However, it was quite a step up from there price‑wise to the first paid‑for version. Pro Tools First was a useful educational tool and taster for the real thing, but was too limited for most real‑world production tasks, especially as it could only work with cloud‑based Projects and not with the locally hosted Session format. For quite a few years now, Avid have offered two paid‑for versions of the software alongside a free version called Pro Tools First. Hand in hand with this move came a reconfiguration of the Pro Tools product line. The most widely used digital workstation software in professional music circles is now effectively a subscription‑only product, though of course existing perpetual licences won’t cease to be valid. Earlier this year, however, they announced a major overhaul of the Pro Tools pricing structure, and by the time you read this, it will no longer be possible to buy a perpetual licence. It’s been a bumpy ride at times, but on balance, I think most users would agree that there’s merit to this approach, and Avid have continued to offer perpetual licences to the unconvinced. No longer would they have to save up new features for a big integer release every couple of years instead, they could make them available as soon as they were ready.

One of Avid’s stated reasons for moving Pro Tools to a subscription model was to adopt a ‘little and often’ approach to updates. Is the most affordable version of Avid’s DAW still a serious music production tool? Incidentally, it seems that Dark mode is now the default, though the classic Pro Tools grey look is still available. A major focus in the development of Pro Tools Artist has been smoothing the learning curve for new users.

Pro tools artist subscription