The 7 Best Audio DI Boxes (2023 reviews)

We consider a audio di box to be a worthy investment in the long run. We are here to help you choose the right one for your purposes from all the best available products in market today.

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Our Top Picks:

Best overall: Buy: Radial Engineering Passive Direct Box READ REVIEW

Best For price: Buy: Samson Audio DI Box READ REVIEW

Best For synth: Buy: Mackie Audio DI Box READ REVIEW

Best For Live Use: Buy: Radial Engineering Audio DI Box READ REVIEW

Best For Bass: Buy: DBX Audio DI Box READ REVIEW

Best For home recording: Buy: DBX Direct Box READ REVIEW

Best For splitting signals: Buy: ART Audio DI Box READ REVIEW

Best overall: Radial Engineering Passive Direct Box

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Here, we review box that manages to win our hearts. It's the radial engineering passive direct box and it's widely considered as one of best box you can buy. Whether it's being jostled around in a gig bag or dropped on the floor, this DI box just keeps on working. It's built like a tank and can withstand just about anything you throw at it. It reduces the clutter and the clunkiness of two d1s taped together. It makes a great addition to any sound system, especially guitar, bass and bass.

The XLR cable is a balanced cable so the signal going to a PA would be Balanced no matter what. It's pro-studio grade quality, works perfectly, and won't comprise your audio signal in the slightest. It's a passive direct box, so there isn't much that can go wrong. This thing could definitely handle some road wear.

• Very solid and reliable and great signal quality
• Buzz / hum, quiet as a church mouse
• New and hot release

Best For price: Samson Audio DI Box

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The samson audio di box might be a relatively new release, but it's still nothing short of impressive this year. The Samson MDA1 active direct box is a rugged direct box that can be powered by a 9v battery or phantom power. It runs very clean and has a durable housing made of metal and is great for live sound and recording studio applications such as guitars and basses and operates on either batteries or phantom power. It’s quiet with multiple instruments and amps. It can be used in country music concert hall.

This is a direct box that takes instrument input and converts it to a balanced XLR. It’s built like a tank and is inexpensive for what you get. If you want to record a clean signal and the amplified signal at the same time, this is what you need.

• Solid weight and construction, db pad switch is a must have
• Rock solid, transparent and ultra boost
• Runs right into the stage mixer no issues

Best For synth: Mackie Audio DI Box

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The mackie audio di box should be able to handle its purpose and duties with ease. This is an “active” DI box, meaning that it needs a battery or phantom power from the mixer. It feels like a solid little box that is well made. It is a line-level signal converter to an xLR output. This device translates input from each 1/4" input to the associated XLR output. The signal passing through from your instrument is all the power needed. It is great with no buzz or hum. This last feature is actually very useful not only for driving an amp onstage as a monitor while the low-Z signal goes to the mixer. It is perfect fit for keyboards.

• Very solidly built, quiet, with many useful features
• More buzzing sound from the computer through the mixer console
• Good investment for long term

Best For Live Use: Radial Engineering Audio DI Box

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It is great for live use. It is a passive direct box for multi-media/audio/video use. It is great for helping select the right box and hooking it up correctly. The Radial unit works perfectly for these needs easily and the sound quality is great. This helps when the DI is placed in an area that gets a lot of use, or an uneven surface. It is a great resource in helping select the right box and hooking it up correctly.

• Uses the same excellent transformer as the prodi series from radial
• Good brand reputation

Best For Bass: DBX Audio DI Box

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Compared with other box in this category, the dbx audio di box has a convenient design. It’s really meant for a DJ mixer/controller. It features such as level and impedance matching, phantom power indication, signal pass through, and ground lift functionality. It is used to connect unbalanced outputs to balanced inputs. There is a bit of volume drop on the speakers, but this is easily overcome. It takes a bit of twiddling to get the settings correct, but once you have it, then you never should have to change it. It is great for dj use.

• One of the new comers and featured product
• Good brand reputation

Best For home recording: DBX Direct Box

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It’s a very versatile passive DI box, that adds little if any coloring to the sound. It comes with their bullet-proof construction, and extraordinary audio performance to rival their looks, and finally there’s a direct box worthy of the dbx name. It is for the guitar amp, there is a direct wired thru output, so that you can hook the amp's speaker output up to this box's input, and plug the amp's speaker into the thru output.

All of this sits atop a solid, stable footprint, that will keep the box from being dragged around the stage, and the unique contoured underside allows secure stacking of multiple units. The switches are protected by the cast metal housing so they shouldn't be damaged by performers kicking, stepping on, or otherwise abusing the device.

• Stackable chassis with durable rubber foot
• Excellent solution to several recording problems
• Include a pad switch that accommodates instrument, line and even speaker level signals

Best For splitting signals: ART Audio DI Box

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Art offers a variety of box for personal choice and yet maintaining quality in all the variants. It is the ideal input solution for any application where stereo ipods, laptop computers, consumer dvd players, consumer hifi equipment or video machines have to be connected to a single xlr microphone level input. It has stereo rca, 1/8th inch and 1/4-inch trs line level inputs, as well as a 1/4-inch and bare wire pressure clip speaker level inputs. It makes it much easier to simply set a max volume at the board, then control the volume at the source when the presentation begins.

The gain knob on the box is nice for fine tuning the gain stages. It's just like using a Y-connector to feed two devices into one. The independent volume control on the DA is a really nice feature. It has a design for best grip fit. It can be used in a church setting to take an unbalanced connection to a balanced signal from a CD player to sound board, and computer to soundboard.

• Just an excellent inexpensive directbox that can be used for many applications
• Works well and is road worthy
• A solidly built product that performs very well