Preferences, Settings, and Templates

The Three Tiers

Your workflow and work style in Logic exist on three levels. Each one has a different scope, and knowing which one you are dealing with prevents a lot of confusion.

Tier 1: Preferences (Global Settings). Under Logic Pro > Settings (Apple used to call these Preferences — they rename things periodically). Whatever you change here applies to Logic everywhere, across every project you open. This is the “forever” menu. Audio device selection, buffer size, the advanced features toggle, editing behaviors, click zone settings — all global.

Tier 2: Project Settings. Under File > Project Settings. These belong to the song you are working on right now. Tempo, key signature, sample rate, recording settings, metronome behavior — these are per-project. Change them and they affect only this song.

Tier 3: Templates. A template inherits both your global preferences and whatever project settings you configure, plus the tracks, routing, instruments, and tool assignments you have set up. When you create a new project from a template, you get a pre-built starting point that reflects how you actually work. No template replaces the other two tiers — it sits on top of them.

The distinction matters because sometimes the setting you need is not where you expect it. Apple has moved things between the global menu and the project menu over the years. If you cannot find something in one, check the other. All of these settings panels — Audio, Recording, General, MIDI — are just tabs of one larger window anyway. It does not matter which entry point you use to get in. You will find your way around once you are there.

And sometimes Logic is inconsistent about where something lives. The metronome, for example, has settings in both the global preferences and the project settings. Recording overlap behavior is a project setting. Buffer size is global. Audio device is global. Sample rate is per-project. If something is behaving unexpectedly, check both tiers before you start troubleshooting.

The Preference File

When you change a global preference, Logic does not save it to disk immediately. The preference file gets written when you quit Logic normally. If Logic crashes before you quit — and Logic does crash — any preferences you changed during that session may not survive.

This is not a bug. It is how macOS handles preference files for most applications. But it means that after you spend time customizing settings, you should quit and relaunch Logic once to make sure those changes are written to disk. Do not rely on a crash doing it for you.

The preference file itself lives in ~/Library/Preferences/ and is named something like com.apple.logic10.plist. Your key commands are stored separately, in ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.logic.pro.cs. Both of these files are worth knowing about because they are what you back up when you want to preserve your configuration.

Creating and Cleaning Up a Template

Logic ships with templates — Electronic, Hip Hop, Songwriting — but the first part of that template menu is training wheels. “Do you want to make a rock song?” The real value is in building your own.

A template is a project file stripped of content but loaded with configuration. Your preferred tracks. Your tool assignments from Chapter 3. Your screensets. Your routing. Your default plugins. Your metronome and count-in settings. When you start a new song from your template, all of that is waiting.

A good template includes:

• Your preferred tracks and instruments pre-loaded
• Tool assignments (the three-button setup from Chapter 3)
• Screensets configured for your workflow
• Default plugins on the master bus (if you use them)
• I/O routing for your audio interface
• Metronome and count-in settings
• A reverb bus already set up (if you always use one)

To save a template: File > Save as Template. Logic suggests a location — use it. Your template will appear in the chooser next time you create a project.

To build one from a working session: strip out all the content — audio files, MIDI regions, automation — but keep the configuration. Check the audio file pool and clear anything that should not carry forward. This takes a little time the first time, and it is a good exercise to do with someone else watching, because you will discover settings you forgot you had set.

One habit that works well: keep a running list of things you set up manually every time you open Logic. “I always create a reverb bus.” “I always assign this third tool.” “I always change the metronome count-in to two bars.” Once a month or so, open your template, make those changes, save it as a new version. Over time, the template becomes a mirror of how you actually work.

Customizing the Toolbar

Right-click the control bar to see what you can add and remove. Some things that are there by default are not particularly useful — the Stop button, for example, takes up space but duplicates what the spacebar does. Consider removing it.

Other things are worth adding: the Low Latency Mode button, the count-in toggle, the tuner. If you use something every session, it should be one click away. If you never touch it, take it out. Screen real estate is valuable, especially on a laptop.

One thing about the transport buttons that is easy to miss: some of them have extra functions if you click and hold. The Play button reveals alternative playback modes. The Record button reveals additional recording options. These long-press menus give you access to settings that are not visible anywhere else in the toolbar. Get in the habit of holding down those buttons to see what is hiding underneath.

For people working on small screens — laptops especially — toolbar customization is not optional. The default toolbar includes items most people never click. Take five minutes, strip it down, add what you need, and put the saved configuration in your template.

Project Saving: Folders, Not Packages

When you first save a project, Logic offers two formats.

Package bundles everything into a single .logicx file. Convenient to move around — it is one thing. But it contains your project data and all your audio, so it grows fast. Save a new version and you duplicate the entire package, audio files and all.

Folder saves the project as a directory structure — a small project file alongside organized subfolders for audio, bounces, and movie files. The project file is typically 2 MB or so. Save a new version and you are only creating a new copy of that small file. The audio stays where it is.

Over a session, you might accumulate a dozen versions. With folder saving, that is a dozen 2 MB files. With package saving, that is a dozen copies of your entire audio folder. Use folders.

Consolidating Assets

When you save, Logic can copy dependencies into your project folder — audio files, sampler instruments, movie files. A Logic project aggregates content from all over your system: a loop from one folder, a sample library from another, a movie file from somewhere else. If any of those dependencies moves or disappears, the project breaks.

Under File > Project Settings > Assets, control which file types get pulled into the project. The safe approach: check everything. Storage is cheap. A 30 MB sampler instrument adds negligible weight, but it means the project is portable. Put the folder on a thumb drive, bring it to another machine, and everything opens because the dependencies traveled with it.

Version Control

Save versions as you go. Not “let Logic auto-save and hope for the best” — manual, intentional versions with names that mean something.

The workflow: File > Save As, give it a version number (MySong_v01, MySong_v02), and keep them in the same project folder. Each version is a small file. If something goes wrong — you delete a take you should not have, you make an edit you cannot undo — you can go back to a known good state. Logic does save version history internally, but you will not know what is in those auto-saves. Doing it yourself means every version is a deliberate checkpoint.

What to Practice

• Open Logic Pro > Settings and open File > Project Settings. Click through the tabs in each. You do not need to memorize what is where — just notice which panels exist and get a feel for the territory. Try to find the same concept (like recording or audio settings) in both places, and notice how the scope differs.
• Enable the advanced features if you have not already. Notice how the interface changes — the wood paneling disappears and you get screen space back.
• Right-click the control bar and customize it. Remove the Stop button. Add something useful — the count-in toggle, the Low Latency Mode button. Try the long press on the Play and Record buttons and look at what is hiding in those menus.
• Save a project as a folder (not a package). Open the folder in Finder and look at the structure — the project file, the audio files folder, the subfolders. Do a Save As with a version number and notice how small the new file is compared to the audio.
• Locate your preference file and key commands file in ~/Library/Preferences/. Copy them to a cloud drive or a USB stick. You now have a backup of your entire Logic configuration.
• If you have been working in Logic for a while, take 15 minutes to build a basic template. Strip out content, keep configuration, save as template. Start a new project from it and see how much setup you just eliminated.

Key Commands from This Chapter