Hysterizer Light

Hysterizer Light is a free digital implementation of hysterisis, a type of subtle lagging/softening effect found on magnetic recordings. This effect can tame unruly transients and thus add an extra level of sonic polish. Use Hysterizer's mix-control to fine tune the exact amount of hysterisis on your tracks. Pick from eight presets to start your transient-taming journey.

Use Cases:

• Adjust the amount of "snap" in snares, kick drums, and picked bass tracks
• Control "plosives" (loud consonants) in vocals
• When placed before dynamics processors you can smooth out transients for better compressor/limiter performance 
• Inject your recordings with extra groove thanks to more coherent micro-dynamics

The Light-version has 2x and 4x oversampling options. For even more professional users, Hysterizer Elite is there to provide 8x oversampling.

Instructions:

1. Start with the Clean preset and adjust the Inertia control, discussed next, to your liking.

Higher values for Inertia mean:

• Transients have to push harder to get through
• Small movements are resisted entirely
• The sound feels heavier and more "stuck"

Lower values for Inertia translate to:

• Immediate response
• Better sensitivity
• More harmonic detail at lower levels

2. Experiment with the mix-control to control effect intensity.

3. Make sure to A/B your track with the bypass control frequently.

This plugin has been verified by Pluginval at strictness level 10.

Installation

Unzip and copy Hysterizer.vst3 into your audio plugin folder. 

This is usually c:\Program Files\Common Files\VST3.  

Release history:

• January 2026. First release (ver 1.0)