Voice recorder
Published
Record your voice with the microphone you choose, watch the level while you speak, then play the take back and download it. Echo cancellation, noise suppression and automatic gain can be switched on or off. Recordings stay in this tab and are never uploaded.
What you can do instead
Use a current version of Chrome, Edge, Firefox or Safari over HTTPS, and open this page in your regular browser if it is inside a messenger or social app.
Microphone
Record
The sound is recorded inside this page and kept in memory. It is not uploaded, not saved on a server and not stored in the browser.
How to record
- If you have several microphones, pick one in the list. Names appear after you have allowed access once, so the list may show a generic entry the first time.
- Decide on the three sound-processing switches (see below). For speech in a quiet room the defaults work well. For music or a clean test of the raw microphone, switch all three off.
- Press Start recording and allow the microphone when the browser asks. The level bar and the history strip start moving at once and the timer starts.
- Speak at a normal distance. Aim for a bar that moves into the middle or upper-middle range. If the clipping warning appears, the signal reached the maximum and will sound distorted: move back or lower the system input level.
- Press Pause to stop for a moment and Resume to continue in the same file. Press Stop and save to finish. The take appears in the list with a player, its format and size, a download link and a delete button.
Echo cancellation, noise suppression and automatic gain
These three switches ask the browser to process the microphone signal before it is recorded. Whether each one can be changed depends on the browser and the device. The page asks the browser which of them it supports and disables the ones it cannot control; after the recording starts it shows which settings the browser actually applied.
Echo cancellation
It removes the sound of your own speakers from the microphone signal. It is useful for calls. For recording with headphones it does nothing useful, and on some devices it can slightly thin the voice.
Noise suppression
It reduces steady background noise such as a fan. It can also clip the start of quiet words or make music sound watery, so turn it off for anything other than speech.
Automatic gain control
It raises the level when you are quiet and lowers it when you are loud. That helps with distance changes but makes the recording's loudness pump up and down. Turn it off if you want a natural dynamic range.
Reading the level meter and history
The bar shows the loudness of the signal the browser receives, measured in decibels relative to full scale. Zero is the loudest possible value and a quiet room sits far below it. The strip under the bar draws that loudness over time, newest on the right, so you can see where you paused or got too quiet. This history is a drawing for orientation, not a copy of the sound.
Problems and fixes
The bar does not move
Check the mute switch, the selected device and the system input level. A headset that has switched to a different profile, or a virtual device whose program is not running, can also be silent.
The sound is thin or tinny
Bluetooth headsets switch to a lower-quality call mode when the microphone opens. Use the computer's own microphone or a wired headset for better quality.
Permission blocked
If the browser remembers an earlier Block, it will not ask again. Change the microphone setting for this site in the address bar's site settings and reload.
The file will not play elsewhere
The tool saves the format your browser produces, such as WebM with Opus or MP4 with AAC. Most current players handle them; for older ones, convert the file with a program you trust.
Browser support
Microphone access and media recording are available in current versions of Chrome, Edge, Firefox and Safari, according to MDN's compatibility data. The container differs between browsers; the tool tests which audio types the browser can record, in the order WebM with Opus, Ogg with Opus, then MP4, and shows the one used. Which processing switches can be controlled also differs. In-app browsers inside messenger apps often block the microphone; the page then shows a hint to open it in your regular browser. This describes documentation, not tests on every device.
Privacy: what happens to your voice
The microphone signal goes to the browser's recorder and to an audio meter, both inside this page. The page does not upload the sound, does not save it to the browser's storage and has no analytics for this tool. The list of takes exists only while the tab is open. Stopping or leaving the page releases the microphone.
Frequently asked questions
Is my voice uploaded anywhere?
No. The sound is recorded into memory in your browser and offered as a download. The page has no code that sends it to a server.
Why are my recordings gone after a reload?
On purpose. The tool does not store anything in the browser, so a reload or closing the tab deletes the takes. Download what you want to keep.
Which file format will I get?
The first one your browser can record from a fixed list, usually WebM with Opus, or MP4 on Safari. The list shows the format of each take.
Should I switch noise suppression on?
For speech in a noisy room, yes. For music or sound effects, no, because it can change the sound.
References
Official documentation used to check this article. Pages are maintained by their owners and may change.
Reviewed against ChatLite's current behavior on .