Encore was originally created for the Apple Macintosh by Don Williams for the US company Passport Designs Inc. of Half Moon Bay, CA., and first released in 1984.

[3] Encore 5 included wizards to create scores for numerous types of ensembles from scratch, MusicXML support (although in now obsolete 1.3 version), use of VST, and J.S.

Direct competitors in the music notation niche have taken market lead over the last decade, surpassing Encore in features and improved standards.

Passport Music Software, LLC claimed to be reworking Encore, departing from the original code that was created over 20 years ago.

[7] Following the subsequent acquisition of the product line by Sonic Scores,[5] version 6 of Encore is being developed by its original author, Don Williams, for both Windows and macOS.