Here is my review of Elgato’s Wave XLR with Wave Link and Voice Focus. Although the creators of the Elgato Wave XLR audio interface (≈US$170) mainly target online video gamers, in this review article, I’ll demonstrate how valuable and powerful the Wave XLR (and its accompanying software) can also be ideal for other industries, like high-quality videoconferencing, live broadcast television remote guests, podcast production, live online radio, commercial voiceover, audiobook production and tutorials. These markets are covered and reviewed by a different set of KOLs (Key Opinion Leaders) than the ones who cover online video gaming. Those other KOLs are those of us who collaborate with respected platforms like Escuchalibros.com (in Castilian/castellano) and ProVideoCoalition.com (in English), and are (so-far) ignored by Corsair’s marketing team. (Corsair is the current owner of the Elgato brand). Naturally, the technical jargon for features vary among the mentioned markets. Despite their ignoring us, I am not ignoring them or its products for these (so far) ignored markets. Ahead I’ll include several audio test recordings made with three very different microphones (both condenser and dynamic) from RØDE and Shure to demonstrate the quality of the Wave XLR, as well as clarifying many of its compelling features and covering more about the company, brand and history as a creator of TV tuners for computers.

In this article

• About the Elgato brand and history


• The importance of realtime functions and effects in an XLR audio interface in 2025


• Why I picked these three diverse microphones for my tests


• OS compatibility for the Elgato Wave XLR


• Elgato Wave XLR inputs and outputs


• Wave XLR lacks output for powered speakers: How I resolved it


• Wave XLR sampling frequencies


• Clipguard, to prevent clipping automatically and flawlessly


• Capacitive mute button on the top of the Wave XLR


• Front panel knob and LED indicators


• Voice Focus from AI|coustics technology (with test recordings)


• Is the up to 75 dB of gain enough to be clean? (The SM7B challenge + test recordings)


• Free and paid add-on realtime effects


• Adjustment of LED colors on the Wave XLR panel


• Physical colors of the Wave XLR (only via the direct Elgato website)


• How to use the Wave XLR with a headset mic that is not XLR


• Using pre-recorded audio carts with Wave Link


• Using Wave Link with remote guests and phone callers with proper mix-minus


• When the Wave XLR with Wave Link are an ideal fit (and when not)


• When multiple Wave XLR units without Wave Link are a good fit (although with fewer features)


• Caveat


• Ratings


• Suggestions to the manufacturer and developers


• Conclusions

About the Elgato brand and history

Although Elgato is now a brand of Corsair GmbH (a German company which also has offices in California, United States), it was born as Elgato Systems in 2010 in Munich, Germany. While Elgato was under its original ownership, I was independently involved with integrating Elgato TV tuners in computers in a company in Florida, together with its companion DVR (digital video recorder) software similar to TiVo, to set days and times to record certain TV shows from certain TV channels. In this case, it was for clients to be able to perform TV airchecks to confirm and prove the successful broadcast of certain commercials. The Elgato tuners I used at that time were PCI cards to be installed inside shoebox style computers, but there were also external boxes too. Per my research, Elgato Systems stopped selling its TV tuners in 2015 and later sold the EyeTV brand and product line to Geniatech Europe in 2016. In 2018, the Elgato brand was purchased by Corsair Gaming, without any TV tuners. In addition to my prior use of the Elgato TV tuners and very recent coverage of Elgato’s audio devices and software, I have happily used the Elgato Green Screen XL since 2023 and a Stream Deck since 2024, with the following associated articles: Using a Stream Deck for «guillemets» (angle quotation marks) and in Stream Deck now controls RØDECaster Video mixer/switcher.

Corsair GmbH is a German entity, but it is a subsidiary of the larger, U.S.-based Corsair Gaming, Inc.

Corsair GmbH was formed in Germany after Corsair acquired the German company Elgato Systems in 2018, keeping the Elgato brand under the Corsair umbrella.

The name «Elgato» comes from the Castilian/castellano term el gato, which refers to a male cat or feline, where the feminine version is la gata, of which two different gatas (female cats) are covered in my books La conspiración del castellano and in the English adaptation, The Castilian Conspiracy). Elgato is not the only German brand I have known which uses a Castilian word as a brand name. Other German brands which have a Castilian brand name include FotoMágico (a slideshow software editor for macOS and iPadOS, developed by Boinx Software International GmbH of Germering, Bavaria, Germany) and Mercedes (now Mercedes-Benz) which is based in Stuttgart, Baden-Württemberg, Germany. The Mercedes brand comes from the homonym Castilian feminine first name, which translates to English as Mercy.

The importance of realtime effects in an XLR audio interface in 2025

In the past, the only important details of XLR audio interfaces were to have a high quality amplifier and A-to-D (analog to digital) converter. That has changed, which is why the Wave XLR offers much more than a great preamp and A-to-D, as I’ll demonstrate ahead. In addition to those traditional requirements, the Wave XLR and its accompanying software offer realtime muting, realtime Clipguard, realtime noise reduction (without gating), realtime reverb reduction, realtime dynamic compression, realtime equalization and more. Even though in the past, many productions were designed to handle many of these functions in post-production, about half of the applications I mention in the introductory paragraph (videoconferencing, live broadcast television guests, live online radio) often don’t have any post-production, so they need pristine audio now, not later! Even the other fields I mentioned which do involve post-production (podcasting, audiobook production, commercial voiceover and tutorials) can be alleviated by having a pristine audio signal in advance, so the remaining steps in post-production are fewer and more content-related, which streamlines the process. Ahead, I’ll be testing the preamps and