How to Record an Audiobook at Home: Room, Mic, Settings

The room comes first

ACX asks narrators for “a dedicated space to record, master, and edit your audio”, and SAG-AFTRA notes that narrators largely work from home studios.^7,8 The room matters more than the microphone, because nothing fixes it afterwards: Audacity’s audiobook guide says there are no tools to remove noises that keep changing, so traffic, dogs and the neighbour’s TV “are now your permanent performance partners.”⁴

• Quiet: the finished files need a noise floor of −60 dB RMS or lower, and mastering raises the noise along with the voice.⁶ Audacity’s guide treats about −65 dB as comfortably quiet.⁴
• Dead: Audacity recommends “a quiet room with no echoes”.⁴ Soft furnishings, hanging clothes and blankets around you absorb reflections, which is why a closet full of clothes is a common budget booth.
• Steady: switch off fans, fridges and notifications while you record, and record at quiet times of day.

The equipment

ACX’s gear posts name examples at every price: condensers such as the Rode NT1, Audio-Technica AT2020 and AKG C214; USB microphones such as the Rode NT-USB Mini and Samson G-Track Pro for beginners; and dynamics such as the Shure SM7B and Rode PodMic for less ideal rooms. “A built-in laptop microphone or gaming headset just won’t cut it.”² For software, REAPER has a $60 discounted licence, Audition is $20.99 a month and Audacity is free; ACX advises against GarageBand because it is “not conducive to punch-and-roll recording”.³

Recording settings

ACX specifies what you deliver, not how you record: 192 kbps or higher constant-bit-rate MP3 at 44.1 kHz, all files mono or all stereo.⁶ Record and edit in uncompressed WAV, keep a backup of the raw reading, and make MP3s only at the end.⁴ Recording at 44.1 kHz means no sample-rate conversion when you export. Record peaks at about −6 dB, leaving headroom.⁴ Use mono for a single voice.

The workflow, from script to delivery

1. 1

   Prepare the script

   Read the book first. Mark character voices and look up every name and unusual word, so you don’t stop mid-sentence to check.

2. 2

   Test the room

   Measure the noise with your microphone and settings. The finished file needs −60 dB or lower, and mastering raises the noise, so leave a margin.

3. 3

   Record a minute of room tone

   At the start of each session, with everything set up exactly as you’ll record.

4. 4

   Record with punch-and-roll

   When you stumble, stop, go back to just before the mistake, let the software play a few seconds in, and read on from there. The take replaces the mistake.

5. 5

   Edit

   Remove mistakes and noises; fill gaps with room tone; keep pauses natural and under 5 seconds. Narration clean-up softens mouth clicks, lowers breaths that stand out and tames harsh “s” sounds.

6. 6

   Master and check

   Low-cut the rumble, bring the RMS to about −20 dB, limit peaks to −3.5 dB, export 192 kbps CBR MP3 at 44.1 kHz, then check every file.

7. 7

   Listen through

   Proof-listen against the text for misreads, noises and level jumps between chapters before you deliver.

Punch-and-roll is the industry’s standard method: SAG-AFTRA says audiobook employers expect “punch and roll” WAV files from narrators.⁵

Mastering to ACX levels

Audacity’s documented chain for audiobooks is a low roll-off EQ for rumble, loudness normalisation to −20 dB RMS, then a limiter with its ceiling at −3.5 dB, then an ACX check; peaks and RMS “should be nearly perfect”. It also warns that ACX’s human reviewers don’t like heavy processing.⁴ Every setting, for Audacity 3 and 4, is in Audacity for audiobooks.

How long it takes

ACX estimates a new narrator spends about 6.2 hours per finished hour.¹ At 9,300 words per finished hour, a 90,000-word novel is about 9.7 finished hours, or roughly 60 hours of work.