Top 10 Best Free Kontakt Sample Libraries 2019

Everybody loves getting free stuff, especially musicians and composers who know how much an average instrument or software library can cost. That is why we scouted some of the best free Kontakt sample libraries out there that will help you get started composing if you’re on a small or zero budget. This list is in no particular order because all of the selectees here are going to give you a lot of music for zero cash.

1. Precisionsound – Amore Grand Piano

Precisionsound are one of those developers that offer really great sample libraries at awesomely affordable prices. You can find great stuff here for under $30 and the quality is great! They also have some free Kontakt libraries out there and their samples are also very well recorded.

Amore Grand Piano is one of those libraries. They recorded a Yamaha grand piano with a close mic setup in stereo and kept it small, under 200 MB. The three-page GUI is intuitive and easy to understand with controls for decay, EQ, IR reverb, Delay and Keyboard response.

2. ProjectSAM – The Free Orchestra

ProjectSAM, the creators of Symphobia series. Need we say more? This is not an actual instrument but a collection of various different individual patches that you can download from their page, and boy do they sound great. If you need a really great entry point to orchestral FX and various instruments, here’s a great place to start.

3. Strezov Sampling – Thunder X3M Taiko Freebie & Duduk Freebie

Strezov Sampling are fairly new players in the street of sampling but their products are of impeccable quality and they live up to their popularity. Most of their libraries are fairly affordable but there are some amazing freebies like the Taiko Freebie taken from Thunder X3M and Duduk Freebie taken from Balkan Ethnic Orchestra.

Both of them sound amazing out of the box. Taiko is very usable and honestly, it’s my go-to taiko library for layering some powerful percussions. Duduk freebie gives you that amazing duduk sound which reminds me of the Gladiator soundtrack. Check them out, they will cost you nothing!

4. Impact Soundworks – Shreddage 3 Stratus

A freebie by Impact Soundworks? YES PLEASE! The goal of this free library is to give all Kontakt users a realistic virtual guitar instrument that includes some of the most useful sounds from the full version. You also have access to tons of editing features, TACT 2.0 (customise how all articulations are mapped and triggered) and the console mixer with 30 effect modules.

Just like the full version you get the updated fretting & voicing engine with multiple algorithms and styles to choose from. With this instrument you can create lead, rhythm and strummed parts all in a single Kontakt instance.

The guys from Impact Soundworks promise that this is the most realistic and flexible electric guitar library you can possibly get for free, so feel FREE to check it out, get it?

5. WavesFactory – Music Box

“Dancing bears… painted wings, things I almost remember and a song someone sings in December” This is what I get as soon as I start playing this free instrument by WavesFactory. A beautiful sampled music box that sends me back to fairytale world and soothing lullabies. The GUI looks just beautiful and even though it has limited options, the sound is nothing short of superb.

6. WavesFactory – Whispers

Here’s something for all horror fans out there. It is filled with creepy male and female whispering and it uses filtered white noise to produce the sound of various vocals. Combining these filters gives some amazing results with a huge variety of weird whispering sounds and noises. Not for the faint-hearted.

7. Cinematique Instruments – Landscape

Cinematique Instruments have a reputation of being a developer with rather unique, and dare I say, boutique sample libraries with some of the most original sounds out there. Plus you can get a lot of their amazing instruments for free.

Landscape is one of those instruments and it is an amazing drone generator that easily creates deeply woven, dynamic ambiances and drones and surprises with an astonishing randomise feature. Equipped with seven layered sounds and eight effects, Landscape can be used either as a self-running drone generator or as a playable instrument. This is a one-stop station for all your drone needs.

8. Cinematique Instruments – Free Marble

Another gem by Cinematique Instruments comes as a free version of their much larger instrument called Marble and it is a sound designer’s dream. 

Marble is a creative music tool, it is an extremely versatile instrument, modern and inspiring. By coming up with two parallel sound slots equipped with an “open” sequencer, real-time sound shaping and loads of acoustic and synthetic sound sources, Marble tries to find new approaches to music production.

9. The Alpine Project

These guys are entirely dedicated to free orchestral libraries and the “Alpine Project” libraries are split into 3 categories – brass, strings and woodwinds.

Now including samples from a greater variety of public domain sources, the brass collection has been painstakingly reworked to be more playable, more dynamically responsive and more versatile. It now includes 8 solo brass instruments including muted versions. Thousands of composers and musicians have used the original instruments and this updated collection massively improves the results one can achieve.  In addition the Alpine Brass collection is now available as a single download.   

There are also strings and woodwinds where the strings are divided into 4 parts, but you can’t play an “ensemble” patch with all of them together and another drawback is that the string samples are monophonic.

The woodwinds somewhat sound unnatural, but hey it’s free, and if you work your way around them you can get a decent sound. My personal favourite here are the brass samples.

10. Beats 24/7 – Trap Gods

Here’s where to get your hip-hop samples for free and they actually sound pretty cool! This preset bank for Kontakt includes 66 high quality and industry-ready sound presets containing drums and instruments ranging from 808s, kicks, snares and hats to leads, pads, keys & more. You will be able to make beats entirely using this preset bank and get a ton of customisation options with built-in effects, envelope, equalizer and even more. Furthermore, this library can be used in any genre including Hip Hop, Trap & Rap and comes with a unique user-interface.

Here are some bonus free Kontakt sample libraries that we’ve got available in our Freebies area.

Shortnoise: a unique and inspiring electronic sample library with a huge 6GB of content and over 300 Kontakt instruments to choose from. Jam packed full of Electronic Grooves, Arpeggiated Sequences, Manipulated Synths, Cinematic FX, Unique and Expressive Performance Patches, this beauty has a whole world of surprises waiting to be unleashed!

pocketBlakus Cello: a stunning free solo cello library for Kontakt created by Australian composer Blake Robinson.

The library sounds gorgeous when soaked in reverb and is perfect for slow moving, expressive cello lines and fast, choppy spiccato lines.