19 of the best plugins under $50 this Cyber Monday for last-minute impulse buying

For a lot of working producers, Melodyne will be amongst their most used plugins. Pretty much every vocal nowadays is tuned, to the point that most big live shows you go to will have some form of tuning on the vocal.

Although it lacks the polyphonic Direct Note Access (DNA) of more expensive versions of Melodyne, Essential is great for speedily tuning vocal takes and monophonic instruments.

With a massive $74 off at Plugin Boutique, this is one plugin buy I guarantee will improve the quality of your music.

Plus, if you grab this now, you can always upgrade to the DNA-equipped Editor version of Melodyne later on, via a discounted upgrade price.

One of the all-time greatest delay plugins, Soundtoys EchoBoy is an effect that various members of the MusicRadar team use all the time, and we regularly see it appearing in artists' studios too.

Packed full of lush analogue delay tones and with unparalleled flexibility in tweaking, with $150 off at Plugin Boutique it's a great addition to your plugin folder.

Read more: Soundtoys 5.5 review

The API 500 series is a really excellent bit of studio outboard. We've heard it described as ‘revealing’ and I can’t put it any better than that. Even when you start getting into boosting frequencies in the realm of 12dB it still somehow manages to sound good.

UA's plugin version nails the sound and response of the hardware. If you want to capture that pro studio mixing experience at home, this is a great addition to your hard drive.

Read more: Universal Audio API 500 Series EQ review

One of the most popular saturation plugins in the industry, Soundtoys Decapitator is a go-to for countless pro producers.

It's versatile enough to cover a light dusting of vibe all the way through to all-out sonic destruction, this is one plugin that should be in every producer's arsenal.

A $150 discount over at Plugin Boutique makes it a fantastic deal to take advantage of.

Personally, I can never have too many delays. Yes, they'e all essentially just echo effects, but the differing character and response you get from different designs of delay – be they hardware or software – can result in totally different tonalities.

Baby Audio's Comeback Kid is a case in point. Yes, it's another analogue style delay – and I already own a lot of those – but features like its shaper and ducker capabilities mean it can create some lovely, unique delay effects that have lots of personality.

It's already pretty cheap by plugin standards, but a $40 discount at Plugin Boutique has brought it down to just $29, an absolute steal.

Read more: Baby Audio Comeback Kid review

From my colleague Andy Price: "Blackhole is a really exemplary atmospheric reverb that on balance I’d probably say tops my personal perennial favourite UltraSpace. This ain't no ordinary reverb, its mind-bending Gravity control can invert the decay and essentially bend time to your will, just like a black hole can (theoretically) do. At 80% off until Jan 5th, this is an offer you should find yourself being sucked right into (sorry!)"

bx_digital V3 has been around a little while, so it isn't the newest or most cutting-edge EQ on the market. That doesn't mean it's not impressive though.

This is a feature-packed and highly capable plugin that set the standard for mid/side EQ upon release.

It's currently less than $10 in the Cyber Monday sales. So if you're currently using your DAW's stock EQ and want to up your game for a bargain price, this is a very good shout.

A fantastic deal on an intelligent and easy-to-use EQ that will point out where you're going wrong, and fix your problems without breaking a sweat.

Sonnox has a wealth of experience in this field and Claro is built on their expert knowledge.

Plugins like this are as close as mixing comes to having a cheat code. A steal at just $33.

Another recommendation from my colleague Andy Price: "This Shadow Hills-endorsed emulation, accurately modelled by Plugin Alliance, has been a mainstay of many a pro mastering engineer’s chain for years. Arguably (and mastering engineers do tend to argue…) it's one of the most impact-lifting compressors that money can buy, whether in its original (expensive) hardware form, or this now ultra-affordable plugin version.

It’s a robust classic that applies a release-quality sheen to to pretty much anything you throw its way. If the end result is a bit too much for the master buss of your particular style, I've found that it also works specifically well to beef up a drum buss. This is an iconic tool that, at 83% off, is not to be sniffed at."

The Thermionic Culture Vulture is one of those hardware devices that many producers swear by. It's a saturation tool that responds in a brilliantly musical manner, capable of adding real depth and presence to sounds.

Again, UA's version nails the sound of the hardware. I love it on bass guitar and monosynths. It can do everything from subtle to thickening to full-on sonic destruction, and the plugin includes some features you don’t get on the hardware, including a mix knob and stereo link function.

Read more: Universal Audio Thermionic Culture Vulture review

Playbeat is a sample-based drum machine with a difference. This is an easy-to-use, boundlessly creative launchpad for fresh rhythmic ideas, powered by 'AI' tools and randomisation functions that inspire, as opposed to doing all the work for you.

Playbeat can generate randomized drum patterns drawn from source sounds selected on-the-hoof from within its vast (and further expandable) sample library, or loaded from your own stock of samples.

It’s provided no-end of surprising creative inspiration to multiple members of our team in recent years. Well worth taking a punt on.

Cherry Audio plugins are universally excellent. They are one of the most consistently high-scoring brands in our review section.

Part of our love for them lies in the fact that their plugins are excellent value – most go for around $50 even at full price, but in the current sales you can pick up much of the developer's line-up for considerably less.

The whole sale lineup is worthy of recommendation, but I'll highlight a few personal favourites below...

The GX-80 combines elements of Yamaha's iconic CS-80 – arguably the greatest polysynth of all time – with features of its predecessor the G-1.

The originals were renowned for their massive sound, and Cherry Audio's take nails that too. The plugin is dual layer, allowing it to create hugely thick stacked tones, and includes a cool 'faux poly aftertouch' feature.

This really is a hell of a lot of synth for $35.

Unlike a lot of Cherry plugins, Sines isn't an emulation of a classic hardware synth. Rather, this is an original polysynth based around four individual sine wave generators. These can be combined to create sounds using a mix of phase modulation and subtractive synthesis, with a touch of additive influence thrown in too.

It's a deep and hugely capable instrument, but really clearly laid out and an absolute joy to build sounds in. As you can probably tell, I'm a big fan.

$25 – a discount of 50% via Plugin Boutique – is a ridiculous bargain for a unique and massively underrated instrument. 

Dreamsynth is sort of an 'uncanny' instrument emulation, in that it looks and sounds like vintage hardware without actually emulating a specific synth.

In fact, Dreamsynth is inspired by the hybrid analogue-digital synths of the 1980s – think Prophet VS and Ensoniq ESQ-1. It benefits from not being beholden to a single design, capturing the vibe of an era without getting too hung up on a specific synth.

The sounds here are lush and inspiring, and it works great with an MPE input.

Atoms is a physically modelling synth that's great for ambience, metallic tones and – to my ear at least – surprisingly handy for bass too.

I've ended up using it regularly since I first reviewed it back in 2024, and would certainly recommend giving it a go at this price.

Read more: Baby Audio Atoms review

The Juno-106 is one of the all-time great polysynths. It's simple and easy to use, but sounds lush and iconic. There's a good reason that the Junos and Jupiters remain staples of dance and pop production.

This is Roland's official plugin version, built using the company's Analog Circuit Behaviour technology. It sounds on-the-money and updates the classic feature set with additions including an expanded arp and extra effects.

An iconic drum machine that needs no introduction.

This is the official Roland version, based on its Analog Circuit Behaviour Tech. It sounds great and expands on the feature set with better tuning and decay controls, plus an improved sequencer.

Same deal as the TR-808 above. This is Roland's official ACB-powered version of an iconic drum machine, complete with additional tuning and shaping parameters and an expanded sequencer.

Korg's Wavestation is a '90s icon. It made use of sample-based Wave Sequencing and Vector Synthesis, which essentially involved PCM samples played one after another, resulting in continuously evolving sounds.

It's a hugely distinctive sound palette, and Korg's official recreation benefits from drawing on the same source material – and expansion cards – as the original hardware. The result is a distinctive '90s classic in you DAW.