WUP New Low
I've never been a fan of WUP, but I totally understand how much work it is for developers to keep software up to date year after year. However, my experience with Waves today has been extremely discouraging and might even cross the line into fraud.
Long story short, I purchased WUP in April of 2025, V16 released in June of 2025, and my WUP plan expired about a month ago.
I made the mistake of not updating my plugins before my plan expired, which apparently means I've lost access to the updates I paid for?
I'm sure some of you are aware from similar experiences that this is how it works, but I was not and there is absolutely nothing on the Waves sales page, support page, or anywhere else that explains that this is how it works.
The only relevant line that I can find anywhere is this from their support page: "As part of your Waves Update Plan coverage, you will have access to any updates that Waves releases for your covered products during the coverage period." Seems pretty clear that I've paid for access to updates that Waves released during the coverage period, right?
I called support to ask about this and they told me that's not how it works and even had the audacity to explain that I would have received an email before my plan expired. As if I don't receive dozens of emails from Waves every month (just checked, I literally get one every single day).
So I went and found that email. All it says is the following:
"We would like to let you know that your Waves Update Plan for the following product/s will expire in 7 days, on April 08, 2026: ...You can continue using the current version of your Waves licenses even if you do not have Waves Update Plan coverage; however, you will no longer enjoy 2nd licenses and ongoing version updates unless you renew your Waves Update Plan." No references to version numbers, what version I'm on, or what update access I'm about to lose when the plan expires. I know I'm not getting future updates after the coverage expires, but it's implied everywhere on their website that I would always have access to the updates that were released during my coverage period
The only reason to exclude this information in their email, support pages, and terms is to intentionally mislead the customer. But it's not even hidden away somewhere in fine print. This information is nowhere to be found, I guess unless you call support about it?
Waves has always been more anti-consumer than most audio companies, but I'm not sure how this kind of policy is even legally defensible without proper disclosure. Thankfully the support team provided me a "one-time" exception on my upgrade. But it cost me quite a bit of time to deal with this today. They are unable to help over the phone (???) so they ask you to write a support ticket or an email, which ends up going directly the the person you were just talking on the phone to. Ok.
I'm hoping this post informs someone else to avoid the same mistake, but more importantly, I hope that raising awareness of this will cause Waves to start treating their customers with a bit less contempt.