KORG iM1

I own the majority of Korgs iOS apps and this one kinda takes the cake on features alone. I would also suggest getting the in app purchases for this! You can program your own drum kit with a keyboard chase option! I am ecstatic because I have really been searching for an easy way to map drums to my Arturia beatstep without remapping midi notes. You can also map any sound to a key on the drum kit and it will auto assign the lower pitched notes with a no assign slot. Going to got absolutely bananas with drum kits now! Not to mention this thing does practically any instrument sound aside from heavily modulated stuff. My gripes are bit of a high learning curve for beginners, and it has no easy mixer page (could just be on master fx page) aside from adjusting each instruments volume one at a time. The app sounds awesome and is a great addition to iOS music making. After touch supported for the seaboard like gear. Also works great with geoshred more mode, but I just record audio for that because I don’t know how to record mpe midi into cubasis. Midi routing is pretty good and allows channel selection but lacks source option. Software manual is online. Obligatory comment about Korg not making audio units (or allowing them in gadget) for apps like aum3, cubasis, etc. Use aum + rozeta sequencer suite/atom + midiflow + this... for a good time. 🤪

Updated to 5 stars (sorry rewrote my review but neglected to update the rating)! The addition of AUv3 pretty much makes this the perfect synth unit. I use it for everything. Keys, as a guitar synth with guitar midi in AUM. Given the age of the app I was not certain whether Korg would update it. Long live the M1! Original review. The M1 workstation was and remains one of my favorite platforms. Lately, I’ve been trending to a lot of my music on iOS. It’s just way more convenient to bring one, or even two iPads vs trying to arrange the perfect set of keys layouts. Especially for me since I play several other instruments and often need to bring these to live performances. I have no problem paying $40 for this particular app given the amount of power, but the lack of AUV3 support is a huge detriment. There are free synths out there like King of FM that inter operate with AU hosts and this is a game changer. With the power of the M1 sound library, I find I don’t use this app much if at all any more and it makes me sad. Please Korg we beg you - make this AUV3 compatible! For those of us that have paid for this (I bought it when it first came out) and for those that yet haven’t - I guarantee that this extension would tap into unrealized revenue for Korg.

You know, back in my day we fell in love with the original Korg M1 — that workhorse keyboard that showed up in hit after hit: the organ riff in Robin S — “Show Me Love” (that I17 Organ2 patch) , the ubiquitous “piano-16’” lines in house tracks, Rhythm Is a Dancer by Snap! , and the lush pads and strings that haunted ballads and soundtracks alike. The original M1 defined a generation of sound.  Now, iM1 brings that legacy into your iPad or iOS device, polished and empowered. This isn’t a mere emulator — it’s a revival, a reawakening. The sonic authenticity is stunning: the same shimmer, the same metallic bite in the keys, the same depth in the pads — only now with more modern flexibility, more modulation, more routing, more control. It feels like I’ve taken that vintage M1 I once gigged with and given it a new heart, new lungs, but kept its soul intact. If you loved the sound of the original M1 — or if you’re young and chasing that classic 80’s / early 90’s vibe — iM1 feels like destiny. It’s respectful of its history, yet arms you with modern tools. It brings the best of then and now into your hands. I say this with the authority of someone who’s sat behind analog boards, multi-trackers, late nights and early mornings: iM1 is a triumph. Now, let’s go lay down a piano line worthy of those old nights — you with me?