Kanto Karaoke Player&Recorder vs Performous

Kanto Karaoke Player&Recorder is karaoke software for amateur and professional singers, with live lineup management, mixing and crossfading. It plays MP3, MP3+CDG, WAV+CDG, KFN, MP4, AVI, WMV, KAR and MIDI files. Live Performance shows the current and upcoming songs and lets users queue tracks by dragging and dropping them. Singers can record microphone vocals over a song and adjust microphone and music volume, latency, echo and reverb. The software converts MIDI and KAR files to MP3, with an option to remove the melody track, and supports importing and changing SoundFonts for MIDI playback. Users can select an external MIDI driver or device, and a built-in browser can play online karaoke songs such as YouTube videos. Dual Display opens a second window for lyrics on another monitor or TV while songs are managed on the computer. Free editions are available for Windows and Mac. Paid options include personal and professional licenses, with different device counts and use restrictions; the Standard and Professional licenses last three years.

Performous is free software combining karaoke, band games, and dancing on Windows, macOS, and Linux. Its modes include vocals, lead, rhythm and bass guitar, drums, and dancing, with multiplayer support. Scored singing shows pitch so players can adjust their performance; karaoke mode displays lyrics without notes or scoring. The project says pitch detection works with laptop or webcam microphones. Controllers are autodetected, and the game can use a keyboard, microphones, USB guitars and drums, and dance pads. Supported song formats include Frets on Fire, UltraStar, SingStar XML, and StepMania. Composer edits and converts notes for music games, offering pitch analysis, zoomable timing, note synthesis, and format import and export. Composer lists SingStar XML, UltraStar TXT, and Frets on Fire MIDI formats. Free karaoke song packages are available under different libre and restricted license terms. The site says its free-song page does not yet include band-game or dancing songs. Performous is licensed under GNU GPL version 2 or later, with documentation, Discord, and a GitHub feedback page.