If your microphone seems too quiet or too loud on Windows 10, you can easily adjust the signal input level. Here’s how to increase or decrease your microphone volume.
Change microphone volume with Settings
Windows Settings is one of the fastest and least confusing ways to adjust the microphone volume in Windows 1
To open it, click on the “Start” menu and select the gear icon on the left. This will open ‘Settings’. You can also press Windows + i to open it.
To speed things up, you can also right-click the speaker icon on the taskbar in the notification area (system tray) and select “Sound Settings”. The Sound Settings window will appear.
In the “Settings” window, click “System”.
Select “Sound” in the sidebar.
Scroll down to the “Input” section in the Sound window. Select the device you want to configure using the “Choose your input device” drop-down list. Then click on ‘Device Properties’.
In “Device” properties for the microphone, use the “Volume” slider to adjust the input level of the microphone.
The louder the volume, the louder the input signal will be when using the microphone. However, louder isn’t always better: if the signal is too loud, your voice will be distorted. Try to find the ideal volume where your voice (or other sound source) is loud enough without any kind of distortion.
If you need assistance, click the “Start Test” button and speak into the microphone at a normal volume. Clicking ‘Stop Test’ will show you the highest percentage recorded by the testing program.
You can then adjust the volume slider accordingly. If you keep hitting 100% by speaking at a normal volume, the volume slider is too high. Lower the volume and try again.
When you are satisfied, close “Settings” and you are good to go. If you ever need to adjust it again, just open “Settings” and navigate back to Sound> Input> Device Properties.
Change microphone volume from the control panel
You can also adjust the microphone input volume using the classic control panel.
You can start this tool from the speaker icon in the notification area of your taskbar, which is located opposite the Start button. First, right-click on the speaker icon and select “Sounds” from the menu that appears.
In the “Sound” window that opens, click on the “Record” tab.
You will see a list of microphones installed on your system. Select the one you want to adjust and then click the “Properties” button.
In the “Properties” window that appears, click the “Levels” tab.
In the “Levels” tab, use the Microphone slider to adjust the microphone input level. The higher the level, the louder your microphone signal will be while it is in use. That means your voice will be louder. But a signal that’s too loud will distort, so try to find the right spot where it’s loud enough, but not too loud to distort your voice.
Then click “OK” and click “OK” again to close the “Sound” window. If you need to adjust the level again, access the Microphone Properties from the speaker icon on the taskbar. Good luck!
