Engineering guide
What is LUFS?
The complete guide
If you've ever uploaded a song to Spotify and thought "why is it quieter than everything else?" — you've experienced LUFS in action.
LUFS stands for Loudness Units relative to Full Scale. It is the international standard (ITU-R BS.1770) for measuring how loud audio sounds to the human ear. Unlike peak level (dBFS), LUFS accounts for how our ears perceive loudness across different frequencies.
Hear a real before / after
Crazy Stacy was analysed and repaired in CoProducer: score 70 → 90, LUFS −12.61 → −13.63, clipped samples 831 → 0. Switch A/B at the same sample.
Why LUFS matters
Every major streaming platform uses LUFS to normalize playback:
- Spotify targets −14 LUFS
- Apple Music targets −16 LUFS (Sound Check)
- YouTube targets −14 LUFS
- Amazon Music targets −14 LUFS (−2 dBTP peak)
- TIDAL targets −14 LUFS
Sources: Spotify for Artists, “Loudness normalization” (tracks adjusted to −14 LUFS per ITU 1770); Apple Support, “Sound Check” (Apple describes the feature but does not publish a LUFS figure there, so ≈ −16 is the commonly reported value); AES TD1008, the AES recommendations for streaming loudness; ITU-R BS.1770, the loudness and true-peak measurement. The YouTube, Amazon Music and TIDAL rows are commonly reported figures; we did not find an official published target to link.
A hotter master is not played louder. It is turned down until it matches the lane. That is why chasing −8 LUFS usually wastes dynamics without winning volume on the store.
Target LUFS by platform
| Platform | Target LUFS | True Peak | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Spotify | −14 | −1 dBTP | Does not reward hotter masters |
| Apple Music | −16 | −1 dBTP | Sound Check on by default |
| YouTube | −14 | −1 dBTP | Accepts a wide range |
| Amazon Music | −14 | −2 dBTP | Stricter peak limit |
| TIDAL | −14 | −1 dBTP | Master quality authenticates |
What CoProducer checks
CoProducer’s analyze table treats −14 LUFS as the release target (pass within 1.5 LU), with true peak ≤ −1.0 dBTP and clipped samples = 0. Those are the same red/green gates on the homepage A/B.