The music player for live show collectors

Built by Chris, a fan who'd been to the shows. Not a company.

You were there.Now hear it again.

All your live recordings. Six sources. One app. Search once, hear it all. $39.99 for Mac.

Download for Mac
14-day free trialmacOS 14+
All your sources. One search.
nugs.netTIDALQobuzArchive.orgPhish.in

Showboard is a native Mac player for live show collectors.

It plays your local files and pulls from nugs.net, TIDAL, Qobuz, Archive.org, and Phish.in, all from one search bar, all bit-perfect to your DAC.

The Story

August 1998. Loring Air Force Base, Limestone, Maine. 60,000 people on a decommissioned Cold War bomber base. At 3am, the band played an hour-long ambient jam lit only by candles the audience made with their own hands. Meteors streaked overhead.

You were there.

Now you want to hear it again. So you open Phish.in for the SBD. Archive.org for the audience tapes. Your local files for the FM broadcast you’ve had since ’98. Three sources. Three apps. Three search bars. For one night.

This isn’t just about Lemonwheel. It’s about every show you’ve ever been to. The Gorge sunset set. The MSG run where nothing repeated. The Red Rocks rain that turned the second set transcendent.

Showboard brings all of it together.

One app. Every source. Every show. Every recording. Search once, find everything. Play it the way it was meant to be heard.

Try it free for 14 days
Showboard showing the Lemonwheel setlist from August 16, 1998 with SBD badges, set breaks, and jam notes

Lemonwheel, August 16, 1998. Phish.in SBD. Set breaks, jam notes, source badges.

My Shows

Your concert life, in one place.

Every show you've been to, lined up like the ticket stubs in a shoebox. Mark one and Showboard hunts all six sources for the recording. The SBD, the AUD, the matrix. Phish.in shows match themselves, and the whole diary follows you to every Mac you own.

2024
PhishPhish.in★★★★★

The Gorge, George, WA

2024-07-14
Goosenugs.net★★★★

Radio City Music Hall, New York, NY

2024-08-04
2023
PhishPhish.in★★★★★

Madison Square Garden, New York, NY

2023-12-31
Billy Stringsnugs.net★★★★★

Red Rocks, Morrison, CO

2023-07-21
2022
GooseArchive.org★★★★

Dillon Amphitheater, Dillon, CO

2022-09-03
1998
PhishPhish.in★★★★★

Loring Air Force Base, Limestone, ME

1998-08-16
140
Shows
19
Artists
115
Venues

Mark a show, find the tape

Date, venue, artist, your own notes. Mark a show and Showboard searches all six sources in the background. SBD, audience tape, matrix. If a recording is out there, it surfaces it.

Phish.in matches itself

Open a Phish show and the matching Phish.in recording is already attached. No hunting for the date. The source pill is right there, one click to play.

It follows you across your Macs

Rate a show on the Mac mini in the listening room and it's rated on the laptop too. The diary, the ratings, the notes. iCloud keeps every Mac in sync.

Live Shows grid showing attended concerts with photos from Billy Strings, Goose, Dead & Company, and more

140 shows. Every recording matched, on every Mac.

Across your Macs

Your shows follow you. Every Mac you own.

You rate a 7/12/19 Gorge taper note on the Mac mini in the living room, and it's already there on the laptop. Your favorites, your My Shows diary, your playlists, your ratings, your play history. One iCloud account, every Mac, no re-doing your work.

Showboard syncing favorites, My Shows, ratings, and a Continue Listening handoff card between a Mac mini and a MacBook over iCloud, with no device limit

Paused at the desk. Waiting on the laptop.

HANDOFF

Continue Listening

Pause a show on one Mac, open another, and the Continue Listening card is right there waiting. Pick the set back up where you left it. No hunting for the file, no scrubbing to find your spot.

iCLOUD

Synced, not stored away

Favorites, My Shows, playlists, ratings, and play history sync over iCloud. Your concert diary is the same on every Mac, automatically.

$39.99 ONCE

No seat limit

One purchase. Install it on every Mac you own. The studio Mac mini, the couch laptop, the one at the office. We don't count devices and we never will.

In every room

Bit-perfect at the desk. The whole house when you want it.

Your exclusive-mode path to the USB DAC never changes. But a Saturday morning is not a headphones occasion. Send a 1995 soundboard to the kitchen over BluOS, or push it to the living room over AirPlay. The desk rig when you sit down for it, the whole house when you want the show wherever you are.

Now Playing
1995 SBD · FLAC
One signal, three rooms
USB DAC
Exclusive mode, your desk rig
BIT-PERFECT
AirPlay
The living room
BluOS
The kitchen
BIT-PERFECT

Your DAC, untouched

The bit-perfect, exclusive-mode path to your USB DAC is the default and it never changes. Output to another room is a separate choice you make per listen, never something applied to your desk rig behind your back.

AIRPLAY

AirPlay, room to room

Push any show to an AirPlay speaker, an Apple TV, or a HomePod. The same library you were just at the desk with, now playing in the room you walked into.

BLUOS

BluOS, discovered for you

Bluesound, NAD, and other BluOS systems appear on your network on their own. Send a show across, gapless, with no setup beyond turning the speaker on.

Fresh Tapes

Last night's show, up this morning.

Tour season moves fast. A taper uploads the 6/22 Bethel second set overnight, a soundboard hits nugs, Phish.in matches it by breakfast. Fresh Tapes pulls the newest live recordings from nugs, Archive.org, and Phish.in into one rail, so the first thing you see each morning is what just landed.

Fresh Tapes rail showing recently added live recordings across nugs, Archive.org, and Phish.in with SBD and AUD source badges

What dropped overnight. nugs, Archive.org, Phish.in.

nugs · ARCHIVE.ORG · PHISH.IN

Every morning, one rail

New recordings across nugs, Archive.org, and Phish.in, sorted by what showed up most recently. Open the app, see what dropped.

YOUR ARTISTS

Filter to your bands

Already follow Goose, Billy, and Phish? Narrow Fresh Tapes to the artists in your library and skip the rest.

SBD · AUD · MATRIX

Source you can see

SBD, AUD, or Matrix, badged before you press play. You know what you're getting into.

How to find new live recordings →

Share the moment

Remember the night.

Every show gets its own card with a unique gradient generated from the artist name. Build one now.

Try it. Type a show you were at.

Showboard

I Was There

Phish

Loring Air Force Base

Limestone, ME

1998-08-16

showboard.app
One Library

Stop switching apps. Everything plays.

Your files, your streams, your archives. Type a date or a song and Showboard searches them all.

Pick a date and Showboard lines up every recording of that night side by side. The board, the audience tape, the matrix, your own download. You choose which one plays.

Local Files

FLAC, DSD, ALAC, WAV, and more

nugs.net

nugs.net

Hi-res live concert streaming

TIDAL

TIDAL

Lossless and Hi-Res streaming

Qobuz

Qobuz

Studio-quality lossless

Archive.org

Archive.org

Free live recordings archive

Phish.in

Phish.in

Complete Phish live archive

Phish.in source browser in Showboard with random picks, on-this-day shows, and year-by-year browsing

Phish.in

Qobuz integration in Showboard showing recently played and release history

Qobuz

One search, every recording

Type “Red Rocks 7/10/99” and get the SBD from Phish.in, the AUD from Archive, and the studio album from Qobuz. All in one list.

One artist, whole picture

Pick an artist. See studio albums from TIDAL, live shows from nugs, free recordings from Archive, and your local files. No more switching tabs.

Your files play first

Already downloaded that SBD? Showboard finds it and plays your local copy automatically. No buffering, no stream quality compromise.

Your folders stay exactly where they are

Showboard never moves, renames, or rewrites your files. Point it at your library and it reads. Your fifteen years of folder conventions are safe.

New tapes, most mornings

Fresh Tapes pulls the live recordings just posted across nugs, Archive.org, and Phish.in into one rail. Tour season, it's the first thing worth opening.

How it connects

Phish.in & Archive.org work out of the box, free.TIDAL, Qobuz & nugs.net use your existing subscriptions.Local files import from any folder you point to.
Set 2

Showboard speaks live music.

Every other player treats your concert recordings like broken albums. Wrong track names, no set breaks, no context. Showboard understands live music down to the conventions the taper community invented.

Billy Strings at Arlington Assembly Hall, 2022-03-27: full tracklist with set breaks, SBD source badge, and concert photo

Billy Strings, Arlington Assembly Hall, 2022-03-27. Set breaks, source badges, taper notes.

SET II

Set Breaks

Set I, Set II, Encore. Jump straight to any set. Skip the soundcheck. Start where the show gets good.

SBD

Source Type Badges

SBD, AUD, Matrix. Color-coded at a glance so you know exactly what you're hearing before you press play.

DSBD>DAT>WAV

Taper Notes

The story behind the recording. Source chain, microphone placement, transfer notes. Displayed in monospaced text the way tapers intended.

★ Jamcharts

Jam Notes & Charts

See what makes each version special. Jamcharts annotations surface the moments worth hearing, right in the track listing.

AUTO

Live Show Detection

Drop a folder of recordings in. Showboard reads the dates, parses venues, and files them as live shows automatically. No tagging required.

42 shows

Venue Explorer

Browse by venue. See every show at Red Rocks, The Gorge, MSG. Across every source.

From the audience

People who get it.

“My whole thing was Audirvana for the bit-perfect stuffand then Relisten when I wanted to pull up a show real quick. Having both in the same app is wild. My wife is tired of hearing about it but the exclusive mode output is legit.”

D
David K.Beta tester
Audiophile, Qobuz subscriber

“I had Relisten on my phone, VLC for SHNs, nugs in a browser tab, and a spreadsheet tracking which shows I'd downloaded from etree. Now it's just... one app. Typed in Hartford '97 and got the SBD, two AUDs, and the matrix all in one list.”

J
Jake P.Collector
Dead head since '89, 300+ shows

“I tape. I've been taping since 2004. Every other player I've tried treats my recordings like they're broken podcasts or something. This one actually knows what set breaks are. It reads my taper notes. That's all I wanted honestly.”

M
Melissa R.Taper
Taper, mostly East Coast lots

“Got into Billy last year. Tried to find that Renewal set from Red Rocks and spent like 20 minutes bouncing between nugs and Archive trying to figure out which source was best. Showboard just showed me all of them ranked. Yeah it's solid.”

S
Sarah T.Explorer
Billy Strings, Goose, Khruangbin

“Someone on PT mentioned this and I figured whatever, another music app. But the source badges are real, the FLAC handling is clean, and it actually pulled in my whole Phish.in history. Wasn't expecting that.”

M
Marcus W.Collector
Phish since Junta, SBD hoarder

“Forty bucks and done. I was paying for Roon plus nugs plus TIDAL and half the time nothing talked to each other anyway. Canceled two of those. No regrets.”

C
Chris H.Audiophile
Former Roon subscriber, WSP fan
Sound Quality

The sound matters because the shows matter.

You were there. The playback should honor that. Integer mode through CoreAudio HAL, your DAC switched to exclusive control, the sample rate matched to the file. Bit-identical from disk to dome.

FLAC 24/96 → Integer Mode → USB Class 2 → DAC at 96 kHz
Source
FLAC 24/96
Decoder
Bit-identical
Sample Rate
96 kHz match
Integer Mode
CoreAudio HAL
To Your DAC
Exclusive (Hog)
Bit-Perfect
Lossless
Processed

Nothing between you and the music

Showboard takes exclusive control of your audio device through CoreAudio HAL and runs integer mode where your DAC supports it. No system mixer, no resampling. What was recorded is what reaches the DAC.

Automatic sample rate switching

Your DAC switches to match every file automatically. Play a 44.1 kHz SBD, then a 192 kHz studio master. No settings to change.

Gapless playback

The segue from Tweezer into Tweezer Reprise doesn’t have a gap in real life. It shouldn’t in your player either. Zero-gap transitions across every source.

Shape the sound

10-band parametric EQ with presets. Tame a harsh AUD or add warmth to a flat SBD. Without leaving the app.

Headphone crossfeed

Blends the stereo field for headphone listening the way speakers do naturally. Long sessions without the fatigue.

Play it anywhere in the house

Bit-perfect to your USB DAC, or push the same show to AirPlay and whole-home BluOS speakers. The listening room rig or the kitchen. Showboard sends it where you want it.

Plays everything you've got

FLAC

Up to 384kHz/32-bit

DSD

DSD64 via DoP

ALAC

Apple Lossless

WAV / AIFF

Uncompressed PCM

WavPack

Lossless & lossy

MP3 / AAC / OGG

Lossy formats

No sandbox. No compromise.

Apple's App Store sandbox blocks the exclusive audio hardware access that makes bit-perfect playback possible. Other players accept that tradeoff. We didn't. Showboard ships direct so your DAC gets exactly what was recorded.

Your DAC. Our signal path. Nothing in between.

SchiitToppingiFiChordFiiORMEFocusriteSMSLDenafripsCambridge Audio

Works with any USB audio device. No drivers required on macOS.

The Comparison

See for yourself.

FeatureShowboardRoonAudirvanaApple MusicSpotifynugs.net
Where every other player goes blank
Live recordings are studio tracks with weird filenames to everyone else. Here they are the point.
Live show management✓————Partial
Concert diary✓—————
Play by set (Set I, Set II, Encore)✓—————
Source type badges✓—————
Taper notes✓—————
Compare versions across sources✓—————
Venue Explorer✓—————
Archive.org integration✓—————
Phish.in integration✓—————
nugs.net integration✓✓———Native
TIDAL integration✓✓✓———
Qobuz integration✓✓✓———
Lossless, bit-perfect output✓✓✓———
Native, no server to run✓Needs Roon Server✓✓——
Gapless playback✓✓✓✓—✓
DSD playback✓✓✓———
Parametric EQ✓✓✓———
Web remote control✓✓——Connect—
Price$39.99$14.99/mo$79.99/yr$11/mo$11/mo$13–25/mo

Roon added nugs.net this year. That gets you the official albums, track by track. Showboard plays those same nugs releases next to your Archive.org pulls, your Phish.in matches, the SBD/AUD/Matrix badge on every recording, and the Concert Diary of shows you actually stood at.

Read the full comparison: Showboard vs Roon · Showboard vs Audirvana
Leaving a subscription? We rounded up the best roon alternatives and the audirvana alternatives for Mac.
Run Plex at home? See where it fits in the best Roon alternatives for Mac.

6
Sources unified
DSD
Down to lossy, all of it
$0
Per month, forever
<1s
Launch time
Under the hood

Built right.

Native Mac appInstant launchTiny footprintAuto-updates

A real Mac app

Launches in under a second. Uses less memory than a browser tab. Keyboard shortcuts, menu bar, notifications, native dark mode. Built for the Mac from day one.

Uncompromised audio

Showboard takes exclusive control of your audio hardware. No system mixer in the way. No resampling. The file plays exactly as it was encoded.

Always up to date

New versions appear as a notification. One click to update. No app store, no manual downloads.

Encore

One price. Every update. Forever yours.

No subscriptions. No recurring charges. Pay once, own it forever.

$39.99one-time

14-day free trial. No credit card required.

Download Free Trial
Buy now, $39.99

Left Audirvana when it went subscription? Came up for air after a Roon renewal? This is the one-time way back in.

macOS 14+•Apple Silicon + Intel

Everything included

✓All six sources in one library
✓Bit-perfect, exclusive-mode playback
✓Set breaks, source badges, taper notes
✓Concert diary (My Shows)
✓Song Versions & Venue Explorer
✓EQ and headphone crossfeed
✓AirPlay and Bluetooth output
✓Control from your phone (web remote)
✓Menu bar player
✓Every future update

Meanwhile

Roon
$14.99/mo

$149.88/yr · $829.99 lifetime

Audirvana
$79.99/yr

every year

Apple Music
$11/mo

forever

Spotify
$11/mo

forever

nugs.net
$13–25/mo

forever

Five years of Roon runs about $750 on the annual plan. Five years of Showboard runs $39.99. Same bit-perfect output to your DAC, plus five more sources and a Concert Diary Roon has never heard of.

Audirvana now charges $79.99 a year, every year, and still does not know what a Matrix recording is. Roon rents by the month or asks $829.99 up front. Showboard is $39.99, paid once, with every future update.

30-day money-back guarantee. If Showboard isn't for you, email us and we'll refund you. No questions.

Common questions

Before you ask.

More questions? Visit support or email chris@showboard.app

A note from the builder

One night my wife Sabrina and I were flipping through our ticket stub books, remembering shows we'd been to together. We'd point at a stub and say “pull that one up.” And every time, it was the same thing. Open Phish.in. Open Archive. Open the folder of SBDs. Three apps. Three searches. For one night we both remembered perfectly.

So I built the app we always wanted.

My name is Chris. Sabrina and I have been to hundreds of shows together. Showboard exists because those nights meant something, and the music deserves better than three tabs and a prayer.

Read the full story →