Audient Horizon 16 Thunderbolt Audio Interface

Audient Horizon 16 — Flagship Thunderbolt 3 Audio Interface for the Professional Studio

The Audient Horizon 16 is a 34-in / 34-out Thunderbolt 3 audio interface for the hybrid studio. Sixteen channels of analogue line I/O flow through four DB25 connectors, bridging outboard racks and summing workflows. Dedicated stereo monitor and mix-bus paths capture a final print without repatching the primary 16×16 I/O.

Mastering-Grade Conversion and Native Plugin Performance

ESS ES9823PRO and ES9039 32-bit AD/DA converters pair with OPA1602 and OPA1612 op-amps for surgical transient capture. A hybrid analogue/digital PLL clocking circuit keeps jitter attenuation rock-solid. Thunderbolt 3 delivers 0.99 ms round-trip latency at 192 kHz with a 64-sample buffer — the benchmark for real-time native monitoring.

I/O Configuration and Expansion

I/O architecture keeps an outboard rack patched with headroom for digital expansion.

• Total I/O: 34 in / 34 out — 16×16 primary analogue line I/O on four DB25 connectors, plus dedicated stereo monitor and mix-bus paths
• Digital Expansion: Dual ADAT I/O (SPDIF/ADAT optical) — 16 channels of digital input and 16 channels of digital output
• Word Clock: BNC input and output, ±10 ppm accuracy — switchable internal termination

Conversion Quality — Transparent Capture of Analogue Character

Mastering-grade conversion adds nothing and removes nothing from the signal, with selectable +18 dBu / +24 dBu reference levels.

• Dynamic Range: 133 dB A-Weighted (monitor outputs) — 132 dB on line outputs, 127 dB on ADC inputs
• THD+N: -122 dB (0.00008%) on line outputs, -117 dB (0.00014%) on ADC inputs

System Performance and Scalability

Sub-millisecond latency and a unified driver let this unit scale from a single 16-channel interface to a 200-in / 200-out facility, housed in a 1RU full-metal chassis with fanless cooling.

• Round-Trip Latency: 0.99 ms at 192 kHz / 64-sample buffer — scales through 176.4, 96, 88.2, 48, and 44.1 kHz
• Supported Sample Rates: 44.1 / 48 / 88.2 / 96 / 176.4 / 192 kHz — full 32-bit AD/DA at every rate
• Scalability: 200×200 I/O across four daisy-chained units — managed through a single unified macOS driver