9 Best Reaper Plugins

One of the most powerful things about Reaper is its built-in Reaper plugins. The library consists of tons of amazing plugins that are free.

Reaper offers tools for mixing, mastering, FX, amps, and many other types of plugins. All the plugins are free and work perfectly. One of the best plugins that come with DAW.

And if you don’t use Reaper as your DAW, you can still download ReaPlugins and use it in your main digital audio workstation. ReaPlugins may not have the best interface but they are powerful and work very well.

In this list, you will find the nine best and most useful plugins you can use for free with Reaper.

What Are Reaper Plugins?

ReaPlugins or ReaPlugs are built-in VST plugins in Reaper. These tools work like any other plugin and some of them are better. They have many features and you can shape your sound any way you want.

These plugins come with Reaper and they are free. And the list of plugins is huge. You get all the tools you may need for mixing or mastering. Different types of equalizers, compressors, limiters, effects, utility tools, and much more.

Additionally, if you are using a different DAW, you can download ReaPlugs for free and use it in your DAW. These plugins are very lightweight and offer many great features. Perhaps the best free VST plugins you can find.

What’s The Best Reaper Plugin?

Although there are tons of great plugins in Reaper, I chose the best nine plugins I use the most times. These plugins are great for mixing, mastering, or adding effects to your audio tracks.

1. ReaEQ

ReaEQ is an amazing free EQ plugin from Cockos Reaper. It’s a professional plugin with great features built-in. It has a nice visual equalizer spectrum where you see how EQ shapes the sound. Reaper includes a couple of EQ plugins but ReaEQ is the best among others. It’s a very simple to use 4-band EQ.

You can tweak each EQ independently. ReaEQ offers options for frequency, gain, and bandwidth. So, you can choose any frequency, make boosts or cuts, and choose how wide or narrow it should be. Additionally, you can choose the type of EQ band. You are able to choose from filters, notch, shelves, and more. You have full control of the EQ.

2. ReaComp

ReaComp is the best compressor plugin in Reaper. The sound, features, and ease of use are amazing with this plugin. You can use it on any instrument or vocals and also as a mastering compressor. Offers tons of settings and is a very transparent plugin. Volume meters allow you to see how the compressor affects your sound.

This Reaper compressor plugin has features such as threshold, pre-comp, attack, release, ratio, auto-release, knee, etc. Has a gain reduction meter and also an auto gain feature. But one of the greatest features is HPF and LPF options. You don’t see that many features in free plugins.

3. ReaXcomp

Another great compressor plugin is ReaXcomp which is a multi-band compressor. It has four bands and you can choose any range on the frequency spectrum and compress that area. Multi-band compressors are great mastering tools and Reaper offers them for free. This plugin really works.

With each band, you get separate settings you can tweak. First, you choose the range you want to compress. And then you are free to control threshold, ratio, knee, attack, release, and other settings. It also has a visual section where you can see the impact of the compression.

4. Event Horizon Clipper

A limiter is a must-have tool. Especially for mastering. Although ReaPlugs include a couple of limiter plugins, Event Horizon Clipper is perhaps the best one. It’s a soft clipper and it can be used not only for mastering but for mixing too. Has a minimalistic interface and three faders. But it does the job.

What you can control with this soft clipper plugin is the threshold, ceiling, and clip softness. A very easy-to-use plugin that works perfectly. You can use it in the mixing stage and add some loudness to your mix without hard limiting. If you want more standard limiters, Reaper has a couple of them.

5. ReaGate

Another great mixing tool is ReaGate. It’s a gate plugin for Reaper. It’s free, simple to use, and works great. The interface is very similar to ReaComp and the settings are almost identical. It’s very powerful and can compete against premium gate plugins. The plugin is transparent and has many great options.

Has some default options such as threshold, pre-open, attack, hold, and hysteresis. Also, you can control dry/wet signals and noise. Like ReaCompe, ReaGate has a feature of filters that makes it a great tool. Additionally, you have options for output preview and ducking. This is a high-class plugin that is free.

6. JS Delay

JS Delay is one of the best Reaper plugins in the effects category. This delay plugin sounds awesome, it’s easy to use, and has some great options. But the best thing about the Reaper delay plugin is that it’s free to use. You won’t find this high-quality product for free.

JS Delay offers features such as delay time in milliseconds, feedback, and a mix option, and you can balance dry and wet signals. It’s a really simple plugin that does its job. It can be used on any track you like. Great for guitars, vocals, and other instruments. Has a very transparent sound and adds no character to the sound.

7. ReaPitch

ReaPitch is one of my favorite free Reaper plugins. This plugin changes the pitch of the sound. It’s a very helpful plugin and works great with heavy guitars or basses. If you want to try how your guitar riff sounds in drop tuning, you can do it in seconds. But it can be useful in other cases too. You can increase or decrease the pitch of the sound.

The options of ReaPitch are diverse. You can change the pitch by semitones, cents, and octaves. With this tool, you can create weird sounds without hassle. It’s easy to use and does its job without problems. Also, you can control the volume and mix dry and wet signals.

8. ReaVerbate

Although the Reaper plugins library includes many reverb plugins, ReaVerbate is the best in my opinion. It offers some awesome features, sounds awesome, and is very easy to use. Love how minimalistic it is and how big it can be. Perhaps it’s the best free reverb plugin you can find. Also, it’s lightweight.

With ReaVerbate you can choose the type of room, control dampening, adjust stereo width, set initial delay, etc. Like other plugins, it includes options for low-pass and high-pass filters. Filtering is really critical for reverbs and Reaper offers it out of the box. You should try this plugin before you use other reverb plugins.

9. ReaSurround

ReaSurround is a special plugin. It’s a very interesting and useful plugin to have. It works like a stereo imager but can do much more. The features and interface of this plugin are awesome. You can take a mono sound and make it stereo in just minutes.

Other than stereo, it can create octophonic, 5.1 surround, and other types of stereo images. You can control almost everything. You can control channels, diffusion, lows, highs, and much more. You are able to add width and depth too. And all these things are done by simple faders and beautiful visual displays. It allows you to change almost every aspect of the signal and make it as wide as you want.

Conclusion

Reaper plugins are one of the best features of Reaper DAW. Not only it’s an affordable DAW, but it also comes with all the tools you need to record, mix, and master songs. The plugin library includes everything from EQ to guitar amps. Also, you can download custom Reaper themes for free and give your DAW a different look and feel.