MicSwitch VS BackgroundMusic

For the Mic mute there are a few free programs which can do that. One is called MicMute and another is called MicSwitch. At least one of them can use a hotkey.

I don’t think you can natively, but there are apps that will do it. This one looks promising.

Finally, the last program I used is called MicSwitch. This program is actually something I had used before buying the 5-inch display, I just used a hotkey instead. This lets me mute or unmute my microphone using one of the dock's buttons. I used MicSwitch's overlay function to have an updating indicator on the dock. I just placed it over the button.

**Applications:** [Stats](https://github.com/exelban/stats) \- macOS system monitor in your menu bar [Maccy](https://maccy.app/) \- macOS clipboard manager [micSwitch](https://github.com/iXab3r/MicSwitch) \- mute/unmute your system microphone [MonitorControl](https://github.com/MonitorControl/MonitorControl) \- Control your external display's brightness & volume on your Mac [Rectangle](https://rectangleapp.com/) \- Move and resize windows in macOS using keyboard shortcuts or snap areas [Background Music](https://github.com/kyleneideck/BackgroundMusic) \- set individual apps' volumes [Transmission](https://transmissionbt.com/) \- Free BitTorrent Client [Discord Canary](https://discord.com/api/download/canary?platform=osx) \- native M1 Discord app (direct download link)

micSwitch - mute/unmute your system microphone

Even if you dont have a switch, you can still mute your mic using MicSwitch, which in my opinion is arguably better as it allows you to set your own hotkeys, and choose between toggling your mic and push to talk/mute. Certainly, any way of mic muting is the way to go here.

I basically use the system-wide mute/unmute toggle via this app. https://github.com/iXab3r/MicSwitch - its very reliable... you can also assign your own hotkey in the app itself

Just a friendly heads-up that a program called MicSwitch exists. It lets you bind mic muting to a key, gives you a sound when you go on/off mute, and lets you customize an overlay that shows you if you're muted or not.

Here are two, which work pretty good. Pick one. You can download the binaries for Windows from the Release Pages. AHK MicMute and MicSwitch. First one maybe needs AutoHotkey installed.

For controlling a software defined volume like Windows has, try https://github.com/kyleneideck/BackgroundMusic

Download Background Music: LINK (free and open-source) Once downloaded, run it and you'll see it as an icon in your menu bar

Thanks for the comment. I checked out Rogue Amoeba's SoundSource, and BackgroundMusic. I think they're using some sort of virtual audio device or something to intercept applications' audio data, control each application's volume, and then send it to the speakers (or another output device).

I had an app called Background Music that I deleted a few days ago, but it still shows up as an audio output in the Sound menu bar menu as well as in Settings.

you can check BackgroundMusic : https://github.com/kyleneideck/BackgroundMusic

Tried https://github.com/kyleneideck/BackgroundMusic before. But didn't work for me.