How to make vaporwave in your browser

By Tongkit Leong · August 26, 2026 · 8 min read

Vaporwave is built by slowing a source sample down in both tempo and pitch, drowning it in chorus and reverb, and letting it loop over a laid-back drum groove — and you can put the whole thing together from scratch in the Tracks browser studio in an afternoon, with no software to install and no account to create.

The anatomy of a vaporwave track

Vaporwave grew out of chopped-and-screwed hip-hop and 1980s and 90s mall music, and its sound is defined less by rhythm than by processing: a familiar-sounding source, pulled and softened until it feels submerged. A handful of elements show up in nearly every vaporwave track:

• A slowed, pitched-down sample — a source track dragged down in tempo and key until it feels heavy and half-remembered rather than energetic.
• Chorus and tape-style warble — a detuned, shimmering modulation that makes the sample sound like it's playing off a worn cassette.
• Long, hazy reverb — the sample sits back in a large, distant-sounding space instead of up front and dry.
• A laid-back, swung drum groove — simple, unhurried drums that support the loop rather than push it forward.
• Repetition over development — a short loop repeated with minimal variation, favoring mood and texture over a verse-chorus arc.

Tracks covers this end to end — the sampler and time-stretch/repitch tools for the slowed source, chorus and reverb sends in the mixer, the drum machine for the groove, and the subtractive synth for the bassline.

Step 1: Set your tempo

Open the Tracks studio and set the BPM in the transport bar. Vaporwave sits well below most dance music:

• Most vaporwave: 60–75 BPM. The pocket where a slowed sample feels heavy without dragging.
• Slightly brighter, more song-like takes: up to 80 BPM.

70 BPM is a safe default, especially if your source sample was originally recorded somewhere between 100 and 120 BPM before slowing down.

Step 2: Slow and pitch down a source sample

Load a sample — a synth line, a vocal phrase, a bit of found audio — into the Tracks 16-pad sampler, then use the time-stretch and repitch tool to drag it down. Vaporwave's signature move is doing both at once: slowing the tempo and dropping the pitch together, the way a song sounds when a cassette or turntable runs slow, rather than time-stretching alone while keeping the original key.

Start conservative — a semitone or two down and a noticeable tempo drop — and listen for the point where the sample stops sounding like a mistake and starts sounding intentional. See How to chop and flip a sample for the sampler workflow if you want to isolate just a phrase or a few bars rather than a whole track.

Loop a short section rather than the whole source

Most vaporwave tracks are built from four or eight bars of source material looped for the length of the song, not a full slowed-down track played straight through. Find a section with a clear, simple phrase — a chord stab, a vocal line, a short instrumental hook — and loop that instead of trying to carry an entire arrangement.

Step 3: Soak the sample in chorus and reverb

Add a chorus effect to the sample track for the detuned, warbling shimmer that gives vaporwave its tape-warped character — see Chorus, phaser, distortion, and bitcrusher explained for how the effect works and how far to push it. Keep the depth noticeable; vaporwave chorus is meant to be heard, not subtle.

Then send the sample to a long reverb with a slow decay to push it back into a hazy, distant space. See Reverb and delay explained for setting up a send in the Tracks mixer. The goal is a sample that sounds like it's playing in another room, half-submerged under its own reflection.

Step 4: Program a laid-back drum groove

Add a track and open the Tracks drum machine. Keep the pattern simple — a soft kick, a loose snare or clap on the backbeat, and a relaxed hi-hat pattern with some swing applied so it doesn't feel mechanical. See Quantize and swing explained for dialing in that loose, unhurried feel.

The drums should sit behind the sample in the mix, not compete with it. A touch of the same reverb send used on the sample helps glue the two together.

Step 5: Add a warm, detuned bassline

Open the subtractive synth and write a slow-moving bassline that mostly holds root notes under the sample's chord changes rather than adding its own melody. Slightly detune the oscillators and close the filter down for warmth over brightness — see Subtractive and FM sound design explained for the filter and detune basics.

Keep the bass simple and steady. Its job is to anchor the slowed sample and drum groove, not to draw attention to itself.

Step 6: Arrange and export

Vaporwave arrangements favor repetition and mood over a traditional build-up. A workable shape looks like this:

1. Intro (4–8 bars): the sample alone, drenched in reverb, before drums enter.
2. Main loop (32–64 bars): sample, drums, and bass locked together, repeating with only small variations — a filter sweep, a drum fill every eight bars.
3. Break (8–16 bars): strip back to just the sample and reverb tail, letting the space breathe.
4. Return (16–32 bars): the full loop comes back, sometimes with an added texture layer.
5. Outro (4–8 bars): let the reverb tail ring out rather than cutting or fading sharply.

Block these sections out on the Tracks timeline before polishing any individual part — see How to arrange a song for more on building a structure from loops, and Make lo-fi hip-hop in your browser for another genre built around a slowed, hazy sample loop rather than a driving beat.

When the balance feels right, export to WAV for a clean master file or MP3 to share online — see How to export your song to MP3 or WAV for the full walkthrough. Your project stays in your browser the entire time; Tracks never uploads it anywhere.

Frequently asked questions

What BPM is vaporwave?

Most vaporwave sits between 60 and 75 BPM, with brighter, more song-like takes pushing up to around 80 BPM. 70 BPM is a reliable starting point.

Do I need a copyrighted song to make vaporwave?

No — you can record or write your own source material and slow it down the same way. What defines the sound is the processing (slowed tempo, dropped pitch, chorus, long reverb), not where the sample came from.

Why does slowing down a sample change its pitch?

Playing audio back slower naturally lowers its pitch, the same way a record sounds deeper at a slower speed. Tracks' time-stretch and repitch tool can either link the two, for that classic dragged-down sound, or stretch tempo independently of pitch if you want more control.

Why does my vaporwave track feel too busy?

Vaporwave leans on space and repetition more than density, so if a track feels cluttered, try removing layers rather than adding new ones and let the reverb tails do more of the work.