YouTube 'lower audio levels or quality on music videos' issue: Here's the potential reason & workaround

YouTube is the most popular video streaming platforms in the world. Millions of people use it on a daily basis to consume their favorite content.

However, having such a big user base also means that even minor issues may end up affecting hundreds of thousands.

YouTube users report lower audio levels or quality

According to reports, many YouTube users are getting lower audio levels or quality on music videos on the platform (1,2,3,4,5).

This is affecting their experience as the audio is muffled specifically when the vocals of videos are being played.

YouTube recently changed the standard from ‘Volume/Normalized’ setting to ‘DRC’ (Dynamic Range Compression) which seems to be the cause of this issue.

@TeamYouTube yo is there any way I can change DRC for music videos? Some setting either changed or reverted to DRC 3 days ago and I can’t find a way to change it back. It makes music videos sound awful.
Source

When I upload my song on YouTube the volume of my song is kinda lower than the original export, I dont know why maybe because it has to do with my setting needed for YouTube standards or anything but I noticed that most of the famous artist has a pretty loud volume on their song on Youtube. Does anyone know how to fix this problem? Let me know asap. Thanks.
Source

Interestingly, the lower audio quality issue only happens when users are signed in to their YouTube accounts. When they try the same music video when logged out of their account, the issue isn’t present.

Various troubleshooting methods such as logging out and back into the account, uninstalling and reinstalling Google Chrome, and adjusting various Windows sound settings also don’t work.

Potential workaround

Unfortunately, there is no official acknowledgment of this issue from the YouTube team. But in the meantime, there is a potential workaround that involves using YouTube in incognito mode.

Of course, this is besides playing music videos when logged out, which isn’t the most ideal solution but still useful for now.

We will be keeping an eye on it and update this article if and when YouTube acknowledges the issue and fixes it for good.

Note: We have more such stories in our dedicated YouTube section so be sure to follow them as well.

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