ProTools has been the flagship DAW for studios across the globe. With the steady growth of Logic and Live, ProTools is starting to become less and less used in the home studio because it is simply expensive to get started. Avid, the maker of ProTools, looks to cut the cost of using ProTool to… Free with ProTool First.
Pro Tools | First is a free version of Pro Tools that will be available to everyone. It includes a subset of Pro Tools features users of ProTools will be familiar with.

ProTools First will let everyone use ProTools without the need for an iLok. The free software will include the same audio production tools used by the pros enabling new artists to get comfortable and create music using ProTools.

ProTools First will also be compatible with Avid Cloud Collaboration for Pro Tools, allowing artists, producers and engineers to connect work together as if they were in the same room.

Pro Tools | First vs. other Pro Tools Software.

Pro Tools | First has most of the same features as its older siblings. Limitation are only having up to 16 mono/stereo audio tracks, 16 MIDI tracks and 16 Instruments tracks for a maximum of 48 tracks compared to the hundreds of tracks you can use in the other versions of Pro Tools.

Another possible drawback with Pro Tools | First is that you can only saves projects to the cloud in your Avid Master Account and only three sessions are included free. You can purchase additional Pro Tools | First projects to from the Avid Marketplace.

You’ll also get the 21 popular ProTools audio effect plugins from the outset, but you’ll have to pay for more (if you want them).

You can find a detailed comparison chart between between the different versions of Pro Tools here.

Pro Tools | First is set as “coming soon.” In the meantime, you can watch this video or head on over to Avid’s blog for more information.