Every DAW converter in 2026, compared

Updated September 2026

A DAW converter reads one digital audio workstation's project file directly and rebuilds it in another's format — tracks stay tracks, MIDI stays editable, the tempo map stays a tempo map. That is a different thing from bouncing stems (which flattens the session to audio) and a different thing from an interchange file like AAF or OMF (which carries audio regions and timing, but not MIDI, plugins or automation).

There are about seven tools worth knowing about, and they are not competing on the same axis. Some cover many DAWs shallowly; some cover few DAWs deeply; some are free and open source; one is an open format that the two biggest DAWs haven't adopted. Here they all are, fairly. Disclosure: this guide is published by Doseedo, which makes one of the tools below. We've tried to make the table something you could check yourself — every limitation cited is the vendor's own published claim.

The short version

• Most DAWs covered — WG DAW Converter: 29 in, 24 out. Deepest into Cubase, thinnest into Logic, with an active bug tail; try the demo before you trust it.
• Anything landing in Logic Pro — Doseedo. Fades, markers, meter maps and pan/breakpoint automation carry; the wide-coverage tools document inserts only into REAPER and Live, and Logic is where their testers hit lost crossfades and markers.
• Free and open source — DawVert (broadest), ProjectConverter (Reaper ↔ DAWproject), logic2ableton (Logic → Ableton).
• Audio-post and video conform — Vordio, AATranslator.
• The long-term answer — DAWproject, once Logic and Ableton adopt it.

WG DAW Converter — the widest format list, and a visible bug tail

WG DAW Converter reads more formats than anything else here: its site states 29 project formats in and 24 targets out, ten of them native project files (.als .rpp .flp .song .logicx .cpr .npr .ptx .sesx .bwproject). Desktop, Windows/macOS/Linux, $59 one-time. If your session has to land in Cubase, Nuendo, Studio One or Bitwig, it is the only tool on this page that even claims to try.

The format list is the pitch. Reliability is the open question. Its Gearspace launch thread runs to 95 replies and doubles as a public bug tracker. Buyers reported, through July and August 2026:

• Nuendo → Pro Tools: “The original project contains 104 audio files, but after conversion I ended up with only 5 audio tracks/files.”
• Cakewalk Sonar → REAPER: “some of the MIDI tracks are empty and the audio track has been shortened severely.”
• Ableton → Nuendo: “it just doesn't work… midi has never come across… i am not getting any plugs coming across, not even on stereo output.”
• Logic ↔ REAPER round trip: “the plugins get lost in translation”, and the project sample rate “is not being acquired by the translator”.
• Pro Tools → Logic: crossfades initially lost entirely, then present but “the shape of the fades doesn't match”; markers and mono/stereo track types wrong.
• And, prosaically: the app hanging on licence entry, and activation emails not arriving.

In fairness, the developer is responsive — he answers in the thread, ships fixes within days (“Everyday I'm adding features and fixing bugs”), and the buyer who lost 99 of 104 files came back to say so. Several people report clean conversions, particularly old Pro Tools sessions into Cubase. Treat the list above as a snapshot of a fast-moving one-person tool, not a permanent verdict.

But it is the right thing to weigh, because of how this failure mode works: a converter's worst property is the silent partial success. You do not find out that the MIDI is missing, the fades are the wrong shape or 99 of your 104 files never arrived until you are already in the other DAW, rebuilding from memory. That is the case for trying before paying — and the gap the developer still names himself: “automation is volume lanes only so far.”

DawVert — free, open source, the widest free net

DawVert is free and GPL-3.0, written in Python, with both a CLI (dawvert_cmd.py) and a GUI (dawvert_ui.py). Its input list is unusually wide and includes tracker and chiptune formats most tools ignore — MIDI, FL Studio, Ableton, DAWproject, LMMS, MOD/XM/S3M/IT, Beepbox/Jummbox. It outputs FL Studio, LMMS, Ableton Live 11, MIDI, Reaper and DAWproject.

The honest framing: DawVert converts project structure. Its documentation doesn't claim audio-sample preservation, plugin parameter mapping or automation handling, and support varies by format pair. If you're technical, converting something exotic, and willing to check the result, it's remarkable for free.

ProjectConverter — Reaper ↔ DAWproject, done properly

ProjectConverter is free and open source (LGPL-3.0, Java, with a GUI) and does exactly one job: Cockos Reaper projects to the open DAWproject format and back. It is refreshingly explicit about what it does not support — built-in devices, AU plugins, video clips, VST and MIDI parameter envelopes, complex routing beyond standard sends, and continuous tempo changes. Nested clips get flattened and may need consolidating first.

Narrow, honest, and the right tool if DAWproject is already in your chain.

AATranslator — the veteran session translator

AATranslator ($79 Standard, $249 Extended; Windows-only, though Mac users run it under Wineskin or Crossover) has been translating sessions between DAWs for a long time and reads Ableton .als natively. The catch is the path it takes to most other DAWs: OMF/AAF interchange (Extended version), and the vendor states plainly that this path does not convert plugins, effects or MIDI. For a project that is mostly audio regions, it's serviceable; for a MIDI-heavy or mix-heavy project it isn't the tool.

logic2ableton — free, one pair, one direction that counts

Credit where due: logic2ableton is free, MIT-licensed, on PyPI, and ships desktop installers for Windows and macOS plus a CLI. It moves audio onto the timeline with the tempo and extracts note-accurate MIDI to importable .mid files. Its README is upfront about the limits: automation is not recreated, there is no bus or send routing, no plugin parameters or state, and the Ableton→Logic direction produces a “transfer package” you rebuild by hand rather than a native .logicx. Good tool, clearly scoped.

Vordio — adjacent, for video post

Vordio is a post-production toolkit for sound editors working with video editors, not really a DAW-to-DAW converter. It takes Final Cut Pro X, Premiere, DaVinci Resolve, EDL and several audio sessions in, and outputs to REAPER, Audition, Nuendo, Studio One, Hindenburg and back to the video editors. Its real value is reconform — detecting editorial changes and matching the audio session to them. Mac and Windows; a free version caps timelines at 3 minutes. If your problem is picture, this is your tool and nothing else on this page is.

DAWproject — the right idea, still waiting on two companies

DAWproject is a free, open interchange format and the correct long-term answer for the whole industry. Bitwig, Studio One, Cubase 14+, Nuendo and Cubasis support it. But neither Logic Pro nor Ableton Live has adopted it — there are open feature requests on both companies' forums — so today it cannot move a Logic or Ableton project without a converter in the middle. Worth watching; not worth waiting for.

Doseedo — fewer DAWs, more of the project

Doseedo is ours, so judge this section against the table. It's a browser DAW converter covering five DAWs — Logic Pro, Ableton Live, FL Studio, Pro Tools and REAPER — in all twenty directions, writing the destination DAW's own project format (.logicx, .als, .flp, .rpp, .ptx). That is half the native targets WG DAW Converter writes, and if your session has to land in Cubase or Studio One, this is not your tool. The trade is what survives on the pairs it does cover — and, since v3 closed the routing and insert gap, the honest remaining difference is automation and access.

What carries: tracks in order with names and colors; audio clips with fades and clip gain; MIDI notes, CC and pitch bend; multi-point tempo and time-signature maps; arrangement and section markers; and off-rate audio resampled to the destination rate. On the Logic ↔ Ableton pair, volume/pan/breakpoint automation lanes, buses and sends as real routing, stock compressor/reverb/delay mapped to native devices, and third-party effects carried as the same plugin with their saved state. On the Pro Tools ↔ Logic and Pro Tools ↔ Ableton pairs, buses and sends, mixer automation lanes and third-party effect state carry too.

Against WG specifically: pan and breakpoint automation lanes carry here and don't there yet, and on the Pro Tools pairs so do mixer automation lanes including sends. There's also nothing to install and nothing to pay to find out whether it works on your session — it runs in a browser, free to start. The honest limits, in the same spirit as everyone else's above: plugin-parameter automation lanes and third-party instrument state don't cross the Pro Tools boundary yet; plugin state and automation don't cross the FL Studio or REAPER boundaries yet; and third-party instruments load at factory defaults going into Live on purpose (a patch recalling a sample library the machine doesn't have can crash Live on open). Full spec: the what-carries-over breakdown. It runs in the browser with nothing to install, and it's free to start.

Side-by-side

One caveat applies to every column: no tool translates a preset between two different plugin formats — the device models are simply different, and anyone claiming otherwise is overselling. “Not claimed” above means the vendor publishes no assertion either way; it is not evidence that the feature is missing, and we'd rather say that than guess on someone else's behalf. Where a vendor has publicly corrected an out-of-date claim on their own site — as WG's developer did on Gearspace — we use the correction, not the stale page.

Which one should you use?

• Your session has to open in Cubase, Studio One, Bitwig, Nuendo, Audition or something vintage. WG DAW Converter is the only option — run the demo on your real session first, and check the track and file counts against the original before you rebuild anything on top of it.
• You're moving between Logic, Ableton, FL Studio, Pro Tools or REAPER, your mix rides on automation, and you'd rather not install or pay anything to find out. Doseedo — pan and breakpoint lanes carry, it runs in a browser, and it's free to start.
• You want free and open source and you're comfortable checking the output. DawVert, or ProjectConverter if DAWproject is in your chain.
• You're conforming audio to a picture edit. Vordio.
• You only need the audio on a timeline. Bounce stems from bar 1. It's free and it always works.

Watch the walkthrough

Related guides

• How to convert projects between DAWs (the general problem)
• Logic ↔ Ableton converters compared, in depth
• What carries over, field by field
• DAWproject, Logic and Ableton
• The DAW converter — all twenty directions