Microphone Test (Free, Online)
A free tool to check your microphone input level in real time, right in your browser. Switch between multiple microphones and record playback — handy for checking your audio before a video call or testing a built-in or external microphone.
Usage Tips
- Check your microphone level on this page before a video call so no one has to ask "can you hear me?" once you're live.
- If multiple microphones are connected (built-in plus a USB headset, for example), use the dropdown to switch between them and compare their sensitivity.
- If the meter turns red (clipping), you are speaking too close to the mic or the input volume is too high — lower the microphone volume in your OS sound settings.
- Use "Start Recording" then "Stop Recording" to record and play back your actual voice, so you can listen for background noise or echo.
Frequently Asked Questions
Side Note — What "dBFS" means on a volume meter
The "dBFS" (decibels relative to full scale) unit you often see on audio equipment and microphone test tools measures volume relative to the loudest signal a digital system can represent (0 dBFS). Going above 0 dBFS means the signal exceeds what can be represented digitally, causing distortion known as "clipping." A reading around -60 dBFS, on the other hand, represents a very quiet room with almost no ambient sound.
Microphone input level is often measured not by a single instantaneous peak amplitude, but by "RMS" (root mean square) — the square root of the average of the squared waveform over a short window. RMS tracks perceived loudness more closely than a raw peak value, which is why it is the standard metric in broadcast and music production.
Most complaints of "you sound too quiet" or "your audio is breaking up" on a video call trace back to the microphone gain setting in the operating system, or simply how close you are speaking to the mic. Visualizing your own voice level ahead of time with a meter like this one means you don't have to scramble to adjust settings once the meeting has already started.