No sound? We’ve put together all the best tips on getting your MacBook speakers working, starting with the most common and working our way down.
No sound from MacBook Speakers?
Turn sound up via F12 – The first, most would say obvious point of call is to check the sound is up via F12, this will show a gray translucent box in the middle of your screen with white bars. These bars will go up or down with F11 and F12.
Check system Preferences
Click the Apple logo at the top left of your screen, on the drop down click system preferences which will open a new window. On this window click the sound icon and on the sound settings menu click output. On this page you will see a tick box with the word MUTE next to it. This should not be ticked, if it is, you’ve found your problem. If the volume bar next to it is all the way to the left, drag it across and see if that restores audio.
Swap Apps
However you are currently playing sound on your Mac, try swapping over to another app to check if it’s a bad source or if you have a specific program that needs to be troubleshot. Again the first step if you find it is a particular app is check the sound levels and secondly the app preferences to check it hasn’t been hard muted by the sound settings.
Off and on again
The original tech support tip. Try turning it off and on again, this gives your Mac the Reset it might need to kick any bugs or malfunctions that are stopping your sound from working.
Check headphone jack
Have a look at your headphone jack for debris, or even snapped jacks. If it looks clean on first inspection get a flashlight and have a look closely for anything that’s been jammed in there. If there is you can try blowing in it to dislodge the obstruction or get a can of compressed air to try. If you have no luck, you’ll need to see a specialist for help.
Unplug everything
If by this stage you haven’t gotten any closer to getting audio back, unplug anything you’ve got attached to your MacBook, including hdmi, charger and USB’s. On the odd occasion these can be channeling your audio.
Check for update
If none of the above has worked, the next thing to check is wether you have any outstanding software updates for you operating system, if you select the Apple logo in the top left corner you will have a notification number next to system preferences if there is one outstanding.
Although it may not seem important, some firmware and software patches in the updates address the hardware of your Mac, things like the keyboard, trackpad and most importantly, speakers!
Reset SMC
Resetting SMC (system management controller) reboots many of your Macs core functions, it may not always work but it’s worth giving it a go if you’ve got to this stage to no avail. To reset your MacBooks SMC follow these instructions:
- Shutdown your MacBook or let the power drain.
- Connect the charger
- Hold Shift+Control+Option and the Power button at the same time for approx. 10 seconds
- Release the keys
- Reboot your Mac and test the keyboard.
If you cannot get passed the loading screen after this, you can try a very similar process resetting the PRAM.
Reset PRAM
Resetting Parameter Random Access Memory puts system settings like brightness, sound, contrast back to factory spec. This may just kick start your speakers if they’ve been confused by something. Do this as follows:
- Turn off back
- start your Mac and hold Command+Option+P+R before the gray screen appears.
- Once you hear the Mac chime release all keys.
- Check keyboard once Mac has booted up
No luck? Talk to the Apple Repair Specialists
If your sound still isn’t working after following these tips, we’re sorry to say that you may have hardware issues on your MacBook like dead speakers or faulty connections.
Fear not, at Hero Tech Support we offer free pick up, free diagnosis and free drop off across Hampshire. We even give free advice over the phone and via email.
Get in touch and we’ll do everything you need to get your speakers going again.
