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macOS 14 or later · Apple Silicon

Mixing at an analog console: headphones on, a hand on the faders, racks of outboard gear behind.

X2Pro alternative

An X2Pro alternative for Final Cut Pro to Pro Tools

X2Pro and fcp2aaf both take a Final Cut Pro edit to Pro Tools as an AAF. fcp2aaf converts projects up to five minutes free, with every feature on, so you can test it on your own timeline before you pay.

Download free See pricing

macOS 14 or later · Apple Silicon

Preview before you convert

Get to know the fcp2aaf interface

fcp2aaf draws your Final Cut timeline as the session it will become, with real waveforms from your own recordings. Click any clip and it plays: the exact channel that will travel, at the level it was recorded.

  1. 1 · The project

    The project

    Its name, frame rate and sample rate. Open Timeline… brings in the next one.

  2. 2 · What was read

    What was read

    Clips, tracks, markers, fades and regions, and the timecode the session starts and ends at. Check them before you convert.

  3. 3 · The markers

    The markers

    Each one on its frame, in the colour of its kind. View all opens the whole list.

  4. 4 · The tracks

    The tracks

    One row per track, named as Pro Tools will list it. The box decides whether it travels.

  5. 5 · The lanes

    The lanes

    Every clip where it sounds, with its waveform. Point at one to read about it; click it to hear it.

  6. 6 · The navigator

    The navigator

    The whole project in one strip. Drag the rectangle to jump anywhere; the legend names the colour of each role.

  7. 7 · The settings

    The settings

    Every setting of the delivery, with the preset at the head. Change one and the session redraws.

  8. 8 · Notes and Convert

    Notes and Convert

    Notes lists what to handle by hand, before you convert. Convert writes the AAF.

  9. 9 · The licence

    The licence

    The plan running on this Mac. Click it to open your licence in Settings.

  • Real waveforms

    Decoded from your own recordings, one track per microphone, before a single file is written.

  • Every clip plays

    Click one and hear the channel that will travel, with the level it will carry shown underneath.

  • What will not travel, first

    Offline media, a missing channel, a fade AAF cannot carry: listed before you start.

fcp2aaf vs X2Pro

Price

fcp2aaf

Free up to five minutes, permanently. US$15 for a three-day pass, or US$79 once for a lifetime licence.

X2Pro5

US$159.99 on the Mac App Store.

Try it on your own project first

fcp2aaf

Yes. Projects up to five minutes convert free, permanently, with every feature on. No account, no card.

X2Pro5

Marquis state on their support forum that there is no trial version, and point to an App Store refund instead.

Mac

fcp2aaf

Apple silicon, macOS 14 or later.

X2Pro5

Apple silicon and Intel, macOS 13 or later.

Before it converts

fcp2aaf

The window draws the session it will build: every track, every clip in place, real waveforms from your own recordings and the markers on their own rail. Click a clip to hear it.

X2Pro5

Four tabs of settings in their published interface: project, roles, media locations and options, where you choose whether disabled or inactive clips are included.

Reaching your media

fcp2aaf

Reads the paths Final Cut wrote into the FCPXML and opens them. A renamed drive is fixed by pointing at the new folder once.

X2Pro5

Sold through the Mac App Store, so it runs sandboxed: it lists the folders it cannot reach, and you grant each one by dragging it in or navigating to it.

Roles and tracks

fcp2aaf

Roles become tracks, one per microphone, and the plan is in front of you: reorder, rename, exclude, or fold the subroles together.

X2Pro5

A Roles tab to include or exclude roles, merge sub-roles into their parent and reorder them.

After it converts

fcp2aaf

A report beside the delivery naming what travelled and what did not: every fade shape, every muted microphone, every file that was not on the drive.

X2Pro5

An AAF with the media embedded and trimmed with handles, or referenced in place.

Where the AAF opens

fcp2aaf

Standard AAF by default: Pro Tools, Nuendo, Cubase, DaVinci Resolve, Premiere Pro.

X2Pro5

Published as an AAF that Pro Tools opens as a session.

Language

fcp2aaf

English and Spanish, interface and manual.

X2Pro5

English.

Test it on your own project

Every converter in this category makes the same promise: your Final Cut timeline arrives in Pro Tools with the tracks named and the audio in place. What tells two of them apart is a real project — yours, with the multicam synced by timecode, the four-microphone rush, the music under the closing shot.

fcp2aaf is free up to five minutes with nothing held back: no watermark, no locked setting, no countdown. Open your project, look at the tracks it plans, listen to a clip, convert five minutes and open the AAF in Pro Tools.

Made for film and TV

fcp2aaf began in a sound studio, on the side that receives the Final Cut turnover.

Since then, colleagues on projects for streaming platforms and for cinema, and editors, mixers and post houses who use it on real deliveries, have contributed ideas and reported issues, and our team has resolved them release by release. Most of what it does today came from a project somebody was really delivering.

The changelog thanks each of them by name, beside the version their idea went into. Read our story.

The material a real shoot brings

A feature, a series or a documentary hands the sound department more than clean stereo. fcp2aaf was built around what it actually brings:

  • Four-microphone rushes from P2, XDCAM and Canon XF: each microphone arrives on its own track.
  • Multicams synced by timecode: every angle's sound lands where the edit put it.
  • J-cuts and L-cuts: the sound keeps the length the editor gave it, music under the closing shot included.
  • A microphone the editor switched off arrives at −∞ as clip gain on its own track, ready for the mixer to bring back.
  • Material that is not on the drive is named in the report, and the rest of the delivery goes ahead.

Audio cut from your own recordings

fcp2aaf opens your original rushes and cuts exactly the regions the edit uses, with as much handle around each clip as you ask for. Final Cut renders nothing. WAV, BWF, RF64, AIFF, CAF, FLAC, MP3, MP4, MOV and MXF, at any size.

The audio goes inside the AAF or beside it in a folder, your choice. Both carry the original timecode of every recording, so “spot to original timecode” works on the other end.

fcp2aaf goes one way. A Final Cut timeline becomes an AAF. It does not read an AAF and it does not write an FCPXML.

Questions

What is X2Pro?

X2Pro is the Final Cut Pro to Pro Tools converter made by Marquis Broadcast. The current version, X2Pro5, is a rewrite of X2Pro Audio Convert that runs natively on Apple silicon and Intel, and Marquis publish that it reads FCPXML up to version 1.12, turns roles into Pro Tools tracks, carries levels and gain, keeps L-cuts and J-cuts, handles compound and multicam clips, and embeds the media trimmed with handles.

Is there a free alternative to X2Pro?

fcp2aaf is free, permanently, for projects up to five minutes, with every feature on and no watermark. Longer projects need a licence: US$15 for a three-day pass, or US$79 once for life.

How is fcp2aaf different from X2Pro?

Both write an AAF for Pro Tools from a Final Cut Pro FCPXML. fcp2aaf draws the session it will build before converting — tracks, clips, waveforms and markers — lets you play any clip, writes a report of what travelled, and is free up to five minutes. The table above has the details, with X2Pro's taken from Marquis' own material.

Can I use fcp2aaf alongside X2Pro?

Yes. They are separate applications that read the same FCPXML export, so you can put one project through both and compare the sessions in Pro Tools.

Does fcp2aaf run on Apple silicon?

Yes. It is built for Apple silicon and needs macOS 14 or later. It does not run on Intel Macs.

Do I need Final Cut Pro or Pro Tools installed to use it?

Neither. fcp2aaf reads the FCPXML that Final Cut exported and your original recordings, and writes the AAF, which matters if you are the sound department receiving somebody else's export.

Does the AAF only open in Pro Tools?

No. The default output is standard AAF, so it opens in Nuendo, Cubase, DaVinci Resolve and Premiere Pro as well. One optional setting, the Audio Channel Combiner, is a Pro Tools extension and is off unless you ask for it.

Where do the X2Pro details on this page come from?

From Marquis' website, their published interface documentation, their App Store listing and their support forum, read on the date printed under the table. This page publishes no head-to-head test; it asks you to measure fcp2aaf on your own project instead, free up to five minutes.

Can I move my licence to another Mac?

Yes. A licence works on one Mac at a time and allows five machine changes in any 30-day period, so a new machine or a rented edit suite is not a problem.

Put your own timeline through it

Five minutes free, permanently, with everything switched on. You will know in a few minutes whether it fits your project.

Download free Read the manual

macOS 14 or later · Apple Silicon