5 Great New Features in Ableton Live 10.1 Beta

Today, Ableton launched 10.1 Beta, the public beta for Live 10.1. That means the official release of Live 10.1 is just around the corner. For some software, a.1 (dot one) release isn’t very exciting. Not so for Ableton’s 10.1 update. It’s feature-laden and brings Live users many features they’ve been asking for — features that weren’t quite ready for prime time when 10 was released in 2018. Ableton is known for rock-solid software that won’t leave you hanging onstage, so rather than postpone the initial 10.0 release, they waited for 10.1 to roll out these features, some of which may even convince hesitant Live 9 users to upgrade, or pull Live Standard users into Live Suite.
User Wavetable Import
Live 10 Suite comes with a powerful, versatile, and user-friendly wavetable synth called, well, Wavetable. Competing with leading synthesizers like Serum and Massive, Wavetable gives Live 10 Suite users instant access to huge modern sounds in an accessible, easy-to-understand format. When introduced in Live 10 Suite, Wavetable shipped with a comprehensive set of tables, but users wanted the ability to import their own tables.

Ableton users rejoice: 10.1 brings us the ability to import new wavetables by dragging and dropping WAV or AIFF files directly into the oscillator visualizer.

When you take into account Wavetable’s unique features, like its very dynamic unison modes, an extremely comprehensive yet accessible mod matrix, and perfect integration with Max for Live devices like LFO and shaper that further expand the synth’s capabilities, this synthesizer could well claim the title of “King of the Softsynths.”
Massive Automation Streamlining
Live 10 gave us the ability to snap breakpoint automation to the grid and edit multiple MIDI tracks at once, among other big workflow enhancements. Now 10.1 brings even more automation enhancements to the table, and we’re most excited about both the ability to type in precise values on a breakpoint and the new automation shapes.
Right-click on a single breakpoint, and the first choice on the context menu is now Edit Value, which allows you to type in the precise value you want. This is essential for those doing precision work in the automation lane and makes Live more powerful as a mixing and mastering tool.
Highlight an area and right-click in the automation lane, and you’ll notice a new Insert Shape option at the bottom of the context menu. Suddenly, precise and graceful S-curve volume swells are just a click away. For electronic music producers, writing precise automation becomes so fast that you might never use sidechain compression again, instead relying on clean, predictable volume automation.

It’s also worth noting that drawing automation with the pencil tool no longer creates a multitude of breakpoints but instead creates just a handful, using Live’s ability to render curves in real time to make digestible, easy-to-edit automation. Live 10.1 also adds a Simplify Envelope function that allows you to clean up clunky automation drawn in Live 10.0 and previous versions, allowing us to see just how much smarter Live’s new breakpoint logic is.

Channel EQ
There’s a speed and efficiency to mixing on a physical console that we all appreciate. Part of that comes from the classic EQ layout common to many boards — three bands with a sweepable mid and a highpass filter. Getting obsessed with the exact value of the Q on band 7 of your parametric EQ is not a boon to creativity. Big, complex tools that are built for precise mixing and mastering (Live’s EQ Eight is the perfect example) have found their way into our writing and creation processes, and the people at Ableton want to offer something less cerebral so we can shape our tones without leaving the musical, creative headspace.

The solution is Channel EQ, a practical and speedy 3-band EQ that helps us think like music producers rather than mastering engineers and is a departure from the DJ-style EQ Three that has been a mainstay in Live’s basic toolset. Additionally, the output gain knob gives a convenient extra gain stage for boosting anemic signals.
One Delay to Rule Them All
Well, kind of. Ableton did clean up and improve their audio effects selection by doing away with the Simple Delay and Ping Pong Delay devices and putting everything we love about these two classic Live devices into one device that they call, ingeniously, Delay. Straightforward, isn’t it?
Delay does away with the cramped interfaces of the old device and actually brings a cool feature — variable delay modes — right onto a prominent set of buttons, whereas in past delay devices these functions were hidden. This allows Live users to more rapidly dial in the precise sound they want, and the new pristine Delay device is the perfect counterpart to Ableton’s more vibey, organic Echo effect. Delay lovers now have access to a cornucopia of sound using just these two devices.
Delay the old way:

Delay the new way:

Workflow Cleanup
The last feature isn’t a single feature, but rather a bunch of smaller features that, taken together, remove barriers between Live users and lightning-fast music creation and collaboration. Live 10.1 enables freezing of tracks using sidechained effects, supports VST3 plug-ins, allows users to include return and master FX on bounced stems, and so much more.
NOTE: Remember the public beta is available for you to try, but we certainly wouldn’t recommend using it in professional or mission-critical scenarios. Wait for the final release if stability is high on your priority list.
We have lots of Ableton 10 users at Sweetwater who look forward to the 10.1 final release with great anticipation. The power added to Wavetable adds another compelling reason for Live Intro and Standard users to make the jump to Suite, and the workflow enhancements introduced since Live 10.0 make Live 10.1 feel turbocharged in comparison to Live 9. It’s a whole new animal. If you don’t yet have it, you should, and of course you’ll get a free update to 10.1 as soon as it’s available.
It’s also worth considering the upgrade to Live 10 Suite if you’re an Intro or Standard user. Wavetable is exclusively available to Suite owners, and Suite comes with literally hundreds of other amazing tools, from convolution reverbs to full-featured samplers to exclusive content like the massive Beat Tools expansion. Learn more by following the links below or calling your Sweetwater Sales Engineer at (800) 222-4700.
Ableton Live 10 Suite (download)
Compare Ableton Live Editions
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