homecrate - Player & Studio

A music player with a production studio inside. Algorithm-tuned shuffle, spatial audio, synced lyrics — and an 8+8 track DAW with a synthesizer, drum machine, guitar amp, AUv3 plugins, and MIDI sync. One app. No subscription.

YOUR MUSIC. YOUR RULES.

homecrate is a music player and production studio for people who have opinions about music. Not a streaming service. Not an algorithm that watches your habits and decides what you like. A local library player that asks — and a mobile DAW for creating.

LISTEN

Algorithm Tuner — Set your own taste profile. Weight genres, moods, and eras. Shuffle reflects what you told it, not what it watched you do.

Liner Notes — Every track gets AI-generated facts, synced lyrics, and music theory analysis. The stuff that used to come in the sleeve. The app site provides a library of 2m+ songs and artist facts.

Weather Mood — Real-time weather matched to your library. Not a playlist. Actual conditions, right now and a fun game asking what you like on a rainy day. On-device, not to advertisers.

Spatial Audio (Pro) — A spectral binaural engine. Per-track toggle. Drift-corrected sync. Put the band in the room.

CREATE

homecrate Studio (Pro) — 8 audio tracks + 8 MIDI tracks. Device-measured latency compensation. Count-in recording. Per-clip automation. Undo/redo. Loop playback. Mixdown to library or export with Ambisonics on iOS 26+.

Synthesizer (Pro) — Dual-oscillator subtractive synth. MPE and microtonal tuning (EDO + world scales). Per-voice IR cabinet. 2 LFOs. Up to 6-voice unison. Poly voice allocation. Built-in AUv3 instrument.

Drum Machine (Pro) — 16-pad sampler. Step sequencer with multi-bar patterns. Per-pad pitch and volume. MIDI clip export. GM-mapped. Built-in AUv3 instrument.

Guitar Amp (Pro) — Neural Amp Modeler (NAM A2) with IR cabinet loading. 5-band EQ. Algorithmic reverb. Load any .nam model or .wav IR. Built-in AUv3 effect.

AUv3 Host (Pro) — 4 insert slots per track. Load any third-party instrument, effect, or MIDI processor. Parameter automation via drawn lanes.

MIDI I/O (Pro) — Hardware routing. Clock sync (24 PPQN). Bluetooth MIDI. Transport control. Record MIDI clips. Learn controller mappings.

AI Voice + Chat (Pro) — Always-listening mode voice commands for DAW control. Music Chat panel: mix analysis, AI-generated drum beats, MIDI clip insertion, natural-language commands. Informed. Not generative.

Video Capture (Pro) — Camera overlay with backing track mix. Capture front and back camera to have a single view of musician and instrument. Adjustable backing and mic volume. Export muxed video.

TOOLS

Guitar Tuner — Chromatic with custom tunings. Strobe mode. Chord detection. Persisted tuning library.

Metronome — Analog needle animation. Tempo presets. MIDI clock output and input sync. Rock solid metronome!

FREE VS PRO

Free: local player, algorithm tuner, weather mood, liner notes, music games, analytics dashboard, tuner, widgets, 4 audio tracks, 1 MIDI track, homecrate instruments with some features limited.

Pro: 8 audio + 8 MIDI tracks, spatial audio, synthesizer, drum machine, guitar amp, third-party AUv3 plugins, AI voice + chat, video capture, Plex sync. $9.99. One time. No subscription. No renewal.