No Sound on Mac

Open Control Centre → Sound, or System Settings → Sound → Output, and pick “MacBook Speakers” or your device. AirPods and Bluetooth speakers grab the output automatically when they connect.

Press F12 (volume up) and check “Mute” is unticked in Sound settings. Some apps, including browsers, have their own volume.

Open Terminal and run sudo killall coreaudiod. macOS restarts the audio service immediately. A full restart does the same.

Unplug USB audio interfaces, docks and displays, and turn off Bluetooth briefly. A dock can register as the default output even with nothing connected.

Applications → Utilities → Audio MIDI Setup. Select the output and check the format (e.g. 2 ch 24-bit 48 kHz) and that it is not set to an aggregate or multi-output device by mistake.

Start in safe mode to rule out third-party audio extensions (virtual drivers from recording or meeting apps). Remove those you no longer need and install macOS updates.

On Intel Macs, resetting NVRAM (Option+Command+P+R at start-up) restores volume and output settings. Apple silicon Macs reset these automatically on restart.

If headphones work but the internal speakers do not after all these steps, the speakers or the logic board need service. The speaker test helps confirm whether one side or both failed.

• Audio Test
• Speaker Test