Audacity's Spectrogram view shows frequency content over time, enabling spectral selection and editing

The Spectrogram view replaces the amplitude waveform with a time-frequency plot: the horizontal axis is time, the vertical axis is frequency, and brightness (or colour) encodes energy. It reveals what the waveform hides — clicks appear as vertical stripes, tones as horizontal bands, harmonic content as stacked lines. The key capability unlocked is spectral selection: dragging in Spectrogram view creates a selection bounded in both time and frequency, which can then be targeted by spectral repair effects. Window size trades frequency resolution for time resolution: a large window resolves pitches precisely but blurs transients; a small window resolves beats but smears pitches. This is the same uncertainty principle that governs STFTs generally.

Examples

To remove a constant 50 Hz hum: switch a track to Spectrogram, observe the bright horizontal line at 50 Hz, make a spectral selection spanning just that band across the whole file, then apply Effect > Notch Filter.

Assessment

Switch a recording to Spectrogram view, identify one broadband transient and one narrowband tone, and describe what visual signature each leaves. Then make a spectral selection covering only the tone’s frequency band.