

The reason we care, beyond it sounding bad, is that our speakers have physical components that react to the audio signal. The more severe it is, the more distorted the music begins to sound until it can become unrecognizable in an ocean of noise and loudness. It sounds like the audio is starting to 'break up,' which is light distortion. You'll know when you have severe clipping because you'll hear it. In some cases it can do damage to your listening equipment too. But when you have major amounts of peaking audio you'll definitely hear it. That's because you can have minor amounts of peaking that aren't noticeable but give you more 'headroom' in order to let you have a louder audio source. Almost every professionally recorded, mixed, and mastered piece of audio you hear has clipping audio built into it on purpose.

There are not only different types of audio clipping but there's also ranges of severity. You lose detail and resolution, and things stop sounding clear and sharp, while you also end up with unwanted noise, hiss, clicks, pops, and other sounds that aren't in the original audio. The picture above is the visual, graphical version of the results of distortion.

The difference between a purposefully distorted guitar versus accidental clipping is that it affects the entire audio track and sounds horrible. Distortion is when you start to notice the audio is 'breaking up' and losing quality.įuzz sounds like a bunch of bees in a plastic bag frantically trying to get out. Overdrive is the lightest amount of distortion and can even be unnoticeable. We actually have terms in the music industry for the three levels of distortion:Īll three levels are noticeable, but they're really obvious in the 2nd and 3rd levels. You hear distortion in rock and heavy metal guitars all of the time, but that's done purposefully and tastefully. What Does Audio Clipping Sound Like?Ĭlipping is the phenomenon that causes the sound of distortion. When this plateau is played back in your loudspeaker, it's an unnatural and jarring event that sounds horrible and can even lead to blown speakers. A smooth, rounded sine wave has its peaks and troughs 'clipped off,' resulting in the flat plateau of a square wave. It's called clipping because that's what the clipping waveform ends up looking like. Notice in this clipping waveform how the loudest peaks and troughs are literally clipped off and made flat. This is called 'overdrive' and just like the guitar pedals with the same name, it leads to distortion and a lowering of audio quality. What is Audio Clipping?Ĭlipping audio is when an audio signal is amplified past the maximum allowed limit, whether in a digital or analog system. This audio peaking can undermine your expensive entertainment system, high quality headphones, and studio monitor speakers, so let's get this fixed up for you, pronto.
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It's important if you want to get the full enjoyment and experience out of any music, TV, or movies you're trying to enjoy.
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What causes clipping? Is there anything we can do about it? Is it the same as peaking (yes)? I'm going to explain it all, tell you what it sounds like, and show you how to fix it. Whether during recording or playback, you've been around someone that sees the little red light go off or light up permanently who then says "Oh, dude, you're clipping." But do they even know what audio clipping is?
