membership or just let mine revert to the Free Tier.  I have been using Cake products since 1994 and still load either Cakewalk BnB or Sonar as my first go to DAWs — I just know them better and am comfortable with them.  However, I have been using Studio One 7 and Cubase more and more. 

Thanks for the help and clarification!

C2

 

 

2

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