Presswerk
by u-he · Compressor · Channel compressor
Not rated yet
Feature-rich compressor with character, saturation and several detection modes, plus a simplified view.
Best for: Vocals, Drums, Mix Bus, Bass. Genres: all genres.
Keywords: bus processing, drums, vocals, parallel processing, glue, mid/side, sidechain input, warm, bass, classic, feed-forward, full mix, gritty, mix bus, mixing, preset-driven, resizable UI, single-band.
What it does
Presswerk is u-he's compressor, blending the warmth of classic hardware with digital-only options.
- Compression: ratios from 1:1 to 20:1 with adjustable knee and linearity, and feed-forward, feed-back or interactive detection.
- Views: six layouts (Easy, Vocal, Drum, Bus, M/S and Limiter) that show only the relevant controls.
- Side-chain and blend: internal side-chain with filters and bipolar delay, plus parallel (New York) compression.
- Tone and stereo: saturation with variable warmth, M/S processing and a dual phase rotator for shaping transients.
- Presets: over 120 factory presets and a resizable interface.
The current version is 1.1.6. A demo is available.
When to use it
Presswerk sits between the character compressors, such as the 1176 and LA-2A emulations, and all-rounders like FabFilter Pro-C 3. The per-task views make it quick to set up on vocals, drums or a bus, and the saturation and phase rotator add colour that a plain compressor lacks.
- Best for: drum and vocal compression, bus glue and parallel compression with a bit of grit.
- Genres: rock, pop, electronic and hip-hop.
Where to buy
- Best Service: $129
- Plugin Boutique: $129
- PluginFox: $129
- AudioDeluxe: $129
- u-he: $146.48 (Listed at €129; converted at €1 = $1.1355 (ECB rate, 29 Sep 2026))
Tutorials and reviews
- U-he Presswerk, this thing is seriously nice 🔥
- Is it REALLY THAT DIFFICULT? || U-HE Presswerk
- Introducing Presswerk, a dynamics processor from u-he
- Presswerk - The Only Compressor Plugin You Will Ever Need!?!
- Review: U-He Presswerk VST effect plugin
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