For immediate release ·
DMXDesktop Launches Live Wire: Intelligent Lighting Generated from Any Live Audio in Real Time
Live Wire builds a DMX light show from whatever is playing, as it plays, with no pre-analysed tracks, no DJ software integration and no dedicated lighting hardware.
DMXDesktop today released Live Wire, an automatic lighting engine that listens to live audio and drives a DMX rig in real time. Live Wire ships as part of DMXDesktop 1.0.52 for Windows and macOS.
Automatic lighting has usually meant one of two things: analysing tracks in advance so the software knows what is coming, or buying a dedicated box that does the job for a fixed rig. Live Wire does neither. It takes whatever audio the machine can hear, including a system audio feed, a microphone or a line input, and decides what the lights should do as the music happens.
That makes it work in situations planned lighting cannot reach: a band playing live, a DJ taking requests, a venue running a playlist nobody prepared for, or a set where the next track is decided thirty seconds before it plays.
What Live Wire does
- Tracks tempo, energy, build-ups and drops from the incoming audio
- Drives colour, movement, intensity and effects across the whole rig
- Assigns fixtures to roles so movers, washes, strobes, pixels and lasers each behave appropriately
- Offers Band, DJ and Ambient modes for different kinds of performance
- Exposes reactivity controls so the operator can shape the feel without programming cues
Who it is for
Very nearly anyone running lights, which is unusual for automatic lighting. Live Wire scales from a handful of pars on a USB-DMX interface to installs spanning hundreds of universes over Art-Net or sACN, and runs the same engine at both ends.
At the small end it needs nothing beyond an interface and the fixtures already in the room: no lighting console, no compatible DJ application and no separate hardware unit. At the large end it inherits DMXDesktop's output capacity, which is two universes on Standard and no fixed universe limit on Pro, where output is capped at 1024 universes.
Preview
Availability and pricing
Live Wire is available from 2 September 2026 as part of DMXDesktop 1.0.52 on Windows and macOS. It is included with Standard and Pro subscriptions at no extra cost. It is not part of the Free edition.
Current pricing is listed at www.dmxdesktop.com/pricing. The software is downloadable from www.dmxdesktop.com/download, and full details of Live Wire are at www.dmxdesktop.com/live-wire.
Comment
We started this journey over two years ago. We were never interested in something that was merely good enough, which is why it took two years and not six months. Live Wire does the hard version of the problem: it reacts to music it has never heard, as it plays, with no second attempt.
Images
Logos and the complete asset archive are on the press page.
About DMXDesktop
DMXDesktop is professional DMX lighting control software for Windows and macOS. It combines automatic audio-reactive lighting, live busking controls, timeline programming, cue stacks, pixel mapping and an optional 3D visualiser in a single application. It ships with a searchable library of almost 30,000 fixture profiles and drives USB DMX interfaces, Art-Net and sACN without requiring proprietary lighting hardware. DMXDesktop is available in six languages across Free, Standard and Pro editions.
Press contact: [email protected]. Review access, technical assistance and remote demonstrations are available. See the press page for details.
DMXDesktop® is a registered trademark. EU Reg. No. 019259247. Art-Net™ designed by Artistic Licence Holdings Ltd.
