A robust pedalboard simulator, Guitar Rig 5 player is one of the best free VST plugins that comes packed with a Shoegazer’s dream effects: heavy reverb, delay, phaser, chorus, flanger, you name it. Best Free VST Instruments (2020/2021) Spitfire Audio – Labs Although the Labs series has been available for a while now, new library keeps turning up and continues to bring us a host of new, creative, and esoteric sounds. Currently in the collection, we have instruments like the Chinese Moon Guitar, Hand Bells, and a Music Box. Komplete Start is also a collection of instruments rather than just one VST. But it’s all free and worth checking out. You’ll get 7 synths, 9 sample instruments, and a couple of FX. The synths and samples alone are reason enough to download this one. Free VST downloads: BJAM (Strat electric guitar by Malaclypse the Younger) - FabBass (Hofner violin bass by Samsara Cycle Audio) - Project16 Picked Bass (Bass guitar by bigcat Instruments) - SuperRiff Bass (Bass guitar by SuperRiff) - Gutbucket (Washtub bass by Samsara Cycle Audio) - OMB1 (Electric bass guitar by Samsara Cycle Audio) - AkoustiK. Native Instruments’ Kontakt Player is arguably the Don of all free virtual instrument plug-ins. Based on the company’s own hugely successful Kontakt sampler, Kontakt Player effectively hosts all sample-based instruments developed for its more fully-featured big brother.

Get producing music straight away with free VST plug-ins and samples in KOMPLETE START, taken from our leading production suite, KOMPLETE. Get REAKTOR PLAYER, KONTAKT PLAYER, KOMPLETE KONTROL, free effects VST plug-ins, free synth plug-ins, and sampled instruments to use in your own productions, as much as you want.
Download over 2,000 sounds and more than 6 GB of content – drums and percussion, basses, acoustic instruments, synths, pads and atmospheres, and more – plus VST plug-in instruments, effects, and other free resources for music production.
FREE DOWNLOAD

SYNTHS

A selection of VST synths, complete with 500+ professionally-designed presets for any genre.

SAMPLED INSTRUMENTS

Nine pro-grade sample-based VST instruments – vintage synths, acoustic instruments, drums, and more.

EFFECTS

A tube compressor and 13 versatile effects, great for guitars, drums, vocals, synths, or anything you like.

KOMPLETE KONTROL

Find, play, and tweak all your sounds, instruments and effects from one powerful plug-in.

SAMPLES

Almost 1,500 loops and samples from our popular Expansions range, suitable for use in any DAW.

KONTAKT PLAYER

A sample player that runs all NI KONTAKT instruments, and hundreds of instruments from other companies.

REAKTOR PLAYER

A powerful platform that runs all REAKTOR-based synths and effects from NI and other creators.

Free Rock Vst Instrumentals

HOW TO USE VST PLUGINS

VST plugins are virtual instruments and effects that you can use in productions. They can recreate classic synth designs, or represent completely new ways of making sound. VST plugins are easy to use; download them, install, and your DAW will pick them up and let you use them in the workstation. From classic instruments to experimental indie gems, there’s a huge world of both paid and free VST plugins to choose from. Native has spent decades creating and developing some of the world’s leading VST plugins with REAKTOR, KONTAKT, KOMPLETE KONTROL, and loads more.

HOW TO USE VST PLUGINS FOR SYNTH SOUNDS

VST plugins can be used in a wide variety of ways to create synth sounds for songwriting and production. Almost any instrument can be turned into a VST plugin, and more often than not, when you need a certain kind of sound there’s a VST plugin for it. There are several varieties of VST plugins for synth sounds that are worth noting. Polyphonic VST plugins create more than one note at a time, so are great for building complex melodies, chords, and harmonies, while monophonic VST plugins play one note at a time and are commonly used for basslines. Some VST plugins strictly model themselves on reproducing sounds you would expect from analogue instruments, but others go way beyond that. Wavetable VST plugins like MASSIVE and MASSIVE X tend to focus on helping producers create something unusual and completely different to traditional instruments, and can be more useful for experimental productions than other VST plugins.

HOW TO USE MULTIPLE VST PLUGINS

Trying things out and exploring new territory is hugely important when trying to craft something unique, and using multiple VST plugins will give you a wide range of instruments and sounds to work with. Chaining multiple VST plugins together sis a typical way to start crafting a sound you can call your own. Feeding one VST plugin instrument into a VST plugin effect will alter them even further. This is also common with digital production as lots of recording tools come in VST plugin form – there’s no issue with running multiple VSTs at once – simply load them in and start playing. Native offers over 2,000 free sounds and more than 6 GB of free VST plugin content with KOMPLETE START, so if you’re looking for some inspiration it’s a great way to get started.

DON’T HAVE AN ACCOUNT YET?

Download Native Access, create an account, and find all KOMPLETE START contents under the NOT INSTALLED tab.
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Learn how to install KOMPLETE START...
Please see the Native Access system requirements.

ALREADY HAVE AN ACCOUNT?

INSTALLATION GUIDE FOR NEW CUSTOMERS

1: Create a Native Instruments account using Native Access

2: Your KOMPLETE START products might take a moment to appear – press the refresh button if necessary. Install all included products by clicking ‘Install All’ in the ‘Not Installed’ tab in Native Access.

3: Launch KOMPLETE KONTROL. Important: Run it in standalone mode before using it in your DAW. This allows it to scan and organize all your sounds.

This article features the best free guitar samples you can find online. We focused on multi-sampled guitar sound libraries that allow the user to play each guitar note individually. We didn’t include sample libraries that only provide guitar loops and guitar riffs.

When it comes to freely downloadable multi-sampled guitars, there are surprisingly few high-quality libraries online. For example, there are dozens of excellent piano sample libraries you can download for free, but that is not the case with guitars.

That said, the recently released Shreddage 3 Precision FREE guitar instrument by Impact Soundworks sounds amazing. It is easily the best guitar sample library you can download for free and it rivals some premium offerings. Unfortunately, the library requires the full version of Native Instruments Kontakt and it won’t work with any other sampler VST plugins. You can only use Shreddage 3 Precision FREE in demo mode (for fifteen minutes) in the freeware Kontakt Player.

The two libraries that everyone can use for free are the amazing Standard Guitar by Unread instruments and Shinyguitar by Karoryfer Samples. Both are available in SFZ format and also feature a graphical user interface for the Plogue Sforzando plugin. Read on for more info about these and some of our other favorite free guitar sample libraries.

Shreddage 3 Stratus FREE (Kontakt)

Shreddage 3 Stratus FREE is a free guitar sample library for Kontakt. It is based on the premium Shreddage 3 Stratus guitar virtual instrument by Impact Soundworks.

The free version of the instrument features a much more modest set of articulations, but it’s still a very powerful virtual guitar. You get deep-sampled sustain samples, palm mutes, and choke articulations, with three full octaves of playing range. There are up to 24 samples per note (including dynamic layers and round-robin variations), with the same performance engine for NI Kontakt as in the full version of Shreddage 3 Stratus. The library also features a virtual mixer with built-in effects.

Again, keep in mind that the full version of NI Kontakt is required to use Shreddage 3 Stratus FREE. It will only work for fifteen minutes in the freeware Kontakt Player plugin. If you like this library, be sure to check out the excellent Shreddage 3 Precision FREE bass guitar instrument from the same developer.

The download of this library is delivered using the Pulse Downloader app which needs to be installed first. You will also need to sign up for a free Impact Soundwor