How to Play Desktop Audio Through Discord

You are likely already familiar with music bots such as Hydra and know that you could easily play music through them. If you’re a Nitro subscriber, perhaps you’ve also already heard about integrating other music streaming apps such as Spotify in order to blast music in your server or chat room.

But what if you want to play audio directly from your desktop, like music from your local computer or game audio? Fortunately, these can be easily done on your desktop without having the need to use other external devices. All you have to do is to configure certain sound settings on your computer and you’ll be set. Here’s how.

Playing audio through the mic on your Discord server can be done in just a number of steps. Basically, you only have to do the following steps to play music on Discord from your desktop

1. Step 1

   Enable the Stereo Mix setting on your desktop and set it as the default recording device.

2. Step 2

   Join a voice channel and start playing PC sounds.

3. Step 3

   If the audio can’t still be heard by you or others, set “Stereo Mix” as the main input device for Discord.

If you aren’t familiar with all these settings on your PC and on Discord, don’t worry. I’ve also made a step-by-step guide on how you can do this.

Enabling Stereo Mix Setting On Your PC

1. Step 1

   

   Find the speaker icon on the notification area (or system tray). Right-click on it.

2. Step 2 

   

   Click “Sounds” on the context menu.

   Alternatively, you can also search for “Sound Control Panel” on the search bar.

   If you can’t find either of these, you can go to Settings > System > Sound > Sound Control Panel under Related Settings.

3. Step 3

   Select the “Recording” tab.

4. Step 4

   Choose “Stereo Mix” among the devices listed. Make sure it’s enabled. If not, right-click on “Stereo Mix” and enable it in the context menu. You will know if it’s disabled if the option is greyed out, but, if not, then it’s most likely enabled by default.

5. Step 5

   

   Click “Set to Default”.

   Joining a Voice Channel

6. Step 6 

   Launch the Discord app.

7. Step 7

   Join a voice channel and play any music from your computer.

   Adjusting the Input Sound on Discord’s Audio Settings

   Usually, just setting “Stereo Mix” as your default recording device on your PC will allow you to play music. However, if that still doesn’t work, you probably need to configure the sound settings on the Discord app to help you out. Here’s how:

8. Step 8

   Click the cogwheel or gear icon beside your username to access User Settings.

9. Step 9 

   Go to Voice and Video settings tab.

10. Step 10 

    

    Enable “Stereo Mix” as the Input Device.

    After that, you can go back to the voice channel and play any audio. Other server members should be able to hear it now.

    However, if that still wouldn’t work, I recommend using third-party software such as Voicemeeter, Virtual Audio Cable, and Resanance to enable playing audio directly from your desktop.

    Virtual audio mixers and soundboard apps like those I mentioned are useful for playing audio from your PC, especially when you’re streaming a game. This will also allow you to play sounds while giving you the ability to talk through your mic, plus other features such as changing your voice and adding sound effects.

    I’ll discuss more of this in the section below, “How to Play Both Desktop Audio and Mic Audio on Discord”.

You can also play desktop audio using Discord’s screen share feature. Follow these steps:

1. Step 1

    Launch Discord.

2. Step 2

   Join a voice channel.

3. Step 3

   

   Click the “Screen” button, just beside the “Video” button to start screen sharing.

4. Step 4

   

   Select a screen to share, and then click “Go Live”.

5. Step 5

   

   Check the video settings for your live stream, and then click “Go Live” again.

   People should be watching your stream on the voice channel so they can hear the audio. To do so, they need to click “Watch Stream” on their devices.

If you want to play audio from your desktop as well as speak on your microphone, you can either do that with the previous methods I’ve discussed: by configuring your PC’s sound settings or using screen share. However, if you’ve only enabled the stereo mix on your computer, there’s a chance that only the music or game audio will be heard, not your voice.

In this case, using a virtual soundboard and audio mixer might do the job.

There are lots of good software that can help you play mic and game audio at the same time, without losing the quality. However, in my experience, I’ve used Voicemeeter, Virtual Audio Cable, and Resanance. They’ve all worked very well for me.

Voicemeeter is a virtual audio mixer with a wide range of features. This one’s especially helpful if you are a streamer. There’s Voicemeeter Potato and Voicemeeter Banana, with the latter having more tools you can use at your disposal. The installation can be a little tricky, and it’s best to read the user manual first to set it up correctly.

Next, Virtual Audio Cable is a WDM media driver-based software product. It acts as an audio bridge from one app to another, so it’s very handy to have installed, especially if you want to play audio on Discord.

But, for anyone who wants to play audio on their Discord voice channel quickly, using Resanancemight be the easier route you can take. All you have to do is download the software from their website and install it on your PC. However, know that by installing Resanance, you will have to install Virtual Audio Cable to act as audio drivers. But don’t worry because Resanance will do that for you while you install the main software.

To play desktop and mic audio on Discord using Resanance, follow these steps:

1. Step 1

   

   Install Resanance on your computer.

   

   While installing Resanance, agree to install Virtual Audio Cable, too.

2. Step 2

   Restart your computer to finalize the installation.

3. Step 3

   

   By this time, Resanance has automatically set “CABLE Output” as your default recording device. You can check it by viewing the Sound Control Panel.

4. Step 4

   

   When you launch Discord, agree to switch to “CABLE Output” when prompted by a window.

   

   When you check Voice and Video Settings, the new input device is automatically set to “CABLE Output”.

5. Step 5

    Join a voice channel.

6. Step 6

   Play desktop audio or speak to the microphone.