World’s “smallest and silliest” synth created by music tech developer: Watch

A new fully functional USB-C MIDI synth, which has been described as the world’s “smallest and silliest”, has been launched.

Not set to be made officially available for sale, the synth is the work of a music technology developer called Mixtela, real name Tim Alex Jacobs. Based around a miniature circuit board, a USB-C connector and a piezoelectric buzzer, Music Radar described the synth as being “about the size of a raspberry”.

As you might expect, the synth isn’t capable of creating particularly big sounds, but Jacobs says it is in full working order. It’s the latest in a line of miniature music gear that he has created, having initially set out to do so in 2015 when he made what he believed was the world’s smallest MIDI synthesiser by retrofitting a broken MIDI cable, adding a microchip, some DIY wiring and a piezo buzzer and wrapping it all together in electrical tape.

Unsatisfied with that creation, he pushed further and has now produced this USB-C MIDI synth, which he says is a slightly more sophisticated creation.

Speaking to Music Radar, Jacobs said: “I seem to have crafted myself a niche, a very small niche, a micro niche. A niche where I build the smallest and worst… whatever. To be clear, no one is competing with me. No one is vying for the title of the smallest and worst MIDI synthesiser. But that’s not going to stop me.”

He continued: “You might be thinking that this is utterly pointless, and you’d be right. There is no device we could plug this into that doesn’t already have a speaker. There are no USB-C hosts that couldn’t already run a software synthesiser. The only thing it can do is a monophonic square wave.”

Get a look at Jacobs’ latest creation for yourself below.

Small synths, albeit larger than Jacobs’ product, have grown increasingly popular in recent years. Teenage Engineering produces its popular and affordable Pocket Operator Modular series and launched some new modules in the line in early 2022.