Phase Plant, Phase Plant, Phase Plant… considered to be an enigmatic and mysterious beast by some, it has still managed to become the go-to soft-synth for numerous music producers and sound designers around the world.
If you’ve just picked up Phase Plant or are considering getting into it but are still unsure of what it’s really all about, we’ve put together a few answers to your deepest questions.
Phase Plant? What’s that then?
Phase Plant is Kilohearts’ ground-breaking, mind-blowing, multi-award-winning, all-singing, all-dancing, unlimited, modular soft-synth plugin type thing.
You can load it up as an instrument in your DAW and control it using any kind of MIDI input, such as a keyboard or piano roll. It is designed in such a way that you can create pretty much any sound you can imagine by combining various sound sources and effects and modulating them in various ways.
There’s quite a lot to it, but don’t let that put you off, it’s very easy to get the hang of and you’re going to be burning up that learning curve and creating your own signature sounds in no time.
What makes Phase Plant so unique?
There are lots of things that stand out about Phase Plant but the most significant are probably creative freedom and usability.
As well as having all kinds of top-quality synthesis, effects, and modulation options available, Phase Plant has a flexible architecture that allows you to combine these elements in any way you desire without feeling limited by a small number of oscillators, or only using one or two of each effect, and only in a basic variety of arrangements.
And yet, despite this extremely open system, it is incredibly easy to work with. All the elements of your patches are on one neat page, with no tabs to flip through and no deep menu diving. Presets and editors are one click away and easy to navigate. It’s so simple to add, tweak, and rearrange the modules that it’s seriously fun to play with.
It's a bit like musical Lego.
“Phase Plant” sounds a bit like “Face Plant”
No, it doesn’t.
It’s pronounced “Phase Plant.”
Phase.
Plant.
It’s totally different.
What types of music is Phase Plant suitable for?
By its very nature, Phase Plant can be almost any synth you want it to be. This makes it suitable for almost any genre imaginable, and even a few unimaginable ones. You can make basses, leads, pads, atmospherics, sequences, percussion, effects, whooshes, uppers, downers, screamers, laughers, loops, and sample flips… all within one Phase Plant patch if you like!
For one example, Phase Plant’s wavetables, modulation system, and effects capabilities make it a solid choice for any electronic music that revels in exploring fantastical sound design with precise control such as DnB, IDM, or the many forms of bass music.
Those working in ambient, atmospheric, and cinematic styles might find the granular module an exciting starting point for organic and evolving sounds, especially when combined with random modulators, super-slow curves, and custom reverb/delay effects.
Other genres we’re aware of Phase Plant being used for include; Pop, Hyperpop, RnB, Hip Hop, Trap, Trance, Psytrance, Techno, Generative, Noise-Art, basically all electronic music and even the occasional rock/metal track. Phase Plant is currently not ideal for composing realistic orchestral music, but maybe one day…
Is Phase Plant really unlimited?
Well. Are you up for some mathematics?
You have three sections in Phase Plant; generators, modulators, and effects. In the generator section alone there are twelve different modules available, not counting groups, and currently up to 32 slots. Let’s just count the five current generators, Analog, Granular, Noise, Sample, and Wavetable. We need at least one group and one output so that leaves us with 30 slots in the generator section.
The equation for the number of possible generator combinations is five to the power of thirty, which is approximately 9.31 quintillion (931 with seventeen zeroes after it) combinations. That’s nearly one sextillion. Nice!
When we attempted to include effects and modulation slots in the equation our calculator spontaneously combusted. And that wasn’t even counting for all the different parameters and possible modulation connections.
So. If you want to be pedantic, Phase Plant isn’t technically ”unlimited” but there are way more possible combinations than there are stars in our galaxy, or grains of sand on our planet (or even both added together). So hopefully enough options to keep you busy creating unique sounds for a long time.
Is Phase Plant a CPU Killer?
Let’s be fair. Anything can be a murder weapon in the wrong hands.
The thing about Phase Plant being modular and basically unlimited (see above) is that you can just keep adding more and more elements to your patches, requiring more and more processing… we optimise all our plugins to be as efficient as possible but if you push it you will eventually smell burning plastic and see whisps of smoke coming from your laptop.
So yes, it is possible to commit CPU-icide if you try, but you should be able to do everything that a sensible sound designer needs to do without having to take things to that extreme.
A tip to help you stay in the green is to keep an eye on unison, especially global unison, as every extra unison voice multiplies the processing required. Similarly, if you’re using the “POLY” option on an FX lane then each note played will require about the same amount of CPU, which can quickly add up when playing chords. Consider reducing polyphony and only using effects that really need to be per-note on POLY lanes.
We also recommend not trying to do hardcore music production on a potato.
Is there anything Phase Plant can’t do?
It won’t make your coffee or do your tax returns. Sorry.
But apart from that, Phase Plant is one of the most fully functional and easy-to-use “do it all” synths available, with five different generator types, stacks and stacks of effects (with the ability to build your own if you own any of our host plugins), and an incredibly flexible and intuitive modular design.
That said, there are always more things that could be added and we have plenty of ideas that we’re working on to keep on improving our entire range. We’re also open to feature requests from users via our Discord channel.
Do I need to buy all the effects separately?
Nope! Every Kilohearts account comes with Kilohearts Essentials absolutely free. This is a growing collection of over thirty individual effects which can all be used in the effects lanes of Phase Plant as well as separately in your DAW of choice.
There are also a handful of premium effects and Snapin Hosts that can be purchased from our website to further bolster your sound design capabilities but you will already have plenty to work with.
Note that any Phase Plant or Snapin Host preset you load will be fully functional even if they use premium effects that you don’t own, you just won’t be able to tweak those specific effects unless they’re controlled by macros.
Are there any expansion packs available for Phase Plant?
Yes! We call them Content Banks and they can contain Phase Plant presets along with other cool stuff like samples, wavetables, LFO Shapes, and more. We have some incredible banks available in our Content Bank Shop that we’ve curated ourselves and there are also quite a few out in the wild. We highlighted some of our favourites recently in this blog post.
It’s worth noting that Phase Plant comes with an extensive selection of factory presets straight out of the box. And we keep adding more.
How much does Phase Plant cost?
Phase Plant retails at $199 for a perpetual license. That price includes local taxes, which we cover to ensure everyone pays the same price, wherever you are.
There is also an option to Subscribe to Own with the Kilohearts Subscription, which gives you immediate access to all our plugins and Content Banks for $9.99 a month and $100 Subscriber Rewards every twelve months to put towards reducing the full price of anything in our shop.
If you plan to subscribe until you've earned enough rewards for a perpetual Phase Plant license, it would take precisely 24 months.
Will I have to pay for future updates?
That’s an easy one... No.
All version updates to Phase Plant and any of our other plugins are totally free for existing license holders forever. When we release an update you just need to run your installer and upgrade at no extra cost.
Does owning Phase Plant earn me any loyalty offers?
Yes. Any paid products you own will contribute to reductions in the total cost of upgrading to Kilohearts Ultimate, which is the full collection of plugins.
When you buy Phase Plant you will also get a $30 Phase Plant Buyer Reward Coupon that you can put towards anything in our shop that isn’t currently on sale, including Content Banks.
Can I try Phase Plant before I buy it?
Yes yes yes! And you really should! We offer a free, unrestricted, ten-day trial of all our software to new users. Just click the “Trial” button on the Phase Plant product page and away you go.
