- Move. Free. Do not record in the center of the room, and do not face a bare parallel wall. Sit roughly 38 percent along the room's length, symmetrically between the side walls, facing down the long dimension.
- Get closer to the microphone. Free. Halving your distance roughly doubles direct sound relative to reflected sound. This is the largest single improvement available at zero cost, and almost nobody does it.
- Use what you own. Free. A duvet on a clothes rail behind you. A bookcase, full and irregular, on a bare wall. A sofa in the reflection path. These are real absorbers you have already paid for.
- Build two panels. Cheap. A timber frame, 3 inch mineral wool, breathable fabric. 0.53 absorption at 125 Hz for a fraction of any finished panel. Put them at the first reflection points found with a mirror.
- Build two corner absorbers. Cheap. Same materials, thicker, straddling the front vertical corners with an air gap behind.
- Only then buy finished panels, if you want them to look bought rather than built.
Steps 1 to 3 cost nothing and, done properly, take a bare-room recording most of the way to acceptable. Step 4 is the best value in home recording by a wide margin. The order matters, because doing step 4 first while still recording from the middle of the room wastes most of the benefit.
Why DIY wins so clearly here
A finished acoustic panel is mineral fiber in a frame with fabric over it. That is the whole product. The materials are inexpensive; what you are paying for in a finished panel is the labour, the shipping of something bulky and light, and a tidy edge.
More than double the absorption at the frequency that matters, for less money, in exchange for a Saturday. If your budget is genuinely tight, this is where it goes.
Building one, in outline
- Build a simple timber frame slightly larger than the batt — 2x4 is ample, butt-jointed and screwed.
- Fit the mineral wool snugly inside. It should support itself without compressing; compressed material absorbs less.
- Staple breathable fabric over the front and around the edges. Breathable matters: if air cannot pass through the fabric, the absorber behind it cannot work. Hold it up to a light and you should see through it.
- Add a batten at the back so the panel stands off the wall by an inch or two. That air gap moves the material further into the moving air and extends its range downward.
- Hang it on the reflection point, not on the space that looks empty.
Where a small budget should not go
- Thin foam tile kits. 0.23 at 125 Hz for 3 inch foam, and the kits are usually thinner than that. You will absorb high frequencies you did not have a problem with and leave the boxiness untouched. Do acoustic foam panels work.
- Egg cartons. They scatter a little above 2 kHz, they are a fire risk on a wall, and they are not absorbers.
- Diffusers. Useful later, in a room with distance to spare. Not a first purchase and not cheap to do properly.
- A better microphone. If the complaint is the room, this is the most common misdirected purchase in home recording.
- Anything sold as soundproofing at a treatment price point. Isolation needs mass and decoupled construction; nothing you can hang achieves it.
What to buy
The two DIY materials, and the value finished panel
The two mineral-fiber materials with the best published low-frequency figures, and the cheapest finished panel worth buying if you would rather not build.
Owens Corning 703 (DIY panels)
Top pickOwens Corning · The most absorption per dollar, if you build
The right choice if you have a weekend and want the most low-frequency absorption your money can buy. If you want it to arrive finished, buy the ATS 4-inch panel and accept paying for the labour.
Why it is here
- 0.53 at 125 Hz is more than double what foam manages, and 125 Hz is where small rooms go wrong
- A fraction of the cost per square foot of any finished panel
- Cut and frame it to whatever depth your corners need
What it costs you
- You are building the frames and stapling the fabric
- Rigid fiberglass needs gloves, a mask and a plan for the offcuts
- Bare board must be covered before it goes on a wall you touch
Rockwool Mineral Wool Board, 3-inch (DIY panels)
Rockwool · DIY panels at a thickness that reaches low frequencies
Buy it if you will actually build the frames and you want depth rather than a finished look — three inches of mineral wool beats any two-inch finished panel below `250 Hz`. Buy Owens Corning 703 instead if you want the best-documented figure at `125 Hz`, which is `0.53` at `3 in`.
Why it is here
- Three inches of mineral wool is where DIY absorption starts reaching the low-mid band that matters in a small room
- Rigid enough at `8 lb/ft3` to hold its own shape in a frame, unlike a soft batt
- Cheapest route to a lot of absorbing depth if you are willing to build frames
What it costs you
- You are buying a raw building material: frames, fabric and labour are all on you
- At `8 lb/ft3` it is denser than the classic DIY batt, which helps rigidity but not low-frequency absorption
- Same dust and glove precautions as any mineral fiber
ATS Acoustics Panel (2-inch)
ATS Acoustics · The value finished panel
The best value in a finished panel for flutter echo and first reflections, and the money saved buys the depth that actually changes the room. Read its own `125 Hz` figure before you buy four of them to fix boxiness: at `0.12` it will not, and the 4-inch version of the same panel reaches `0.65`.
Why it is here
- Mineral-wool core at a price close to foam kits
- NRC 0.95 is within a rounding error of panels costing twice as much
- Publishes its figure at `125 Hz` as well as its NRC, which is the honest way to describe a thin panel
What it costs you
- `0.12` at `125 Hz` is the 2-inch depth limitation stated plainly — this is a high-frequency device
- Edges are softer than Primacoustic's resin-hardened ones
- Not fire rated, which rules it out of some rented rooms
The order to spend in, if you have a fixed amount
- Nothing: move your position and get closer to the microphone. Do this first regardless.
- A small amount: materials for two DIY panels, at the first reflection points.
- A bit more: add two DIY corner absorbers, as thick as you can build them.
- More again: a ceiling cloud above your head, and rear-corner absorbers.
- Only after all of that: consider monitors or a condenser microphone, both of which are now worth having.