Universal Audio Volt 476P USB-C Audio Interface Reviews

I'm a Windows11 user and suffered through the driver issues with the Apollo Twin eventually going back to Focusrite and later landing on an Antelope Zen Go. Then I spoke with my rep from Sweetwater because I needed 4 channels and he suggested this box because apparently UA has weeded out the Windows drivers issues. So far so good with one exception of Cakewalk crashing first trying to record. It was a simple buffer issue fix but all is well now. The two switches for Vintage and Compressor are really really nice. I mean real nice. Just icing on the cake. If you're looking for 4 channels of deliciousness, this is it.

I had the Apollo but ran into workflow issues using unison. Wanted something simple with good clear sound mainly for vocals and this more than does it. I am extremely pleased with this fine piece of equipment. The vintage and compressor buttons sound great and are fun to use. The UA plug ins they come with this are extremely useful and have taken my recording to the next level. It's the best looking interface on the market, it looks vintage. It's a plug and play no nonsense interface great for a singer songwriter.

Stupendous !! With an AP8 in main room, THIS allows me to set up a small 'writing' room anywhere else.
Fantastic sound with small footprint.

The built in headphone amp, the pre sets are the killers and of course the pre amps

This may not quite be Avalon or Focusrite or Apogee or Neve preamp quality, but at this price point it's unbeatable in my view—and sonically, for home studios, assuming you have top quality mics—it's all you need to produce professional-level audio. And this reviewer's ears have been listening to stuff recorded in many top Nashville studios on all the aforementioned gear.

All that would be great just by itself, but what really sets this unit apart is the one button "1176 Universal Audio Compressor" emulation. Maybe it won't work for every input source, but for vocals and acoustic guitars (which is what I use it for), it's flawless. I just turn the unit on, leave that compressor button on (all the time), and record. Voila, perfectly recorded audio with no peaks and no distortion. And I have never gone back and listened to a track where there's "pumping" or "breathing." The compression is transparent.

The only compressor I ever liked for vocals and acoustics was the Manley ELOP and that's a $5 grand hill to climb. I sold mine a long time ago when I first got into DSP compression (on an Apogee Element—which, IMHO, never quite delivered on the promise of DSP compression before the audio hit one's DAW).

The UA Volt DOES deliver on that promise. The DSP compression rocks.

My only beef? You can't easily turn the **** thing off! If you have it plugged into USB on your computer, that powers the unit too. So, if you turn off the power button on the back of the Volt, the USB keeps the unit powered up. I didn't solve this problem until I bought a USB hub that has on/off power buttons for each USB input. But that's a nit.

Buy this unit. You'll love it!

I just used my Volt 476 on a piano and violin recording, and it really shined. The Volt 476 captured the nuances of the violin and was very accurate in the full spectrum of the piano. I did not use the compressor except on one of the recordings, but I did use the vintage button that modeled UA recording console strip.
I have used the Scarlet 4i4 in previous recordings and was pleased with what I heard however, and in this recording I noticeably saw a difference in the overall sound of the recording as compared to the Scarlet 4i4.

The UA Volt 476P has been an honest-to-goodness game changer for my home studio. I used a Focusrite Scarlett 2i2 to track demos for a long time, and it was a great starter interface. But as far as ease, mobility, power and value, the Volt has really helped me level up what I can record at home. And if that wasn't enough, it also came with dozens of plug-ins that are a solid bedrock for anyone (like I was) getting into that world for the first time.

I kept my Volt476 after I bought the Volt476P. Other than two input preamps they are identical and my bass player doesn't need harmony and pedal guitar track inputs. My UA Mix Edition bundle provides two licenses so we're set. Also, Ilok will sell another USB key for the new computer. But... if I had a wish from a genie at Universal Audio Labs, it would be a GUI to the Volt476/P interfaces that would allow me to dial input gains to a specifically recorded reference values saved within the Graphical User Interface, so I could easily setup and play a gig, even if the gains were accidentally bumped. I hope engineers at UA pop open a bottle and shove a genie into it.

I love it. Just wish that made an 876P so I could track drums with 6 mics.

Recommended by Cliff Hackleman of Sweetwater for recording purposes with Mac Studio. Works well with GarageBand. There isn't a feature I have been disappointed with for recording. Has a nice 70's look to it. Did a few sample recordings of songs and am very pleased. Have only utilized no more than two inputs at a time. Have a Rode and Shure SM7B mics for recording simultaneously. Also recorded with a Jamstik MIDI guitar. Takes a while to know my way around the interface, but, will need to put in more hours to become familiar. I recommend the Universal Audio Volt 476P USB-C Audio Interface.

First of all, the packaging and presentation is top notch. Simply opening the box gives you an idea of the love and care that goes into making these. The sound quality is easily the best of all the interfaces I've owned, and the pre-amped analog inputs are absolutely amazing. Recording is extremely easy, and the quality of my work has noticeably improved. Looks great, performs amazingly, and came with some good software as well. More than worth it!

I love my UA Volt476P interface almost enough to sleep with it underneath my pillow at night... even though I haven't actually heard it in action yet. The UA Volt476 was my go-to studio interface, because of its sound using the vintage tube coloring and onboard compression for vocals and guitar. In my world everything I can do to 'condition' my vocal and guitar inputs to Ableton Live 11 Lite, means I can use those CPU resources for other purposes, such as pitch correction, equalization, doubling, side chain compression and effects. With a 2.9GHz laptop 16G RAM Intel I7 processor, Ableton still tends to freak out about CPU overload, so the jury is out as to what four inputs will do, but I will use the second vocal and guitar ins for TC Guitar Acoustic harmony/backup (vocal) and effects (guitar) to give me stomp box pedal options into my DAW sound. The TC box has selectable guitar effects associated with voice presets and it can filter out the lead vocal, leaving only backup and harmony (based on the guitar input key). Using Nembrini's doubler I can split and place the extra inputs, starting at a split frequency and field spatial position I choose, to really 'mix' things up... and if the CPU doesn't like it, I'll ren a second licensed copy of Ableton on my 1.9GHz laptop for MIDI tracks and parallel them into my Mackie Mix8.

Beautiful, sleek form factor. Excellent preamps. Dual headphone outs. Simple and musical onboard compression. Vintage mode sounds great. Easy plug and play operation. Solid bundle of software. Great value for money. Only quibble—I wish there were individual controls for phantom power per channel. Not a huge deal.

UAD studio quality in an at-home interface. Would absolutely recommend.

This interface packs a slew of functions for a small price. The software that comes with it is a deal in itself. The sound and warmth it produces is worth every penny.

5 stars for features and quality - 5++ stars when you factor in price. I needed a 4-channel interface for stereo guitar and drums. Originally had the 476 - where channels 3&4 required line amplification as they had no pre-amp and were gained at (barely) unity gain. Had to us line-level external amp which was fine but not ideal. Channels 1&2 were amazing; quiet, great preamps (vintage preamp setting sparkled), and of course the 1176 compression on channels 1&2 - which i used for guitar were spectacular! Enter the 476P that basically has 4 pre-amped channels, each with vintage compression and preamp settings. Sold the live amp and the 476 on Recerb easily? and bought the 476P; same amazing quality, great packaging (aluminum and wood) and we'll-thought-out controls. Also like the monitor patch options - great for playback and real-time monitoring. Great reinvention of an already great interface!

I love the sound envelope of the Volt476, but I wanted my TC Helicon Live Acoustic harmony and effects guitar on channels 3 & 4. Now I can dial in all 4 channels together in Ableton 11 Live Lite and place them consistently where I want in the sound field, because the 476P 3/4 preamps can boost the TC Helicon XLR outputs.

I want to start off the review giving credit to Michael Grebe, my sales engineer at Sweetwater since..2008? I have bought three interfaces (five if I count a zoom recorder and A&H mixer) from him over the years. The Volt replaces a Focusrite interface and I evaluated devices (obsessively) on the internet for a year before committing. Then there were multiple phone calls with Michael. Michael spent a lot of time, endured some friendly conflict, and ultimately set me up with an interface with which I am very pleased. He pushed me toward this when I thought I wanted something else. and ... Michael was right!

I do mostly electronic music production with a lot of digital hardware sources and I really felt like I wanted an interface that would allow me to track with some saturation, and that I could also use to warm up stems. I had never been happy with the gain or headroom on any interface I had ever used so far, particularly for tracking my basses. I also felt like there were a generation of products that were using older AD/DA chipsets that have big numbers at cheap price points and I was finding it very hard to research products to find out if I was getting yet another interface with basically the same tier of AD/DA. I don't make music for a living so I can't justify Apogee, RME or Antelope etc.

I have only lived with my Volt for about two months. I am immediately very happy with the gain and head room. Finally! The preamps have me fooled, that is for sure. Fool in love.

I love the monitoring control it gives me. Simple direct routing! No software! The Volt has turned my Soundcraft mixer into a valuable link in the chain, as opposed to a monitoring nightmare.

And the vaunted 1176 based compressors... smoke and mirrors? I just finished doing some A/B testing using each setting compared against raw unprocessed, and plugin compressors I am using (Kush.). I am not a pro, but these one button settings on the Volt are doing pretty much what I want them to do. I am happy tracking my voice through the vocal setting, and I love tracking my Hydrasynth and my Wavestate through the guitar setting. My basses sound great through the guitar setting when I go direct.

I don't know if I am making radio ready music, but at least I am finally smiling when I hear my preprocessed tracks. I especially rely on the guitar setting for warming my digital synths up.

I haven't tried looping through the Volt to 'glue' a stereo stem through the Volt back to my DAW. I will update this review when I do.

I am an older musician now, and I really had to recognize that this might be the interface I live with for the rest of my life. There might not be another. Michael helped me make the right choice.

I am not expert enough to know if this is Woodford Double Oaked bourbon at Pabst Blue Ribbon price. Maybe there is some jim crackery that the engineers at UA did on this product to make me think I am hearing something I'm not. I just know that this new UA hotness for the masses exceeded my expectations, and that has never happened with any audio interface I've bought or used before.

remember, if you fail to configure, you're configured to fail. cheers.

Look Great: Yep
Sound Great: Yep
Easy to Use: Super Yep
Easy to Set Up: Yep
Brings All They Boys to the Yard: What's wrong with you?

I've got only one and a half tiny complaints and I'll get to that in a bit.

First of all, it sounds great and is crazy easy to use. I got rid of a rack preamp and rack compressor for this. It blows them away. The compressors works great. Yes, there is only three settings, but apparently those are the only settings I need. I record by myself, so this might not apply to everyone, but it has made recording guitar and bass so much easier. I'm not worried about blowing out the signal anymore. I might have to make some minor adjustments, but nothing serious. This thing is great. I could have bought the two-input version but I'm getting a little ambitious. Workflow is crazy fast with this. I mean it. It has made it so much easier.

So, my only real complaint...the USB jack on the back is a little wiggly. I had to return my 1st one because it was too wiggly and it would disconnect on occasion. I mentioned this to Cliff, my awesome sales-dude, and he immediately got another one in the mail. It was one serial number away from the 1st one I received. It also has a slight wiggle in the jack but it doesn't disconnect. I think UA might have a small QC issue with the 1st run of these. They should take a look at that.

My .5 complaint is really minor...the UA plugs-in seem to get a lot of accolades, but I don't find them to be that great. I might be alone in that opinion. They're fine, but maybe not quite living up to the hype. The Volt, on the other hand, deserves the hype.

Should you buy this? Yes. Should you buy two? Hmmmm...that seems a bit excessive.

This has great analog feel and preamps, if UA spent more money on better conversion, these things would be worth $2000 easy. Grab one and get you some get vibes. The preamps are very great...