Podkstr vs Riverside

Two ways of seeing a podcast

Riverside starts from video. Its strengths are listed in the table below, with the date they were checked.

Podkstr starts from sound. The episode lands in a multitrack editor where every voice has its own chain: filter, EQ, noise gate, compressor, gain, echo, reverb, limiter, soft clipper, de-esser and stereo width. Each of the eleven effects has its own visual editor, where an EQ curve is shaped with the mouse rather than typed into a form.

The difference lies in what happens to the sound once it is recorded. What each tool includes, hosting as well, is in the same table.

Raw capture

Podkstr captures raw sound. The browser's automatic gain control and noise suppression are switched off on purpose: once baked into the file, that processing cannot be removed by any edit. Cleanup comes afterwards, by choice, with the tools chosen.

Measured loudness

The output level is measured, not estimated: it is normalised to -16 LUFS, the level Apple Podcasts recommends, with a limiter holding the peak under the ceiling. On the five test signals of the validation script, the Podkstr loudness meter stays within 0.08 LU of the measurement made by the ffmpeg loudnorm filter.

Who each is for

Riverside when video is the main channel and the video edit matters as much as the sound.

Podkstr for publishing audio, working the sound track by track, and an interface in seven languages.

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