Both Cakewalk Sonar and Cakewalk Next have free tiers. Most of the DAW threads in the Cakewalk forum concern Sonar which is understandable since it is the DAW with the 30+ years development legacy. However Next is very interesting because it is new and has no legacy.

Next is a 48 megabyte download. It is pretty intuitive and simple to use to me. So far Next can do everything I typically ask a DAW to do.


Jim Fogle - 2025 BiaB (Build 1128) RB (Build 5) - Ultra+ PAK
DAWs: Cakewalk Sonar - Standalone: Zoom MRS-8
Laptop: i3 Win 10, 8GB ram 500GB HDD
Desktop: i7 Win 11, 12GB ram 256GB SSD, 4 TB HDD
Music at: https://fogle622.wix.com/fogle622-audio-home