SonoBus and trakk'em Streaming both send live audio over the internet in lossless quality, both are cheap or free, and both get recommended in the same forum threads. They are still built for different jobs, and picking the wrong one is the kind of mistake you discover on the day of the session. So here is the real difference, before the feature table.
SonoBus is for playing together. trakk'em is for being listened to.
Everything else follows from that. Facts and prices are as of September 2026, sources at the end.
What SonoBus is
SonoBus is a free, open-source (GPLv3) application for low-latency, peer-to-peer audio between people. Everyone installs the app (macOS, Windows, Linux, iOS, Android) or loads the plugin (AU/VST/AAX) in a DAW, joins a named group, and hears everyone else with a few tens of milliseconds of delay. The audio goes directly between participants; the SonoBus server only helps them find each other. Quality is adjustable per person, from Opus at 16-256 kbps per channel up to uncompressed PCM at 16, 24 or 32 bit, and the whole session can be recorded to disk, multitrack.
It is a remarkable piece of software for what it is: a rehearsal room over the internet. Musicians in two cities can play in time, with a metronome, mixing each other in their own headphones.
What trakk'em Streaming is
trakk'em Streaming is a one-to-many broadcast from a web page. You pick an audio input in the browser (your DAW through a virtual cable, or any other app), press Go live, and everyone who opens your link hears it, in lossless PCM or Opus, on any device, with nothing installed. Listeners are anonymous unless they type a name; you see who is connected, from where, on what device, and for how long, live and afterwards in a broadcast history. The link is permanent: share it once, it works for every future set, and the page waits in a "not live yet" state until you start.
It is a private radio station with a guest list, not a rehearsal room.
Side by side
| SonoBus | trakk'em Streaming | |
|---|---|---|
| Built for | Playing or talking together in real time | Letting people hear you, live, one-way |
| Direction | Everyone sends and receives | One broadcaster, many listeners |
| What listeners install | The SonoBus app or plugin, on every device | Nothing: a link in any browser |
| Latency | Tens of milliseconds on a good wired connection | About 1, 2 or 5 s, listener's choice |
| Audio quality | Opus 16-256 kbps per channel, or PCM 16/24/32 bit, per participant | PCM lossless, or Opus about 320 / 128 kbps, per listener |
| Transport | Peer-to-peer, direct between participants | Relay: one upload from you, the server fans out |
| How many people | The user guide's own estimate: "perhaps a dozen" participants in practice | No published cap during the beta |
| Your upload bandwidth | Grows with every participant (you send to each one) | Constant: one stream to the relay |
| Who is listening | Names in the group | Per-listener city, device, quality, duration; history of every broadcast |
| Waiting before it starts | Everyone joins the group when ready | Waiting room: the page connects by itself when you go live |
| Recording | Yes, multitrack, to disk | No |
| Encryption | None (stated in the project README) | TLS between browser, relay and listener |
| Price | Free, open source | Included in trakk'em Pro (see pricing) |
Where SonoBus wins, clearly
Latency. If two people need to play in time, only a peer-to-peer tool with a tiny jitter buffer works, and SonoBus is one of the best. trakk'em's one-to-five seconds of delay is a design choice that makes it useless for jamming, and we would rather say so than let you find out.
Everyone can talk. SonoBus is a conversation: each participant sends audio too. A trakk'em stream is one-way; the listener has no microphone into it.
Recording and per-person mixing. Record the session multitrack, set each participant's level and quality in your own headphones, add a metronome. None of that exists in trakk'em.
Free. GPLv3, no account, no subscription, and you can run your own connection server.
Where trakk'em wins, clearly
Nobody installs anything. This is the practical reason most people end up choosing between the two. The client who wants to hear the mix, the label person on a phone, the thirty followers you told about tonight's session: sending them an app to install and a group name to type is where it breaks. A link they tap is not.
It scales like a broadcast. In SonoBus you send a separate copy of your audio to every participant, which is why the user guide talks about a dozen people as a practical ceiling. In trakk'em you send one stream to the relay, which fans it out; your upload bandwidth does not change whether one person listens or fifty.
You know who came. SonoBus tells you who is in the group. trakk'em tells you who connected, from which city, on which device, at which quality, for how long, and keeps that for every broadcast. If the point of the session is "did the client actually listen", that record is the deliverable.
The permanent link and the waiting room. One URL that never changes, a page that sits in "not live yet" and connects on its own when you start. It goes in a bio or a signature and stays true.
It comes with the rest of your delivery workflow. The same account holds your library, your per-listener private links with listen analytics, downloads, attachments and file requests. Play the mix live now, send the tracked link afterwards.
Which one should you pick
- You want to rehearse, jam, co-write or record remotely with other musicians: SonoBus. Nothing browser-based will match its latency, and it is free.
- You want a client, a band, a class or an audience to hear what you are playing, live, with zero setup on their side, and to know who listened: trakk'em Streaming.
- You want to hear a mix together and discuss it: either can work. SonoBus if everyone is already set up and you want to talk in the same app; trakk'em if the other person is not technical or is on a phone, and you take the conversation to a call.
Live streaming in trakk'em is in beta on Pro and Studio: see how it works, read the virtual cable setup guide, or compare the plans.
Sources
- SonoBus on GitHub (README): description, platforms, plugin formats, GPLv3, peer-to-peer transport, wired-connection advice, the note that data is not encrypted.
- SonoBus User Guide: every participant needs the app, Opus and PCM options, jitter buffer and the "40 ms upper limit for music" guidance, the "perhaps a dozen participants" practical limit, multitrack recording.
- trakk'em pricing and the live streaming page for the trakk'em side.