About Audient
Audient is a British pro audio company founded in 1997 by David Dearden and Gareth Davies in Hampshire, England, where it remains headquartered. The pair had already built a reputation in large-format console design through DDA (Dearden-Davies Associates), founded in 1980 and later acquired by Klark Teknik, and they brought that console pedigree into Audient with the ASP8024 large-format inline recording console, released in 1998. That console's Class-A preamp circuit is the lineage every Audient interface still traces back to today.
Audient moved into desktop USB audio interfaces in 2013 with the iD22, and the iD range has since grown to include the iD14, iD4, iD44, iD24, and iD48. In 2020 the company launched EVO, a simplified sub-brand aimed at first-time recordists. Independent reviewers have consistently singled out the preamp quality inherited from the ASP8024: Sound on Sound described the iD4 MKII's mic inputs as "clear, spacious and noise-free," and MusicRadar praised its "tried and tested Audient preamp" and JFET instrument input. Our own testing reached the same conclusion, rating the iD4 MKII as the best-sounding single-input preamp we tested in this category.
Brand website: audient.com
What Audient makes
Audient's catalog runs wider than the gear we review. The lines we know best from our own testing are marked with a star:
iD Series Desktop Interfaces
USB-C audio interfaces built around Audient's ASP8024-derived Class-A preamps, from the single-input iD4 up to the 8-channel iD48 — featured on House of Octave
EVO Series
A simplified sub-brand launched in 2020 with Smartgain automatic level-setting, aimed at first-time recordists
ASP Recording Consoles
Large-format analog mixing consoles for professional studios, the lineage the iD preamps descend from
ORIA
An immersive monitoring audio interface for Dolby Atmos and object-based mixing
Sono
A guitar and bass recording interface pairing amp modeling with a dedicated instrument input
Why we recognized Audient
The House of Octave Top Brand recognition isn't paid for and can't be applied for. We award it to the brands whose gear consistently stands out in our player-tested category guides. Audient earned it on the strength of the products below, judged the same way every product on this site is: assessed on build, tone, and playability, weighed against what players actually report over years of use, and ranked on merit.
Audient gear we rated highly
Audient iD4 MKII USB-C Audio Interface
Its preamp is derived from Audient's ASP8024 recording console and carries around 58dB of clean Class-A gain, enough to drive a Shure SM7B or another low-output dynamic microphone without the hiss entry-level interfaces add at the top of the dial. An assignable scroll wheel controls monitor level and, with a second press, the blend between input and playback, entirely in hardware, and two independent headphone outputs let a second person in the room dial in their own mix. The instrument input uses a discrete JFET circuit that reads audibly cleaner on a passive guitar than a generic Hi-Z jack.
Read the 13 Best Audio Interfaces of 2026 (Home Studio, Podcasting, iPad & 8-Channel) guide →What earned Audient the recognition
- Audient's founders, David Dearden and Gareth Davies, built their reputation in large-format console design at DDA before founding Audient in 1997, and the ASP8024 console they released in 1998 is the circuit lineage every Audient interface still descends from
- The iD4 MKII's preamp is derived directly from the ASP8024 console and delivers around 58dB of clean Class-A gain, enough headroom for low-output broadcast dynamics like the Shure SM7B, which is the standout figure in our testing of this category
- Independent reviewers agree with our findings: Sound on Sound called the iD4 MKII's mic inputs 'clear, spacious and noise-free,' and MusicRadar praised its preamp and JFET instrument input
- Two independent headphone outputs on a single-input interface let a producer and a vocalist each dial in their own monitor mix, a feature not common at this tier
- The assignable scroll wheel puts monitor level and input/playback blend under direct hardware control rather than requiring a software panel