Limiter

A limiter is an aggressive compressor with a very high ratio that prevents audio from ever passing a set ceiling, acting as a brick wall against peaks. In practice it does two jobs: it protects a mix from clipping by catching stray transients, and on the master bus it raises overall loudness by clamping peaks so the average level can come up. A mixer places a limiter last in the chain, sets the output ceiling just below full scale (often minus 1 dBTP to satisfy true-peak rules), and pushes input gain until the loudness target is met. The art is restraint: light limiting catches occasional peaks transparently, but driving it hard squashes dynamics and pumps. For delivery to streaming or broadcast, the limiter is what reconciles a clean mix with a required loudness spec.