How to Record an Akai MPC into Your iPhone

A standalone MPC does not act as a USB audio device for a phone. Connect the MPC's USB port to your iPhone and it will not appear as an audio input, because in standalone mode the MPC switches that USB audio device off entirely. There is a controller mode where it does show up over USB, but that mode exists to drive Akai's desktop MPC software, and there is no MPC software for iPhone or iPad. So that route is a dead end on iOS.

That is not a problem, it just means you record the MPC the way you would record any hardware without class-compliant USB audio: take its outputs into a class-compliant USB interface, and the interface into your phone. This applies to the MPC One, One+, Live II, X and Key. There is one newer exception, the Live III, which I will come to at the end.

One extra box in the chain and you are set.

• Your Akai MPC (One, One+, Live II, X, Key, and so on).
• A class-compliant USB audio interface with two line inputs. Anything an iPhone sees without drivers, like a Focusrite Scarlett, MOTU M-series or similar.
• Two 1/4-inch TRS cables, to take the MPC's main left and right outputs into the interface.
• The cable for your iPhone: a USB-C cable for a USB-C iPhone, or an Apple camera adapter for a Lightning iPhone.
• A recording app. Reel is the one I make and use for this, but any class-compliant iOS audio app works.

Run the MPC's Main L and R quarter-inch outputs into two line inputs on your interface, then connect the interface to your phone. On a USB-C iPhone that is a single USB-C cable. On a Lightning iPhone use an Apple Lightning to USB camera adapter, and the powered version lets you charge while you record.

One setting on the interface matters: set those inputs to LINE level, not instrument or mic. The MPC puts out a line-level signal, and choosing the right input type is what keeps it clean.

MPC main outputs are line level and can be very hot. If your interface meters are slamming into the red, that is why. Pull the MPC's master volume down, plenty of people track with the MPC master around a third below full, and set your interface gain so peaks sit comfortably short of clipping.

Record in stereo. The main output is a left and right pair, so bring both into the interface and into two tracks in Reel, or a stereo pair, so you keep the panning and stereo image of your beat rather than folding it to mono. In Reel each take lands in clean 32-bit float, which gives you headroom to re-level afterwards.

A standalone MPC's live engine runs at 44.1kHz, so set your recording app to 44.1kHz to match the source. Recording an analog feed at a higher rate does not create any detail the MPC did not produce, it just resamples it, so matching 44.1kHz is the honest choice here. Reel's 32-bit float capture still helps with headroom either way.

The 2025 MPC Live III is the exception to all of the above. Akai lists it as a class-compliant USB-C audio interface that works with iOS with no driver, so a single USB-C cable from a Live III to a USB-C iPhone should let Reel record it directly, no separate interface needed. If you have a Live III, try the one-cable route first.

For every other current standalone MPC, the interface method above is the way. And to be straight, since Akai's wording is about the Live III as an interface rather than spelling out standalone behaviour, if the direct connection does not behave as expected on a Live III, the same outputs-into-an-interface method always works as a fallback.

With the MPC's outputs in the interface, the interface on your phone and your inputs set to line, the MPC shows up as a stereo input. Arm your tracks in Reel, hit record and play your beat. Each pass lands as a clean take you can overdub, loop and mix, and you can layer more parts on top from the MPC or anything else you plug in.

Reel is the app I use to capture these takes, so here is a quick overview of how it works.