Awesome Audio Plugin Framework

Curated list of small C/C++ libraries for building your own custom audio plugin framework.

Small libraries usually follow the Unix philosophy, making them more maintainable, replaceable, and flexible in how they are used. Frameworks, by definition, break this philosophy.

See the Examples folder for code & build examples of these libraries.

See the Templates folder for ready to go, lightweight plugin templates.

The listed libraries and example code are generally biased towards:

• Permissive non-GPL licensing
• Support for Windows & MacOS. (Linux, iOS, Android and Emscripten are not actively supported!)
• Ease of compilation, fast builds, small binaries, fewer LOCs, single compilation units, C89 & C99

C

Function	Name	License	Description
Plugin wrapper	CPLUG	Unlicense	Wrapper for VST3, AUv2, CLAP, standalone. Includes optional window lib for plugins
Window	Pugl	ISC	Native window with mouse & keyboard callbacks. Made with plugins in mind
Window	sokol	zlib	Native window with mouse & keyboard callbacks. Made with games in mind. See: sokol_app.h.
VST3	vst3_c_api	Dual	VST3 wrapper
CLAP	clap	MIT	CLAP wrapper
Threads	threads.h	Unlicense	C11 like threads & atomics, mutexes, singals, single reader/writer queues, cross platform
Threads	tinycthread	BSD like	C11 threads.h like API, cross platform
Atomics	c89atomic	Unlicense	C11 like atomic.h like API, supports flags, float, double and ptr, cross platform
WAV	dr_libs	Unlicense	WAV read & write. See dr_wav.h
AIFF	dr_libs	Unlicense	AIFF read & write. See dr_wav.h
MP3	dr_libs	Unlicense	MP3 read. See dr_mp3.h
FLAC	dr_libs	Unlicense	FLAC read. See dr_flac.h
FLAC	FLAC	BSD-3	FLAC encode / decode / read / write
Opus	Opus	BSD-3	Opus encode / decode / read / write
Log	sokol	zlib	Log to console or file. See sokol_log.h
Log	stb	MIT	Fast log to console. See stb_sprintf.h
FFT	pffft	BSD like	1D real & complex FFTs. Competitively fast. SSE & NEON optimised
Audio thread	sokol	zlib	Spins up an audio thread with buffer to write to. See sokol_audio.h
Audio IO	libsoundio	MIT	Wrapper for CoreAudio, WASAPI + more
Vector graphics	NanoVG	zlib	Antialised 2D polygons, lines, text, gradients and images using OpenGL
Vector graphics	nanovg_compat	zlib	NanoVG wrapper with Metal & DirectX 11 backends and extra functions for initialising a context.
Text Rendering	Freetype2	FTL	CPU rendering for most fonts for most devices.
Text Shaping	kb	zlib	Multilingual text segmentation and shaping
Memory	xhl	Unlicense	Allocators with leak detectors. See alloc.h
Maths	xhl	Dual	Fast maths approximations. See maths.h
Time	xhl	Unlicense	High res time, get OS time as unix timestamp, performance profiling tools. See time.h
Time	sokol	zlib	Get & parse high resolution time. See sokol_time.h
Image codecs	stb	MIT	Load/decode many image formats. See stb_image.h, stb_image_resize.h, stb_image_write.h
Data containers	stb	MIT	Variable type dynamic arrays and hash maps. See stb_ds.h
Strings	sds	BSD-2	Dyanamic size strings with manipulation and formatting methods.
UTF8	utf8	Unlicense	stdlib string.h, locale.h, ctype.h replacement functions for \0 terminated UTF8 strings
UTF8	cute_headers	Unlicense	UTF8 & UTF16 conversion functions. See cute_utf8.h
Crypto	TweetNaCl	PD	HMAC hashing, Public/Secret key encryption and signatures
Binary embed	bin2c	Apache 2	CLI. Turns single file (eg. font, image) into .c containg const char[].
File dialog box	osdialog	CC0	Native select file/folder dialogue boxes, alerts, colour picker & more
File dialog box	tinyfiledialogs	zlib	Native select file/folder dialogue boxes, alerts, colour picker & more
File I/O	xhl	Unlicense	File r/w/a, paths eg. Desktop/Documents, list dir & watch file change events. UTF8. files.h
File searching	cute_headers	Unlicense	Recursive file & directory search. See cute_files.h
File stream	sokol	zlib	Read & write stream for local files. See sokol_fetch.h
TLS	cute_headers	Unlicense	HTTPS request. Lacks any parsing of responses. See cute_tls.h
HTTPS	curl	BSD like	Makes HTTPS requests
HTTP parsing	picohttpparser	MIT	Parses HTTP1 requests & responses
JSON	yyJSON	MIT	2nd fastest JSON encode/decode. Parses all data upfront to create a searchable linked list.
JSON	zzzJSON	BSD like	Fast JSON encode/decode. Uses on the fly parsing and string searching and string views.
Base64	base64	BSD-2	Base64 string encode & decode
Regex	tiny-regex-c	Unlicense	Regex pattern matching
Regex	PCRE2	Dual	Regex pattern matching
Regex	TRE	BSD like	Regex pattern matching but with a greater name

C++

Function	Name	License	Description
Window	CrossWindow	zlib	Native window with mouse & keyboard callbacks.
VST3	vst3_public_sdk	Dual	VST3 wrapper
AU	vst3_public_sdk	Dual	AU wrapper via a VST3 wrapper wrapper
AUv3	vst3_public_sdk	Dual	AUv3 wrapper via a VST3 wrapper wrapper
AAX	vst3_public_sdk	Dual	AAX wrapper via a VST3 wrapper wrapper
VST3	clap-wrapper	Multi	VST3 wrapper via a CLAP wrapper
File read/write	cppfs	MIT	Manage local, virtual and remote files
Audio codecs	CHOC	ISC	Decode/encode WAV, FLAC, Ogg-Vorbis, decode only MP3.
MIDI parsing	CHOC	ISC	Parse MIDI messages, MIDI sequences and MIDI files.
MIDI/Audio sync	CHOC	ISC	Splits an audio block to match times of MIDI events
Log	fast_io	MIT	<iostream> replacement with threadsafe options
FFT	KFR	Dual	Really fast FFTs.
Lock free queue	readerwriterqueue	BSD	Does queue. No lock
Timer thread	CHOC	ISC	Timed callbacks
Machine ID	machineid	Apache 2	Generates a unique string based on users hardware
Base64	CHOC	ISC	Base64 string encode/decode
JSON	simdjson	Apache 2	Fastest JSON encode/decode
Regex	hyperscan	BSD3	Regex pattern matching
File/folder window	Portable File Dialogs	WTFPL	Native select file/folder dialogue boxes

Building the exmaples

All examples are built using CMake

Dependancies are are stored as git submodules.

Several of these dependencies use their own CMake build config, and we ignore all of them, often because they're too slow and complicated. All necessary build code is written in this repo.

git clone https://github.com/Tremus/awesome-audio-plugin-framework
cd awesome-audio-plugin-framework
git submodule update --init --depth=1 --recursive

cmake -B build -S .
cd build
cmake --build .

TODO

Things to add to the list:

• Graphics engine agnostic customisable widgets
• Something else? (suggest more!)