Record and playback test
A level meter proves your microphone works. Only listening back tells you whether you sound muffled, distant, echoey, or buried under a fan.
Last reviewed on August 9, 2026
A level meter proves your microphone works. Only listening back tells you whether you sound muffled, distant, echoey, or buried under a fan.
Last reviewed on August 9, 2026
A level meter tells you a microphone is working. It does not tell you whether you sound muffled, distant, echoey, or buried under a fan. The only way to know that is to record a few seconds and listen back — which is what this tool does, entirely inside your browser.
The clip never leaves your device. It is held in browser memory as a temporary object, played back from there, and destroyed when you press delete, reload, or close the tab. There is no upload, no storage, and no server-side copy.
| Symptom | Most likely cause | Fix |
|---|---|---|
| Very quiet, need to turn playback up | Too far from the microphone, or input gain too low | Halve your distance; raise input level to 50–75% |
| Distorted or crackly on loud words | Clipping from excessive gain or "mic boost" | Lower input gain; disable microphone boost in sound settings |
| Hollow, like a bathroom | Room reverberation from bare walls and floors | Move closer, add soft furnishings, avoid corners |
| Muffled, as if under a blanket | Obstruction, wrong microphone selected, or a Bluetooth profile switch | Check the selected device; use a cable; move the boom clear of clothing |
| Constant hiss or hum | Room noise floor, or electrical interference on a USB or analogue line | Measure the room with the dB meter; try a different USB port |
| Words cut off at the start | Aggressive noise gating or noise suppression | Disable enhancements and vendor noise-cancelling utilities |
| Popping on P and B sounds | Plosives hitting the capsule directly | Speak across the microphone rather than into it; add a pop filter |
In order of impact per unit of effort. Re-record after each one — the difference is usually obvious.
If you are deciding between a laptop microphone, a headset, and a USB microphone, record all three back to back and keep everything else constant:
Judge in this order: intelligibility first, then background noise, then tonal character. A microphone that sounds richer but picks up twice the room noise is usually the worse choice for calls.
Recording uses the browser's built-in MediaRecorder, so the container depends on your browser: Chrome, Edge, and Firefox produce WebM with Opus audio; Safari produces MP4/AAC. Both are fine for listening back, which is all this tool is for. It is a diagnostic, not a studio recorder — there is deliberately no export, no editing, and a ten-second limit.
If recording fails to start, the cause is almost always the same as a failed microphone test: permission, device selection, or another application holding the device. Work through the microphone troubleshooting guide, then come back.
In your browser's memory only, as a temporary object. It is destroyed when you press delete, reload the page, or close the tab. Nothing is uploaded and nothing is written to disk by the site.
Common causes are an obstruction in front of the microphone, the wrong device selected, or a Bluetooth headset that has switched to its narrowband calling profile.
Room reverberation from bare walls and hard floors. Move closer to the microphone and add soft furnishings — noise suppression cannot remove reverberation.
An aggressive noise gate or noise suppression setting. Disable enhancements in your sound settings and any vendor noise-cancelling utility, then record again.
Whatever your browser produces: WebM with Opus audio in Chrome, Edge, and Firefox; MP4 with AAC in Safari. There is no export, because this is a diagnostic rather than a recording tool.
Ten seconds, which is enough to judge level, clarity, and background noise while keeping the clip small enough to hold in memory.