OneTaskBy Tim King · Updated
Podcast Clip Cutter
Cut a Social Clip From an Episode and Normalise It to -16 LUFS
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How the Podcast Clip Cutter works
This podcast clip cutter exports a quote from a long episode. Load the episode, drag across the waveform to mark the quote or moment you want to share, and press Preview to hear it. The export cuts that section, adds a fade at each end, pads it with a little silence so it does not start abruptly, and raises or lowers the level so it sits at a standard loudness. The result is a clip you can drop straight into a video editor, an audiogram tool or a social post. Decoding and processing all happen in your browser.
Podcast clip cutter: what it does and why
A clip lifted straight out of an episode rarely sounds right on its own. It starts on a half-word, ends with a click, and is either too quiet next to everything else in a feed or so loud that platforms turn it down. This tool applies the four fixes a podcast editor would make by hand, in one pass.
Fades. The fade in is short, a hundred and fifty milliseconds by default, so the first word is intact but the cut is not a hard edge. The fade out is longer, because a spoken clip that trails away sounds deliberate where one that stops dead sounds cut off. Both are linear gain ramps applied to the selected region.
Padding. Video editors and social platforms tend to swallow the first few frames, so a clip that starts at zero loses its first syllable. A hundred milliseconds of silence before and three hundred after give the audio room; they are counted in the output length shown in the stats.
Loudness. The clip is measured to the ITU-R BS.1770 integrated loudness standard and gain is applied to hit the target. -16 LUFS is the level most podcast platforms and Apple's guidelines expect and is a good default for social video; -14 matches YouTube and Spotify's music normalisation. A true-peak ceiling of -1 dBTP is enforced, so a clip with a loud laugh or a plosive is raised as far as the peak allows rather than clipped; the stats show the measured loudness before and after so you can see when the ceiling has limited the gain.
Mono. Speech recorded on one microphone gains nothing from stereo and the file halves in size, so choose Mono for a voice clip. Keep the channels for anything with music beds or stereo effects.
The format selector below the settings picks WAV or MP3 for the export. WAV is right if the clip is going into an editor; MP3 at 192 kbps is fine for anything that ends up on a phone.
FAQ
Why does the clip still sound quiet after normalising?
The true-peak ceiling stopped it. A clip with one loud moment cannot be raised far without that moment clipping. Check the Measured line in the stats; if the after value is well short of the target, trim the loud moment out or accept the level.
Can I add a music bed or an intro sting?
Not here. Export the clip and combine it in the audio joiner or a video editor, where you can control the mix and the timing. Normalise the clip first so the voice sits at a known level before you balance the music under it.
What length should a social clip be?
Thirty to ninety seconds is the usual range; platforms that show a waveform or captions do best under a minute. The stats show the output length as you drag the handles.
Does it also make the video or waveform image?
No. Pair it with the waveform image generator for a still soundwave picture sized for the platform, or an audiogram tool for a video that animates with the audio. Both work better from a clip that has already been cut and normalised here.
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