Fix Discord Screen Share Audio Not Working (2023)

What is Discord? You may never have heard of it, but that doesn't mean something as simple, and a fun-to-use platform for communication isn't worth your time. Imagine being able to connect with friends who live far away or work in different cities efficiently — it's like having an instant party chat room right on your desktop!

Discord is rich with features, and screen share is one of the most popular ones today. It's a way to broadcast your computer's display, so others can watch what you're doing in real-time. It could be used for educational purposes, work presentations, or just for having fun with friends!

Many Discord users are having trouble with audio on their screen share. For example, even if you hear the audio on your side, it's possible that the viewer(s) can't hear anything. If you're also struggling to get Discord screen share audio to work, the tips below will help you resolve the issue quickly.

Let's get started!

Screen share audio not working on Discord: 5 causes

We investigated various situations and discovered that multiple reasons could cause the problem with Discord's screen share audio. Do keep in mind that every computer configuration differs significantly from the next; none of these cases may apply to you.

Beta features. If you're using the Discord Public Test Build (Discord PTB) or the lesser-known Discord Canary build, you may have early access to some unstable features. It's possible that a new update needs fixing before you can screen share with audio.
Problem with audio drivers. The issue can be local to your computer. If your audio drivers are outdated, corrupt, or missing, you may not be able to screen share with audio on Discord.
Administrative permissions. On some computers, you need to launch Discord with administrator elevation to use screen share with audio.
Bad settings. To share audio, your Discord audio settings need to be set up correctly when you begin screen sharing. Double-check to make sure your settings are correct!
Compatibility problem. Some applications have compatibility issues with Discord, which may lead to problems when sharing your screen. If you're unable to transfer the audio of a specific application, it's possible that said app is not yet compatible with Discord's screen share feature.

Solved: Discord screen share no audio

Before we start, make sure that you have your Discord credentials required for login. You might be asked to log in and out of the application for some solutions to work.

Quick fix

Make sure that you're selecting to share your audio when setting up screen share in Discord. Many people glance over this option and assume something is broken — you need to turn this on to enable audio sharing!

The sound may not be available when sharing a screen on your device.

Newer versions of Discord may no longer allow you to manually select audio sharing, as it's the default method. However, if you're trying to share your screen, you may see a warning displaying that audio problems occur. Take note of this and select a screen or application with no warning shown.

Method 1. Open Discord as Administrator

When you can't share your audio with Discord's screen share functionality, the first thing to try is opening Discord as a local administrator. The screen share feature may not work correctly if A standard user runs Discord.

Here's what you need to do:

Exit out of Discord entirely by closing the application. Open your tray menu in the taskbar, and right-click on the Discord icon. Choose "Quit Discord" to stop the program from running in the background.
Find your Discord launcher. Right-click on it once, and then choose Run as administrator from the context menu.
Click "Yes" if you're prompted by the User Account Control (UAC) screen. This will allow Discord to run with elevated permissions, which may be required for screen share.
You may be required to enter the computer's administrator password. If you don't know it, reach out to the person who owns the PC, or learn how to convert your user account into an administrator account.
Test if you can screen share with audio.

Method 2. Restart your computer

Here's a quick fix to the most common computer issues: simply restarting your system. A reboot will flush many temporary files and allow each application to launch with a clean slate, including Discord. Here are simple steps for how to do this on Windows 10:

Click on the Windows icon in the bottom-left of your screen to bring up the Start menu.
Click on the Power option, and then choose Restart. This is going to close all of your open applications and completely restart your computer.
After your computer has restarted, launch Discord (preferably with administrative permissions) and see if you're able to screen share with audio.

Method 3. Toggle experimental setting

There are some experimental settings you can play around with even on the stable release build of Discord. One of these is audio during a screen share. Yes, even in October 2021, the feature is still in beta (which explains why it's so buggy!), and it's currently under development by the Discord team.

Some users have shared that toggling the audio screen share feature off, then turning it back on again shortly after fixed the problems with audio not getting through to the other side. Here's how to find the experimental audio screen share setting in Discord:

Open Discord.
Click on the User settings icon, which can be found in the bottom-left of the interface, right next to your avatar and username.
Select Video & audio from the App Settings category to switch to the designated tab in settings. Scroll down until you find the Screen Share section, and then toggle the "Use an experimental method to capture audio from applications" setting off and back on.
Press Esc or close the settings with the X button in the top-right, and try screen sharing with audio again. If you're still having problems, the following method may help you resolve them!

Method 4. Reset your Discord voice settings

You might want to consider resetting your Discord audio settings if you're having trouble with screen share audio. Make sure to take note of your current configuration in case you need to reconfigure how Discord works afterward.

Open Discord and navigate to User settings > Voice & audio.
Scroll down to the bottom of the page and click on the red Reset voice settings button.
Once you read the warning pop-up, click OK if you wish to proceed with the operation. To make sure your voice settings aren't lost, note down any important settings before you continue!
After resetting your voice settings back to default, Discord's screen share may be able to share your audio. Test the feature with default settings before you reconfigure your voice settings.

Method 5. Use the Legacy audio subsystem

Discord is a rather straightforward application, but there are many things under the hood that you can customize. Did you know that you're able to pick what audio subsystem you want to use while in a voice chat? If you didn't, it's time to learn something new today!

Various users looking for solutions to the dreaded audio screen share problem have found that the Legacy audio subsystem is the least likely to experience this problem. So, to maximize your chances of successfully sharing audio on a Discord screen share, we advise you to switch to this setting.

Open Discord and navigate to User settings > Voice & audio.
Scroll down until you see the Audio Subsystem category. Here, open the drop-down menu and choose Legacy from the list of options.
A pop-up warning will appear on your screen. Read the message and click OK if you wish to proceed with the steps.
After changing the audio subsystem, try and screen share with audio to see if this method solved your problem. If not, we have plenty more things to try!

Method 6. Add the application to your Activity Status

Some applications (especially those which aren't video games) don't get picked up by Discord automatically. If you're trying to share audio from a specific app, you may need to manually add it to your Activity Status.

Open Discord and click on User settings.
Scroll down in the menu on the left side of the Settings area, and then click on the Activity settings tab. Here, click on the Add it! Link underneath the "No game detected" box.
You should see a list of currently open applications. Select the one you want to screen share with audio, and click on the Add game button.
You should see the application show up like this. Now, you can test whether or not screen sharing will share the audio of it.

Method 7. Clear Discord's roaming data

Discord has a lot of temporary files that may cause your installation to run into errors. You can easily clear this folder out and get the files replaced by following this method.

Navigate to your AppData folder:

Press the Windows + R keys on your keyboard to bring up the Run utility. Type in "C:\Users\Your username\AppData" without the quotation marks, and hit Enter. Make sure to replace "Your username" with your local account name.
Alternatively, open the File Explorer with the Windows + E keyboard shortcut, and then navigate to This PC > C: > Users > Your username > AppData.

Open the Roaming folder.
Scroll down until you see a folder named like your Discord installation, then select it. For example, if you're using the Discord Canary build, you'd choose the folder named "discordcanary." Otherwise, select the default "discord" folder.
Right-click on the folder and choose Delete from the context menu. You can also press the Del button on your keyboard to get the operation done quicker!
After successfully deleting the folder, restart your system. Launch once the system has restarted and check if you can hear audio from your screen while sharing it.

Keep in mind that after performing this method, Discord may take longer than usual to launch. This is temporary, as it needs to re-download some important files! Your next launch will be just as fast as ever before — if not faster!

Method 8. Update your audio drivers

A tried and true way of solving audio problems on any computer is simply updating your audio drivers. Even if you think they're up to date, a new update may have been released recently, or your driver files could've gotten corrupted since you last installed them.

Updating the audio drivers on your PC is simple, and you'll be able to test the Discord screen share with audio after acquiring the latest version:

Press the Windows + X keys on your keyboard simultaneously, then click on Device Manager.
Expand the Sound, Video, and game controllers section by clicking on the arrow icon in front of it. Right-click on the sound device you're using (for example, Realtek, Intel, etc.) and choose Update Driver.
Select the "Search automatically for updated driver software" to let Windows look for the latest drivers compatible with your device. Note that you'll require a connection to the internet to perform this step.
Once the new driver has been downloaded and installed, restart your computer. Check if your problem with Discord screen share having no audio has been resolved after the new drivers are installed.

Method 9. Reinstall Discord

If your audio during screen share hasn't improved after completing the method above, the last thing we recommend is to reinstall Discord. You can try to use the same Discord client you're running right now or switch to another one.

First, you'll need to uninstall your Discord version. Open the Settings application using the Windows + I keyboard shortcut or the gear icon from your Start menu.
Click on the Apps tab.
Find your Discord version from the programs list. Click Uninstall > Uninstall to let Windows remove Discord from your device. Now, you need to delete residual files in your app data folder.
Press the Windows + R keys on your keyboard. This is going to bring up the Run utility. Type in "%appdata%" without the quotation marks and click OK. This will immediately redirect you to the AppData folder in the File Explorer.

READ: What is the AppData ("%appdata%") Folder in Windows 10?
Locate the Discord folder with the name of your previous installation, then right-click on it and choose Delete. This will remove any residual files left over after the uninstallation has concluded.
Choose which version of Discord you want to download, and install the latest release to get the most enjoyable experience:
- Discord
- Discord Public Test Build (Discord PTB)
- Discord Canary

After downloading the installer for Windows, follow the instructions in the installation wizard and wait for Discord to install on your computer. After it's completed, launch it and test if screen sharing works with audio.

Before you go...

The Discord screen share no audio issue can be frustrating, but we hope our article has helped you troubleshoot and fix your problem. As always, if there's anything that needs clarification or assists with a different Discord error, feel free to contact us! We're happy to provide any advice we can.

If this helped solve your problems with the Discord screen-sharing no audio issue, check out some of our other articles on how to use Discord or get more information about what Discord is:

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How To Fix Discord Screen Share Audio Not Working (2023)

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