Pro Tools has been an industry-standard DAW (digital audio workstation) for everyone from hip hop producers to cinematic film composers, so when people ask “can I create new beats in Pro Tools,” the answer is a resounding yes.

However, unlike other DAWs that are specifically designed for electronic music production, Pro Tools doesn’t have an obvious toolset for beat creation (like Ableton Live and Garageband). To create beats in Pro Tools, you need a tutorial to understand how to use its extensive set of versatile tools to create your own beats from scratch. 

In this guide, we’ll walk you through how to create brand new beats in Pro Tools. Once you get the hang of it, you’ll find that Pro Tools’ versatility allows you to create pretty much anything you can dream up. Ready to start mixing and mastering like a pro? Let’s get into it.  

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How to create beats in Pro Tools

You can create beats in Pro Tools using two techniques. One is called “MIDI merge” and the other uses the loop record feature. We’ll walk you through both techniques so you can try each out and see which one works for you. 

MIDI merge allows you to use a MIDI controller (such as a MIDI keyboard) to create several different tracks layered on top of each other. To set up the MIDI merge, follow these steps:

Step 1: Go to “display” in the menu bar, click “transport window shows” then “MIDI controls” to expand the transport menu to include all your MIDI control buttons. 

Step 2: In the transport window, click the “MIDI merge” button so that it’s highlighted.

Now, when you record to your record-enabled track, any new MIDI recordings are added on top of the existing recordings. You can use this to create stacked beats on a single track. 

You can also use this in tandem with the loop record function to continuously loop a certain section on your session timeline and record different beats on top of each other while creating a continuous loop. To enable loop recording, simply hold “control” and “command” and click on the spot where you want to create your loop. 

You can now record several different takes of the same section and choose the best ones from that recording session. This allows you to experiment freely and worry about the editing later, which can majorly speed up your beat creation sessions. 

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