The classic soft synth TyrellN6 is known and loved by the audio community for its fat, gritty, analog-like sound and boundless retro appeal.
Initially hosted as freeware at amazona.de, the synth is now at home at u-he.com with some brand-new features.
TyrellN6 has an interesting origin story. It was supposed to end up as a real hardware synth designed by Amazona but became a VST cult classic instead.
Although the initial idea of a hardware synth never came to fruition, the man behind u-he, Urs Heckmann, took it upon himself to program a synth engine, and the rest is history.
We’ve covered the TyrellN6 here at BPB before. It received a glowing review from fellow contributor James Nugent that’s worth reading to get a more detailed look at the features.
TyrellN6 has also consistently held a spot with our absolute top free VST synth recommendations for years now, and for a good reason!
Want to hear some of the sounds you can get with this thing? Check out Christoph Toma’s demo on YouTube:
The TyrellN6 synth has been available for free for over a decade and is still going strong. U-he is now in the process of updating both functionality and graphics.
The current beta version is focused on improving the user experience.
The current update boasts a more polished VST3 implementation, and brand-new CLAP support while supporting the latest Apple systems. UI is now resizable, the GUI performance is better, the preset browser is improved and the preset library is updated to modern standards.
Tyrell N6 also supports MTS-ESP micro-tuning software for Mac, Windows, and Linux, which is huge! Intonating entire compositions has never been easier.
U-he will make additional updates to graphics and features down the road, most notably the inclusion of MIDI polyphonic expression (MPE) and polyphonic parameter modulation to give you even more flexibility.
Being a cheapskate has never been better, especially when good stuff like this keeps outperforming a lot of the paid alternatives.
Please note that support for 32-bit macOS has been discontinued, while AAX and CLAP formats are 64-bit only. U-he also recommends Windows and Linux users remove the original factory presets before updating the plugin.
Download: TyrellN6 (FREE)
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Last Updated on March 20, 2025 by Tomislav Zlatic.
