View Menu: Zoom

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The Zoom commands enable you to control the amount of audio, longer or shorter periods of time, that is visible on your screen.

The Zoom In and Zoom Out commands will attempt to keep the editing cursor position, or the selection, centered in the track display.

See Also: Zooming for details about other ways to zoom in and out, for example, using the magnifier icons on the edit toolbar.
View-Zoom 3-7-0.png
Tip Zooming is usually done using the top 5 buttons on the Edit Toolbar
  • Zooming can also be done using the Mouse Wheel (if you have one).

Zoom In  Ctrl + 1

  • View > Zoom > Zoom In: Doubles the current zoom level.

Zooms in on the horizontal axis of the audio, displaying more detail over a shorter length of time. You can also use the Zoom tool from the Tools Toolbar to zoom in on a particular part of the window.


Zoom Normal  Ctrl + 2

  • View > Zoom > Zoom Normal: Reverts back to Audacity's default zoom, where you can see 5 - 10 seconds at a time.

Zooms to the default view, which displays about one inch per second. It centers the cursor in the track display, or if you have a selection it will attempt to keep some part of a selection visible.


Zoom Out  Ctrl + 3

  • View > Zoom > Zoom Out: Cuts the current zoom level in half.

Zooms out, displaying less detail over a greater length of time.


Zoom to Selection  Ctrl + E

  • View > Zoom > Zoom to Selection: If you have audio selected, this zooms and scrolls so that the selection just fits in the window.

Zooms in or out so that the selected audio fills the width of the project window. Its most useful purpose is to zoom in when the selection is only a small part of the visible waveform.

If there is a region of audio selected and it is not visible on the screen, the Zoom to Selection command will move the selection to fill the track display.


Zoom Toggle  Shift + Z

Toggles between two pre-defined zoom levels, these are user selectable in Tracks Preferences.

Defaults are normal Default Zoom level and 4 Pixels per Sample (which shows a fraction of a second of audio as samples).



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