Recording singing
Record vocals with the browser's speech processing switched off. Noise suppression and automatic gain control are built for conversation and actively damage singing — this page turns both off.
Ready. Press Record and allow microphone access when your browser asks.
Why the default settings ruin singing
Browsers apply three processes to microphone audio by default, all tuned for video calls, and all of them harm a vocal take.
- Automatic gain control continuously adjusts the level. For singing that is destructive — the difference between a quiet verse and a belted chorus is the performance, and AGC flattens it into a single volume.
- Noise suppression is trained on speech. Sustained notes, vibrato and breathy passages can be misread as noise and partially removed, which produces an audible warble.
- Echo cancellation removes the natural room reflections that give a vocal its sense of space.
All three are disabled here, and the output defaults to uncompressed WAV so nothing further is thrown away.
Setting a level for singing
Set gain against your loudest passage, not your speaking voice. Sing the biggest note in the song and adjust so the meter touches amber but never sustains at the top. Then sing the quietest phrase and check it still registers clearly. If it does not, you are too far from the microphone rather than too quiet.
Clipping is unrecoverable — the peaks of the waveform are discarded at capture and no processing brings them back. Recording slightly quiet is always the safer error.
Singing over a backing track
This is where headphones stop being optional. If a backing track plays through speakers while you record, the microphone captures it along with your voice and you get a single inseparable file. With headphones you get a clean vocal track that can be mixed properly.
- Put on headphones — closed-back if you have them, since open designs leak into the microphone.
- Start the backing track in another application or device.
- Press Record here and sing along.
- Stop and download the WAV.
- Line up your vocal against the backing track in an editor such as Audacity or a DAW.
Give yourself a count-in you can hear, and clap once at the start — it makes alignment straightforward.
Microphone placement for vocals
- Distance
- 15–20 cm for most voices, further for loud singers
- Angle
- Slightly off-axis, so plosives pass beside the capsule
- Plosives
- A cheap pop filter, or a sock over the mic, solves P and B thumps
- Room
- Sing away from bare walls; soft furnishings kill reflections
- Format
- WAV, always — compression artefacts are audible on sustained notes
- WAV recorderThe general uncompressed recorder.
- Sound recorderSame raw settings, for instruments.
- Voice acting demosTake-based recording for performance.
- Reduce background noiseTreating a room for nothing.
More in use cases
See all use cases — the right recording setup depends on the job: what you are capturing, and where the file goes afterwards.
Questions
Why does this page sound different from the main recorder?
It requests the raw microphone signal with noise suppression, echo cancellation and automatic gain control disabled. Those processes are designed for speech and damage singing, particularly sustained notes and dynamics.
Can I record over a backing track?
Yes, but use headphones. Playing the track through speakers means the microphone records it alongside your voice, and the two cannot be separated afterwards.
Should I record singing in MP3 or WAV?
WAV. Lossy compression artefacts are most audible on exactly the material singing produces — sustained tones, reverb tails and high harmonics. Convert at the end if you need to.
How far should I be from the microphone?
Around 15–20 cm for most voices, further if you sing loudly. Angle the microphone slightly off-axis so plosives pass beside the capsule rather than into it.
My recording distorts on high notes.
You are clipping. Lower the input gain or move back, then re-record — clipped peaks are destroyed at capture and cannot be repaired afterwards.
Is a laptop microphone good enough for singing?
For practice and reference, yes. For anything you want to share, no — laptop microphones have limited frequency response and sit too far away, which means you capture as much room as voice.