Yamaha MOXF8 88-key Synthesizer Workstation Reviews

I've used Yamaha products for over 40 years. When I got my MOXF8, I was looking for a more substantial sound than my MX61, but less weight than my S90ES. This hit the spot - I've used it as my sole keyboard for gigs, and I take it as a spare when I use my S90ES. All the workhorse sounds are there - acoustic piano, Rhodes, Wurlitzer, strings, that Van Halen sound that shall remain nameless, strings and organs. And there are tons of other sounds and workstation features. The sounds aren't quite the S90ES quality, but they are still very usable. We aging musicians need to be smart about how much weight we lug around, especially when we need 88 keys. The MOXF8 hits the sweet spot for me. Thanks again, Yamaha.

I"ve been looking at this workstation for sometime now and have to say I am so glad I now own one For me it"s still a little intimidating because of everything that this thing can do Yamaha really put some thought into this one The manual was a big help in finding the banks of sounds and once you look around a few times it"s pretty easy finding what you want I have to say I"m very impressed and I"m looking forward to putting this workstation through its paces

Here"s a little background on how I eventually chose the MOXF8:

I"ve been looking for a keyboard to replace my 49 pound Yamaha S90ES for several years and after trying out and then sending back both the MONTAGE8 and the newest Kronos, I finally realized that for me, there is no replacement for the S90ES. It"s not just the quality of the sounds but a feature which allows me to route my left hand key bass part out of a separate output to a dedicated bass amp.

Having made that determination, I started looking for a smaller lighter 88 note hammer action keyboard that I could use on dinner cruise, country club, small stage and quick in and out gigs. I was aware that I wouldn"t have a dedicated bass output but felt that I could live with that especially when doing solo or duo work.

I bought a Casio PX-560 and used it for about a year, then sold it. In September of 2017 I bought the Yamaha mx88. I've been able to tolerate it on the types of gigs that I listed above but was always disappointed in the acoustic piano samples.

A couple of weeks ago, I started looking for yet another keyboard with sounds that I would like better while still being a size and weight that I could handle.

I can"t believe that the MOXF8 meets all of my criteria. I'd completely missed the boat last year and wasn"t aware that it is a full featured, smaller and lighter version of the Motif XF. It"s true that there are a couple of minor caveats but, none of them are related to the quality and quantity of the onboard sounds.

Yesterday afternoon I used the John Melas Tools MOXF Performance Editor on my iMac and set about making the keyboard gig ready. It took me about 6 hours to program 32 Performances. 16 of which Layer/Split the keyboard for me to kick key bass and another 16 exactly the same but without the bass split for when I"m working with bands that have a bass player. I then made backups of the MOXF8 to a USB Flash Drive as well as saving all of the Performances to the John Melas Tools MOXF Librarian.

I am wildly pleased with my new MOXF8! It sounds every bit as good if not better than my S90ES (which is still my choice on larger gigs). In fact, I was able to model all of the Performances on the S90ES and put them in the same memory locations on the MOXF8. It"s also much easier and faster to select alternate Voices on the fly on the MOXF if I want to use a variation piano, string, brass, organ or bass sound than what I"ve already saved. I also love having a dedicated level control for the A/D Input within reach as well as being able to see the level of that signal. Since I"ll be plugging in the BeatBuddy for drums, this is a welcome feature.

I"ll be using the MOXF8 on a gig this Saturday! I"ve never had a new keyboard that was ready to use on a real world gig this quickly! I am completely out of my mind stoked!

Thank you yet again to Ed Nystrom and his excellent team for their patience, helpful information and customer service beyond compare!

I was looking to upgrade from a recently broken Suzuki 88 key keyboard and decided on a keyboard workstation over a controller keyboard. I compared every workstation keyboard in this price range, including discontinued workstations from Roland and Yamaha. I settled on the MOXF and was immediately blown away. It sounds absolutely beautiful and is very versatile.
I was a little concerned about how the keys would feel. I grew up playing on an acoustic piano, so having that acoustic feel is important to me. I was very impressed and satisfied with how nice it felt to play, considering some of the complaints i have seen about it.
Accessing different functions is very easy. There really isn't as much screen diving as some of the other workstations on the market in this price range, which is a bonus for faster workflow.
There are vocal effects including a vocoder. It is not a true vocoder, however it is nice to have as an all in one.
I've had this keyboard for a couple of months now and have barely scratched the surface of everything it can do. It offers so much and has been an inspiring unit! It really pushes my creativity. I love it and can see it being a part of my studio for a very long time.

Very powerful instrument, key touch is great, sounds outstanding. Manual leaves a great deal to be desired, too vague about how to perform functions. Called tech support for help and no one knew how to answer my question. I was told that none of them owned this keyboard and that they would get my answer and call me in no less than two days, that was four weeks ago, no answer.

Really nice keyboard and I'm certain that once I get it figured out, I will amaze people

This keyboard took my programming skills to the next level. It could do things that I didn't even know that keyboards could do. The sounds are great and very expressive. You can assign up to 8 elements (voices) per program, which can each have their own settings for their amplitude, filter, and pitch envelope generators, fine tuning, coarse tuning, panning, pitch range, velocity range, crossfade, and much, much more! I use this keyboard live and it sounds amazing. My band has an alternative rock sound that mixes 80's rock with new wave and synth pop and this keyboard has been perfect for what we do. Stereo outputs allow me to create lush, stereo images live. The built in effects are excellent, especially the reverbs. There is so much good that can be said about this keyboard. Simply put, if you're looking for a keyboard with high-quality sound samples (especially synthesizer samples), and an excellent step sequencer, then this keyboard is for you. Whether you run it master or slave it is a powerhouse. Just as a warning, it is a little heavy to carry but nowhere near as bad as a lot of keyboards its size. I don't mind having to haul it around live though because it sounds so good. As always, Yamaha has done an amazing job with yet another product.

Instructional book is not that great but online information pretty good starting to enjoy

I was pleased when I bought this keyboard - but after having it for almost a year now, it's time to really sing it's praises! First, the sounds. Incredible. Beautiful. An entire library of great, USABLE sounds including lots of drum kits! Not only that, but with the expansion board and the waveform software you can roll your own sounds and load them up.

Next, the sequencer. There is both a song sequencer and a pattern sequencer, and both are 16 channel sequencers with a well-thought out interface and lots of possible ways to use it with other gear. The only drawback I've found with the sequencer is that you'll run out of song memory quickly - it only holds about 5-8 fully sequenced songs in memory, which is really strange considering how much sample memory there is. I wanted to load all my gig sequences in memory, but that's not happening. Not a biggie tho, because you can load them from USB or use an iPad to run sequences into the MOXF, which is what I do.

The keyboard itself is good. Great? Debatable. I've heard some folks don't like the feel, saying it's too hard on their hands. It doesn't bother me, and I like the feel, so I'm okay with it. The lack of aftertouch is a drag - but keeping the price down makes up for that.

When you first get this keyboard, you will be overwhelmed by all of the options and configuration possibilities. It took me a few weeks to really get around it, and even now I still don't know how to create my own arpeggios or create/load my own samples. But I will, when I get time! The bottom line is that there isn't a workstation in this price range that can compete with all that you get with the MOXF. I love it so much I bought the MOXF6 as well, which doesn't have the weighted keys and works well for organ/synth lead stuff. It also provides me with a backup should one go down during a gig.

Overall, this thing is a monster and nothing compares right now to it's price, or it's functionality. The Montage series is out now, but waaay more than the MOXF price-wise. If you want one keyboard that can fully produce songs in just about any style, this can do it. You could make an instrumental record with this box and nothing else. In this age of vintage-is-better, analog prissy-ness, Yamaha keeps doing what it does best - creating musical instruments for real music professionals and hobbyists that open worlds of possibility.

Lightweight is a big plus! Great sounds, another big plus! I am not a wizard at all, I'm kinda mid level when it comes to programing but I was able to set up the keyboard without any problems or having to contact tech support. My only con is that I need aftertouch otherwise I would have given it a 5. I'm sill tweaking but so far so good I've only had it about a month or so...

I am very pleased with this keyboard. The voices are amazing. I do not regret purchasing this keyboard.
My sales guy Jed was awwesome

First and foremost, praise to Sweetwater and the sales staff. Not only is the facility world class, but the staff and sales support team simply cannot be bettered. Even when I am pining to go spend some time there for inspiration, my family love it too! so much for them to see and do while I chew the fat with the techs. Just brilliant! I go looking for them when I'm aware I've been playing for over an hour and they don't even notice I'm gone! hahaha. Food, recreation- it's like a Chucky Cheese's for teenagers - they love it!
I bought this with a TC Helicon voicelive3 to cover anything and everything I could ever need or want to do with home music production.
The keyboard build quality is solid luxury. I am a Yamaha guy because the feel is good, the looks are killer and they never go wrong. I have been banging about my YPG625 for years in the back of pick up trucks, wedged in cars, out in the freezing and in the sweltering. this stuff just keeps on truckin'!
There is a lot of techno / hiphop stuff that I quickly move away from, but if you were into that, you'd have it made! my teenage kids start nodding and grinning when I'm messing around with those presets and when I kick the arpeggio variations in to give it a bit of an edgy switch ,they love it. very strong sounds, very editable and fun.
The quality of solo voices can be fantastic. there is a string quartet preset that is so good, my wife had to come into the room and see how I was making those real sounds. lol. It was that good. She thought I had quit playing and was listening to recordings of the real thing instead
It is a nice weight and is solid. It looks nice and the display is not huge, but big and clear enough to show everything you need to see. Piano presets are gorgeous, Clavis, Wurlys, they're all there. Gutsy Hammonds and fantastic swirling speaker sounds. the fun is endless.
The expansion package was absolutely amazing! first thing I loaded was hundreds of voices for orchestration and boy, are those sounds good. The brass sounds are class. low register breathy trumpets and flugel horns are so real, I was tempted to do covers of the Thad Jones/Mel Lewis big band numbers from their consummation album - you tube it and you'll hear what I mean.
It's inspiring, it's addictive, it's versatile, it's everything you could need.

This is an incredible instrument and I am so pleased with the decision to purchase it. I am equally pleased with my decision to go with Sweetwater as they provide the best customer service in the industry.

Did my research before buying the MOXF8 - I'm glad I have it though a word of caution - oddly enough the piano samples aren't that good! Subjective ? Yes - but lets define good. Good to me means natural - good means you forget you're playing a sample and get lost in it. My Addictive Keys plugin for example, is really good - I play through that and I feel ike I'm playing a piano - I've been playing real pianos for 40 years and I'm pretty fussy. With the MOXF you get these very linear, metallic, decays. The initial strike is very woody but the trails are pretty fake sounding.

Part of the promotion from Yamaha includes the expansion slot and a new library of piano samples - maybe they will be better - if not I'm sure I can get some samples on compatable flash that will do the trick - that's the cool thing about this board - you're not stuck with just the initital factory sounds. In the studio I can still access the Addictive Keys samples so I'm good there. In a live setting it won't be quite as crucial most of the some - though some of the time it will.

So that's the bad - there's plenty of good too - the electric pianos (Rhodes, Wuritzer, etc...) are wonderful. oragans seem better to me than the ones I had on my Motif ES8 from 2004 - having a blast creating songs with the sequencer - to the point that I am contemplating making a record with these beats and sound files. Key action is good for me - I find it's loose enough to get some quick synth and organ runs done without fatigue - and weighty enough to satisfy the piano and electric piano requirements.

If you're reading this review you're probably contemplating this purchase - I would say go for it because it's an expandable system. In this price range you'll be hard pressed to do better all around given it's impressive feature set. I'm happy to have it - If I were stuck with these piano samples however, I would probably send it back. Good luck searching - the mid price synth range is particularly tough.

Great sounds, great size and weight!!! So good!!!

Firstly I never thought Id be able to afford a MO brand. The sounds a very relevant as a gospel musician. The Brass Sections are on point. I am our main keyboardist so I play in both Youth and Main. The style of music for main services is really old school and general but youth is the very new style of gospel. The MOFX has allowed me to preset my Layers for each kind of service and style. Im still learning how to drive it as I just converted from Roland but once I get the hang of it I know I will love it even more. Its light, it looks good and the heavy keys are amazing. Not too heavy and not too light. Only issue for me is the pitch bender is pretty far away from where i sit on the 88 note. Other than that this is a church kind of Workstation

Alex Morales of Sweetwater was awesome. He gave me a much better price than I was expecting. Got me several 40th Anniversary items for free and suggested an inexpensive case to protect it that works great. I ordered it Friday PM about 3:30 expecting it in a week. It showed up at the house about noon the NEXT Day!! (I had a band job that night and it was Great.)

The sounds are Very Realistic! The feel of the weighted keys are Wonderful! I struggled with the operating system at first but I am getting used to it the more I work with it.

Thank You Alex and Sweetwater! I'LL BE BACK!!! Dan

I'm extremely pleased with all of the sounds on the MOXf8, or the ones that I have gotten to. The piano sounds are outstanding along with all the keyboards. The drums are very good. The keys are very realistic and have a very piano like feel. Since I don't gig much, the plastic build of the board doesn't bother me, although the light weight of the board is a huge plus for gigging. Navigating the controls is turning into quite a learning curve for me. I'm getting there and I don't think that any piece of equipment is going to be perfectly understandable for the first few months that you are getting to know it. After I have had time to learn the in's and outs, I think I would give it a complete 5 stars. For the price, it is an outstanding piece of gear. I've been using sequencers to produce jingles and recording projects for 30 years and I would put the MOXf8 up against any on the market today.

I like very much

As a worship leader in a smaller church without a lot of instruments, the MOXF8 does a fantastic job of filling in the missing sounds. The pad is phenomenal for the altar times and more subtle worship moments. Being able to create my own sounds is also a huge plus as a worship leader because different churches mean different cultures/music styles. This keyboard is my first ever workstation and I would recommend it to anyone looking for one themselves.

It was a great deal buying from sweetwater, quality and warranty, great costumer service..i'm happy with my gear!!!

love the thing its wonderful

The MoXF8 is a powerhouse. I bought this through sweetwater.com almost a month ago and I still haven't scratched the surface of what this bad boy does. The piano sounds and sounds in general sound very organic and the action is awesome, especially for a keyboard weighing only 32 pounds.

As it features the sounds of the Motif, you can't go wrong for a keyboard that is half the weight of the Motif, but holds its own as a great keyboard in its own right.

A sincere mention to the folks at sweetwater.com for such a quick, smooth and pleasant transaction. The customer service is very thorough and great. Highly recommended for getting any musical gear online.

I play alot of different styles (rock, soul,blues jazz and country) and you can't beat this keyboard for the price and it only weights 31 lbs. The piano and organ sounds as well as all of the keyboard sounds are more than adequate for live gigs. One day they will nail the horn and brass sounds for us all purpose keyboard players although It has a great tenor sax. Nylon and steel acoustic guitar sounds are great too. Recorded the opening riff on Hotel California on my daw and it sounded awesome on playback. Played the Sunflower Blues Festival in Clarksdale, MS. using 4 of the Hammond simulated sounds and it sounded great listening to the video playback. To my ears the full motif workstation seems to have better sonic quality but it weighs twice as much and I have to carry it in a flight case. Hope this helps if you're considering buying one. No buyer remorse here. Here's a tip. Use the performance mode to layer thick organ sounds. Used a combination of cruncy and rotor sounds for "Green Onions" sounds extremely close to my Hammond XK3.

I recently purchased the MOXF8 for my recording studio hear in Michigan. I'm a singer/songwriter and guitar player and on occasion use a keyboard to embellish my tracks. When I first set down and played a few chords and experimented with the various musical possibilities with this instrument I was truly amazed.
I'm recording a local piano player/ songwriter, vocalist right now and she absolutely loves this piano. She thought the play action was great and the sounds on her tracks sound really world class.
Thanks Jeff Law for all your help in directing my search for a great studio piano. I'm very pleased.

Yamaha makes some of the BEST keyboards and keyboard workstations out there! It's true when they say Yamaha keyboards are the industry standard. They sound flawless. I only have one complaint--The Archtop Dot guitar patch's AF1 switch for "slide" seems to be at a fixed volume, so if you're playing a soft passage then press AF1, the slide seems to be louder than the softly played preceding note. I suppose that would be the case in a real situation (since you play the note harder during a slide). Oh, well, that's just trivial, so forget I even mentioned it. The sounds are pristine and the navigation is very easy. Sequencing is a joy. All it needs now is a sampler, but who really samples anymore.

Unfortunately Yamaha got the piano samples absolutely wrong for this product. As a synthesizer/workstation it would have been a very good product had Yamaha not messed up the piano samples. The advertisement for this product states "Of special note are the detailed digital re-creations of two Yamaha grand pianos (a 9-ft CFIIIS and a 7-ft S6) that only an acoustic piano manufacturer could achieve. The finely-detailed reproduction of even very subtle nuances has resulted in exquisitely crafted piano voices that will satisfy even the most demanding players. “. I found all the piano samples on this instrument to have shades that were off. For instance on the main grand piano sample had a metallic overtone which was abnormal and even at that it was not consistently present in the same way on all key ranges. For example on Eb4,D4, Db4, C4, B4 the metallic overtone was totally prevalent which produced an abnormal tonality and would get very annoying if you were playing loud staccato notes that utilized those notes.
This is not what I have come to expect from Yamaha and I was very disappointed. I returned the instrument.

I am a pianist, well was college grad in music. With piano as my major instrument. The sounds are great and the keyboard is great with one exception. The rebound is too slow but since I don't play that type of music anymore it is noticeably missing to me in experimenting with the keyboard rebound / action. This a You Tube video of one of my favorite classical pieces you could never play on this keyboard (I understand this instrument is not designed for this type of keyboard action. This is the only reason I gave it 4.5 stars instead of 5. The sounds are great and the support from Yamaha is equally excellent.

I had a MOX8 and really liked it alot. I play live alot, and wanted to add samples I need the board doesn't have, making the upgrade the only option for me (XF too much $). Beyond the 1 gig flash upgrade, getting 128 note polyphony and 8 insert fx instead of 3 (I do a ton of editing fx per voice, this may be the best reason of all!), is how configurable and streamlined working with MOXF is. There's a learn curve, but it's so very worth the work. Highly recommend the MOXF. Dollar for dollar the best bang for buck IMHO.
I wish more 3rd party libraries were made for this! Hint hint...

First of all, the keyboard touch is that perfect mix between a great synth and studio grand. It has just enough bounce to use in any style music.
As a senior citizen/musician it took awhile to learn all the great features of the MOXF. Everyday I learn something new and now I'm "full on" sequencing and recording great tracks with just the waves available in this keyboard. Where were the arpeggios back in the day? Can't say enough, it's great!
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I played out for about 13 years with an 88-note MIDI controller and an 8 space rack of module that really killed my back and to have all of these sounds and features in a 32 pound package is amazing !!!! I would highly recommend this board to anyone wanting 88-notes and great sounds in a portable package!!!!

Obviously everyone loves this product and Sweetwater is the best. Just a word for old schoolers new to workstations. This is a very deep and at times complicated keyboard. In order to provide a great product at a great price, the important info is on a small menu screen with lots of manual reading. I spent a lot of time getting started and currently have an unsolved electronic problem. Just a word to the wise for "old school, analog" musicians.

I'm a keyboard player in a gigging cover band (we like to cal it a "concert and event band") and I love having such in depth control of all my gear. We work to have minimal downtime between songs--Utilizing Master Mode, I'm able to switch all my settings on all my boards with a push of a button (or a stomp of a footswitch) for easy transitions between my sound palettes .

My only complaint was that the manuals are hard to grasp for someone that has no in depth experience with a workstation of such capability. It comes with a kind of quick start "Owner's Manual" and a more in depth "Reference Manual" (as well as other resources, but these are the ones that teach the majority of its inner workings). It seems to me that there should be a manual for the user working in a live setting, and one who works in the studio setting. It was tough to find the information I needed for my particular use.

I love this board and I love what this board has allowed me to do. And Sweetwater is definitely top-notch. Screw Guitar Center. I hate those f***ers.

This piano is amazing. Very pleased and I could not ask for more. Also I suggest Sweetwater because the sales reps are excellent to work with.

First I want to comment on the keyboard action is wonderful. Being the owner of a Grand Piano I find the nuance of touch to be tremendous.
The MOXF8 fits perfectly in my production studio as well as a live performance instrument. Great piece of engineering interfaces with several DAWs and comes with a DAW/ VST software Bundle.

THE BEST. I HAD THE MOX8 AND ALSO THE MOTIF SERIES AND ALL I CAN SAY IS THAT THIS IS SUPER GREAT KEYBOARD LESS WEIGHT AND SAME ENGINE AS THE EXPENSIVE MOTIF XF KEYBOARDS. THIS IS A MUST HAVE.

SWEETWATER IS THE BEST PLACE TO PURCHASE. ESPECIALLY "TIM HARRINGTON" GREAT EMPLOYEE AT SWEETWATER.

A Motif XF can't route streams of audio to your DAW "out of the box". You must buy and install the optional Firewire card which is basically useful only for Apple Mac owners since Windows computers typically don't have compatible Firewire interfaces.

The MOX can route audio to your DAW over USB "out of the box", but has half the voice polyphony (64), less simultaneous effects, lacks the Motif XF voices, and can't play 2 track audio from USB flash.

The MX can route audio to your DAW over USB "out of the box", has 128 voice polyphony, can play 2 track audio from USB flash, but has less simultaneous effects, lacks the Motif XF voices, and lacks the Motif XF sequencer.

THE MOXF FIXES EVERYTHING!!!!!!!!!!!!! The MOXF has all of the key features together at my price point. What about no Motif XF sliders and color display? I have an iPad with a MIDI interface for that. DONE.

What the "F" did they do? Isn't it obvious!? Thus the "F" interfix between "MOX" and 6 or 8!

They must have noticed the "Michael Jackson" looks of Korg's Kross models and upped the ante!

The instrument panels are entirely identical compared to the MOX6 and MOX8, of course but they added style to these square-rigged Yamahas!

Though more than twice as expensive as the DGX-650, the MOXF8 is over 12 pounds lighter. Yamaha really put that much-needed piece of the puzzle missing into the MOX by doubling the maximum note polyphony!

And with much more sounds, performances and perhaps more effects, the "F"-type Yamaha MOX appears to have almost everything the Motif XF has minus the control sliders and the large color display... for half the price!

I love it!