Answers to common questions. Can’t find yours? Send us a message.
AirExtend streams your Mac’s sound to phones, tablets, TVs and browsers on your Wi-Fi, and brings a phone’s microphone back to the Mac. It has a Mac menu-bar app and an iPhone and iPad app that is coming to the App Store. Any browser works in the meantime.
Yes, for now. If paid licences are added later, the home page will say so.
The Mac app needs a Mac with Apple silicon and macOS 14 or later. A single app can be captured on macOS 14.2 or later. The iPhone and iPad app needs iOS or iPadOS 17 or later. Any current browser on a phone, tablet, TV or computer can play the sound, including Android and Windows.
Download AirExtend-1.0.1.dmg, open it and drag AirExtend to Applications. Open it, click Install… under Audio driver in the menu-bar panel and enter your administrator password once. Allow Microphone, Screen Recording and Local Network when macOS asks. Then pair a phone.
Yes. AirExtend is signed with a Developer ID and notarized by Apple. macOS shows its usual confirmation for an app downloaded from the internet: choose Open.
AirExtend adds two virtual audio devices to the Mac, AirExtend and AirExtend Mic. macOS only allows that for an administrator, and it restarts the audio service, so the Mac’s sound pauses for a second or two. This happens once.
Open the menu-bar panel and scan the QR code with the phone’s camera, or open the address under it in a browser and type the six-digit code. The code changes every ten minutes. A phone only has to be paired once.
Each device gets its own live stream: lossless sound with about 20 ms of delay, and the phone’s microphone comes back to the Mac as AirExtend Mic. The devices are not in step with each other. Use it for calls, games and a phone as a headset.
Every phone, tablet and TV plays the same moment after one shared delay, from 0.3 to 60 seconds. Use it when several devices play in one room. Each device can have its own delay correction, and Auto-sync measures it with the Mac’s microphone.
Lossless sound with a bigger buffer, about a quarter of a second, for steady playback. It keeps playing with the phone locked.
In the menu-bar panel on the Mac. Every phone follows the Mac’s mode.
Every device plays a short click in turn, and the Mac’s microphone listens for it and works out how late each device sounds. Keep the devices where they will play and keep the room reasonably quiet. A device that cannot be heard is reported as not heard rather than guessed.
Yes, through the phone. Bluetooth adds its own delay, often 120 to 250 ms, which AirExtend cannot remove. In Broadcast mode, enter that delay for the device so that it lines up with the others. An iPhone cannot act as a Bluetooth speaker for a Mac or a TV, because iOS does not allow it.
Yes. Under Sources in the Mac app, switch off Whole Mac and pick the apps. Every connected device then hears, and for video sees, those apps. If an app quits and starts again, open the list and pick it again.
Yes. Allow Screen Recording for AirExtend in System Settings, then restart AirExtend. The iPhone app shows it full screen or in Picture in Picture. Video quality is under Video quality in the Mac app.
Yes, a 10-band equalizer on the phone, plus sound and microphone gain on the Mac.
Standard is lossless PCM and has the lowest delay. For a weak Wi-Fi network choose Low data (AAC, 128 kb/s) or WebRTC on the listener’s page. WebRTC uses Opus, survives lost packets, adapts to the link and keeps playing in the background in iPhone Safari, with a little more delay and the equalizer off. Both keep playing in the background in the iPhone app.
No. The stream goes directly from your Mac to your devices on the local network. Nothing is sent to 278labs or to a cloud service.
Only a device that was paired with the QR code or the six-digit code, which changes every ten minutes, with rate-limited guesses. You can turn on Open access in the Mac app so that anyone on the network can connect, but then anyone there can listen, see the screen and use the phone microphone.
macOS puts the AirExtend audio device behind the microphone permission even though it is virtual. AirExtend also uses the Mac’s microphone for a few seconds during Auto-sync. Nothing is recorded or sent anywhere.
Check that the phone and the Mac are on the same Wi-Fi network and that the Mac’s firewall allows AirExtend. Android, Windows and TVs cannot open .local names, so type the Mac’s IP address and port instead. A VPN with a kill switch on the Mac can block incoming connections.
Raise the jitter buffer on the phone, or move to a better Wi-Fi network. USB tethering removes most of the jitter. Try the WebRTC transport on a weak network, or Music mode when delay does not matter.
Make sure the Microphone permission is allowed for AirExtend, that the audio driver is installed, and that the source is the Whole Mac or an app that is playing sound. After changing a permission, restart AirExtend.
Quit AirExtend, delete /Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/HAL/AirExtendDriver.driver, then restart the audio service by restarting the Mac. Then choose a normal output in System Settings, Sound.