Your songs are all about the beat, and you want to make sure what you use sounds great and wows your fans.
There are a lot of drum machines out there, ranging from cheap to downright pricey.
How do you know what features you need?
Which machines are worth the price, and which ones are just hype?
Read on for a short guide to the best in beat-making drum machines.
10. Teenage Engineering PO-12 Pocket Operator Rhythm Drum Machine
Using real drum and synth sounds, this pocket-sized beats machine lets you take your rhythms on the go. Cymbals, drums, and cowbell are available in a device smaller than many smartphones. With 16 built-in effects and the ability to chain-sync multiple operators with the 3.5mm audio jack ports, you can’t beat this drum machine in price or portability. With both a built-in speaker and audio output option to help you fine-tune your beats, you can compose on the move and use the pattern in your next song.
Rating: 4.4 stars
9. Korg ELECTRIBE2BL Drum Machine
The Korg drum machine is a standard in the industry. This board gives you 38 insert effects and 32 master effects, the ability to loop your samples, a last-move undo button, and extra rhythm storage if you insert an SD card. With 16 available parts per pattern, this board gives you a lot of powerful options.
Rating: 4.3 star
8. BeatBuddy
This drum machine has a pedal format for hands-free operation, an on-screen metronome, and 200 songs in 24 genres that come pre-installed. Download and create new songs to store on its internal memory, and share your beats to the BeatBuddy online community. The beats used are recordings of professional drummers, giving you real-sounding percussion for your tracks. It can hold 3.2 million songs / 300 drum sets.
4.3 stars
7. Alesis SR-16
This standalone drum machine has built-in effects, an onboard library of 233 professional songs, MIDI support, sound stacking, step editing, 50 presets, 12 velocity-sensitive pads, and 4 stereo pair outputs for connectivity. One of the original and most popular drum machines, the Alesis comes in two models, one with 100 patterns and one with 200.
4.1 stars
6. Boss DR-670 Dr. Rhythm Drum Machine
This machine has 255 drum and percussion sounds with 16 bass sounds, and velocity-sensitive pads to express your rhythm patterns. You can hook it into a footswitch for hands-free use. With 200 preset patterns and 200 user-programmable ones, the combinations are endless! It has a large LCD display and runs on batteries or AC adapter, which is not included.
3.9 stars
5. Akai Professional XR20
This device has 700+ built-in songs produced by Chronic Music and 99 preset patterns. With an additional 99 user patterns capability, you can create and save all the beats you need. Standard drums, electric drums, and one-hit sounds are all included, making this machine perfect for hip-hop and R&B. This drum machine also has a backlit LCD screen and 12 glowing pads with lights that follow the beat, and each pad can be set to initiate a separate pattern for easy use in live performance. It has both a microphone input and headphone output and can run on both AC and battery power.
3.7 stars
4. Arturia SparkLE 420101
This machine is a step above the original Spark, bringing the same creative power with a streamlined interface and better portability. With a huge range of sounds to use in your next song or live performance. It’s not just the 180 drum kits, also offering a great variety of synth sounds (over 1,900) that run the spectrum from acoustic normalcy to electric novelty. Eight quantized or freeform pads assist your programming and sequencing on a machine that also slices beats, offers reverse playback, and loops patterns of up 64 steps.
3.4 stars
3. Boss DR-3 Dr. Rhythm
Another great Boss drum machine, this one streamlined for affordability. A great device to get started on, with a simple LCD screen and clearly labeled buttons. Use realistic percussion, drum, and bass sounds with the velocity-sensitive pads and new rhythm progressions that feature 3 variations each for intro, verse, fill, and ending. This Boss comes with 100 preset styles and the ability to store 100 more of your own creation.
3 stars
2. Roland Rhythm Composer (TR-08)
For a more affordable and ultra-compact version of the legendary Roland TR-808 drum machine, look no further than the TR-08. It has hands-on controls including tone, tuning, level, and decay. With additional compressor, gain, tune, and pan for selected instruments, it is programmable with classic step and time modes. This machine boasts ten separate outputs via USB audio and is battery-operated (with 4 AAs) or USB-powered.
4.6 stars
1. Korg 16-Key Volca Beats Analog Synthesizer
Take it old-school with this classic rhythm machine that lets you cut and slice loops with ease. Edit instantly with the intuitive user interface of six editable knobs that perform one function each, and four PCM parts provide speed control for drastically adjusting pitch. It has a 16-step sequencer and eight memory patches and sync in/out ports so you can synchronize multiple instruments in the Volca series, as well as Korg’s Monotribe.
4.4 stars
Thanks for reading!
We hope you’ve enjoyed this sampling of great beats makers.
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