Headroom
The safety margin between your working level and the clipping ceiling
Related
Headroom is the space between the working level and the clipping ceiling. In digital audio 0 dBFS is a hard limit, so recording, mixing and mastering all need a safety margin above the peaks. A 24-bit recording has so much range that averaging around -18 dBFS costs no useful resolution.
A mix bus usually keeps 3–6 dB of peak headroom, and mastering decides final loudness. If the bus already sits at 0 dBFS, any gain change from EQ or compression can clip at once. Leave headroom first and talk about loudness later: loudness belongs to mastering, not to every track.
The usual mistake is to record as hot as possible. That habit comes from tape; digital recording gains no equivalent noise benefit, and is more likely to trip on inter-sample peaks.
Related → Clipping
Sources
- 数字余量与峰值表，参 Bob Katz, Mastering Audio 与 Huber & Runstein, Modern Recording Techniques；本文为原创表述
Used for fact-checking only; all prose is original.