Synth / Native Instruments
Massive X
8.1Great
Massive X is Native Instruments' polyphonic wavetable synthesizer plug-in built around two wavetable oscillators and a modular routing engine.
Plugin comparison
Massive X vs Nexus 5
Specs, price and the Dubspot Score, side by side — with our verdict on which synth to buy.
Independent score / workflow fit / buying signal
Contenders
The side-by-side
Synth / reFX
Nexus 5
8.1Great
NEXUS5 by reFX is a ROMpler/synthesizer plugin with eight sound-generator types, thousands of factory presets, effects, and a built-in sample editor.
Technical matrix
Specs compared
| Signal | Massive X | Nexus 5 |
|---|---|---|
| Price | — | — |
| Dubspot Score | 8.1 | 8.1 |
| Formats | VST, VST3, AU, AAX | VST, VST3, AU (AudioUnit), AAX |
| Wavetables | Over 170 wavetables | — |
| Oscillators | Two wavetable oscillators plus two phase modulation oscillators | — |
| Oscillator modes | 10 oscillator modes, each with their own sub-modes | — |
| Filters | Eight filters with multiple modes (low/high/band-pass, comb, parallel and serial dual filters) | — |
| Effects | Up to three insert effects in series or parallel, plus output Stereo FX | Includes Bucket Brigade Delay, Particle Reverb, Vowel Filter, Rotary, and Pusher, plus 216 impulse responses |
| Standalone | Plug-in only; does not run in standalone mode | — |
| System requirements | Intel processor with AVX or Apple Silicon; 64-bit only | — |
| Sound generators | — | 8 types: Virtual Analog, Sampler, Wavetable, Time Stretcher, Retro Sampler, Grain, Cloud, and FM |
| Presets | — | 5,454 included in the Starter edition; 33,352 in the Complete edition |
| Sample library | — | 6,810 multi-samples (~65.8 GB uncompressed) |
| Editing & sequencing | — | Built-in sample editor with slicer/loop/crossfade, 119 arpeggiator presets, and 52 trancegate presets |
| Operating systems | — | macOS 10.13+ (native Apple Silicon support) and Windows 10/11 |
See the full plugin database for more comparisons.