Universal Audio Reviews 

If you purchase a plugin make sure your email address is the one that is registered to your iLOK manager otherwise your product will be stuck in the Guest Cloud which is very annoying.

There is no way to merge this account to the one with my iLok email address.

I will update review to a full five star if this matter is resolved within 31 days which is pretty fare.

(update)

They sorted it out promptly i'm over the moon. Apollo Twin Soundcard is on my priorities list. Thanks UA

Spark plugins are really good! I’ve become dependent on them to make my music sound how I want it to.

The Spark subscription is a little more expensive than ones from other brands, but the quality is a lot better to my ears, and everything just works!

I don't want to leave this review, have had the apollo for years and have purchased more plugins than I like to admit. Recently signed up for their UA Connect Service & literally nothing has worked for over a month, plugins no longer even show up in my DAW, the UA Connect app never connects and their support takes WEEKS to respond. Unbelievable, it's not like they're a cheap company, how is your support SO AWFUL? Happy to revise my review If You Get Your Sh*! Together!

Definitely selling my apollo twin for something else due to the nonexistent customer service. These are some of the most expensive interfaces and plugins on the planet but there's no customer service. I payed for the spark subscription but the ua.connect.app won't open. The only part about this entire situation that went smoothly is when they charged my debit card. It was immediate and no problems whatsoever when taking my money. I can't wait until I get rid of this thing. Don't believe the Apollo hype. Purchase you something more reliable.

Here is my story about UA. It is an expensive pedal and I bought it because of the sound. It is amazing! However, here is why I gave it a bad rating on quality:
1. My first unit came in with a broken switch. It was obviously not from transport, but from QC at the factory
2; Now I have a working one, but... the bluetooth connection is not working. The connection is not stable. I contacted UA support. They gave me indication , which resulted in losing my presets and not being able to connect to the pedal.
I am very disappointed about UA, and if I ever thought this again, I would have bought a Strymon. Sorry UA.

Made a bit of a mistake with support. with the license on my site. gave one star. but this ended with me getting my stolen sound card back. Thanks for the suppor

I own two of Universal Audio's Apollo x8 interfaces (around $3k each) and several of their UAD plugins that were purchased in-addition (which only work with UA’s proprietary hardware). I really enjoyed the initial Universal Audio ecosystem experience and decided to buy a second device (to cascade devices) as a better option to add more channels—compared to dealing with ADAT options.

When I purchased my second Apollo x8, I received some extra UAD plugins (around 8), which really made me feel confident about my purchase and choice to further invest into Universal Audio. Two weeks later, UA sent me a short email stating that I received free plug-ins in error and that they would be removing them. Two days later they removed activation for 8 plugins from my account & computer without any record of what was actually added or removed. A few days after that, I reluctantly purchased six more UADs via a third-party so that I could gain some more options.

What I realize in hindsight, is that with all of the UADs I have purchased there is no static, detailed log of what I actually own. All I can see is what UA says I own under the "My Plug-in Library" in my online account and in my UA Control panel on my computer, which both sync together like other plugin and app management portals—and this dynamically changes as they give and take.

So please be aware that when you commit to UA's ecosystem, they have free rein over the "My Plug-in Library" section of your account (which from what I can see is the only documentation of what you own). The invoices logged to your online account also lack details (e.g. some transactions say bundle, but no details of the specific UADs you picked). An example of why this matters—I believe that one of the UADs they took back was in error, but I have no way to prove it because of how this system updates.

UA makes licensing errors & has a take-away policy that you can’t dispute, because you don’t have a static log of transactions. Please keep this in mind before you set forth on a very expensive journey with Universal Audio’s product line. A product is only as good as the team responding to issues.

Support is not ok. Ask 3 things you get 1 answered at best. They avoid anything you aks or want to be made clear. I really am disappointed about UAD support.
You get kind but useless response reply takes a whole day so if you ask 5 thing you are busy for a week to get things clear. Getting wrong answer is pretty common as well (the head of support manager Dan is a bully and prefers to hide and tell you to shut up or they will block support) Having 10.000 euro invested doesn't make a difference to be kind or understanding. I hate being owner of good plugins which are not updated and asking questions leads to trouble and conflict. I hate it.

if that's what they do is what they call Support, then good luck!

Garbage customer service and garbage plugins

Customer service has decided to treat us very unprofessionally. We have been refused customer service for an insured, relatively new Apollo unit. We had it professionally test out at a recording studio (In Shoreline, WA) UA will not even take it back for testing. If we had known the company was this rude and false to customers, we would have searched out another product from a different company. Read this, and buy something else. Do not go thru what we have...5-3-2022

Brand new item ordered (AI) and it arrived broken. After weeks of talking to Volt customer service they informed me it was my fault and will not be replacing or refunding. Never doing business here again.

this company is a scam

all my plugins where stolen and this guy from support Dan is ignoring my emails

all my 188 plugins are missing from my account
over 6000usd trown in the garbage....

Where to begin,.......
I recently purchased a Universal Audio Apollo x4 QUAD Thunderbolt 3 Audio Interface (Refurbished/New) on Reverb.com directly from Universal Audio.

I received the unit a few weeks ago (I am based in Bangkok, Thailand) and I immediately noticed the box and "picture frame" inside the box as well as the box containing the adapter looked very used, pretty beat up is more accurate I would say. And then along the away I also discovered a tiny chip on the jogwheel and some scuffing,on the right side of the unit as well. Then after hooking it up and downloading the software I noticed my unit was paired with an Apollo Twin MK II, according to the hardware configuration in Luna/Console, I can delete the Twin, but it comes back every time I restart the software (I don't own an Apollo Twin). In any case it became pretty clear to me that this was in fact a year old (if not older) 2nd hand unit that was repaired or something then dumped back into its old beat up box and passed of as Refurbished/NEW/B-Stock on the Reverb website. All the images of the item in the listing were stock photos of a new Apollo X4, unit even though Reverb requires sellers to post photos of the actual unit and highlight any damage that the item may have, so that potential buyers are aware of the condition the item is in. I basically paid $ 1,599.00 for a device that could in fact be almost 2 years old, it's just too much money for something that old.

So then I complained on Reverb and opened a ticket directly on the UAD website and there was a bit of back and forth for about a week or so and then all communication stopped. UAD had stopped responding, possibly because they didn't like what I had to say. Also Reverb decided they couldn't support my claim either because I had bought the item in the US and then forwarded it to Bangkok, Thailand.

I am not sure what else to do here, I am simply asking for a partial refund, which could be money, credit, plugins or whatever because I am not planning to send the device back to California and incur the additional shipping charges (back and forth) and more duties and taxes etc. just to get another 2nd hand unit that may look slightly better. Quite frankly I am wondering why the world's leader in Thunderbolt audio interfaces, analog recording hardware, and UAD audio plug-ins would want or need to sell used old devices for premium prices in such a misleading way on Reverb, it just doesn't suit a company of this stature, I am appalled and disappointed with the way this has been handled by UAD so far and I sincerely hope they will reach out to me a.s.a.p. and make this right.

Bit overpriced but one of the best sounds on the market.

For the plugin snob, there is no better company ;) I've been slowly buying their plugins for the last 10 years, and finally plunged in all the way with 77 plugins and an Octo satellite to go with my Apollo Twin last month. Even though I have a high end Mac with Logic, it really helps to offload the DSP to the UA units. And their plugins sound sweet. All sorts of analogies come to mind: they are the Mercedes of plugins, they are the champagne of plugins, they are the workhorse plugins, etc. Bottom line: they sound great and I never have tech issues. (Except after running a session all day with too many programs open. A reboot solves all.)

You know how they call someone who loves food a foodie? Well, if you're a soundie, then you will love UA plugins.

Awesome interfaces, I can't fault anything about them aside from integration with Windows. However this is a windows problem and not the fault of UAD, they run seamlessly on Mac. I had a lot of issues on windows but Albert from customer support was super helpful and it's all running smoothly now.

Great hardware and great plugins.
For sometime I've been a Universal audio customer and have an excellent UAD-2 Satellite Duo . Their audio plugins are excellent and I use them in my Music Studio. They really enrich source tracks and aid in the richness of the master mixes. A couple of days ago I've just acquired their UAD-2 Satellite Quad (with double the processing power!) I also purchased 3 more of their excellent plugins in a current sale. Keep up the great work Universal Audio

IMO, Universal Audio is the leading Audio Plugin Software Developer for Professional Mixing and Mastering Engineers and Musicians. Their customer support is second to none. Their products are State of the Art! If you are serious and new to recording music, RESEARCH UA before you waste your time and hard earned cash. They aren't cheep, but you'll save in the long run. You'll end up at UA either way anyway.
Just an FYI for those of you looking to Trust pilot.
Best of Luck, - G. Kevin Gilroy

Awesome shop - fast and easy. The customer support quality is absolutely fine if you need it.