People mean three different things by muting Zoom audio only, and each needs a different control. If you want the other side to stop hearing you, that is your microphone. If you want Zoom to go quiet while music and your browser keep playing, that is a per-app output control, and it lives in the operating system rather than in Zoom. If you only want the chime to stop every time somebody joins, that is a checkbox in Zoom's own settings. Work out which one you are after first, because the wrong control gives you the wrong kind of silence, and discovering that mid-call, right after someone has asked you a question, is a bad moment to learn the difference.
Mute your microphone, and know which mute you are in
Muting yourself is the button at the bottom left of the call window, and its keyboard shortcut is worth learning, because a mouse is slow when a drill starts outside. Two mutes can stack, though, and from your seat they look identical: yours and the host's. If the host has muted you, your own button will not release you. You get a request instead, and until somebody approves it you are talking into nothing.
- Your own mute: the button toggles freely and the icon changes the instant you click.
- Host mute: you can ask to unmute, and the host has to allow it before you are audible.
- Muted on entry: a host setting applied before you arrived, not a fault on your machine.
- Hardware mute: a switch on the headset cable that Zoom cannot see and will never report.
That last one catches somebody every week. A headset with an inline mute switch tells Zoom nothing, so the app shows you unmuted and confident while your voice goes nowhere at all. If the button says you are live and the room stays silent, run a hand down the cable before you touch a single setting. Our short page on how to mute in Zoom covers the buttons themselves; the point here is that silence has several sources and only one of them is the button you keep pressing.
Silencing Zoom without silencing your computer
When people ask how to mute Zoom audio only, this is usually the one they mean, and it is the least documented, so here it is plainly. On Windows, open the volume mixer from the speaker icon in the taskbar and pull Zoom's own slider down while everything else stays where it is. That is a genuine per-app mute, and it holds until you move it back, which is the part people forget an hour later when their audio seems mysteriously broken. macOS has no per-app volume control built in. Apple never shipped one, and no amount of hunting through System Settings will produce it.
The macOS answer
What you can do instead is leave the system alone and use Zoom's own speaker control. The audio settings carry an output volume slider that affects only what Zoom plays, so dragging it to zero leaves music, video and notifications at their normal level. It is not a mute button, but it does the same job in one drag and undoes itself in the same drag. What neither trick touches is the other direction, which is what you are sending. Muting yourself so nobody hears the room is a workaround, and it costs you the conversation every time you use it.
Turning off Zoom's own noises
Join and leave chimes, the message ping, the ringtone when somebody dials you: these are Zoom's own sounds, and they are settings rather than volume. Open Settings and work through the audio and chat sections. The entry and exit sound sits with audio, the message alert with chat. Switch off the ones you do not need and keep the ringtone, unless you have decided that nobody may reach you unannounced.
While you are in there, make the rest of the pass at the same time. Set speaker and microphone by name rather than leaving them on the system default, run a quick audio test before your meeting so you hear yourself once, and confirm background noise suppression is sitting on Auto. If you are the one hosting, the entry sound and the muted-on-entry option both live with the other host controls, and our walkthrough on how to host a Zoom meeting shows where they sit.
One more sound worth chasing: if you hear yourself a beat late, that is not a Zoom sound at all but a loop between somebody's speakers and their microphone, and the fix belongs to them. We keep the full ladder on the page about how to fix echo. And if you are wondering whether a headset would end most of this, our comparison of laptop mic vs headset vs software is the honest version, because the headset wins on echo and the software wins on the room.
Edge cases worth knowing
You muted Zoom and now nothing has sound
Check the volume mixer first, because a slider you pulled down last week stays down and Windows will not remind you. The second suspect is the output device: if Zoom is still pointed at a headset that is no longer plugged in, it plays into something that does not exist, and it does not always fall back on its own.
Muting on a phone or tablet
The mobile app gives you a microphone mute and the phone's volume keys, and that is close to the entire toolkit. Neither mobile platform offers per-app volume, so quiet Zoom with loud everything else is simply not available there. Use headphones and lower the meeting's speaker level inside the app instead.
Muted while the call is recording
Muting removes you from the recording as well as from the room, because there is no separate track quietly keeping you. Sit muted through half a session and you are absent from half the file, which matters when somebody later has to write meeting minutes from it.
Muting Zoom audio: frequently asked questions
How do I mute Zoom audio without muting my computer?
On Windows, open the volume mixer from the taskbar speaker icon and lower Zoom's slider on its own, leaving every other app at its level. macOS has no per-app volume, so use the output slider inside Zoom's audio settings instead. It changes only what Zoom plays, and you can drag it back in a second.
Can you mute Zoom audio output and still be heard?
Yes. Output and input are separate controls that do not affect each other. Drop Zoom's speaker level to zero and your microphone carries on normally, so you can speak and be heard while hearing nothing back. It is a useful state in a noisy room, and a very easy one to forget you are in.
Why can I not unmute myself?
The host has muted you. Your button then sends a request rather than flipping a switch, and you stay silent until somebody approves it. Muted on entry is the related setting, applied to everyone who joins. Neither is a fault on your machine, and reinstalling the app will not give you the button back.
How do I turn off the Zoom join and leave sound?
It is a checkbox in the settings rather than a volume control. Look through the audio section for the entry and exit sound option and untick it. Hosts have their own version of the same setting that governs whether anybody hears the chime, so if you are not hosting, the sound may not be yours to switch off.
Does muting stop background noise reaching people?
Completely, for as long as you stay muted, and that is the whole problem with it. The cost is that you cannot speak, and unmuting brings the room straight back in. If you are muting constantly to hide noise rather than because you have nothing to add, cleaning the microphone side is the better trade.