Posted By Paul Kafasis on June 9th, 2016

Last year was a big one for our recording application Audio Hijack. We released Audio Hijack 3 in January, then followed that up with major updates to versions 3.1 and 3.2 later in the year. In fact, Audio Hijack 3 was so well-liked that iMore named it their “Mac App of the Year” for 2015. Not bad!

Of course, there’s always more to be done, and we’re not standing still. Today, we’re pleased to release Audio Hijack 3.3. This update includes several important enhancements, as well as dozens of smaller improvements to the application. It’s free for current owners of Audio Hijack 3, and you can get it by choosing “Check for Update” from the Audio Hijack menu.

Read on for more information on what’s new.

Major Updates in Audio Hijack 3.3

Perhaps the biggest change in the new version is one we expect folks won’t even notice: simpler, safer recording for the AAC and Apple Lossless formats. Audio Hijack now avoids the need for finalization at the end of recording with these formats, by saving them as so-called “fragmented” MP4s. These files are internally consistent at all times, which means there’s no processing delay at the end of long recordings and ensures that even a power outage won’t cause lost audio. With this change, Audio Hijack’s recordings are more bullet-proof than ever before.

We’ve also added a new preference to Audio Hijack, one that’s intended for our most advanced users. The new Latency slider can be used to reduce the time Audio Hijack takes to process audio, which helps in situations where a slight echo is heard while monitoring live. While Audio Hijack does its best to minimize latency by default, advanced users who wish to lower it further are now able to do so. The default setting (“More Reliable”) is recommended for most users¹, but users like podcasters and musicians doing live monitoring can now reduce latency to the absolute minimum.

Our last major change is the addition of full support for capturing audio from Slack. If you use this wildly popular team communication tool like we do, you may know that Slack’s new Calls feature is rolling out to all users now. With it, you can make voice calls to other members of your Slack team. Now Audio Hijack 3.3 lets you capture and record that audio for later reference.

Many Smaller Improvements as Well

We receive a great deal of feedback on all of our products, and we work hard to prioritize updates based on it. For Audio Hijack 3.3, we knocked off several dozen of the smaller items we’ve had on our list for some time. These improvements aren’t as eye-catching as a major new feature, but they’re an important part of developing top-notch software nonetheless. Here’s a list of many of these updates:

• The Menu Bar Meters block now shows proper Retina art in the menu bar. Our long, blurry nightmare is finally over. As well, the desired meter type is now correctly saved.

• The Instant On component, which enables the capture of audio from all System Audio, running applications, as well as certain difficult-to-capture apps, has been updated to version 8.2.6. This update includes many small fixes and improvements.

• Files in the Recordings tab can now be right-clicked to access a contextual menu, offering controls for manipulating the recording.

• The Schedule area of the Home window will now visually indicate when conflicts exist between timers.

• The Time Shift block has been improved in several ways, fixing a display issue with large jumps, providing a better VoiceOver value, and improving the explanatory text.

• Presets for several blocks have been improved to save additional settings, including saving album art as part of Recorder block presets, saving all settings in the Application source block, and saving the specified channels in an Output block.

• When an audio device’s name changes, Audio Hijack will immediately reflect the new name. This is especially relevant if you’re using our audio routing tool Loopback in conjunction with Audio Hijack.

• Improvements have been made for visually impaired users using VoiceOver. When VoiceOver is active, a “Pin Popover Open” option is added to contextual menus for blocks. The popover window’s role has also been adjusted, so popovers appear in VoiceOver’s “Window Chooser”. Finally, labels for the “Close” and “Pin” buttons in popovers have been improved.

• AirPlay output device name changes are now better recognized, and a better title (“No AirPlay Receiver Selected”) is shown if AirPlay doesn’t have a destination set.

• The display of app names for background processes (accessible by holding option while clicking the Source selector in an Application block) has been improved.

• Many additional smaller problems, rare crashes, and other issues have been corrected.

By making many small updates and fixes, we’ve polished Audio Hijack for the best user experience yet.

Update Now

You can get the latest Audio Hijack by selecting “Check for Update” from the Audio Hijack menu, or by downloading it from our site. This is a free update for all current owners of Audio Hijack 3. If you’re still using an older version of Audio Hijack or Audio Hijack Pro, we strongly urge you to take advantage of the discounted upgrade to version 3!

If you’ve never used Audio Hijack, today’s a great day to change that! Get started recording audio by downloading the free trial from our site.

P.S. Don’t Forget the Take Control eBook!

Last year, we worked with the folks over at Take Control Books to help them create an in-depth guide to Audio Hijack. Audio expert Kirk McElhearn produced the Take Control of Audio Hijack eBook, and since then, it’s helped thousands of users make the most of Audio Hijack. Today, the book has received an update for the changes in Audio Hijack 3.3, so if you already have the book, be sure to download the just-released 1.1 edition.²

If you haven’t yet checked out this helpful eBook, just click for more information on Take Control of Audio Hijack. It’s a great way to learn how to make the most of Audio Hijack. Happy reading!

Footnotes:

1. Reducing latency increases the possibility that you’ll hear audio skips, particularly on slower or over-loaded Macs. Because of this, we recommend that most users leave this preference in its default state. The latency heard when this slider is set to “More Reliable” is already quite low and sufficient for nearly all uses. ↩︎

2. To get the newest version of the book, just open your existing copy and click the link in the “About This Book” section. You’ll be taken to a page where you can download the newest version in any format. ↩︎