Speaker Delay Alignment Calculator

About this calculator

When two speakers — like a main PA and a delay fill, or a subwoofer and a main cabinet — sit at different distances from the same listening position, sound from the closer one arrives first, causing comb filtering and a smeared, unfocused sound image. Time alignment fixes this by electronically delaying the closer speaker's signal so both wavefronts arrive together, using the speed of sound at the venue's air temperature: roughly 331.3 + 0.606 × T(°C) meters per second, then delay = distance difference ÷ speed of sound.

Live sound engineers, PA system installers, and house-of-worship or venue tech teams run this calculation whenever they set up distributed speaker systems or subwoofer arrays, dialing the computed delay into a digital signal processor or amplifier's delay line so the audience doesn't hear a doubled or hollow-sounding mix.

This calculator takes the distances from the listening position to each speaker and the air temperature, then returns the exact delay in milliseconds to enter into your sound system's processor.