
Century Tube Channel Strip™
-
Capture "first take" magic with easy-to-use preamp, EQ, and compression.
With a vintage-inspired tube mic preamp, transparent dynamics control, and intuitively voiced EQ, the Century Tube Preamp plug‑in lets you stay in the creative zone while you record and mix, helping you capture inspiration with stunning results.
Included Versions
UAD Native
Runs on your Mac or PC without UA hardware.Apollo Realtime & UAD‑2
Runs accelerated on Apollo interfaces and UAD‑2 hardware.UAD Native plug-ins run on both macOS 10.15 Catalina or newer and Windows 10 and 11. Go to our UA Support page for system requirements.
- Enhance and simplify your recording workflow with a first-pass tool designed for tracking vocals, guitars, synths and more
- Stay in the creative zone and confidently record performances with a broad stroke, "do‑no‑harm," tube channel strip
- Easily flatter your tracks with a vintage-style tube mic preamp, simple three-band EQ, and optical compressor
- Control Apollo interface mic preamp gain staging and impedance directly from the Century Tube Channel Strip plug-in via Unison™ technology
TAKE A LISTEN
The Perfect Tube Mic Pre for your Vocals
The Century Tube Channel Strip's mic preamp will give your vocals the warmth and detail that only a tube mic pre can provide. The stunning range of tones, from subtle to saturated, will coax inspiring performances no matter the genre. Use the Low/High gain switch to match the Century's Tube Preamp to your microphone, with the Low setting complementing more modern condensers, while the High position excels with dynamic and ribbon microphones.
Unison Technology for Apollo
Century Tube Channel Strip blurs the lines between analog and digital, giving you all of the important impedance, gain staging “sweet spots,” and circuit behaviors of a vintage tube preamp, thanks to UA's groundbreaking Unison technology. The secret is Unison’s bi‑directional control and communication from the Century Tube Channel Strip plug‑in to the digitally controlled mic preamps in Apollo.
Easy EQ Seasoning for Vocals, Guitar, and More
With its intuitive, musically voiced, three-band EQ, the Century Tube Channel Strip is perfect for quickly bringing out the details in a breathy vocal, adding some punch to an overdriven electric guitar, or giving an acoustic rhythm guitar propulsive sizzle and shine.
Get Optimal Compression Quickly
Featuring a classic optical leveler, the Century Tube Channel Strip’s dynamics section takes the guesswork out of compression settings with a single knob. Quickly tame a dynamic vocal or bass performance, and add energy and harmonics to acoustic guitars or piano — all with a twist of a knob. The Century’s leveler can also compress as effect, adding grit and texture to keys and soft synths with character and vibe to spare.
Add Character and Color to your Mixes
Of course, the Century Tube Channel Strip plug‑in isn’t just for realtime recording with Apollo. You can also run it natively in your DAW and give your vocals, guitars, and synths, vintage‑inspired tone and character, without ever leaving the box.
UAD Quick Tips
Learn how to quickly turn your recordings into album-ready tracks with Century Tube Channel Strip.
“The Century Tube Channel Strip is a simple to use starting point for just about anyone — offering tube sound in a straight forward signal path.”
– John Paterno (Robbie Williams, Badly Drawn Boy, Bonnie Raitt)“The Century Tube Channel Strip makes it effortless to get awesome, warm, vintage sounds from sterile sounding digital tracks.”
– Ian Boxill (Lenny White, Prince, 2Pac)“The Century Tube Channel Strip powerfully combines the best of vintage and modern. On vocals and dialog, it imparts forwardness, sheen and body — remarkably simple, but versatile and effective.”
– Richard Chycki (Rush, Aerosmith, Dream Theater)Customer Reviews
f. fallahi
August 29, 2023
Fast, useful, great, album ready
you can use it on everything and it wont let you down
Read MoreC. Heschl
August 24, 2023
OMG Awesome!!
Analog goodness! A far step into sweet plugin goodness! Such a GREAT sounding plug.
Read MoreD. Roseborough
July 20, 2023
The acronym UAD should stand for Ultra Audio Design Century Tube Channel strip
I was a little skeptical at first especially trying UAD plugins for the very first time. I was looking for an easy to use very intuitive channel strip and stumbled across...
Read Moreg. parenti
July 15, 2023
Perfecto
Muy bueno, me encanta la saturación del pre y su calidez!
Read MoreI. Finney
July 15, 2023
Instant Gratification
If you need to track a source via a tube preamp with all the options you need, this does the job perfectly.
Read More -
Key Features
Vintage-inspired channel strip made for UA Audio Interface tracking, always easy to dial and musically flattering
Console-inspired tube preamp with bold and musical hardware sound
Three-band EQ with simple high and low shelf tone control and sweepable midrange
Performance-inspiring single knob optical dynamics control with firm yet transparent response
Physical input impedance and front panel control of gain staging and other preamp parameters with Unison Mic Preamp Technology
Requires a UAD DSP Accelerator or UA Audio Interface available from authorized dealers worldwide
-
Customer Reviews
Century Tube Channel Strip
f. fallahi
Fast, useful, great, album ready
you can use it on everything and it wont let you down
C. Heschl
OMG Awesome!!
Analog goodness! A far step into sweet plugin goodness! Such a GREAT sounding plug.
O. Kudin
I personally did not like(
The preamp is good, everything else is not so good.
I don't understand why this plugin is being praised.
The optical compressor is very bad, ruins the sound a lot and sounds like LMC from SSL.
The equalizer section is the most ordinary and there is no surprising sound there.D. Roseborough
The acronym UAD should stand for Ultra Audio Design Century Tube Channel strip
I was a little skeptical at first especially trying UAD plugins for the very first time. I was looking for an easy to use very intuitive channel strip and stumbled across this thing and haven't looked back. At the time I couldn't afford any outboard gear to track through then seen a video on how this thing works and I was sold on how this plugin really does great on emulation. Not only is it easy to dial in what you need but it sounds freakin awesome! also I'm a firm believer not to over pay for plugins and then have to deal with buyers remorse. I'm going to say it the plugins are to damn expensive. so I'm playing the waiting game to see if they'll come down in price again. I also like that you can check the plugin out in trial mode without any stupid watermarks and what have you. Anyway thanks UAD for making a great product.
j. lane
Love it!
I’ve been using this channel strip on everything lately.
g. parenti
Perfecto
Muy bueno, me encanta la saturación del pre y su calidez!
I. Finney
Instant Gratification
If you need to track a source via a tube preamp with all the options you need, this does the job perfectly.
M. Spicewicz
Good purchase
Its very simple and very musical, money well spent :)
A. Lee
Surprised
Great mid range warmth, lots of uses
A. Legner
Für jeden Kanal geeignet
Sehr gute Presets
M. Oehmke
Century Tube
Exceptional plug-in by UA
O. Cuellar
Best channel strip
it lets my creativity flow, it is very easy to use,
M. TRAP
Not impressed
At the moment i've tryed it few times but i never was really impressed.
Maybe i'll be back to change this comment.
O. Okoke
Beautiful Tube Sound
You can’t go wrong with this one!
Give’s you THAT Tubey sound with the help of beautiful EQD. Groulx
Nice smooth CS!
Does exactly what you need it to do.
D. Hogan
This is cool
This is cool
V. Anselmo
Awesome Channel Strip !
Super easy to get a great sound
d. neill
Great Channel Strip!
Really nice channel strip, easy to use & can achieve lots of different tones really easily.
C. Domenico
Century Tube Channel Strip
ingenious channel strip sounds very good, easy to use and versatile ... more of this please.
M. van Dongen
What a great sound from the tubes
I really love this channel strip. Don't let it fool you by the limited controls, it has a very good sound and very easy to dial in compressor.