Did You Know You Can Set the Volume for Individual Apps on Windows 11?

Some apps on Windows 11 can be louder than others. But fortunately, there’s a way to decrease their volume individually to balance things out. We’ll show you how to do so using the Volume Mixer.

How Does Setting Individual App Volumes Help?

Adjusting the volume for individual apps helps you control how loud a single app can be without affecting others. That way, you can tailor the sound experience to your liking.

Say you're playing a game with friends and using Discord for comms. You can easily turn down the game volume using the Volume Mixer to hear everyone more clearly. Another example would be if you're working while listening to music and the notification sounds from WhatsApp or another messaging app keep disturbing you. Turning down the system volume will also reduce the volume of the music, and turning on Do Not Disturb isn't ideal.

These are just a few use cases, but you may encounter others where it’s beneficial to prioritize the sound level of one app over another. This is especially true if the app you want to turn down doesn't have built-in volume controls.

How to Set the Volume for Individual Apps Using the Volume Mixer

You can access the Volume Mixer in Quick Settings. Press Win + A to open it, and click the speaker icon on the right side of the volume slider (look for it at the bottom).

You can find the app volume sliders by scrolling down to the Volume Mixer section. Moving the slider to increase or decrease the volume of a particular app.

If you prefer an old-school approach to setting the volume of individual apps, you can also use the classic Volume Mixer instead.

How to Set the Output Device for Individual Apps Using the Volume Mixer

You can also use the Volume Mixer to change an individual app's sound output device. This allows you to listen to music using a Bluetooth speaker while app notifications use the system speakers.

Press Win + i, head to System > Sound, and click Volume Mixer in the Advanced section.

Next, scroll down to the Apps section to see the volume controls for individual apps. Click the down arrow of the app and then click the Output Device dropdown.

Select a different sound output device from the list of connected devices. That app's sound output will now come from that device.

If you adjust the volume of that app in the Volume Mixer, it will only affect how loud it will be on that output device. Unfortunately, the Volume Mixer can’t increase an app's volume above 100%. However, you can use a volume booster app to raise it beyond the maximum.