{"slug": "max", "name": "Max", "category": "media", "category_name": "Media and creative", "description": "", "recommenders": 5, "commenters": 11, "warners": 4, "score": 0.826, "rising": 1.02, "first": "2025-11-13", "latest": "2026-09-29", "why": "Max goes a lot deeper than wiring some GUI boxes together", "why_is_quote": true, "has_verdict": false, "sentiment": {"recommend": 5, "neutral": 1, "compare": 2, "warn": 4}, "spark": [0, 0, 1, 1, 0, 0, 0, 1, 0, 0, 2, 0], "listed": true, "loved": [], "caveat": "", "short_quote": "Max goes a lot deeper than wiring some GUI boxes together", "kind": "", "icon": true, "domain": null, "github_repo": "github.com/modular/modular", "official_url": "https://github.com/modular/modular", "pricing": "", "aliases": ["Max", "MAX", "max"], "verdict": null, "praise": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 798343440, "item_id": 49896465, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49896465", "by": "giancarlostoro", "date": "2026-09-29", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "the Max libraries just let you talk directly to the GPU / CPU / ASIC with Mojo", "excerpt": "Mojo might be what you want, especially with \"MAX\" which is their AI modeling framework, where in other languages you need NVidia's libraries, or AMDs, etc the Max libraries just let you talk directly to the GPU / CPU / ASIC with Mojo. I think Mojo is very underrated in this space right now, but assuming they don't mess it up, it could be a major contender in AI. In theory, if someone releases a board, and Modular (c", "context": "", "use_case": "AI model framework", "switched_from": "", "story": "ESP32S3 cluster running 1.58-bit (BitNet) Language model"}, {"id": 793233058, "item_id": 49577066, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49577066", "by": "cmontella", "date": "2026-09-05", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "if you use their Max toolchain you can compile Mojo directly to Metal, with performance at the top of the stack", "excerpt": "https://raw.githubusercontent.com/mech-lang/mech/codex/pypy-ekf-mega-chart/benchmarks/archive/compute/parallel-ekf/charts/parallel-ekf-cross-language-checked.svg I added PyPy and Mojo. PyPy performs valiantly compared to Cpython -- even better than LuaJIT. I'm sure someone skilled at writing it could do an even better job. I measured 3 Mojo implementations. The first is a dynamic implementation, it performs like a ty", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "How an MIT research project became the Julia programming language"}, {"id": 774365009, "item_id": 48397813, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48397813", "by": "windowliker", "date": "2026-06-04", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "which has a snippets[2] feature much like any other good IDE", "excerpt": ">Ableton and Max are totally separate codebases, and \"Max for Live\" is just a ~VST interface between them. This is not strictly true, and Max for Live (M4L) is much more than a pseudo-VST. In the context of Live, the Max runtime is controlled by the DAW, which itself then exposes part of its interface to Max. So there's realtime bi-directional communication going on, more akin to how Propellerhead Software's (now dep", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ableton Extensions SDK"}, {"id": 774360352, "item_id": 48397522, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48397522", "by": "windowliker", "date": "2026-06-04", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "As it is now, Max offers a very smooth interface to the basic paradigm", "excerpt": "The visual patching part of Max makes sense when you know the history of the program. It was built for musicians working at the forefront of interfacing MIDI with the power of the more compact mainframe computers of the day (PDP-11 IIRC). The 'programming' was done through a GUI running on the first Macintosh. At first there was no audio processing in Max itself, it was purely for generating and manipulating MIDI dat", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ableton Extensions SDK"}, {"id": 774356976, "item_id": 48397311, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48397311", "by": "windowliker", "date": "2026-06-04", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Max goes a lot deeper than wiring some GUI boxes together", "excerpt": "Max itself can be manipulated through JavaScript. You can dynamically create and connect objects in it, set scheduler tasks, etc. Max goes a lot deeper than wiring some GUI boxes together. Have a dig around here: https://docs.cycling74.com/apiref/js/", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ableton Extensions SDK"}]}], "caveats": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 782790306, "item_id": 48924394, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48924394", "by": "maqp", "date": "2026-07-15", "version": null, "stance": "warn", "quote": "releasing an obviously backdoored app like Max", "excerpt": ">Ukrainian military has literally relied upon it in the past Well they realized their mistake and banned Telegram's use on state issued devices in 2024 https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c78dwepw95do I'm not going to speak for the author of that article. But I agree with his conclusion. Telegram is indistinguishable from a honeypot. In the world of infosec, stuff isn't secure until someone proves you wrong (which you ", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Mysteries of Telegram Data Centers"}, {"id": 762088817, "item_id": 47630551, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47630551", "by": "kirushik", "date": "2026-04-03", "version": null, "stance": "warn", "quote": "in that state-enforced Max messenger there so much surveillance", "excerpt": "The \"as much of an art project, as an applied cryptography exercise\" take resonates a lot! Just earlier this week I've released https://github.com/kirushik/paternoster (and even won Berlin Hack and Tell with it) \u2014 and it totally came from the idea \"in that state-enforced Max messenger there so much surveillance you can only praise the authorities and pray in there. What if there was a way to hide messages into the te", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "A Recipe for Steganogravy"}, {"id": 755935360, "item_id": 47245960, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47245960", "by": "hagbard_c", "date": "2026-03-04", "version": null, "stance": "warn", "quote": "Another contender to become the European 'Max'", "excerpt": "Another contender to become the European 'Max' [1] for when the EU decides it can no longer tolerate communications applications where those who stray too far from the desired narrative are not reined in. Nope, nein, nee, nej, non, \u043d\u0435\u0442, n\u00e3o, nie, nei, ei, n\u0113, ne, \u03cc\u03c7 and whatever other word for 'no' you can think of. [1] https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2025/08/28/everything-you-need-to-know-about-max-russias-state-back", "context": "", "use_case": "Messaging app", "switched_from": "", "story": "The next era of social media: built and run in Europe, ruled by our laws"}, {"id": 734709665, "item_id": 45919354, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45919354", "by": "wartywhoa23", "date": "2025-11-13", "version": null, "stance": "warn", "quote": "in Russia people are now being forced to use the state-developed MAX", "excerpt": "Yes, it's very bad. And it's not organic. People in this very thread say that they have no choice but to use LINE. I don't know how exactly it rose to prominence in Asia, but for example in Russia people are now being forced to use the state-developed MAX. You only actually force a part of society - various state clerks, military, police, educational workers, schoolchildren, students - and they, together with their r", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Seed. LINE's Custom Typeface"}]}], "who": [{"by": "iainctduncan", "context": "uses Max for Live", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48400543", "date": "2026-06-04"}], "tags": [], "use_cases": ["ai model framework", "music and sound workflows", "messaging app", "repl and scripting", "audio plugin design", "music programming"], "compared": [], "makers": [{"id": 756897392, "item_id": 47306087, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47306087", "by": "benvan", "date": "2026-03-09", "version": null, "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I've been working on something very similar here https://github.com/max-hq/max", "excerpt": "Nice project! I've been working on something very similar here https://github.com/max-hq/max It works by schematising the upstream and making data locally synchronised + a common query language, so the longer term goals are more about avoiding API limits / escaping the confines of the MCP query feature set - i.e. token savings on reading data itself (in many cases, savings can be upwards of thousands of times fewer t", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Mcp2cli \u2013 One CLI for every API, 96-99% fewer tokens than native MCP"}], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48389681", "title": "Ableton Extensions SDK", "mentions": 4}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49884625", "title": "ESP32S3 cluster running 1.58-bit (BitNet) Language model", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49507072", "title": "How an MIT research project became the Julia programming language", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48920475", "title": "Mysteries of Telegram Data Centers", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47560967", "title": "A Recipe for Steganogravy", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47616361", "title": "Google releases Gemma 4 open models", "mentions": 1}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {"warn": 1}, "2025-12": {"compare": 1}, "2026-01": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-02": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-03": {"warn": 1}, "2026-04": {"compare": 1, "warn": 1}, "2026-05": {}, "2026-06": {"recommend": 1, "neutral": 1}, "2026-07": {"warn": 1}, "2026-08": {}, "2026-09": {"recommend": 2}, "2026-10": {}}, "versions": [], "version_unnamed": 0, "family_ref": null, "runs_on": null, "lines": [], "quotes": [{"id": 798343440, "item_id": 49896465, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49896465", "by": "giancarlostoro", "date": "2026-09-29", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "the Max libraries just let you talk directly to the GPU / CPU / ASIC with Mojo", "excerpt": "Mojo might be what you want, especially with \"MAX\" which is their AI modeling framework, where in other languages you need NVidia's libraries, or AMDs, etc the Max libraries just let you talk directly to the GPU / CPU / ASIC with Mojo. I think Mojo is very underrated in this space right now, but assuming they don't mess it up, it could be a major contender in AI. In theory, if someone releases a board, and Modular (c", "context": "", "use_case": "AI model framework", "switched_from": "", "story": "ESP32S3 cluster running 1.58-bit (BitNet) Language model"}, {"id": 793233058, "item_id": 49577066, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49577066", "by": "cmontella", "date": "2026-09-05", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "if you use their Max toolchain you can compile Mojo directly to Metal, with performance at the top of the stack", "excerpt": "https://raw.githubusercontent.com/mech-lang/mech/codex/pypy-ekf-mega-chart/benchmarks/archive/compute/parallel-ekf/charts/parallel-ekf-cross-language-checked.svg I added PyPy and Mojo. PyPy performs valiantly compared to Cpython -- even better than LuaJIT. I'm sure someone skilled at writing it could do an even better job. I measured 3 Mojo implementations. The first is a dynamic implementation, it performs like a ty", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "How an MIT research project became the Julia programming language"}, {"id": 782790306, "item_id": 48924394, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48924394", "by": "maqp", "date": "2026-07-15", "version": null, "stance": "warn", "quote": "releasing an obviously backdoored app like Max", "excerpt": ">Ukrainian military has literally relied upon it in the past Well they realized their mistake and banned Telegram's use on state issued devices in 2024 https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c78dwepw95do I'm not going to speak for the author of that article. But I agree with his conclusion. Telegram is indistinguishable from a honeypot. In the world of infosec, stuff isn't secure until someone proves you wrong (which you ", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Mysteries of Telegram Data Centers"}, {"id": 774408688, "item_id": 48400543, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48400543", "by": "iainctduncan", "date": "2026-06-04", "version": null, "stance": "neutral", "quote": "My typical workflow is a mix of Max, Csound in Max, Gen and Scheme", "excerpt": "There's a big caveat there though that is widely misunderstood. Max has separate scheduler and UI threads. JS only runs in the UI thread, and thus cannot be used for reliable timing tasks - timing will seem to be ok until there is load and than the UI thread timing is out the window. One of the main reasons I wrote Scheme for Max (S4M) was to enable tightly timed scripting. You can pick which thread an S4M instance r", "context": "uses Max for Live", "use_case": "Music and sound workflows", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ableton Extensions SDK"}, {"id": 774365009, "item_id": 48397813, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48397813", "by": "windowliker", "date": "2026-06-04", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "which has a snippets[2] feature much like any other good IDE", "excerpt": ">Ableton and Max are totally separate codebases, and \"Max for Live\" is just a ~VST interface between them. This is not strictly true, and Max for Live (M4L) is much more than a pseudo-VST. In the context of Live, the Max runtime is controlled by the DAW, which itself then exposes part of its interface to Max. So there's realtime bi-directional communication going on, more akin to how Propellerhead Software's (now dep", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ableton Extensions SDK"}, {"id": 774360352, "item_id": 48397522, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48397522", "by": "windowliker", "date": "2026-06-04", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "As it is now, Max offers a very smooth interface to the basic paradigm", "excerpt": "The visual patching part of Max makes sense when you know the history of the program. It was built for musicians working at the forefront of interfacing MIDI with the power of the more compact mainframe computers of the day (PDP-11 IIRC). The 'programming' was done through a GUI running on the first Macintosh. At first there was no audio processing in Max itself, it was purely for generating and manipulating MIDI dat", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ableton Extensions SDK"}, {"id": 774356976, "item_id": 48397311, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48397311", "by": "windowliker", "date": "2026-06-04", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Max goes a lot deeper than wiring some GUI boxes together", "excerpt": "Max itself can be manipulated through JavaScript. You can dynamically create and connect objects in it, set scheduler tasks, etc. Max goes a lot deeper than wiring some GUI boxes together. Have a dig around here: https://docs.cycling74.com/apiref/js/", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ableton Extensions SDK"}, {"id": 762088817, "item_id": 47630551, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47630551", "by": "kirushik", "date": "2026-04-03", "version": null, "stance": "warn", "quote": "in that state-enforced Max messenger there so much surveillance", "excerpt": "The \"as much of an art project, as an applied cryptography exercise\" take resonates a lot! Just earlier this week I've released https://github.com/kirushik/paternoster (and even won Berlin Hack and Tell with it) \u2014 and it totally came from the idea \"in that state-enforced Max messenger there so much surveillance you can only praise the authorities and pray in there. What if there was a way to hide messages into the te", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "A Recipe for Steganogravy"}, {"id": 761901489, "item_id": 47618843, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47618843", "by": "melodyogonna", "date": "2026-04-02", "version": null, "stance": "compare", "quote": "By contrast, here is the reference for MAX:https://github.com/modular/modular/commit/57728b23befed8f3b44e24d67d41b275bd3e49d4", "excerpt": "I reviewed the TensorRT-LLM commit history from the past few days and couldn't find any updates regarding Gemma 4 support. By contrast, here is the reference for MAX:https://github.com/modular/modular/commit/57728b23befed8f3b44e24d67d41b275bd3e49d4", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Google releases Gemma 4 open models"}, {"id": 755935360, "item_id": 47245960, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47245960", "by": "hagbard_c", "date": "2026-03-04", "version": null, "stance": "warn", "quote": "Another contender to become the European 'Max'", "excerpt": "Another contender to become the European 'Max' [1] for when the EU decides it can no longer tolerate communications applications where those who stray too far from the desired narrative are not reined in. Nope, nein, nee, nej, non, \u043d\u0435\u0442, n\u00e3o, nie, nei, ei, n\u0113, ne, \u03cc\u03c7 and whatever other word for 'no' you can think of. [1] https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2025/08/28/everything-you-need-to-know-about-max-russias-state-back", "context": "", "use_case": "Messaging app", "switched_from": "", "story": "The next era of social media: built and run in Europe, ruled by our laws"}, {"id": 750418736, "item_id": 46901171, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46901171", "by": "iainctduncan", "date": "2026-02-05", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Which is freaking awesome, because I can script all of Max from my vim buffers.", "excerpt": "That I don't know, but the s7 author, Bill Schottstaedt (who I will ping about this) is very helpful on the email list and is deeply, deeply knowledgeable about Lisp, so you could definitely ask there! https://ccrma-mail.stanford.edu/mailman/listinfo/cmdist In my context, I have rigged up a REPL in Max, so I wind up using that instead. (Which is freaking awesome, because I can script all of Max from my vim buffers.)", "context": "", "use_case": "REPL and scripting", "switched_from": "", "story": "Why S7 Scheme?"}, {"id": 743772625, "item_id": 46485789, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46485789", "by": "johnwheeler", "date": "2026-01-03", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "trying to recreate things with Max", "excerpt": "I use Claude more as a learning tool in this context. It's kind of funny actually got the idea because I heard that in China they're basically replacing teachers with AI, where we're trying to get AI out of our school systems in the United States. So I went into it with that mindset instead of trying to have Claude do the whole thing to teach me how to do it so I understand it and I'm still learning, trying to recrea", "context": "", "use_case": "audio plugin design", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: I used AI to recreate a $4000 piece of audio hardware as a plugin"}, {"id": 741681137, "item_id": 46355071, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46355071", "by": "heuermh", "date": "2025-12-22", "version": null, "stance": "compare", "quote": "I appreciate Max/Pure Sound but would rather use my text editor.", "excerpt": "I have been using ChucK for a long time. Like others here, I appreciate Max/Pure Sound but would rather use my text editor. Delay delay; LPF filter; Reverb reverb; Gain feedback; adc => delay => filter => reverb => dac; filter => feedback => delay;", "context": "", "use_case": "music programming", "switched_from": "", "story": "Programming languages used for music"}, {"id": 734709665, "item_id": 45919354, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45919354", "by": "wartywhoa23", "date": "2025-11-13", "version": null, "stance": "warn", "quote": "in Russia people are now being forced to use the state-developed MAX", "excerpt": "Yes, it's very bad. And it's not organic. People in this very thread say that they have no choice but to use LINE. I don't know how exactly it rose to prominence in Asia, but for example in Russia people are now being forced to use the state-developed MAX. You only actually force a part of society - various state clerks, military, police, educational workers, schoolchildren, students - and they, together with their r", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Seed. LINE's Custom Typeface"}]}