Today I want to show you how you can record the audio playing on your PC.
Maybe you're in a Zoom, a Teams, or Google Meet meeting, and you want to record the audio.
Or maybe you want to record the music playing in the background.
I'll show you three different techniques for recording your system sound and you'll find
timestamps down below for each one of those techniques. All right let's check this out.
For the first technique we don't need to install any third-party software, we can do all of this
just with Windows; however, your sound card does need to support this. If you find that it doesn't,
don't worry, the next two techniques will likely work for you. For the first technique, open up
settings on Windows. I'm running Windows 11 so settings may look a little bit different from
what you're running; however, the same concept will apply. Within settings, over on the left
hand side, make sure you're within system and then click on sound. Within sound, right in the middle,
you'll see all of your different input devices. These are all of your different microphones and
we want to add an option that says stereo mix. This will allow us to record the audio playing
on the pc. You'll notice that by default, we don't have stereo mix in this list. We have to add it.
Here back on the main screen, you should see an option for all sound devices. Let's click on this.
This opens up all sound devices. If we scroll down to input devices, within this category, you should
see an option for Stereo Mix. Let's click on this and under the general category, let's click on
allow. Next let's go back to the top and navigate back to the sound view. Within sound, let's scroll
down back to the input devices and here you should now see an option for Stereo Mix. Let's make sure
to check this option. With this selected, the sound playing on your computer will now be the
input for any recording application that you use. Down below you can also set the recording volume
for the Stereo Mix. Now that we have everything configured let's test this out. Here I have the
voice recorder app open. This is a free app that comes pre-installed on Windows, and I can now use
this to record any of my system sound. Right next to that I have a song queued up that I'm
ready to record. Here I can click on the record button and then I'll click on the play icon.
I finished my recording. Let's click on the play icon to verify that this worked.
Check that out, works exactly how we wanted it to.
Down below I can click on the trim icon if I want to cut from the beginning or from the
end. Over on the left hand side, I can also right click on this and I can open the file location.
For the second technique, we're going to use a free and open source application called Audacity.
This also happens to be one of my favorite audio editing apps. Not only can you record
your system sound but Audacity can do a lot more than that. If you want to watch a full
overview of what's possible with Audacity, you can check out the tutorial video right up above.
All right, let's take a look. To get Audacity, head to the website audacityteam.org. If you
scroll down just a little bit, you'll see an icon to download Audacity. Once you finish installing
Audacity, you'll see an interface that looks like this. To record your system sound,
up in the top left hand corner, you can choose the audio driver that you want to use to record.
Select the one that says Windows WASAPI. To the right of that, you can select your input source
and here from the previous step you could select your stereo mix but up above you can also
simply choose your speakers. Here I'll select my speakers. By selecting my speakers, anything that
I hear coming from my speakers, I'll be able to record that. Here I'll click on the record icon,
and once again, I have my music player open on the right hand side. Here I'll click on play.
I'm all done with my recording now so I'll click on the stop icon.
To play it back, I'll click on the play icon and there we successfully recorded the system sound.
The thing i love about Audacity is you have full control over the audio output. For example,
right up above I could click on effects. I can change the speed. I can also reduce any
background noise and there are many other effects that I can choose from. Once again, if you want
a full overview of what's possible in Audacity, check out the link in the description down below.
If neither of the first two techniques work, you can also try installing a virtual audio cable, and
my favorite is made by a company called VB-Audio. Let's take a look. To download the virtual audio
cable head to the following website. I've included a link up above and down below in the description.
Here you can simply click on download. This is donationware, so if you find value in
using this virtual audio cable, I would suggest consider donating. Once you finish installing,
navigate back to sound settings, and for your output device, let's select the virtual cable.
Down under input, here too let's select the virtual audio cable. I'm back now within the
voice recorder. Here I can click on the record icon and once again I'll play some music.
Here now I can verify that we successfully recorded music. Here I'll click on the play icon.
The two downsides with this approach: one, you won't be able to hear the audio
as you're recording, also once you're all done, you'll have to remember to turn your
output back to your speakers otherwise you won't be able to hear anything on your pc.
All right, well that's how easy it is to record audio playing on your PC.
To watch more videos like this one, please consider subscribing. I'll see you next time!