Dive into the technical aspects of audio on your device, including codecs, format support, and customization options.

Audio Documentation

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AVAudioRecorder records silence
We have application using PTT Framework to record audio messages when app is backgrounded. Right now we are using AVAudioRecorder for that purpose. And problem is one specific user has frequent issue - recorded audio contains only silence. I've checked almost everything I can imagine but didn't find any possible reason of issue. Conditions: AVAudioRecorder uses following configuration: [ AVEncoderAudioQualityKey: AVAudioQuality.low.rawValue, AVFormatIDKey : kAudioFormatMPEG4AAC, AVNumberOfChannelsKey: 1, AVSampleRateKey: 16000.0 ] App waits both didBeginTransmitting and didActivate audioSession from PTChannelManager (audio session has playback category at that moment) App does AVAudioSession category change to playAndRecord App gets routeChangeNotification with categoryChange and category = playAndRecord There is no any interruption notifications from AVAudioSession during recording There is no any error notification from AVAudioRecorder Any idea what exactly I do wrong? Is there anything else I should check? Thanks in advance. P.S. it looks like recording audio with AudioUnit has the same issue, but let's exclude it from question atm for simplicity.
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378
Mar ’25
Can backgrounded apps record audio?
I'd like to find out: Can backgrounded apps record audio? In the past as I recall, I found that backgrounded apps were pretty restricted and couldn't do much of anything. However I'm not familiar with the current state of affairs. With iOS 15.8 and above, can backgrounded apps record audio if they've been given permission by the user to access the microphone? Thanks.
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431
Dec ’24
AVB Support for the AVnu MILAN Conventions
The AVB AVnu MILAN Convention has a groweing Population. Many big companies (Cisco, Meyer Sound, d&b Audio, l‘acoustics, Presonus, digico etc.) implements the AVB AVnu Milan Standards. Is there a plan on the Apple side to also implement AVnu Milan on top of the AVB Protocol? The advantage for Apple Sound would be a great Integration in the professionell Audio market and a more stable intergration on top of the AVB protocol. The atdecc work, but Not that stable.
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151
Oct ’25
ShazamKit supported for iOS apps that can run on Mac silicon?
I am having issues deploying my iOS app, that uses ShazamKit, to get working on a Mac with Apple silicon. When uploading the archive to App Store Connect I do get ITMS-90863: Macs with Apple silicon support issue - The app links with libraries that aren’t present in macOS: /usr/lib/swift/libswiftShazamKit.dylib Is ShazamKit not supported for iOS apps that can run on Macs with Apple silicon? Or is there something I should fix in my setup / deployment?
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1k
Jun ’25
Play Audio for a Metronome
Hi, I am looking for a good way to play sounds at a high frequency. At the moment I am using the AVAudioEngine, and create a couple AVAudioPlayerNode and for each sound I need to play I create a AVAudioPCMBuffer. When the app needs to play a sound, I get the correct AVAudioPCMBuffer for the sound and use the first available AVAudioPlayerNode and feed it to the buffer. The timing for a metronome app has to be very precise because if it's of by about 16ms the user can hear that it is not playing had the right interval. For low speeds this is working without any problems, but at high speeds it is getting worse. Maybe anyone has an idea on how I can improve my method. Its a Plugin for Flutter. import AVFoundation class FastSoundPlayer { private var audioPlayers: [SoundPlayer?] = [] private var sounds: [String: Sound] = [:] private var engine = AVAudioEngine() let session = AVAudioSession.sharedInstance() init() { do { try session.setCategory(AVAudioSession.Category.playback, mode: AVAudioSession.Mode.default, options: [AVAudioSession.CategoryOptions.mixWithOthers]) try session.setActive(true) createSoundPlayers(count: 20) try engine.start() } catch { print("Error starting audio engine: \(error.localizedDescription)") } } // Selector method to handle applicationDidBecomeActiveNotification func applicationDidBecomeActive() { // Reinitialize AVAudioEngine and reattach all nodes do { engine.reset() objc_sync_enter(audioPlayers) audioPlayers.removeAll() createSoundPlayers(count: 20) objc_sync_exit(audioPlayers) try engine.start() } catch { print("Error starting audio engine: \(error.localizedDescription)") } } func createSoundPlayers(count: Int) { for _ in 0..<count { let player = SoundPlayer() engine.attach(player.player) engine.connect(player.player, to: engine.mainMixerNode, format: nil) audioPlayers.append(player) } } func load(sound: Data, name: String) { let sound = Sound(soundData: sound) sounds[name] = sound } func play(name: String) { if !engine.isRunning { applicationDidBecomeActive() } guard let sound = sounds[name] else { print("Sound not found") return } if let player = getAvailablePlayer() { player.play(sound: sound) } } func getAvailablePlayer() -> SoundPlayer? { for player in audioPlayers { if !player!.isPlaying { return player } } return nil } } class SoundPlayer { let player = AVAudioPlayerNode() var isPlaying = false init() { player.volume = 1.0 } func play(sound: Sound) { player.scheduleBuffer(sound.sound!, at: nil, options: .interrupts, completionCallbackType: .dataPlayedBack) { _ in self.complete() } if (player.engine != nil && player.engine!.isRunning) { player.play() isPlaying = true } } func complete() { isPlaying = false } } class Sound { var sound: AVAudioPCMBuffer? init(soundData: Data) { do { let temporaryURL = FileManager.default.temporaryDirectory.appendingPathComponent("tempSound.wav") try soundData.write(to: temporaryURL) // Create AVAudioFile from the temporary file URL let audioFile = try AVAudioFile(forReading: temporaryURL) // Define the format for the PCM buffer (44100Hz, stereo) let format = AVAudioFormat(commonFormat: .pcmFormatInt16, sampleRate: 44100, channels: 2, interleaved: false) // Create AVAudioPCMBuffer guard let pcmBuffer = AVAudioPCMBuffer(pcmFormat: format!, frameCapacity: AVAudioFrameCount(audioFile.length)) else { // Failed to create PCM buffer self.sound = nil return } // Read audio file into PCM buffer try audioFile.read(into: pcmBuffer) // Assign the created AVAudioPCMBuffer to the sound property self.sound = pcmBuffer } catch { print("Error loading sound file: \(error.localizedDescription)") self.sound = nil } } } Thanks!
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119
Mar ’25
Sound randomly
Hello all! I've been having this issue for a while, on my iPhone 12 Pro. The volume when listening to music, watching YouTube, TikTok, etc. It will randomly lower, but the actual audio slider won't it will still be at max volume but get very quiet. I've followed other instructions such as turn off audio awareness, and other settings but nothing seems to be working. And phone calls too Has anyone else had this issue and managed to fix it?
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413
Dec ’24
Airplay selection not working
I'm trying to implement airplay into my app. I can successfully playback sound and trigger the airplay selector sheet. If the target device is a Bluetooth only device I can connect with no problem and stream the audio to the Bluetooth device, but if the audio device is a airplay specific device like a HomePod or an Apple TV when I select it, I get a spinning icon, indicating that it is trying to connect, and eventually it times out and stops without connecting. I don't believe it is an AirPlay audio issue because if I go to a different app, for example a podcast app and select my HomePods for output, and then switch back to my app. My audio will correctly stream to the HomePod. Not only that, I have it so that my icon will change color to indicate that it is connected via airplay and it is correctly indicating that it is connected via AirPlay. But I cannot then disconnect it using the Airplay selector. The issue appears to be in the AirPlay selection side, which I have spent several days attempting to troubleshoot mostly using ChatGPT to suggest code different than what I have to maybe work around the issue. Mostly it is focused on the audio player section, but it doesn't seem like that is really the route that is the problem.
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191
Jun ’25
Convert CoreAudio AudioObjectID to IOUSB LocationID
Is there a recommended way on macOS 26 Tahoe to take a CoreAudio AudioObjectID and use it to lookup the underlying USB LocationID? I previously used AudioObjectID to query the corresponding DeviceUID with kAudioDevicePropertyDeviceUID. Then I queried for the IOService matching kIOAudioEngineClassName with property kIOAudioEngineGlobalUniqueIDKey matching DeviceUID, and I loaded kUSBDevicePropertyLocationID from the result. This fails on macOS 26, because the IO Registry for the device has an entry for usbaudiod rather than AppleUSBAudioEngine, and usbaudiod does not include a kIOAudioEngineGlobalUniqueIDKey property (or any other property to map it to a CoreAudio DeviceUID). My use-case here is a piece of audio recording software that allows configuring a set of supported audio devices via USB HID prior to recording. I present the user with a list of CoreAudio devices to use, but without a way to lookup the underlying USB LocationID, I cannot guarantee that the configured device matches the selected device (e.g. if the user plugged in two identical microphones).
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506
Sep ’25
Audio player app is silent if device connected via CarPlay
I have a SwiftUI app - (https://youtu.be/VbAfUk_eYl0?si=JxUBh0Bpb-vc1E1U) - which I thought was almost ready for release - a manager for airdropped audio files from Logic Pro or other music creation applications. It uses AVAudioEngine and AVAudioPlayerNode to play audio, and the MediaPlayer API to integrate with car audio and similar, all of which works well. It does not currently have an explicit CarPlay integration (and I'm slightly horrified at the amount of work that is going to require). I had the good or bad luck of getting a loaner car with carplay while mine is being repaired yesterday, and lo and behold, when connected to the vehicle via CarPlay, there is no audio output in the vehicle at all. The now playing panel correctly shows the information my app provides about the currently playing song; the player node believes it is playing, the AVAudioSession is configured as it should be. But there is no sound. Obviously I cannot ship it in this state. I've tried fiddling with the parameters the AVAudioSession is configured with, in case there was some parameter that was preventing audio output, to no avail - currently: var options = AVAudioSession.CategoryOptions() options.insert(.allowAirPlay) options.insert(.allowBluetooth) options.insert(.allowBluetoothA2DP) try session.setCategory(.playback, mode: .default, options: options) try? session.setPreferredIOBufferDuration(0.002) // ~96 samples at 44.1kHz try? session.setPrefersNoInterruptionsFromSystemAlerts(true) try? session.setPrefersInterruptionOnRouteDisconnect(false) try session.setActive(true, options: [.notifyOthersOnDeactivation]) All diagnostics within the app show the player operating correctly - files are played and flushed; AVAudioPlayerNodeCompletionCallbacks are called when they should be. But the output is not audible in the vehicle. I would much prefer to ship this app without full-blown CarPlay integration, but with working audio when connected via CarPlay, and work on full CarPlay integration for the next release. Is there some secret handshake I am just missing to make this work?
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107
Mar ’25
AVAudioSession.outputVolume not reporting correctly in iOS 18+ devices
I’m using the shared instance of AVAudioSession. After activating it with .setActive(true), I observe the outputVolume, and it correctly reports the device’s volume. However, after deactivating the session using .setActive(false), changing the volume, and then reactivating it again, the outputVolume returns the previous volume (before deactivation), not the current device volume. The correct volume is only reported after the user manually changes it again using physical buttons or Control Center, which triggers the observer. What I need is a way to retrieve the actual current device volume immediately after reactivating the audio session, even on the second and subsequent activations. Disabling and re-enabling the audio session is essential to how my application functions. I’ve tested this behavior with my colleagues, and the issue is consistently reproducible on iOS 18.0.1, iOS 18.1, iOS 18.3, iOS 18.5 and iOS 18.6.2. On devices running iOS 17.6.1 and iOS 16.0.3, outputVolume correctly reflects the current volume immediately after calling .setActive(true) multiple times.
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174
Sep ’25
SpeechAnalyzer error "asset not found after attempted download" for certain languages
I am trying to use the new SpeechAnalyzer framework in my Mac app, and am running into an issue for some languages. When I call AssetInstallationRequest.downloadAndInstall() for some languages, it throws an error: Error Domain=SFSpeechErrorDomain Code=1 "transcription.ar asset not found after attempted download." The ".ar" appears to be the language code, which in this case was Arabic. When I call AssetInventory.status(forModules:) before attempting the download, it is giving me a status of "downloading" (perhaps from an earlier attempt?). If this language was completely unsupported, I would expect it to return a status of "unsupported", so I'm not sure what's going on here. For other languages (Polish, for example) SpeechTranscriber.supportedLocale(equivalentTo:) is returning nil, so that seems like a clearly unsupported language. But I can't tell if the languages I'm trying, like Arabic, are supported and something is going wrong, or if this error represents something I can work around. Here's the relevant section of code. The error is thrown from downloadAndInstall(), so I never even get as far as setting up the SpeechAnalyzer itself. private func setUpAnalyzer() async throws { guard let sourceLanguage else { throw Error.languageNotSpecified } guard let locale = await SpeechTranscriber.supportedLocale(equivalentTo: Locale(identifier: sourceLanguage.rawValue)) else { throw Error.unsupportedLanguage } let transcriber = SpeechTranscriber(locale: locale, preset: .progressiveTranscription) self.transcriber = transcriber let reservedLocales = await AssetInventory.reservedLocales if !reservedLocales.contains(locale) && reservedLocales.count == AssetInventory.maximumReservedLocales { if let oldest = reservedLocales.last { await AssetInventory.release(reservedLocale: oldest) } } do { let status = await AssetInventory.status(forModules: [transcriber]) print("status: \(status)") if let installationRequest = try await AssetInventory.assetInstallationRequest(supporting: [transcriber]) { try await installationRequest.downloadAndInstall() } } ...
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Detecting if a phone call is being recorded by another app on iOS
Hello, I’m new here. I'm developing an iOS app and I’d like to know whether it is possible to detect if a phone call is being recorded by another app running in the background. I’ve already reviewed the documentation for CallKit and AVAudioSession, but I couldn’t find anything related. My expectation was that iOS might provide some callback or API to indicate if a call is being recorded (third-party apps), but so far I haven’t found a way. My questions are: Does iOS expose any API to detect if a call is being recorded? If not, is there any indirect, Apple's policy compliant method (e.g., microphone usage events) that can be relied upon? Or is this something that iOS explicitly prevents for privacyreasons? Expecting solutions that align with Apple’s policies and would be accepted under the App Store Review Guidelines. Thanks in advance for any guidance.
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221
Aug ’25
AVAudioSessionCategoryOptionAllowBluetooth incorrectly marked as deprecated in iOS 8 in iOS 26 beta 5
AVAudioSessionCategoryOptionAllowBluetooth is marked as deprecated in iOS 8 in iOS 26 beta 5 when this option was not deprecated in iOS 18.6. I think this is a mistake and the deprecation is in iOS 26. Am I right? It seems that the substitute for this option is "AVAudioSessionCategoryOptionAllowBluetoothHFP". The documentation does not make clear if the behaviour is exactly the same or if any difference should be expected... Has anyone used this option in iOS 26? Should I expect any difference with the current behaviour of "AVAudioSessionCategoryOptionAllowBluetooth"? Thank you.
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260
Aug ’25
AVAudioUnit host - PCM buffer output silent
Hi, I just started to develop audio unit hosting support in my application. Offline rendering seems to work except that I hear no output, but why? I suspect with the player goes something wrong. I connect to CoreAudio in a different location in the code. Here are some error messages I faced so far: 2025-08-14 19:42:04.132930+0200 com.gsequencer.GSequencer[34358:18611871] [avae] AVAudioEngineGraph.mm:4668 Can't retrieve source node to play sequence because there is no output node! 2025-08-14 19:42:04.151171+0200 com.gsequencer.GSequencer[34358:18611871] [avae] AVAudioEngineGraph.mm:4668 Can't retrieve source node to play sequence because there is no output node! 2025-08-14 19:43:08.344530+0200 com.gsequencer.GSequencer[34358:18614927] AUAudioUnit.mm:1417 Cannot set maximumFramesToRender while render resources allocated. 2025-08-14 19:43:08.346583+0200 com.gsequencer.GSequencer[34358:18614927] [avae] AVAEInternal.h:104 [AVAudioSequencer.mm:121:-[AVAudioSequencer(AVAudioSequencer_Player) startAndReturnError:]: (impl->Start()): error -10852 ** (<unknown>:34358): WARNING **: 19:43:08.346: error during audio sequencer start - -10852 I have implemented an AVAudioEngine based AudioUnit host. Here I instantiate player and effect: /* audio engine */ audio_engine = [[AVAudioEngine alloc] init]; fx_audio_unit_audio->audio_engine = (gpointer) audio_engine; av_format = (AVAudioFormat *) fx_audio_unit_audio->av_format; /* av audio player node */ av_audio_player_node = [[AVAudioPlayerNode alloc] init]; /* av audio unit */ av_audio_unit_effect = [[AVAudioUnitEffect alloc] initWithAudioComponentDescription:[((AVAudioUnitComponent *) AGS_AUDIO_UNIT_PLUGIN(base_plugin)->component) audioComponentDescription]]; av_audio_unit = (AVAudioUnit *) av_audio_unit_effect; fx_audio_unit_audio->av_audio_unit = av_audio_unit; /* audio sequencer */ av_audio_sequencer = [[AVAudioSequencer alloc] initWithAudioEngine:audio_engine]; fx_audio_unit_audio->av_audio_sequencer = (gpointer) av_audio_sequencer; /* output node */ [[AVAudioOutputNode alloc] init]; /* audio player and audio unit */ [audio_engine attachNode:av_audio_player_node]; [audio_engine attachNode:av_audio_unit]; [audio_engine connect:av_audio_player_node to:av_audio_unit format:av_format]; [audio_engine connect:av_audio_unit to:[audio_engine outputNode] format:av_format]; ns_error = NULL; [audio_engine enableManualRenderingMode:AVAudioEngineManualRenderingModeOffline format:av_format maximumFrameCount:buffer_size error:&ns_error]; if(ns_error != NULL && [ns_error code] != noErr){ g_warning("enable manual rendering mode error - %d", [ns_error code]); } ns_error = NULL; [[av_audio_unit AUAudioUnit] allocateRenderResourcesAndReturnError:&ns_error]; if(ns_error != NULL && [ns_error code] != noErr){ g_warning("Audio Unit allocate render resources returned error - ErrorCode %d", [ns_error code]); } Then I render in a dedicated thread. ns_error = NULL; [audio_engine startAndReturnError:&ns_error]; if(ns_error != NULL && [ns_error code] != noErr){ g_warning("error during audio engine start - %d", [ns_error code]); } [av_audio_sequencer prepareToPlay]; ns_error = NULL; [av_audio_sequencer startAndReturnError:&ns_error]; if(ns_error != NULL && [ns_error code] != noErr){ g_warning("error during audio sequencer start - %d", [ns_error code]); } [av_audio_player_node play]; while(is_running){ /* pre sync */ /* IO buffers */ av_output_buffer = (AVAudioPCMBuffer *) scope_data->av_output_buffer; av_input_buffer = (AVAudioPCMBuffer *) scope_data->av_input_buffer; /* fill input buffer */ /* schedule av input buffer */ frame_position = 0; // (gint64) ((note_offset * absolute_delay) + delay_counter) * buffer_size; av_audio_player_node = (AVAudioPlayerNode *) fx_audio_unit_audio->av_audio_player_node; AVAudioTime *av_audio_time = [[AVAudioTime alloc] initWithHostTime:frame_position sampleTime:frame_position atRate:((double) samplerate)]; [av_audio_player_node scheduleBuffer:av_input_buffer atTime:av_audio_time options:0 completionHandler:nil]; /* render */ ns_error = NULL; status = [audio_engine renderOffline:AGS_FX_AUDIO_UNIT_AUDIO_FIXED_BUFFER_SIZE toBuffer:av_output_buffer error:&ns_error]; if(ns_error != NULL && [ns_error code] != noErr){ g_warning("render offline error - %d", [ns_error code]); } } regards, Joël
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418
Aug ’25
SpeechTranscriber/SpeechAnalyzer being relatively slow compared to FoundationModel and TTS
So, I've been wondering how fast a an offline STT -> ML Prompt -> TTS roundtrip would be. Interestingly, for many tests, the SpeechTranscriber (STT) takes the bulk of the time, compared to generating a FoundationModel response and creating the Audio using TTS. E.g. InteractionStatistics: - listeningStarted: 21:24:23 4480 2423 - timeTillFirstAboveNoiseFloor: 01.794 - timeTillLastNoiseAboveFloor: 02.383 - timeTillFirstSpeechDetected: 02.399 - timeTillTranscriptFinalized: 04.510 - timeTillFirstMLModelResponse: 04.938 - timeTillMLModelResponse: 05.379 - timeTillTTSStarted: 04.962 - timeTillTTSFinished: 11.016 - speechLength: 06.054 - timeToResponse: 02.578 - transcript: This is a test. - mlModelResponse: Sure! I'm ready to help with your test. What do you need help with? Here, between my audio input ending and the Text-2-Speech starting top play (using AVSpeechUtterance) the total response time was 2.5s. Of that time, it took the SpeechAnalyzer 2.1s to get the transcript finalized, FoundationModel only took 0.4s to respond (and TTS started playing nearly instantly). I'm already using reportingOptions: [.volatileResults, .fastResults] so it's probably as fast as possible right now? I'm just surprised the STT takes so much longer compared to the other parts (all being CoreML based, aren't they?)
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550
Aug ’25
[26] audioTimeRange would still be interesting for .volatileResults in SpeechTranscriber
So experimenting with the new SpeechTranscriber, if I do: let transcriber = SpeechTranscriber( locale: locale, transcriptionOptions: [], reportingOptions: [.volatileResults], attributeOptions: [.audioTimeRange] ) only the final result has audio time ranges, not the volatile results. Is this a performance consideration? If there is no performance problem, it would be nice to have the option to also get speech time ranges for volatile responses. I'm not presenting the volatile text at all in the UI, I was just trying to keep statistics about the non-speech and the speech noise level, this way I can determine when the noise level falls under the noisefloor for a while. The goal here was to finalize the recording automatically, when the noise level indicate that the user has finished speaking.
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668
2w
Logic Pro cannot load v3 audio unit with framework compiled with Swift 6
Sequoia 15.4.1 (24E263) XCode: 16.3 (16E140) Logic Pro: 11.2.1 I’ve been developing a complex audio unit for Mac OS that works perfectly well in its own bespoke host app and is now well into its beta testing stage. It did take some effort to get it to work well in Logic Pro however and all was fine and working well until: The AU part is an empty app extension with a framework containing its code. The framework contains Swift code for the UI and C code for the DSP parts. When the framework is compiled using the Swift 5 compiler the AU will run in Logic with no problems. (I should also mention that AU passes the most strict auval tests). But… when the framework is compiled with Swift 6 Logic Pro cannot load it. Logic displays a message saying the audio unit could not be loaded and to contact the developer. My own host app loads the AU perfectly well with the Swift 6 version, so I know there’s nothing wrong with the audio unit. I cannot find any differences in any of the built output files except, of course, the actual binary code in the framework. I’ve worked for hours on this and cannot find a solution other than to build the framework in Swift 5. (I worked hard to get all the async code updated and working with Swift 6! so I feel a little cheated!) What is happening? Is this a bug in Logic? Is this a bug in Swift 6 compiler/linker? I’m at the Duh! hands in the air, tearing out hair stage! ( once again!)
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345
Jul ’25