Youlean Loudness Meter: What Every Reading Means, Where It Goes, and a Target Chart

The short answer: Youlean Loudness Meter 2 is a free LUFS and true peak meter, with a paid Pro version, that runs as a VST, VST3, AU or AAX plugin on Windows and macOS. Put it last on the master, after the limiter, reset it, and play the whole song from start to finish. Then read four numbers: Integrated loudness (compare it with your genre, not with -14), True Peak max (at or below -1.0 dBTP for streaming), Short-term max (how loud the drop or chorus gets), and PLR (how much peak headroom is left above the average). LRA tells you how much the song breathes. The meter doesn't make anything louder. It tells you whether the limiter did the job you asked for.

I master my own releases (Sony, Universal, Ultra, Dim Mak, 50M+ streams), and Youlean is the meter in the 60-second check I run on every master before delivery, the one laid out in what LUFS is. I also sell mastering chains, disclosed at the end.

Free vs Pro: what you actually get

Download it from youlean.co and nowhere else. The free version never expires and shows every reading in this post.

Youlean lists the current free and Pro split, and the Pro price, on its site; both change, so check there before you buy. You don't need a streaming preset to measure a song. For music, a preset mostly sets the target line and the alert colors; the integrated and true peak readings come from the same measurement standard (ITU-R BS.1770) either way.

Every reading, explained

PLR is the one people skip, and it's the most useful for comparing masters. A master at -8 LUFS integrated with a true peak max of -1 dBTP has a PLR of 7. Push the limiter harder and the integrated number climbs while the peak stays at the ceiling, so PLR shrinks: that's the density you're trading for loudness.

The main meter shows momentary and short-term loudness (the meter style is selectable), and the hold-max values keep the highest momentary, short-term and true peak readings. Labels and layout can change between versions, so treat the plugin window and Youlean's manual as the authority. If the true peak terms are new, what true peak is explains why a sample peak meter can miss them.

Where it goes

Last on the master, after the limiter and anything else that changes level. If it sits before the limiter, it measures a song you aren't going to release.

Leave the master fader at 0 dB while you measure. DAWs differ on whether master inserts sit before or after the fader; with the fader at 0 dB it doesn't matter, and the meter reads what you'll export.

Or measure the bounce. Put the exported master on its own track with no processing and Youlean on that track. It's the cleanest reading, and it's how the 60-second check works.

Why so many people need it: Ableton's track meters show peak and RMS rather than LUFS, and FL Studio's Wave Candy covers spectrum, vectorscope and peak metering but isn't a full integrated loudness meter. Logic ships its own Loudness Meter (momentary, short-term, integrated and LU range), which does the core job; Youlean puts true peak, PLR and a history graph in the same window. DAWs update their meters, so check your version.

Youlean target chart: what to read, by job

The genre ranges are in how loud your master should be, measured from commercial releases. On the last row: a -8 LUFS master on Spotify gets turned down about 6 dB and plays at the same perceived level as everyone else. Nothing bad happens to it. That's why the target is your genre, not the platform.

How to measure a whole song

1. Load Youlean last on the master, or on a track holding the bounced file.
2. Pick a preset, and don't panic at the colors. If it's a broadcast standard like EBU R128 (target -23 LUFS), a club master will read red against it. That's the preset's target, not a fault in your master.
3. Turn on AUTO or hit Reset. AUTO clears the measurements when playback starts, so every play-through starts clean.
4. Play from the very start to the very end. Don't stop, jump or loop. With AUTO on, stopping and restarting starts the measurement over; with it off, looping the drop counts the drop twice. Looping is for setting the limiter on short-term, not for this.
5. Read the numbers at the end. Integrated, true peak max, short-term max, LRA and PLR.
6. Measure a reference the same way. A commercial track in your genre, start to finish, gives you real numbers to compare with. How to use reference tracks covers the loudness-matching step.
7. Adjust, then measure again. Integrated too low: a little more into the limiter. True peak over: lower the ceiling or turn on true peak mode; the best limiter plugins shows which limiters have it built in.

The mistakes that give you the wrong number

• Reading the drop as the song. Ten seconds of the loudest section is short-term loudness, not integrated.
• Metering before the limiter. Last in the chain, always.
• Trusting the DAW's peak meter for true peak. It reads samples. A master can show -0.3 dBFS there and still go over 0 dBTP.
• Mastering to -14 because a platform normalizes there. Platforms turn loud masters down; they don't punish them. The myth gets its own section in how loud your master should be.
• Mixing to the meter. Loudness numbers belong at the mastering stage. While you mix, the job is balance; the Ableton mix bus chain shows the light bus processing that goes on before any of this.

Youlean vs the other meters

Youlean answers one question: how loud, and how close to clipping. It doesn't show you the spectrum or the stereo image. For those, and for the paid all-in-one meters, see the best metering plugins, where Youlean is the free loudness pick next to Voxengo SPAN. The metering slot in a full mastering setup is in the best mastering plugins, and the rest of the essential free kit is in the best free plugins for music production. For the spectrum and the correlation meter, the free pick has its own guide: Voxengo SPAN.

Where I land (and the disclosure)

A meter tells you where the limiter landed. It doesn't set it. Every one of my master chains ends in a limiter stage: the LIMITER macro on the Ableton, Logic, Waves and Plugin Alliance builds (L2 Ultramaximizer in Waves, bx_limiter True Peak in Plugin Alliance) and the Maximizer in the Ozone build. The setup step on each is the one in this post: bring the limiter up to your genre's target, then check true peak. The Ultimate Master Chain Bundle has all five sounds across six builds. I'm biased; Youlean is free either way, and it's the first meter I'd install.

Quick answers

Is Youlean Loudness Meter free? Yes. Youlean Loudness Meter 2 has a free version that never expires, with integrated, short-term, momentary, true peak, LRA and PLR readouts. Pro adds streaming presets, drag and drop file analysis, a dynamics graph and report export. Download it from youlean.co.

Where do I put Youlean Loudness Meter? Last on the master, after the limiter, with the master fader at 0 dB. Or on its own track holding the bounced master, with no other processing.

What should Youlean read for Spotify? Integrated loudness in your genre's range, not necessarily -14 LUFS, and true peak at or below -1.0 dBTP. Spotify turns louder masters down to its playback level, so a dense master that suits the genre is fine.

Why does Youlean reset when I press play? The AUTO button clears the measurements when playback starts. Leave it on for full play-throughs, or turn it off and use Reset yourself if you need to measure across stops.