Questions people ask about PedalSpice.

PedalSpice is a guitar pedal circuit simulator that works in your web browser. You draw your pedal circuit, press Run, and see the frequency curve and the voltages. Then you play a real guitar through what you drew, so you can hear your idea before you spend a dime on parts.

Yes. PedalSpice was made for pedal builders, so the parts, pots, and switches you need are already in it, and we add more parts every month. There's one big Run button and nothing else to set up, and you hear a real guitar through your circuit instead of just looking at a graph. If you've ever given up on LTspice, this was made for you.

No. PedalSpice is made to be so easy that you shouldn't need the help guide, but it's there if you want it. You draw the circuit the way you'd sketch it on paper. You type values the way you already write them, like 4k7, 4.7k, or 100n, and you press one big Run button. When something's wrong, it tells you in plain English and lights up the part.

No. If you can read a pedal schematic and draw one, you can use PedalSpice. It runs a real SPICE simulation behind the scenes, but you never have to type a command or pick a setting for it.

Yes. Open the Tube Screamer core, change one part, and hear what it does. That's how most people learn what each part in a pedal does, and PedalSpice lets you do it without soldering anything.

You don't have to. The parts pedal builders use are already built in, and we add more every month. There are no model files to hunt for and no hidden folder to find.

Yes. PedalSpice works in the web browser on almost any computer, like a Mac, a Windows computer, a Linux computer, or a Chromebook.

A lot of it does, but PedalSpice is made for a desktop or laptop computer, so some things won't work well on a touchscreen. We're building a separate touchscreen version now.

No. You open it in your web browser and start drawing.

Make an account with your email or your Google sign-in, and you're on the drawing screen. Your 7 days of Pro start right then, and you don't need a credit card.

Yes. Four working circuits are ready to open: a basic op amp stage, the core of a Tube Screamer without the input and output buffers, and OD1 and OD250 style circuits. You can open one and start changing parts in the first minute.

It's accurate. PedalSpice runs a real SPICE simulation, the same kind of circuit math engineers use, and the part models come from the makers' own published data. The curves and voltages you see come from actually working out the circuit you drew. You'll still want to breadboard it to know for sure, but you'll know first whether the idea is worth building.

Yes, and it sounds like a real guitar through a real amp, because that's what it is. Pick one of the recorded guitar clips, with both lead and rhythm parts, or upload a clip of you playing your own guitar. Your playing goes through the circuit you drew and then into an amp made with NAM (Neural Amp Modeler), one of the most accurate ways to copy the sound of a real amp. Use the amps that come with it, or load your own NAM amp file. You can get thousands of them free at TONE3000.com, so you can hear your pedal in front of almost any amp you can think of. Turn a knob, play it again, and you'll hear the same change you saw on the screen, all before you order a single part.

It sounds very close to how that circuit will sound once you build it. A real recorded guitar goes through a real SPICE simulation of your circuit, and then through amp sounds made with NAM, the same way of copying an amp that guitar players trust for their own amp sounds.

Yes. Upload a clip of your own playing, or use one of the eight lead and rhythm clips that come with it. You can play it on a loop and download what you hear as a WAV file.

Yes. Load any NAM amp file and you'll hear your circuit through that amp. If you've made a NAM file of your own amp, you'll hear your pedal the way it would sound in your rig. If you haven't, you can get thousands of free ones at TONE3000.com.

Press Run. The frequency curve shows up right away, so you can see what the tone stack does to your tone without setting anything up.

Press Run and look at the waveform. It's shown in real volts, so you can see the bias and where the circuit starts to clip.

Not yet, but it's coming soon for subscribers. For now, the waveform shows you in real volts where the circuit starts to clip and how hard it's clipping.

PedalSpice shows the DC voltage at every point right on your drawing, so you can check the bias at a glance. It can show the input and output impedance too.

Type in the drain voltage you want, and PedalSpice sets the trimmer for you, so you skip the guesswork.

It can't see your real board, so it won't find a bad solder joint, a part put in backwards, or a wiring mistake, but it can still help a lot. It shows you what the voltage should be at every point in the circuit, so you have real numbers to check with your meter and can find where your pedal stops matching.

It has the parts guitar pedals are made from: resistors, caps, pots, dual-gang pots, op amps, OTAs, NPN and PNP transistors, JFETs, MOSFETs, diodes, and switches. You can pick real part numbers for the op amps, OTAs, transistors, JFETs, MOSFETs, and diodes, and we add more every month.

No. PedalSpice has real pots that you turn like a knob. You can pick audio, linear, reverse audio, W taper, or trim, the same kinds you pick when you order pots for a build. You can double-click a knob to set it back to noon.

Not yet. We're working on a version made just for tube amps and tube amp circuits.

PedalSpice tells you in plain English and lights up the part. If a leg isn't hooked up, there's no ground, there's a short, or an op amp has no bias, it tells you in plain words, so you don't have to figure out an error message written for engineers.

Yes. Type in three values, like 1nF, 10nF, and 100nF, and you'll see all three curves on one graph with a table of the numbers under it. You can also freeze a result and compare your next idea to it.

Use one of the circuit calculators. Move the sliders and watch the frequency curve change as you go, so there's no math to do by hand. When it sounds right, press Send to Pedal Spice and click where you want that tone stack in your drawing, and the values are already filled in. There are sixteen calculators for tone stacks, gain stages, mid scoops, and more, and we add more every month for subscribers.

No. Circuit blocks are whole working sections you add with one click instead of drawing them part by part. There are six gain stages and six tone stacks, and we add more every month for subscribers. Put one in an empty spot, on a wire, or on a connection dot, and the rest of your circuit moves over to make room.

Yes. When a circuit sounds just the way you like it, save it to My Blocks. It shows up at the top of your Circuit Blocks menu, ready for every pedal you build after that.

Copy a link that holds your whole circuit. When your friend opens it, they can turn the knobs and press Run on your circuit. That's much better than posting a screenshot in a Facebook group and hoping someone can read it.

Yes. Get a clear schematic as a PDF to print, and a parts list as a spreadsheet with a buy link for every part. You can also save the circuit file itself.

You can export a clear schematic as a PDF to print, a parts list as a spreadsheet with a buy link for every part, the circuit file itself, and a file for KiCad (beta) that puts every part and connection into KiCad's board editor. That means you can go from your drawing to your parts order, or to laying out your own board, without drawing the circuit twice.

Yes. Use Export for KiCad, which is in beta. When your circuit sounds right, export it, open KiCad's board editor, and follow the four steps the export window shows you. Every part and every connection comes in, and each part already has its footprint picked. You won't have to draw the circuit again or pick footprints one part at a time. Your guitar input, amp output, and 9V power each get their own pads for wiring. It comes with Pro and the 7-day trial.

No. It puts every part and connection in KiCad's board editor. Then you place the parts and draw the traces the way you want your board to look. It goes to the board side of KiCad, so it doesn't make a KiCad schematic.

Parts whose pin order we've checked come in the way they are. Any part we haven't checked yet is marked "Pinout may not be correct. Please verify." in the export window and in the file, so you know which ones to check against the datasheet before you order boards.

Not yet, but it's coming soon for subscribers. For now, you can export your circuit's simulation file, the schematic PDF, the parts list, and a file for KiCad (beta).

Yes. PedalSpice saves your work as you go, so if you refresh your browser, you won't lose anything. It also asks you before you close anything you haven't saved.

Yes. There's a Free plan you can keep as long as you want. Every new account also gets 7 days of Pro free first, and you don't need a credit card.

Pro is $79 every 3 months, or $229 a year. The yearly plan comes to $19.09 a month and saves you $87. A whole year costs about the same as one pedal.

PedalSpice is much easier to use, and it's made just for pedal builders. But there's another big reason. When a free program gives you trouble, there's usually no one to ask. You're left to figure it out yourself, or post on a forum and hope someone answers someday. When you pay for PedalSpice, you get help from us when you need it. You also get new parts, circuit blocks, and calculators every month. Everything we do is about making PedalSpice more useful to you.

No. Every new account gets 7 days of Pro free. You only enter a card if you want to keep using Pro after the 7 days.

Your account goes to Free, and everything you made stays. You keep all four starter circuits, up to three knobs on a circuit, ten guitar plays a month, and ten saved circuits.

No. We never take away anything you already made.

Use the Manage plan button inside the app. It opens the billing page, and you can cancel there any time.

PedalSpice is owned by the Wampler Pedals company, so the charge shows the Wampler Pedals name along with PEDALSPICE.

Yes. Use the Pedal Spice for Teams form. Tell us how many people at your company need it, and we'll work with you.