@audio/denoise vs Waves Restoration

@audio/denoise is a free web tool for cleaning recordings and listening to or saving the result. It handles targets including steady background noise, mains hum, clicks, pops, vinyl crackle, clipping, wind rumble, plosives, sibilance, room reverb, and noise between phrases. The page describes thirteen open-source restoration methods and a classifier. Automatic mode measures properties of a recording, selects a specialized method, and displays its plan; users can instead choose methods such as dehum, declick, declip, and gate. Audio is processed in the browser, and the page says it is not uploaded or sent off the device. The approach uses classical signal processing rather than AI noise removal. For music, the page identifies hum, clicks, crackle, and clipping as treatable, while advising light use of broadband denoising and comparison with the original. Machine-learning models may perform better on heavy speech-over-noise. The associated npm package processes mono Float32Array audio. Automatic mode does not choose dereverb, which must be selected explicitly.

Waves Restoration is a five-plugin bundle for cleaning damaged recordings and preparing audio for post-production, podcasts and remixes. X-Noise reduces computer noise, tape hiss and other constant artifacts. X-Crackle addresses surface noise and low-level crackling, X-Click removes clicks and spikes such as vinyl clicks and digital clocking artifacts, and X-Hum removes hum. Z-Noise profiles unwanted sound for targeted removal, with learn modes in profile-based processing. Spectral displays and meters show artifact attenuation, while monitoring lets users hear cleaned audio or removed sound. Waves lists restoration uses including vinyl and shellac, archives, film and television soundtracks, and live or field recordings. The plugin workflow runs on macOS and 64-bit Windows, with hosts including Pro Tools, Logic Pro, Ableton Live, Cubase, Nuendo, Audition, Premiere Pro, REAPER and DaVinci Resolve. Requirements call for 16 GB RAM and 30 GB free system-drive space. The bundle costs $99, paid once.