What are peoples thoughts about animates keyboards on synth GUI's?

For me - I think they're unnecessary, make a larger file-size, consume more CPU.
I can see what keys I play on my keyboard... why another screen image?

 

If you think that a virtual keyboard on a virtual synth is packing a cpu hit worth mentioning, you should start shopping for another computer.

It's convenient for people while doing sound design, those who do not even use a controller, and DAWs which do not have a floating keyboard you can type notes with.

 

An old shipmate who lost his both hands to Belgian pirates, admitted one drunken night off the Barbary Coast that he loved those keyboards because if he got drunk enough, it almost seemed like he was playing.

 

Last edited: Jan 19, 2026 at 10:57 AM

what goes into an instrument isn't necessarily what you play on your keyboard. Arpeggiators, plugins splitting the keyboard (organs, ..), rerouting to other MIDI channels, transposing, playing full chords or sequences on single key presses, ..

 

but those 2 kilobytes for the key images!

 

Some users find it very helpful to know which note they're playing, and a GUI usually looks better with keyboards.
Every manufacturer does what they want; some do a great job, and some don't.

Of course, I think it's great when manufacturers provide one or more interchangeable skins.
There's a lot of room for improvement in terms of quality and appearance.

Some virtual software synthesizers also allow you to hide the keyboard.
However, the increased CPU consumption and file size are barely measurable.

 

"... it's great when manufacturers provide one or more interchangeable skins... "
Yes you're right.

I realize I'm coming from a background of low-level hardware programming... CPU (assembly level), trying to squeeze the most juice from every clock cycle... OCD you can name it @_@

 

As they say, you can always optimize something. However, you can also overdo it and over-optimize things.
What helps against that is to give yourself a new task or a different approach to a problem.

 

2 GigaBytes in Arturia synths, mate. Anyway, I prefer to have an option to hide the virtual keyboard because it usually takes up too much screen space, and I rarely use them. It depends on your use-case.

 

Like @SineWave and others said, as long as you can hide it's fine. But sometimes is useful

 

It's 1.1 KB and +0.2% more CPU when it's vector-based

 

When FM7 and PPG vst came out the visible interactive keyboard was such a huge part of the experience. I couldn't believe what was happening in my computer. I am pro keyboard.

 

I haven't always hooked up my keyboard. In those cases it is useful to have a online working keyboard for quick hearing. As long as this online keyboard can be hidden it is fine with me!

I can't remember at the moment, but there have been VSTi's with a keyboard that was not usable, just an image of a keyboard. What the hell is that good for?

 

But why? In all those videos floating around the digital "metaverse," are those real people? Schizophrenics claiming they are not, but sometimes they might be. The virtual keyboard, presented as a "huge part of the experience," surely exists for some reason… even though it devours usable screen space, especially when the self-proclaimed musician already has a real MIDI keyboard right in front of them. And the white keys, well, they are white. If they have to exist at all, do they really need to be aesthetically glaring white? During late-night sessions in front of the screen, that stroboscoping glow surely becomes an integral part of the experience. Those blinding, antiseptic keys glow like a dentist’s office in a universe made of pixels. A physical piano reflects light; a virtual one emits it straight into your rods and cones at midnight when your pupils, not on heroin, are wide open like cathedral doors. Designers inherited the look but forgot the physics. They recreated ivory instead of illumination-aware surfaces. The result is not nostalgia; it is retinal violence dressed as tradition. Skeuomorphism overstaying its welcome? A visual fossil preserved long after its function died. Synths with "music for the eyes" wooden panels made of shit-brown premium pixels do nothing to make analog sounds feel analog in the digital domain? The virtual keyboard has become a reassurance device, a symbolic prop whispering, "Look, you're broke, but you are plonking a real CS-80 and a partially hidden Jupiter 8. All is good, right?" Like all props left on stage too long, it stops supporting the illusion and starts exposing it. It is just well, or not so well coded binary?

 

Just light right now I am setting you to ignore for all the idology you can't hold back,



you should similarly scroll by content that doesn't resonate, instead of turning it into a failed masterpiece of one way cathartic back firing bullshit.

 

Most of the time I don't mind them and hide them out of the way if possible, but they do sometimes come in handy as a MIDI monitor. In some cases (samplers like Kontakt) they're extremely helpful as you can see the mapped keyswitches, triggers, and key ranges.

 

As everyone is (perhaps slightly off topic, but hey, what must be done must be done) delightfully informed you certainly will, just ignore it? Scroll by content that doesn't resonate? Wouldn't that be simple enough?

 

Or you could jam a real keyboard. That's real life....

 

It's useful for sound designers who just need to click and hold a note now and then - even if most have a mini controller handy - but it's essential when you're traveling, or out and about at a cafe, or at the beach (I do all three) and didn't shlep a controller with you.

In fact, I'm disappointed, and disinclined to use a soft synth (as primary) if it does not have a visual keyboard (collapsible or not).

The GPU hit is inconsequential.