Very Happy with the Universal Audio Solo, Thunderbolt 3 Interface. I am using it with an IMac 24 with M1. It was very easy to set up, and get running! I am also using the latest MacOS Sequoia, fully updated, and have had No Issues. I love that it was plug and play, and didn't require any fiddling with the settings. It is relatively Expensive but it is Worth it. Clean sound and functionality, and the companion UAD Console software is easy to use too after I watched all the support videos, and of course the UTube University ones also! The free LUNA software is a bonus too! All of it is very easy to keep updated too, which makes it nice! Hot tip on the console is to click on the UA logo at the top of the output meter, and that puts it on the desktop, and is nice to have when using online music services. I recommend this Universal Audio interface!

I thought I was quite content with my old NI Komplete audio interface and there was nothing wrong with it, really. In fact, I was looking for something to supplement it, not replace it. I was looking at preamps and channel strips, something that would allow me to warm things up a bit on the way in. But eventually I realized that the Apollo would allow me to do just that and more.

Likewise, I was not particularly unhappy monitoring inputs through my DAW. I thought it was good enough-ish in most cases, but I figured it would relieve my CPU and come in handy in some cases. That was an added benefit, but not something I considered crucial.

And lastly, to be honest, I've never really been one to worry about things like converters, which I considered a bit like cork sniffing. But I was about to be impressed.

I was immediately shocked by the difference in the stereo image. Because I had always been dismissive of all the talk about converters, I had no idea that this could potentially be expected. I also started noticing issues with sample libraries and instruments I'd been using, things that used to fly under the radar because I could hear them, but which, when all aded up, could create problems which seemed almost inexplicable.

The biggest shock came when I decided to track vocals. Prior to this, I was always baffled by my constant drifting pitch issues. The first take I did using the UAD and monitoring directly through it felt like a revelation. Like: I KNEW it. I can do this. Not only that, but it made me realize that my inexpensive AKG condenser sounded absolutely ok when sweetened a bit by a unison preamp plugin. So it probably saved me some money there, at least for a while.

That's definitely an entirely different ballgame, compared to monitoring through native plugins in Logic or Pro Tools.

Recording guitars DI was equally impressive. Before I knew it, I was done. Usually I agonize over this. But with the Apollo, I didn't feel compelled to re-do it a hundred time because something elusive didn't gel. And of course, playing is a lot more enjoyable. It feels natural.

I cannot say enough good about the hardware and the software, and the interaction between them. There's definitely something to be said about the ability to control software parameters with a knob, or by pushing buttons. And the routing options are fantastic too.

My needs are very simple, so I'm okay with the Solo, but I can imagine that many if not most would probably find its DSP power a bit limiting and might prefer to look one step above the Solo. For me, being able to run a unison preamp and a pair of busses with a reverb and a delay is usually enough. And I could probably add a compressor in there if needed. But that's about it. Anyway, there are always options if you want to add more DSP to your rig in the future.

It really is a game changer, probably the biggest one since I moved from analog to digital 25 years ago. I wish I'd made the jump to UAD earlier.

I think for the price is an excellent interface can't recommend it enough

I wanted a Thunderbolt 3 interface for my home studio. I saw the UA Apollo Solo and it looked perfect. I read the manual, watched a ton of videos and thought with the new interface I might even start using the LUNA DAW. Well obviously I didn't read the manual or pay close enough attention to the videos. The solo has extremely limited DSP power so you can only have 2 (sometimes not even that) plug ins running in Console at a time. For example, if I try to run a pre-amp emulation, guitar amp, and distortion pedal plug-in at the same time you immediately get the dreaded not enough DSP error message. So something that basic can't be done in Console. Ugh. The manual and videos are showing you the more advanced Apollo units so be careful and don't think this unit will do what the others will do. Disappointing. Then with LUNA I quickly realized how user unfriendly it is as much as I wanted to like it. No guitar tuner, simple edits are ridiculously complex, it's confusing, etc. Disappointing. Also the UA stuff is a nightmare to download and get set up. I must have entered my password at least 25 times, had to reset my computer in unconventional ways, took two hours to get everything up and running with LUNA. Ugh. So all that said I decided to ditch LUNA and go back to Logic Pro X. Since then I have really began to enjoy the Apollo Solo interface. The preamps in UA Console really do sound great, zero latency, and if I stick with a good preamp emulation and maybe one Fender and/or Marshall amp insert (assuming the DSP can handle it which is not consistent depending on the setting) you really do get some superior recordings. As for post effects after the initial recording, I'm using the free UA effects downloaded into Logic from Apollo, like the delays, as well as the quality effects built in to Logic (particularly the mastering assistant) and my guitar tracks have never sounded nicer! Also running Fender Tone Master Pro straight into the interface and getting really good guitar sounds on the front end with just a UA preamp emulation in Console. So overall I do really like this interface and it's perfect for 90% of what I do. Also there are not a whole lot of better Thunderbolt 3 choices in this price range and I love the concept of "hybrid" recording. So again, know what you are getting. If you plan to record more than one track at a time or were drooling over the potential for tracking with a ton of inserts in Console...look elsewhere. You will need to upgrade to the Apollo Twin at minimum ro get the additional DSPs to handle the inserts.

Such a great purchase. I was using a Scarlett Solo and was unhappy with my guitar and bass tracks from the moment I got it. I thought It was my computer, cables, headphones, etc... A producer recommended this to me and it's great. No latency, crisp tracks and a really nice intuitive piece of hardware. I mainly record DI guitars and basses and then have them sent to a studio for mixing and mastering. This unit provides the best possible sound I've heard so far.

Aside from the unit itself, this is my first Sweetwater purchase and I see what the buzz is all about. You get assigned your own sales engineer and candy too. Big shout out to Jeff Steinhauser for answering all my questions and giving top notch customer service. Even if I find the same item slightly cheaper somewhere else, I'll still be ordering from Jeff here at Sweetwater. Thanks!

I need to make this clear: I don't write reviews on websites hardly ever. When I have it is to praise something. I can say without reservation the first and only time I have developed utter and complete contempt for a brand is Universal Audio. I have now literally spent months and many hours trying to merge my two separate accounts that are unfortunately on the same system, so it's created problems that NONE of the their online "help" addresses.

I am a tech savvy guy in my 30s who works with computers and audio equipment professionally routinely and yet somehow doing the most stupid, basic thing, regardless of how many times I've uninstalled and reinstalled or bought different Spark subscriptions that don't integrate with my Console, there's no one to help. Oh, you've been paying $ a month (for two separate subs) attempting to reconcile the two... let me send you another generic article that doesn't cover apply to what my problem is. Still doesn't work? No, you can't get a refund or anyone to help.

I have spent HOURS on MULTIPLE occasions and every time it seems like something MIGHT work, something comes up where UA didn't plan or account for and has no interest in remedying because, hey... they are Universal Audio. They are a big legacy company... you need basic technical support? Go screw Yourself, we're dealing with our celebrity endorsements, we can't even be bothered with you peasant.

I'm very close to throwing this piece of garbage away because this brand is now completely tainted for me. They have driven me to a place of genuine hatred I have never felt. Not once. I despise the mentality and ethos of this brand. Will never even consider purchasing another of their products again.

I would seriously look elsewhere. There stuff is good when it works but when it doesn't you're completely screwed.

Love,
Max

Have been using for a week now. Sound quality is excellent however the plugins advertised do not seem to be free. I am able to see 11 plugins total, but 100 other plugins are only available in demo mode for 14 days. Based on the product page, I thought I was receiving a UAD plugin bundle, Neve plugins (have no idea how they are distributed after registration) and the Auto Tune advertised is also locked behind a paywall. I will try to call a support team tomorrow to see if I can get access to those plugins - if not, I'll be returning for something with a simpler setup. Hopefully I'm just a lost Mac user and did something the wrong way. Will update.

first, I have to say Sweetwater sales and tech support was awesome. I have a new Intel NUC 11 Extreme (Windows 11) PC running Thunderbolt 4 ports. After 2 weeks my Apollo Solo stopped powering up at boot-up. After a few hours of troubleshooting, Sweetwater replaced my unit, received it the next day!! ...but same issue happened - so we suspected the PC. I found this fix on-line so won't take credit, but to reset the thunderbolt ports on the NUC I had to unplug the power cord from the NUC and short the AC plug pins for 5 seconds with a metal screwdriver. Plugged back in, all powered up correctly!
Sweetwater PC specialist support verified everything for me too, BIOS/Controllers/Drivers/power management/etc....
I hope this helps someone out there, was frustrating!!

I've spent a whopping 10+ hours spread across four days, testing two different units, using two different lightning bolt cables, shipping units back and forth, buying more cables locally and consulting with three technical support audio engineers at Sweetwater all in a desperate attempt to make this product function with my iMac. Unfortunately, all my efforts were in vain. I must say, I'm incredibly let down by universal audio. I strongly advise against purchasing this product for use with your iMac. Trust me, no matter what you do, the iMac simply won't recognize this audio interface. Consider yourself warned, potential buyers.

I love this unit! Universal Audio makes some of the best hardware and plugins on the market. The drivers are excellent and present a very stable operation. The sound quality is the best in it's class and then some. The quality build is second to none. I'm a Musician songwriter on the go and in the Studio and this guys gets used all around. Can't say enough about the importance of a thunderbolt interface. Unlike USB it provide a much more stable and uninterrupted performance. Will never do USB again! Had an Audeint ID 14 MkII which gave me a lot of problems due to USB and driver issues not to mention the hyped up specs that the interface does not live up too. I also love that the Solo is buss powered but performs like it's plugged into a wall jack minus the brick. Do yourself a favor, if you looking for something on the go or at home with the same quality of the Studio get this guy!

If you're trying to record clean vocals - whether it be voice-over or for songs - I encourage you to consider the Apollo interfaces. They also come with UA plug-ins - which are amazing.

Really good, clean preamps. UA is hit or miss when it comes to customer relations and support. Plugins are expensive, so wait for a BIG sale and enjoy the ones that come with the heritage bundle.

I got this to replace an Audient Id14. This thing is super simple to use on Mac and the unison plugins work and sound great.

The Id14 had was okay but doesn't have any onboard indicator of how loud your volume actually is. It also doesn't remember the volume you left at when you last shut your computer off. I try to leave the master volume alone as much as possible while mixing and tracking. The Apollo solves all of these small issues so I'm pretty stoked. Woop!

I've been very happy with the interface! Sounds great and is pretty easy to use. The price went up though. They raised it up and threw in some extra plugins (that I probably would not use) but the actual interface is the same. High quality product though feels solid too. I am not sure if I would buy it at the higher price point.

I previously had the Arrow which worked great up until the 20th month. It started to fail, so I bought the Solo to replace it. For the past 6 months it has been issue after issue after issue. UAD support just tells you to reinstall everything which takes hours and it still doesn't resolve the issues. The main issues are: it's internal clock fluctuates. Sometimes everything plays pitched up, other times pitched down. Never where it's supposed to be. It's bizarre. Now in month 6 with the Solo it only powers on half the time. I have to constantly unplug it and plug it back in.

For a bus-powered interface, the Solo accomplishes quite a lot. It has the Unison technology and runs UAD powered plugins before and after recording. It has enough output to drive a decent volume on monitors as well as offering mixer-level features like high-pass filter and input level pad. Having only one DSP processor only becomes a real limitation when trying to use large numbers of UA plugins in a mix, but during recording, there is plenty of power to apply pro-level processing to signal before recording. The only real complaint I have is the Console software does not have a loopback function, but if the recording/streaming software can capture numerous inputs and outputs, this is not really a problem. Also, the Solo is a bit on the expensive side, but the quality and feature set are really nice. This is definitely an interface option to consider.

I just setup and started enjoying this audio interface. I successfully used it with UAD Software, NeuralDSP's NTS stand-alone plug-in, and Logic Pro. It sounds great, and I believe sounds notably better than the Presonus AudioBox iTwo I upgraded from.

Note that there are extra steps listed on UA Audio's website for Apple Silicon Macs. I followed the installation instructions for Big Sur, installing the latest version of UAD Software first, then proceeded to follow the extra steps for M1 Macs. This involves starting the computer in macOS Recovery mode and changing the security policy to allow user management of kernel extensions from identified developers. This allows the UA driver to install and run correctly. I hope this helps others.

thanks to the sales and tech support I'm off and running with my Apollo Solo. Everything is performing GREAT!

Really good hardware and software! And it worked with my Apple M1 iMac, with one annoying irritation that didn't bother me much. But then I upgraded to the new, fully released Monterey OS and the Apollo Solo won't even turn on. UAD tech support says the only way to get it to work is to downgrade my operating system, there is no known work around, or to wait who knows how long for the next UAD update.

Support for new Apple updates are slow.

An expensive disappointment. To be clear, the preamps sound great, and the routing interface is blissfully easy to understand. It's lightweight, portable, and will serve your needs for recording ideas and small sessions on the road. It's also ideal for professionals looking for a high quality, rock solid interface...if you're a Mac user.

If you plan on integrating the Solo with Skype, Discord, or any other non-DAW app on Windows, look further. Integration requires absurd workarounds that don't always function. It's a huge pain (they claim it's due to deficient Windows drivers). Many people purchasing interfaces in this class expect this functionality out of the box. Similar products in its class offer easy loopback options.

DSP power is extremely limited, and while great, the plugins are very expensive (it's better to wait for black friday sales).

The original Apollo Twin was special. It was insanely powerful, was an excellent value, and it wasn't much more expensive than the Solo. Those days, sadly, are over. If you're a Windows user and plan on going this route, consider lower priced USB options.

I'm fed up with the obscene pricing of many "Pro audio" brands. There are better options out there at substantially lower prices.

The unit works well but don't be fooled by the "included plugins". You will get Luna Recording software and very few plug-ins. They want you to buy them and they are very expensive-most over $100. I have better software included with Logic Pro which is also easier to use that Luna. Glad to have the interface but disappointed in the software.

I purchased an Apollo Solo for my home Logic Pro recording setup. There were no issues with getting Universal Audio's software installed and running on an Intel Big Sur Mac. It's a very nice audio interface, where I can record all of my sources at 96 kHz with no issues. Universal Audio's ecosystem is based around offering plug-in emulations of real hardware that run on the DSP chip built-in to the Apollo Solo (UAD2). The Solo is only capable of handling a few plug-in instances at a time, which can be significantly reduced if you're recording in stereo or at a higher sample rate. Ultimately, if you're a mixing engineer, you'll probably be disappointed with this model's small plug-in load. I haven't necessarily found this problematic; my default channel strips only consist of a preamp, equalizer, and compressor. The Unison preamps sounds great and I really appreciate being able to have those options available at my fingertips. The "Heritage" set of plug-ins are a decent starter set with some popular studio gear. The plug-ins also come with documentation that can be easily accessed on any plug-in instance window. Plug-ins are purchased via Universal Audio's marketplace, can be demoed for two weeks, and authenticated on the Audio Interface, so there's no need for additional authentication hardware. The device itself has a nice, clean interface, but you might want to give the user manual a read to get the most out of it. I also recommend watching Universal Audio's Guide to Console which will help you figure out a workflow. The Apollo Solo has two input channels, stereo monitor out, but no expansions options (i.e., via ADAT) like higher end models have. Overall, I'm very pleased with the Apollo Solo and the workflow I have with it. Before you buy, ensure that you have enough Thunderbolt 3 ports, otherwise, you may want to consider purchasing a Thunderbolt dock.

I bought this based on how much I like my Apollo II. The Solo sounds just as good, and works the same way, but having only one core is a bit of a nuisance because some of the UA plugins are real DSP hogs. For example, adding the UA Fender '55 Tweed Deluxe plugin in a Unison slot takes DSP usage up to 73%. One plug-in. But the real drawback is the fact that the interface is bus-powered. The interface draws much more power than I'd expected, which means that about every two hours I must disconnect something vital to free up a port for charging so my laptop doesn't shut down in the middle of a take. My only other criticism is that the pair of 1/4" inputs on the back are too tight. Unplugging a jack is surprisingly difficult.