How to read your mastering report
The report is the part of MasteringOne that other services do not have. It is not there to impress you with numbers — it is there so you can tell whether the master did the right thing, and say exactly what to change if it did not.
· 6 min read
1. Input diagnosis
The first thing the engine does is measure your file and tell you how much room there is to work with. 'Mastering headroom: plenty' means the track has dynamics to spend. 'Limited' means it was already dense or clipped and the master will be mostly tonal. This is shown before mastering finishes, so you know the ceiling before you pay.
It also lists specific findings: a high-frequency cutoff (usually an MP3 source), clipping, DC offset, or an unusually narrow or wide stereo image.
2. Measurements, before and after
| Row | What it is | What to look for |
|---|---|---|
| Integrated LUFS | Average loudness | Landed at the target (usually within 0.1) |
| True peak | Highest peak after re-encoding | At or below −1 dBTP |
| Loudness range (LRA) | How much the loudness varies | Should not drop much; a big drop means over-compression |
| Crest factor / PLR | Peaks vs average | Reduction of 2–4 dB is normal; more means the track was very dynamic |
| Side/Mid | Stereo width | Small changes only; big changes mean the engine widened or narrowed on purpose |
| Spectrum by band | Energy in 7 frequency bands | The 'after' column should be closer to the commercial reference than 'before' |
3. Engineer's note
This is a paragraph written by the AI engineer for your track, explaining what it found and what it decided. It is written in your language. It will say things like 'the 6–12 kHz band is 4.2 dB above the reference, so I applied a broad −2.5 dB cut at 7.5 kHz rather than relying on saturation alone'.
Read this even if you skip everything else. It is the fastest way to tell whether the engine understood your track.
4. The chain
The exact settings applied, in order: high-pass, EQ bands, saturation, multiband compression, stereo, limiter. Two numbers matter most:
- EQ gains: small moves (1–3 dB) mean the track was close to the reference. A 5 dB move is the engine telling you something was significantly off.
- Limiter gain reduction: how hard the limiter worked to reach the target. Under 2–3 dB is comfortable. Higher numbers are flagged, with the reason.
Using the report to ask for changes
The report gives you the vocabulary for a revision. Instead of 'it sounds off', you can say 'the 7.5 kHz cut made the vocal dull — halve it' or 'the low shelf is too much on the bass'. Those are precise instructions, and the engine redesigns the chain around them. On Creator and Pro plans that is the revision workflow; on any plan you can type the request before mastering.
Try it on your own track
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