Auto vs. Manual: When to Let the AI Decide

Auto mode builds a custom profile for YOUR track. Manual gives you creative control. Here's when each one wins.

Auto mode builds a custom profile for YOUR track. Manual gives you creative control. Here's when each one wins.

The mastering page offers Genre, Mastering Style, and Dynamics controls - all sent to the processing engine. After mastering, fine-tune Tone and Bass in the Compare page (post-processing), or Re-Master to change engine settings.

Genre: Auto-Detect vs. Manual Selection

When you leave the genre on "Auto-detect", the AI builds a Sonic Profile of your audio - dynamics, spectral balance, transients - and the core processing adapts to that acoustic analysis, not to a genre label. On top of that, a classifier estimates the closest genre and applies genre-specific tonal shaping proportional to its confidence - if it's 70% sure your track leans Pop, it applies 70% of the Pop EQ profile. Below 50% confidence, genre EQ is skipped entirely to avoid wrong corrections. When you manually select a genre, the full genre profile is applied at 100% strength.

Scenario | Best choice You know your genre | Select it manually - full genre character Hybrid or experimental track | Leave on Auto-detect - AI applies conservatively Not sure what genre it is | Leave on Auto-detect - let the AI decide

Tonal Character: Engine vs. Post-Processing

Before mastering, choose a Mastering Style (Auto, Warm, Bright, Punchy, Natural, Cinematic) and set the Dynamics slider - these are engine-level parameters that shape how the AI processes your track. After mastering, the Tonal Adjustment panel in Compare lets you apply real-time tone and bass adjustments over the result (post-processing). For deeper changes, Re-Master sends new engine parameters for a full reprocess.

Scenario | Best choice First time mastering | Auto ✓ Want to preview a tonal color | Tonal Adjustment in Compare Want engine-level style change | Re-Master with a style Have a reference track | Auto + Reference ✓

Tip: The Tonal Adjustment panel lets you hear changes instantly. If you like the result, export it directly - no need to Re-Master. Re-Master is for when you want the engine to apply the style through the full processing chain.

Key takeaway: Use Auto for 90% of your tracks. Switch to Manual only when you have a specific creative vision that Auto doesn't match.