# How to Record a Podcast in DaVinci Resolve Using Fairlight

> **Quick answer:** Open the Fairlight page, patch each microphone to its own mono track under Fairlight > Patch Input/Output, arm every track with the R button, set input monitoring, and press record. Keep peaks between -12 and -6 dBFS at the source, use headphones to avoid feedback, and match your project's sample rate to your interface before you start.

*Published by [TryUncle](https://tryuncle.com) — the AI tutor that teaches DaVinci Resolve on your own screen.*
*Updated 2026-07-17 · DaVinci Resolve 21.0.2 (July 2026) · Canonical: https://tryuncle.com/learn/davinci-resolve/how-to-record-a-podcast-in-davinci-resolve-fairlight*

I've set up enough recording sessions to know the moment that actually scares people: pressing the red button for the first time and not knowing if anything is actually being captured. Fairlight will record your podcast. It just won't tell you when something's about to go wrong, and by the time you notice, the session's over. This is the setup that prevents that, written for someone recording inside DaVinci Resolve for the first time, whether that's a solo voiceover, a two-person interview, or a three-mic panel.

Fairlight is the audio engine built into DaVinci Resolve, not a bolted-on plugin. Blackmagic describes it as "the world's first and only audio post production software that's completely integrated with picture editing" (source: Blackmagic Design, Fairlight product page), and the company that built it has a real pedigree behind that claim. The original Fairlight company built the CMI sampler that "was used heavily in the 1980s by the likes of Kate Bush, Duran Duran, and Stevie Wonder," according to OWC's own [guide to podcasting in DaVinci Resolve](https://www.owc.com/blog/how-to-create-podcasts-in-davinci-resolve). Blackmagic acquired the company in 2016 and folded its full recording studio toolset into Resolve, free tier included.

That history matters less than what it means for you today: you can record, edit, mix, and export a finished podcast without ever leaving one app. This guide walks through every step of actually doing that, plus the failure points that trip up a first session.

## What Do You Need Before You Open DaVinci Resolve?

Get the gear question settled before you touch Fairlight's settings, because every recording problem that isn't a software bug traces back to something in this list.

**For a solo host:**

- One microphone. A USB condenser mic (the common budget entry point) works fine and needs no interface at all.
- Headphones. Not speakers. Speakers monitoring a live mic create feedback and get picked up in the recording itself.
- A quiet room. DaVinci Resolve has real noise reduction tools on the Fairlight page, but they clean up a recording, they don't rescue one made next to a running air conditioner.

**For two or more people in the same room:**

- One microphone per person, ideally lavalier or a dedicated dynamic mic per seat rather than one shared desk mic.
- A multi-channel audio interface or a dedicated podcast mixer, since a laptop's built-in audio input only exposes one channel. A RODECaster-style mixer or an interface like a Focusrite Scarlett with multiple XLR inputs gives DaVinci Resolve one separate channel per person to patch to its own track.
- Headphones for every speaker, ideally from a headphone amp or the mixer's own monitor outs, so nobody is listening through a laptop's shared audio path.

**For a remote guest joining over a call:**

- The guest's own local recording, since a video call's compressed audio is not something you want as your only copy of their voice. This is the one recording style Fairlight genuinely can't help with directly. Riverside, Zencastr, and similar tools solve this by recording each participant locally on their own device, [as Riverside's own comparison of podcast recording software explains](https://riverside.com/blog/best-podcast-recording-software), and you'd import that file into Resolve afterward rather than trying to record the call live inside Fairlight.

If your setup is a single mic and headphones, you can skip ahead to the arming and gain sections below. If you're recording more than one person, the multi-mic section further down is where the real setup work happens.

## How Do You Set Up Audio I/O Before You Record?

This step happens once per machine, not once per project, and skipping it is the single most common reason a first recording attempt fails silently.

Open **DaVinci Resolve > Preferences > System > Video and Audio I/O**. DaVinci Resolve supports audio monitoring and input "using the audio of a supported Blackmagic Design I/O device such as an UltraStudio or Decklink, your macOS, Windows, or Linux workstation's on-board audio, or any Core Audio-compatible, Windows-compatible, ASIO, or Advanced Linux Sound Architecture (ALSA)-supported third party audio interface" (source: DaVinci Resolve Manual, Video & Audio I/O, Blackmagic Design, mirrored). Whatever you plugged in from the gear list above should show up in the **Input Device** dropdown here. Select it.

Two settings decide whether your recording is clean or full of clicks:

**I/O Engine.** On Mac, this is usually System Audio or, if you're on a dedicated interface with its own driver, that interface's Core Audio driver. On Windows, select **ASIO** if your interface supports it rather than the generic system driver; ASIO is Windows-only, and Mac's Core Audio already handles the equivalent job natively. Our sibling guide on [DaVinci Resolve audio crackling](https://tryuncle.com/learn/davinci-resolve/davinci-resolve-audio-crackling-and-popping-during-playback) covers exactly why ASIO matters and what buffer size to set if you hear pops during monitoring, since the same real-time pipeline that causes playback crackle also governs how cleanly Resolve captures a live input.

**Sample rate.** Match your project's audio sample rate to your microphone or interface's native rate before you record a single word, not after. Hollyland's troubleshooting guide is specific about this: "ensure your project sample rate matches your audio device's native sample rate (commonly 44.1 kHz or 48 kHz)" (source: Hollyland Store, DaVinci Resolve Arm for Record Not Working). If they don't match, Resolve has to resample in real time, and that mismatch is a documented cause of the same crackling and popping covered in our sibling troubleshooting guide. 48 kHz is the standard choice if there's any chance this podcast becomes a video.

**Playback and Record buffer size.** The manual lets you set separate buffer sizes for playback and recording, each with "a latency display indicating the approximate latency in milliseconds for each choice" (source: DaVinci Resolve Manual, Video & Audio I/O, Blackmagic Design, mirrored). A smaller buffer means less delay between speaking and hearing yourself in your headphones, which matters for live monitoring, but it asks more of your computer in real time. A larger buffer is more stable but adds noticeable lag if you're monitoring your own voice through it. Most interfaces let you set this in their own control panel instead, which is usually more reliable than Resolve's slider reaching outboard hardware.

**Audio I/O settings that matter for recording**

| Setting | Where | What to set it to |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Input Device | Preferences > System > Video and Audio I/O | Your microphone or audio interface, not "None" or the wrong built-in device |
| I/O Engine | Same panel | ASIO on Windows with a dedicated interface; System Audio (Core Audio) on Mac |
| Sample rate | Same panel, and Project Settings > Fairlight | Match to your device's native rate, typically 48 kHz |
| Record buffer size | Same panel | Start low for responsive monitoring; raise it only if you hear crackle |

Restart DaVinci Resolve after changing the input device if the app doesn't pick it up immediately. This one restart resolves a surprising share of "my mic isn't showing up" reports.

## How Do You Patch a Microphone to a Track in Fairlight?

With your device selected in Preferences, switch to the Fairlight page (the musical note icon in the page switcher at the bottom of the window). This is the only page in DaVinci Resolve where live recording actually happens. Recording is not available on the Edit page, with one narrow exception covered later in this guide.

Patching is the step that connects your physical microphone to a specific track, and it's separate from simply selecting an input device in Preferences. Open **Fairlight > Patch Input/Output** from the menu bar. Hollyland's fix guide describes the layout plainly: "The left panel lists hardware inputs; the right panel lists Fairlight track inputs. Click a hardware input source on the left, then click the corresponding track input on the right to create a connection" (source: Hollyland Store, DaVinci Resolve Arm for Record Not Working). Without an active patch here, no signal reaches your track no matter how correctly everything else is configured, which is the single most common reason a track arms but records nothing.

If you only have one track and one microphone, this takes seconds. Click your hardware input, click Track 1's input, done. The complexity shows up once you're patching multiple microphones to multiple tracks, which the multi-mic section below covers step by step.

A second, faster path exists for a quick solo recording: the **Voiceover Tool**, a microphone icon on the Edit page's timeline toolbar, which "sets up the recording input and track automatically in the background" without requiring you to open the Patch Bay at all (source: Hollyland Store, DaVinci Resolve Arm for Record Not Working). It's genuinely useful for a single narration pass, but it doesn't give you the per-track control a multi-guest podcast needs, so the rest of this guide assumes you're working from the Fairlight page directly.

## Mono or Stereo: Which Track Type Should Your Podcast Use?

Right-click a track header in the Fairlight timeline and choose **Add Track**. You'll be asked to pick a track type, and for a podcast the answer is almost always mono, not stereo.

A single microphone, whether it's a USB condenser, a lavalier, or an XLR dynamic mic into an interface, produces one channel of audio. Recording that single channel into a stereo track wastes half the track's channels on silence and complicates every later step: editing, leveling, and exporting all get simpler when a mono source lives on a mono track. OWC's walkthrough of podcast setup in DaVinci Resolve confirms this directly, noting that "since one microphone produces mono input," users should "create a mono audio track" for each voiceover or speaker (source: OWC Blog, How to Create Podcasts in DaVinci Resolve).

Reserve stereo tracks for genuinely stereo sources: a stereo room mic capturing ambience, a pre-mixed stereo feed from an external recorder, or music and sound effects you'll add during the edit. For the actual voices in your podcast, one mono track per person is the workflow that keeps you in control later.

**Track type decision table**

| Source | Track type | Why |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Any single microphone (USB, XLR, lav) | Mono | The mic only outputs one channel; a stereo track just duplicates it |
| Stereo room or ambience mic | Stereo | Genuinely carries left and right information worth keeping separate |
| Pre-mixed stereo feed from a mixer's main out | Stereo | Already combined; splitting it back to mono loses nothing you can recover |
| Music, intro stingers, sound effects | Stereo | Most licensed music and effects libraries deliver stereo files |

Name each track as you create it. Right-click the track name, or double-click it, and type something identifiable: "Host," "Guest 1," "Guest 2." This sounds trivial until you're staring at four unlabeled tracks an hour into editing, trying to remember which one was the person sitting on the left.

## How Do You Arm a Track and Check Input Levels?

Arming is what tells DaVinci Resolve "record onto this track when I press record." Every track you want captured needs to be armed individually before you start.

On the Fairlight page, find the small red **R** button in each track's header, on the left side of the timeline, and click it. It turns solid red when active. If the button is greyed out and won't click, the track either has no input patched yet (go back to the Patch Bay), or its type is set to Bus or Aux rather than Audio, since "Bus and Aux tracks do not have a record-arm function" (source: Hollyland Store, DaVinci Resolve Arm for Record Not Working).

Once armed, speak or perform at your normal recording level and watch the track's input meter in the mixer strip. This is your only real-time check that the signal path actually works end to end, from microphone through interface through patch through track. If the meter doesn't move at all when you speak, stop here and troubleshoot before recording anything; the troubleshooting section further down covers the most common reasons for a silent meter.

**A greyed-out Arm button almost always means the track has no input patched, not a broken app.** That single sentence resolves more confused first-session panic than any other piece of advice in this guide. It's a routing problem you fix in the Patch Bay, not a bug you fix by restarting anything.

Before you commit to a full recording, do a 30-second test take. Record a few sentences, stop, and play them back through headphones. This costs you nothing and catches problems, a wrong input selected, a muted channel, a loose cable, before they cost you an hour-long interview.

## What's the Right Gain Staging for a Podcast Recording?

Gain staging is the decision that determines whether your recording sounds clean or needs hours of repair afterward, and it happens before Resolve ever sees the signal.

Watch the input meter while speaking at your actual recording volume, not a hushed test-mic voice. Aim for peaks between **-12 dBFS and -6 dBFS**. Occasional transients pushing toward -6 dBFS are fine; anything that consistently hits 0 dBFS and shows red will clip, and clipped digital audio distorts in a way that can't be undone in post, unlike a recording that's merely a little quiet.

**Adjust gain at the microphone or interface, never at the fader.** This is the rule that trips up people coming from a video editing background, where you're used to fixing levels with a fader after the fact. If your levels are too hot or too quiet, turn the gain knob on your audio interface, or adjust your microphone's own output level if it has one. Don't try to compensate with the track fader in Fairlight at the recording stage; you want the cleanest possible signal actually hitting the track, since a fader adjustment after a bad recording can't add back detail that clipping destroyed or that background noise buried.

**Gain staging quick reference**

| Reading | What it means | What to do |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Peaks consistently below -18 dBFS | Signal too quiet, will need heavy gain boost later that also amplifies noise | Raise gain at the interface or mic |
| Peaks between -12 and -6 dBFS | Healthy recording range | Leave it alone |
| Occasional peak at -6 dBFS on a loud word | Normal and expected | No action needed |
| Peaks consistently hitting 0 dBFS (red) | Clipping, permanent distortion | Lower gain at the interface immediately |

For a multi-guest recording, this step happens per microphone, not once for the whole session. Two people rarely speak at identical volumes, and a mixer or multi-channel interface should let you set each channel's gain independently before you arm any track.

## How Do You Record Two or More People on Separate Tracks?

This is where a podcast recording setup diverges from a simple voiceover, and it's worth doing properly the first time, because fixing a blended recording after the fact is far harder than setting up separate tracks up front.

The goal: every person gets their own mono track, fed by their own microphone, so you can edit, level, and clean each voice independently later without one person's cough bleeding into another's dialogue edit.

**Step by step for a two or three person recording:**

1. Connect every microphone to your interface or podcast mixer. A multi-channel USB interface or a device like a RODECaster gives DaVinci Resolve one distinct input channel per XLR or combo input.
2. Confirm your interface shows up correctly in Preferences > System > Video and Audio I/O as a device with multiple channels available, not just a single stereo pair.
3. On the Fairlight page, create one mono track per person and name each one immediately.
4. Open **Fairlight > Patch Input/Output** and connect each hardware input channel to its own track, one at a time. Input 1 to Track "Host," Input 2 to Track "Guest 1," and so on.
5. Arm every track. Fairlight's track index, a panel that lets you toggle lock, arm, solo, and mute states across every track "with a swipe of the mouse" according to DVResolve.com's guide to organizing multi-track sessions, makes arming several tracks at once faster than clicking each header individually (source: DVResolve.com, Organizing Multi-Track Audio in Fairlight).
6. Have each person speak briefly and confirm every meter moves independently. If two meters move together when only one person talks, you've got a patching mistake, likely two hardware inputs assigned to the same track.
7. Set gain per channel as covered above, since two voices at different natural volumes need different gain settings.

**One shared mic feed beats three separate ones you have to sync by hand later.** That's the logic behind recording every guest into Fairlight directly rather than each person recording locally on their own device and you syncing the files afterward. When everyone records into the same session on the same timeline, they're already sample-accurate to each other with zero sync work needed in post. This is the opposite tradeoff from a remote-guest show, where local recording on each person's own device is the only way to get clean audio at all, which is exactly the gap tools like Riverside and Zencastr exist to fill.

For in-person multi-mic setups specifically, isolation matters as much as routing. If two microphones are close together in the same room, each one will pick up a faint version of the other person's voice, called bleed. This isn't something Fairlight's patching fixes; it's a physical mic placement problem. Keep mics reasonably separated, use directional (cardioid) mics rather than omnidirectional ones where possible, and consider a simple acoustic screen or foam panel between close speakers if bleed shows up on your test take.

If you're recording a panel with more speakers than your interface has inputs, or you expect to run this setup repeatedly, a dedicated podcast mixer with individual channel outs is worth the investment before your next session. Our sibling guide to [DaVinci Resolve's multicam workflow for interviews](https://tryuncle.com/learn/davinci-resolve/davinci-resolve-multicam-editing-workflow-for-interviews) covers the camera side of the same problem in detail, since a video podcast recorded with multiple cameras faces the identical logic: one clean, separated source per person beats a blended feed you can't undo.

## How Do You Monitor Playback Without Hearing an Echo or Feedback?

Nothing derails a recording session faster than a guest hearing a delayed copy of their own voice in their headphones while they talk. This is a monitoring problem, and it's separate from everything covered so far.

Fairlight can show you either your live input or your track's existing recorded content while a track is armed, and getting this backwards is what causes a slap-back echo. The practical rule: while a track is armed and you're actively recording, everyone should be hearing the live microphone input in their headphones, not a version of it that's been round-tripped through Resolve's processing and buffer delay. If someone reports hearing themselves twice, slightly out of time, mute that track's monitor output and confirm they're instead hearing a zero-latency direct monitor mix from the interface itself, a feature most dedicated audio interfaces and podcast mixers provide independently of what DaVinci Resolve is doing.

For a solo recording, OWC's guide flags the same issue from a different angle: mute the voiceover track itself while recording, "to avoid self-monitoring" through Resolve's own playback path (source: OWC Blog, How to Create Podcasts in DaVinci Resolve). The buffer size covered in the audio I/O section earlier directly affects how noticeable this delay is; a larger buffer means more lag between speaking and hearing it back through software monitoring, which is exactly the scenario a hardware interface's direct monitor feature is built to avoid.

**Monitoring setup by scenario**

| Scenario | What to monitor through | Why |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Solo host, USB mic, no interface | Headphones plugged into the mic itself, if it has a jack; otherwise mute the armed track's monitor | Prevents hearing a delayed software copy of your own voice |
| Multi-guest, dedicated interface or mixer | The interface or mixer's zero-latency direct monitor output | Bypasses Resolve's buffer entirely; what you hear is the raw signal, not a processed one |
| Remote guest on a call | Their own device's audio, separate from the call software's monitoring | Call software has its own echo cancellation; don't add Resolve's monitoring on top of it |

If you're recording alone with simple headphones and no dedicated interface, the fix is usually simpler: just make sure the track's monitor path isn't set to feed back a processed copy of itself. Test it before a real session. Put your headphones on, arm the track, and speak. If it sounds instant and natural, you're set. If it sounds like a walkie-talkie delay or a slight echo, that's your cue to adjust the buffer size or switch to your interface's own direct monitoring instead of relying on Resolve's software path.

## Should You Record Video Too, or Audio Only?

If your podcast ships as video, this is the point where a lot of people assume Fairlight can just capture their camera feed at the same time as the audio. It can't, and it's worth knowing that before you build a workflow around a feature that doesn't exist.

DaVinci Resolve's Fairlight page has a genuine real-time record function, but it's audio-only. There's no equivalent live video capture built into Resolve the way there is in dedicated live-switching software. If you're recording a video podcast, the standard workflow is:

1. Record camera video separately, either directly to the cameras themselves or through a capture card into different software, running at the same time as your Fairlight audio session.
2. Record your podcast audio through Fairlight exactly as described in this guide, on separate tracks per person.
3. After the session, import the camera footage into the same DaVinci Resolve project and use **Auto Sync Audio** to line up each camera's picture with your clean Fairlight-recorded audio. Our sibling guide on [how to sync audio in DaVinci Resolve](https://tryuncle.com/learn/davinci-resolve/sync-audio) covers every sync method available, timecode, waveform, and manual, in detail.
4. If you're cutting between two or more camera angles for the finished episode, DaVinci Resolve's multicam tools handle that once picture and sound are synced; see our full [multicam editing workflow for interviews](https://tryuncle.com/learn/davinci-resolve/davinci-resolve-multicam-editing-workflow-for-interviews) for the complete process.

**A podcast that never leaves DaVinci Resolve is one less app between you and a finished episode.** Recording your audio directly in Fairlight, then bringing in camera footage and syncing it in the same project, means your entire episode, capture through final export, happens in one piece of software instead of being assembled from three or four different apps' output files. That's the real advantage of this workflow over recording audio separately in Audacity or a phone voice memo app and importing it later: one project file, one timeline, no missing sync points, no forgotten export settings between tools.

This tradeoff runs the other way too. If you genuinely need live-switched multicam video, the kind where a director is cutting between camera angles in real time during the recording itself rather than after, that's a different job than what Fairlight or even standard multicam editing solves; that's closer to the territory Blackmagic's own ATEM switchers and the newly released Fairlight Live mixer, covered below, are built for.

## How Do You Actually Hit Record, and Where Do the Files Go?

With every track patched, armed, and monitoring correctly, the recording step itself is short.

1. Position the playhead on the Fairlight timeline where you want the recording to start, typically at the very beginning of an empty timeline.
2. Confirm every track you want captured shows a solid red Arm indicator.
3. Click the global record button on the transport bar, or use the keyboard shortcut, to start recording. A red waveform region grows on every armed track as it captures.
4. Let the session run. Fairlight includes real-time punch-in, meaning you can start recording at any point during live playback, not just from a stop, which is useful if you need to re-record a section without restarting the whole timeline (source: Blackmagic Design, Fairlight product page).
5. Press the spacebar or the record button again to stop.

Recorded audio saves as a **.wav file** in the capture location set in your project settings, found under **File > Project Settings > Master Settings > Working Folders > Capture and Playback Location**. Confirm this path points somewhere with enough free space before a long session; a multi-hour, multi-track recording at 48 kHz adds up in file size faster than most people expect.

Each armed track records to its own independent audio clip, which is exactly the point of setting up separate tracks earlier. If your two-person interview needs the host's cough trimmed out without touching the guest's answer, having that isolation from the moment of recording, rather than trying to split it out of a blended stereo file afterward, is what makes clean editing possible.

## What Should You Do Right After You Stop Recording?

The session isn't done the moment you press stop. A few minutes of discipline here saves hours of regret if something went wrong that you didn't catch live.

**Disarm every track first.** Click each red R button off, or use the track index to clear all arm states at once. This prevents an accidental overwrite if you or someone else touches record again before you've reviewed anything.

**Scrub through every track, not just the one you were watching.** Play back each speaker's track individually and confirm it recorded cleanly start to finish. It's common to catch one track that stopped early, clipped partway through, or has a dropout that wasn't audible while you were focused on the conversation itself.

**Back up the raw files immediately.** Navigate to your project's capture folder and copy the recorded .wav files to a second location, an external drive, cloud storage, wherever your normal backup habit lives. **Fairlight can capture the session. It was never built to be your only recording safety net.** A corrupted project file, a drive failure, or an accidental undo-to-a-bad-state shouldn't be able to erase the only copy of an hour of conversation you can't reschedule.

**Organize before you edit, not during.** DVResolve.com's guide to organizing multi-track sessions recommends using color coding to visually distinguish speakers and grouping related tracks so you can adjust levels together later (source: DVResolve.com, Organizing Multi-Track Audio in Fairlight). Doing this now, while the session is fresh and each track is still clearly labeled in your head, is faster than doing it during a later editing pass when you've forgotten which color was which guest.

If this recording is headed toward a full edit next, our guide to a [DaVinci Resolve editing workflow for YouTube creators](https://tryuncle.com/learn/davinci-resolve/davinci-resolve-editing-workflow-for-youtube-creators) picks up exactly where this one leaves off, covering organizing footage, rough cuts, mixing to a target loudness, and export.

## Do You Need DaVinci Resolve Studio to Record a Podcast?

No. Every step in this guide, patching, arming, multi-track recording, input monitoring, gain staging, and file export, is available in the completely free version of DaVinci Resolve.

DaVinci Resolve Studio's audio-relevant additions are specific and mostly beyond what a podcast needs: more Fairlight FX plugins, Dolby Atmos and immersive 3D audio mixing, and object-based audio automation. Blackmagic's own tech specs describe the optional **Fairlight Audio Accelerator**, a hardware PCIe card, as supporting up to "2000 Mono Audio Tracks at 48kHz" (source: Blackmagic Design, Tech Specs, Fairlight Audio Accelerator), a number that sounds relevant until you realize it's describing a dedicated hardware expansion card built for feature-film sound mixing, not a software limit on how many microphones your podcast can use. A three or four person podcast, recorded on a handful of mono tracks through your computer's own audio hardware, needs none of that capacity.

If you're delivering to a spec that specifically requires Atmos or immersive audio, which essentially no podcast does, Studio is the only option. For everything covered in this guide, the free version is functionally complete.

## How Does Recording in Fairlight Compare to Dedicated Podcast Tools?

Fairlight is a genuinely capable recorder, but it's not the only option, and being honest about where it wins and where it doesn't will save you from building a workflow around the wrong tool.

The consensus among people who've actually compared these tools breaks along one clear line: local, single-location recording versus remote, multi-location recording. Audacity is, in Riverside's own words, "the most widely used free podcast recording and editing software available," handling "multitrack recording" and basic noise reduction at zero cost (source: Riverside, Best Podcast Recording Software 2026). Reaper has a strong reputation among people mixing podcasts seriously, praised across audio forums as a genuinely capable choice for the format. Neither, though, gets you picture and sound in the same app the way Fairlight does.

On the other side, Riverside, Squadcast, and Zencastr solve a problem that has nothing to do with what's covered in this guide: recording a guest who isn't in the same room as you. These tools work by recording "each participant locally on their own device, capturing separate audio and video tracks" and uploading them progressively during the call, according to Riverside's own comparison of the category (source: Riverside, Best Podcast Recording Software 2026). If your podcast regularly has remote guests joining by video call, one of these belongs in your workflow regardless of whether you also use Fairlight, since Fairlight has no equivalent way to capture a remote participant's local audio.

**Where each tool actually wins**

| Tool | Best for | Where it falls short for a video podcast |
| --- | --- | --- |
| DaVinci Resolve Fairlight | In-person or same-location recording that ships as video, since editing happens in the same project | No remote-guest local recording; no live video capture |
| Audacity | Free, simple, audio-only recording with no video component at all | No picture editing; a separate app your video has to route around |
| Reaper | Serious audio-only mixing and post-production, low cost | Same limitation as Audacity: audio-only, separate from your video edit |
| Riverside / Squadcast / Zencastr | Remote guests joining from anywhere, recorded locally on their own device | Video editing, grading, and multicam still happen in a separate NLE afterward |
| GarageBand | Free, simple, Mac-only solo or small in-person recording | Mac-only; no picture editing; not built for a multi-guest podcast at scale |

The practical answer for most video podcasters recording in person: Fairlight for the recording and the edit, since you avoid moving files between apps entirely. The practical answer for a remote interview show: Riverside or a similar remote recorder for capturing the actual conversation, then DaVinci Resolve for everything that happens after the raw files land on your drive, editing, grading, and export.

## What Is Fairlight Live, and Should You Use It Instead?

In April 2026, alongside the DaVinci Resolve 21 release, Blackmagic announced **Fairlight Live**, a separate, free, standalone application, not a feature inside Resolve's timeline. It's worth understanding the distinction, because the name overlap causes real confusion.

Fairlight Live is "a fully software-based live audio mixer for macOS and Windows, targeting a range of use cases from podcast production to large-scale broadcast," supporting SMPTE-2110 broadcast networking and spatial audio, and working with "standard computer audio or USB audio from ATEM live production switchers" (source: audioXpress, Blackmagic Design Announces Software-Based Fairlight Live Revolution). Blackmagic Design CEO Grant Petty described it this way at launch: **"Fairlight Live is the world's most powerful live audio mixer. Being software-based means it is free from the limitations of traditional hardware systems; the only limitation is the power of your computer"** (source: audioXpress, Blackmagic Design Announces Software-Based Fairlight Live Revolution; corroborated by Sound on Sound's coverage of the same announcement).

Petty specifically called out podcasters as a target audience, noting the software accommodates users "ranging from podcasters experiencing professional audio mixing for the first time to sound engineers managing hundreds of channels" (source: Sound on Sound, Blackmagic Design introduce Fairlight Live). That's a genuinely relevant claim for anyone reading this guide, but it's describing a different tool than the one this guide walks through.

**Fairlight Live vs. recording inside DaVinci Resolve's Fairlight page**

| | Fairlight page (inside Resolve) | Fairlight Live (standalone app) |
| --- | --- | --- |
| What it is | The recording and mixing page of your DaVinci Resolve project | A separate, free, standalone live mixer application |
| Where your recording lands | Directly in your DaVinci Resolve project, ready to edit | Its own session; you'd still import the result into Resolve to edit picture |
| Best for | A podcast recorded and edited in one project, no live mixing needs | Live multi-channel mixing during recording, broadcast-style workflows, larger channel counts |
| Setup complexity | What this guide covers: patch, arm, monitor, record | A dedicated live-mixing interface with its own learning curve |

For a typical two or three person podcast recorded and then edited into a finished episode, the workflow in this guide, recording directly on the Fairlight page inside your Resolve project, is the simpler and more direct path, since your audio is already sitting in the same project you'll edit in. Fairlight Live becomes worth exploring separately if you're running something closer to a live broadcast, managing a much larger channel count, or want a dedicated live-mixing surface independent of your editing project entirely.

## Why Won't Fairlight Let Me Arm a Track, and Other Recording Problems?

Most recording problems in Fairlight trace back to one of a small number of causes, and Hollyland's dedicated troubleshooting guide covers them clearly (source: Hollyland Store, DaVinci Resolve Arm for Record Not Working). Here's the same set of fixes, organized around the symptom you're actually seeing.

**Problem: the Arm (R) button is greyed out and won't click.**

The track type is likely set to Bus or Aux instead of Audio, since those track types don't have a record-arm function at all. Right-click the track header, check its properties, and if needed, create a new standard Audio track instead. If the track type is correct, confirm it actually has an input patched; an unpatched track can also show a disabled arm control.

**Problem: the track arms, but the input meter never moves no matter how loud you speak.**

Work backward through the signal chain. First, confirm the correct device is selected under Preferences > System > Video and Audio I/O, not "None" or an unrelated built-in device. Second, open Fairlight > Patch Input/Output and confirm the hardware input is actually connected to that track's input, not left unpatched or patched to a different track. Third, check your operating system's microphone permissions, since this is, per Hollyland's guide, "the most common cause of recording failure, especially for users new to Fairlight" (source: Hollyland Store, DaVinci Resolve Arm for Record Not Working). On Mac, that's System Settings > Privacy & Security > Microphone; on Windows, Settings > Privacy > Microphone, checking both the general toggle and the one specifically for desktop apps.

**Problem: recording works, but you hear crackling or popping while monitoring.**

This is almost always a sample rate mismatch or a buffer size issue, the exact same real-time pipeline problem covered in depth in our sibling guide on [DaVinci Resolve audio crackling and popping during playback](https://tryuncle.com/learn/davinci-resolve/davinci-resolve-audio-crackling-and-popping-during-playback). Check that your project's sample rate matches your interface's native rate first, since that single mismatch causes a disproportionate share of reported cases.

**Problem: everything worked yesterday, nothing works today, same hardware.**

Corrupted preference files are a real, if less common, cause. Hollyland's guide suggests removing DaVinci Resolve's preference files (on Mac, found in `~/Library/Preferences/Blackmagic Design/DaVinci Resolve/`; on Windows, in `C:\Users\[Username]\AppData\Roaming\Blackmagic Design\DaVinci Resolve\`) and reinstalling or updating your interface's drivers before reconfiguring Audio I/O and the Patch Bay from scratch (source: Hollyland Store, DaVinci Resolve Arm for Record Not Working).

**Recording troubleshooting quick reference**

| Symptom | Most likely cause | Where to fix it |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Arm button greyed out | Wrong track type, or no input patched | Track properties, then Patch Input/Output |
| Meter shows nothing when speaking | Wrong device selected, unpatched input, or missing OS mic permission | Preferences > System > Audio I/O, Patch Bay, OS privacy settings |
| Crackling or popping during monitoring | Sample rate mismatch or buffer size too small | Project Settings > Fairlight, Preferences > System > Audio I/O |
| Worked before, broken now with same hardware | Corrupted preferences or outdated drivers | Delete preference files, update interface drivers |
| One track records, others on the same session don't | That track's input isn't patched, even though others are | Patch Input/Output, check every track individually |

## Is There an AI Tool That Helps While You Record a Podcast in DaVinci Resolve?

Everything in this guide is a fixed sequence: Preferences, Patch Bay, track type, arm, gain, monitor, record. It's not complicated once you've done it, but the first time through, it's easy to get stuck on one step, usually the Patch Bay, and not know whether the problem is your hardware, your settings, or something you missed three steps back.

TryUncle is an AI tutor for DaVinci Resolve on macOS. Ask in plain words and Uncle points at the exact control on your screen. If you're mid-setup and the Arm button won't click, or you can't find where Patch Input/Output lives in the menu, you can ask Uncle out loud or by typing, and it looks at your actual DaVinci Resolve window and points directly at the setting you need, live, without you leaving Fairlight to search a tutorial video for the right timestamp.

**Guided practice inside Resolve beats watching a course about Resolve.** That's the whole premise behind an in-app tutor rather than a pre-recorded video: a course teaches you the Patch Bay in a fixed order regardless of whether that's actually where you're stuck, while Uncle answers the question you have, about the project you're actually recording, at the exact moment you're stuck on it.

It's worth being direct about what this is and isn't. TryUncle doesn't record your podcast, patch your tracks, or set your gain for you; it's a paid macOS subscription in founder pricing at $29.99 a month, and it points and explains rather than acting on your project directly. If you're comparing it to tools that automate edits, like CutAgent or PremiereCopilot, or answer chat-style questions without seeing your screen, like Sottocut or heyeddie.ai, the distinction matters: those tools do things to your timeline; Uncle teaches you to do them yourself, on your own setup, which is the skill that actually carries over to your next recording session without the app in the room.

## The Setup, One Last Time

Patch your microphone, put it on its own mono track, arm that track, keep your gain between -12 and -6 dBFS, monitor through headphones without hearing an echo, and press record. That's the entire workflow underneath every section above. The failure points are almost never the recording itself; they're an unpatched input, a mismatched sample rate, or a greyed-out arm button with an obvious fix once you know where to look.

Run a 30-second test take before every real session, no matter how many times you've done this before. It costs you nothing, and it's the difference between catching a wrong input selection in thirty seconds and discovering it an hour into an interview you can't get back.

## FAQ

### Can you record a podcast directly in DaVinci Resolve for free?

Yes. Every tool needed to record a podcast, the Fairlight page, track patching, arming, input monitoring, and multi-track recording, is in the free version of DaVinci Resolve. DaVinci Resolve Studio adds Fairlight FX plugins, immersive and Atmos mixing, and AI region tracking, none of which you need to capture a clean recording.

### Do I need an audio interface, or can I record straight from a USB microphone?

A single-host show can record straight from one USB microphone with no interface at all; DaVinci Resolve treats it as a standard input device. The moment you add a second person in the room, you need either a multi-channel USB interface or a podcast mixer like a RODECaster, since DaVinci Resolve can only see as many separate input channels as your hardware actually exposes to it.

### What sample rate should I record a podcast at in DaVinci Resolve?

Match your project's audio sample rate to your microphone or interface's native rate before you record, not after, since a mismatch forces Resolve to resample in real time and is a documented cause of clicks and pops. 48 kHz is the standard choice for anything that might ship as video.

### Why is the Arm for Record button greyed out in Fairlight?

Almost always because the track has no input patched, the track type is Bus or Aux instead of Audio, or DaVinci Resolve doesn't have microphone permission in your operating system's privacy settings. Patch the input first through Fairlight > Patch Input/Output, then arm.

### Can I record video and audio for a podcast at the same time in DaVinci Resolve?

DaVinci Resolve doesn't capture live camera video the way it captures live audio; the Fairlight page's real-time record function is audio-only. Most video podcasters record camera footage separately, on the cameras themselves or through a capture device, then sync it to the Fairlight audio afterward using Auto Sync Audio.

### Is Fairlight better than Audacity or Riverside for recording a podcast?

Different jobs. Audacity and Fairlight are both free, local, single-machine recorders, and Fairlight's advantage is that your recording lands in the same app you'll edit and mix in. Riverside, Squadcast, and Zencastr solve a problem Fairlight doesn't touch at all: recording a remote guest locally on their own device over the internet.

### How do I record two or three people on separate tracks in DaVinci Resolve?

Create one mono audio track per person, patch each microphone or mixer channel to its own track through the Patch Input/Output panel, and arm every track before you hit record. Recording each voice to its own track, instead of one blended stereo mix, is what lets you edit, level, and clean up each speaker independently afterward.

### Is there an AI tool that helps while I'm actually recording a podcast in DaVinci Resolve?

TryUncle watches your DaVinci Resolve screen while you work and points at the exact control, including the Patch Input/Output panel, the Arm button, or the input gain slider, if you get stuck mid-setup. It doesn't record or edit for you. It's a paid macOS app, not a recording tool itself.

## Sources

- [DaVinci Resolve - Fairlight (Blackmagic Design product page)](https://www.blackmagicdesign.com/products/davinciresolve/fairlight)
- [DaVinci Resolve Manual: Video & Audio I/O (Blackmagic Design, mirrored)](https://www.steakunderwater.com/VFXPedia/__man/Resolve18-6/DaVinciResolve18_Manual_files/part124.htm)
- [DaVinci Resolve Manual: The Fairlight Page (Blackmagic Design, mirrored)](https://www.steakunderwater.com/VFXPedia/__man/Resolve18-6/DaVinciResolve18_Manual_files/part58.htm)
- [How to Record Audio in DaVinci Resolve (Step-by-Step Guide), Hollyland Store](https://store.hollyland.com/blogs/creator-hub/record-audio-in-davinci-resolve)
- [DaVinci Resolve Arm for Record Not Working: 7 Fixes That Actually Work, Hollyland Store](https://store.hollyland.com/blogs/creator-hub/davinci-resolve-arm-for-record-not-working)
- [How to Create Podcasts in DaVinci Resolve, by Arthur Ditner (OWC Blog)](https://www.owc.com/blog/how-to-create-podcasts-in-davinci-resolve)
- [Recording Audio in Fairlight (DVResolve.com)](https://dvresolve.com/tutorial/recording-audio-in-fairlight/)
- [Organizing Multi-Track Audio in Fairlight (DVResolve.com)](https://dvresolve.com/tutorial/organizing-multi-track-audio-fairlight/)
- [Blackmagic Design Announces Software-Based Fairlight Live Revolution (audioXpress)](https://audioxpress.com/news/blackmagic-design-announces-software-based-fairlight-live-revolution)
- [Blackmagic Design introduce Fairlight Live (Sound on Sound)](https://www.soundonsound.com/news/blackmagic-design-introduce-fairlight-live)
- [Best Podcast Recording Software 2026 (Riverside)](https://riverside.com/blog/best-podcast-recording-software)
- [DaVinci Resolve - Tech Specs: Fairlight Audio Accelerator (Blackmagic Design)](https://www.blackmagicdesign.com/products/davinciresolve/techspecs/W-FAIR-18)
- [DaVinci Resolve Manual: Timeline Sample Rate (Blackmagic Design, mirrored)](https://www.steakunderwater.com/VFXPedia/__man/Resolve18-6/DaVinciResolve18_Manual_files/part187.htm)
- [DaVinci Resolve Not Recording Audio (Beginners Approach)](https://beginnersapproach.com/davinci-resolve-record-audio/)