How to send OBS audio alongside a virtual camera in Discord

The short answer

OBS Virtual Camera carries video only. Discord treats it as a webcam, and a webcam device has no audio track. If OBS video shows up in Discord but nobody hears your OBS audio, nothing is broken. You need a second path for the sound.

That path is a virtual audio device: a software cable that acts as a speaker on one end and a microphone on the other. OBS plays its audio into the speaker end, and Discord uses the microphone end as your input device. Discord then receives video from OBS Virtual Camera and audio from the virtual cable as two separate streams.

Discord's Go Live screen sharing is a different feature with its own audio handling. This guide covers the camera-plus-microphone route, where OBS replaces your webcam and your mic in a voice or video call.

What you need before you start

• OBS Studio with a scene that already looks and sounds the way you want
• The Discord desktop app, since the steps below rely on choosing devices in its Voice & Video settings
• A virtual audio device for your operating system (see the table below)
• Your microphone added as an audio source inside OBS, if you want people to hear your voice as well as OBS audio. Discord accepts only one input device at a time, so once the virtual cable is that input, your mic has to reach Discord through OBS.

Operating system | Common virtual audio option | What Discord should use as input

Windows | VB-Audio Virtual Cable, which installs a playback device called CABLE Input and a recording device called CABLE Output | CABLE Output

macOS | BlackHole (the 2-channel version is enough for voice calls) | BlackHole

Linux (PulseAudio or PipeWire) | A null sink created with pactl, optionally remapped into a regular source | The remapped source, or the null sink's monitor

Step 1: Start the virtual camera and select it in Discord

• In OBS, click Start Virtual Camera in the Controls dock.
• In Discord, open User Settings, then Voice & Video.
• Under Video Settings, set Camera to OBS Virtual Camera.
• Click Test Video.

You should see your OBS scene in the preview. That confirms Discord can access the virtual camera and receive frames from it. It does not tell you how the video will look to others during a call, because that also depends on your connection and on what Discord sends. If OBS Virtual Camera is missing from the list, restart Discord after starting the virtual camera in OBS.

Step 2: Send OBS audio into the virtual cable

OBS has a monitoring output for listening to sources. Point that output at the virtual cable and turn monitoring on for the sources you want Discord to receive.

• In OBS, open Settings, then Audio, then the Advanced section.
• Set Monitoring Device to the speaker side of your virtual cable: CABLE Input on Windows, BlackHole on macOS, or your null sink on Linux.
• Close Settings and open Edit, then Advanced Audio Properties.
• For each source Discord should hear, including your microphone if you added it, set Audio Monitoring to Monitor and Output. Monitor Only also reaches Discord, but it leaves that source out of OBS recordings and streams.
• Leave Audio Monitoring off for any source you don't want in the call.

Monitoring now plays into the cable rather than your headphones, so you won't hear these sources yourself. On Windows, you can listen anyway: open the Recording tab of the Sound control panel, open CABLE Output's properties, and use Listen to this device. This adds some delay to what you hear. It does not affect what Discord receives.

Step 3: Make the virtual cable your Discord microphone

• In Discord, open User Settings, then Voice & Video.
• Set Input Device to the microphone side of the cable: CABLE Output on Windows, BlackHole on macOS, or the remapped source on Linux.
• Leave Output Device set to your real headphones or speakers. Don't set it to the virtual cable.

Step 4: Adjust Discord's voice processing

Discord processes the input to make speech clearer, and that processing can damage other audio. Noise suppression may treat music or game sound as noise and remove it. Automatic sensitivity may cut off quieter passages. If people hear your OBS audio dropping out or sounding hollow, try these changes under Voice & Video and test again after each one:

• Turn off automatic input sensitivity and set the threshold manually, or switch Input Mode to Push to Talk.
• Turn off noise suppression for this input.
• Turn off echo cancellation and automatic gain control if the audio still sounds pumped or uneven.

How to check that it worked

Each check below answers a different question. Passing one doesn't mean the next will pass.

• Detection: the virtual cable appears in Discord's Input Device list. This only means Discord can see the device.
• Input activity: play sound in OBS and watch the meters. The OBS Audio Mixer meters should move. On Windows, the level bar next to CABLE Output in the Sound control panel's Recording tab should move too. Then, in Discord's Mic Test, click Let's Check and confirm the bar responds. This proves signal is arriving, not that it sounds right.
• Intelligible sound: in the same Mic Test, Discord plays your input back to you. Listen for clear speech, complete music or game audio, and no clipping or gaps.
• Call quality: the only full test is a real call with someone who can describe what they hear and see. Ask whether audio and video line up and whether the audio drops out.

This guide doesn't give target input levels or sensitivity values, because no verified figures were available for this setup. Adjust by ear. Keep OBS meters out of the red so the audio doesn't clip, and confirm with the Mic Test playback and a test call.

Common problems and fixes

Discord shows OBS video but there is no audio

This is expected if Discord's input device is still your normal microphone, because the virtual camera doesn't carry sound. If Discord's input is already the cable, check three settings. The OBS Monitoring Device must be the cable's speaker side. The sources you want must have Audio Monitoring turned on. The source itself must not be muted in the OBS Audio Mixer.

Other people hear themselves, or an echo

This happens when OBS captures your whole desktop audio, including Discord's voice output, and sends it back into the call. You can remove Desktop Audio from the monitored sources and capture only the programs you want. Recent Windows versions of OBS include an Application Audio Capture source for this. You can also send Discord's output to a device that OBS doesn't capture.

Your voice is missing but OBS audio comes through

Discord now listens only to the virtual cable, so your physical microphone has to be a source in OBS with Audio Monitoring turned on.

Audio and video are out of sync

Video and audio reach Discord through separate paths, so they can drift apart. In Advanced Audio Properties, OBS has a Sync Offset setting for each source that delays its audio. There is no universal correct value. Adjust it while someone in a test call tells you whether it has improved.

Linux: creating a virtual cable with pactl

On systems running PulseAudio, or PipeWire with its PulseAudio compatibility layer, these commands create a sink for OBS to play into. They also create a regular input source from that sink's output, which Discord is more likely to list as a microphone:

pactl load-module module-null-sink sink_name=obs_to_discord sink_properties=device.description=OBS_to_Discord
pactl load-module module-remap-source master=obs_to_discord.monitor source_name=obs_mic source_properties=device.description=OBS_Mic

In OBS, set Monitoring Device to OBS_to_Discord. In Discord, set Input Device to OBS_Mic. Modules loaded this way usually disappear after a restart, so run the commands again or add them to your audio server's startup configuration. Device names and menu wording can differ between distributions and versions.