How to Fix No Sound in Windows 11

The quickest fix for no sound in Windows 11 is almost always the output device. Click the speaker icon at the right of the taskbar, click the arrow next to the volume slider, and pick the speakers or headphones you are actually using — Windows often keeps sending audio to an HDMI monitor, an unplugged headset, or a Bluetooth device that has dropped out. If that does not bring the sound back, work through the checks below in order: they go from the thirty-second fixes to the ones that take a few minutes, and one of them resolves the vast majority of "no audio" cases.

This guide applies to Windows 11 (all current editions — Home, Pro, Education and the Enterprise/Server SKUs that ship the desktop experience). The menu names are current as of August 2026; Microsoft occasionally moves a setting between builds, so exact wording may differ slightly on very new or very old versions.

1. Pick the correct output device

Windows can play to only one default output at a time, and it silently switches when you plug in a monitor, dock or headset. This is the number-one cause of "sudden" silence, and it is the first check in Microsoft's own Fix sound or audio problems in Windows article too.

1. Click the speaker icon on the right of the taskbar (in the system tray, next to the clock).
2. Click the arrow (>) to the right of the volume slider to open the list of connected audio devices.
3. Choose the device you want to hear — for example Speakers, Headphones, or your Bluetooth headset.
4. Play something to test. If the list is empty or your device is missing, open Settings > System > Sound and check under Output — jump to step 5 if no device appears at all.

2. Check mute and volume levels

It sounds obvious, but a muted app, a zeroed slider, or a hardware mute key accounts for a surprising share of silent PCs — and the master volume and per-app volume are separate.

1. Click the speaker icon and confirm the master volume slider is up and not showing a crossed-out (muted) speaker. Click the speaker glyph once to unmute if it is.
2. Check any physical controls: a mute key on the keyboard, a volume wheel on a headset, or a hardware mute switch on external speakers.
3. Open Volume mixer — right-click the speaker icon and choose Open volume mixer, or go to Settings > System > Sound > Volume mixer — and make sure no individual app is muted or turned all the way down.

3. Run the built-in audio troubleshooter

Windows 11 can diagnose and fix many audio faults automatically — wrong default device, a stopped service, or a disabled endpoint.

1. Open Settings > System > Troubleshoot > Other troubleshooters.
2. Find the Audio (playing audio) entry and click Run.
3. On current Windows 11 builds this opens the guided audio troubleshooter in the Get Help app — the same hand-off Microsoft describes in its sound and audio troubleshooting steps. Follow the prompts and let it apply any fixes it recommends.
4. You can also start the same flow by right-clicking the speaker icon and choosing Troubleshoot sound problems.

4. Restart the Windows Audio service

If audio was working and stopped — often after sleep or a driver update — the Windows Audio service may have hung. Restarting it (and its two companions) is a clean, reversible fix.

1. Press Windows + R, type services.msc, and press Enter.
2. In the list, find Windows Audio. Right-click it and choose Restart.
3. Do the same for Windows Audio Endpoint Builder and Remote Procedure Call (RPC), which the audio stack depends on.
4. While each is selected, confirm its Startup type is set to Automatic (double-click the service to change it if needed).

net stop audiosrv && net start audiosrv

5. Update or reinstall the audio driver

A corrupted or mismatched audio driver — common after a feature update — can leave you with no output device at all. Update it first; reinstall if updating does not help.

1. Right-click the Start button and choose Device Manager.
2. Expand Sound, video and game controllers.
3. Right-click your audio device (for example Realtek, Intel or a headset name) and choose Update driver > Search automatically for drivers.
4. If Windows says the best driver is already installed but sound is still broken, choose Uninstall device instead, tick Attempt to remove the driver if offered, then restart the PC. Windows reinstalls a fresh audio driver on reboot.

Still no sound?

If you have worked through all five steps and the PC is still silent, the cause is usually physical or a bad update:

• Check the connection. Try a different cable, a different port, and — for a 3.5 mm jack — the port on the back of a desktop rather than the front.
• Confirm the device is enabled. In Device Manager, a small down-arrow on the audio device means it is disabled; right-click and choose Enable device.
• Roll back a bad update. If audio broke right after a Windows or driver update, roll the driver back (Device Manager > the device > Properties > Driver > Roll Back Driver) or uninstall the recent quality update from Settings > Windows Update > Update history > Uninstall updates.

Device Manager error codes on the audio device

When Device Manager marks your audio device with a yellow exclamation point (Step 5), it also gives a numbered code — and that code says exactly what is wrong, which saves you guessing. The codes and messages below come from Microsoft's error codes in Device Manager article; the internal problem names in brackets are from the Device Manager error messages reference for Windows drivers.