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My new plugin isn't showing up in my DAW. What should I do?

Thomas
  • Updated

If you are having issues with your plugin not working or not showing up in your DAW, this can be for a number of reasons. We recommend completing the following troubleshooting steps:

1. Double-check that the product you purchased is compatible with your operating system and DAW. 

We recommend going back to check the System Requirements section on the product page. We try to list as much information about a product's compatibility on our product pages. The information you will need to look for will be towards the bottom of the product page and will look like this: 

(Nectar 3 Elements is used as an example)

 
 

If you are confused about what plugin format your DAW uses, we recommend having a read of this article.

 

If you are not sure what version of macOS or Windows you are running please use the following guides:

MacOS

Windows

If you find that the product you've purchased is not compatible with your DAW or operating system please contact our support team to see if we can assist. You can submit a ticket here.
 
  

2. Re-download and re-install your purchase.

Quite often a plugin can't be found because of an interrupted download causing it to not install correctly, because of this we recommend re-downloading and re-installing the product. 

Whenever possible we recommend using a download manager to help stabilise and speed up the download.

 
If you do not already have a download manager you can find one for your system below:
 

Download Manager for Mac 

Download Manager for PC 


If you are using a WiFI connection we also recommend changing to a wired connection while downloading.  
 

3. Restart your system 

Once you have completed step 2 and re-downloaded and re-installed the plugin we ask that you restart your computer. A restart is often required because the task of replacing files cannot be done when they are being used by the operating system or other applications.

 

4. Rescan within your DAW

Please open up your DAW after the restart and if the plugin is still not showing please rescan for the plugin within your DAW. 

 

5. Check to see if the plugin is present with your system files

We recommend that you check to see if the plugin is showing up in your default/custom plugin folder after installation.  

For Windows users we recommend checking the following system folders:

 
VST3
The VST3 format has a dedicated installation path all VST3 plug-ins must comply with. All your VST3 plug-ins should be installed here:
 

VST3

C:||Program Files||Common Files||VST3

32-bit VST3 plug-ins on 64-bit Windows: C:||Program Files (x86)||Common Files||VST3

 .vst3

 

VST & VST2 The following chart includes other common VST and VST2 paths:
 

VST2

 C:||Program Files||VSTPlugins
C:||Program Files||Steinberg||VSTPlugins
C:||Program Files||Common Files||VST2
C:||Program Files||Common Files||Steinberg||VST2
32-bit plug-ins on 64-bit Windows: C:||Program Files (x86)||Steinberg||VstPlugins		 .dll

 

 
For Mac users we recommend checking the following system folders:  
  • Macintosh HD:/Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/Components/ (AU)
  • Macintosh HD:/Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/VST/ (VST)
Certain plug-ins may install themselves to an alternative folder, for help on how to find this please see this guide.
  • Macintosh HD:/Users/[Your Username]/Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/Components/ (AU)
  • Macintosh HD:/Users/[Your Username]/Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/VST/ (VST)
VST2 and VST3 formats can be found in these paths:
  • VST2 - Library/Audio/Plug-ins/VST
  • VST2 - Rarely used: Users/your username/Library/Audio/Plug-ins/VST
  • VST3 - Library/Audio/Plug-ins/VST3
  • VST3 - Rarely used: Users/your username/Library/Audio/Plug-ins/VST3
If you are unable to find your plugin within your system files we recommend contacting the manufacturer for further technical support. Please find the contact details for all of our manufacturers here.
 

 

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