Now in Public Preview channel:  Include Computer Sound on Mac

Description

When sharing a Desktop or Window, users on the Teams Desktop App for Mac can now include their computer’s sound. This allows other meeting participants to hear the audio playing out of your Mac’s speakers while you are sharing (but not the meeting audio, of course). It is very helpful when you want to share a video as part of a collective viewing experience – like sharing a YouTube video with sound.  

This feature requires a one-time installation of an audio driver. Once installed, users can freely toggle the functionality on or off before or after you start sharing.

Flighting status

Rolling out, available to all preview users by next week.
Note: Release notes will be published soon.

How to enable

1. Before sharing a Desktop or Window during your meeting, toggle “Include computer sound” on.

    

   
2. Follow the simple wizard to install the driver. You will also be notified if you need to update the audio driver, but this will be rare.
   
    

   

     
    

    

    
3. As soon as you click “install” or “update,” you’ll see a loading spinner next to the entry point in the Share Content tray. The installation will take around 10 seconds to complete. 
   
    

   

4. You’ll be notified when the installation succeeds. The notification says, “Driver Installed. You might need to pause and play your content to start sharing sound.” The latter part is important! After you install the driver, you might need to toggle the play/pause button on the content you are sharing to get the driver to kick in. This is only needed after installation. In subsequent meetings everything should work smoothly.

    

   

5. If the installation fails, you’ll be notified and computer sound won't be shared. This is a very rare occurrence. To try again, simply toggle the “include computer sound” toggle back on in the Share Content tray.  

6. You can start sharing your Desktop or Window before the installation completes. As soon as it completes, you’ll be notified and your computer’s sound will be shared.

    

    

    

7. Once the driver is installed, you can also toggle computer sound on or off while you are sharing from the sharing toolbar at the top of the screen you are sharing. Mouse to the top of your monitor to bring up the sharing toolbar.  

    

   

    

For more information on the feature, please visit: Share sound from your computer in a Teams meeting or live event - Office Support (microsoft.com)

Note: If you need information about enabling the public preview itself, see “Enable the public preview for Teams” below.

Microsoft 365 workloads and dependencies

Supported clients and platforms

Known issues

If you encounter any of the issues below, please let us know via Help > Give Feedback.

1. Driver fails to install after multiple retries 
   1. This is very rare, but can happen 
2. Your Teams Meeting “can’t find” your mic and/or speaker after installing the driver 
   1. After installing the driver, you may see an error that tells you your mic and speaker can’t be found. You will stop hearing other participants in the meeting if this is the case. When this happens, you will need to leave and re-join the meeting. We expect this to be a rare occurrence.
3. Participants hearing their own voice when you share computer sound (echo)
   1. In rare cases, other participants in the meeting may hear their own voice while you are sharing computer sound. This is called echo and it makes it really hard to communicate.  
4. Installing the driver takes longer than 10 seconds 

Known limitations

1. Mismatched Teams audio output and System audio output.  
   1. If the speaker Teams is using for playing audio differs from the speaker your Mac is using to play audio, you will not be able to share your computers sound.  
2. Trouble accessing the sharing toolbar: 
   1. If you don’t see the sharing toolbar that is mentioned in #7 of the Instructions above, you may not have accessibility permissions allowed for Teams. Go to System Preferences -> Security and Privacy -> Accessibility and make sure you grant accessibility permissions to Teams.  

Source: https://helpdesk.arapahoe.edu/kb/article/118-teams-permissions-in-mac-os/

Enable your Teams client for the public preview 

1. First, IT admins need to set an update policy that turns on Show preview features. Learn how at Public preview in Microsoft Teams - Microsoft Teams | Microsoft Docs.  
2. Users then choose to join the public preview individually. See Get early access to new Teams features - Office Support (microsoft.com) for instructions. 

Summary of public preview features

For a history of features in the Office and Teams public previews, see Release Notes Current Channel (Preview) - Office release notes | Microsoft Docs.

Send us your feedback 

Got feedback on features in the public preview or other areas of Teams? Let us know straight from Teams via Help > Give feedback.  

Thank you,

Preview Team Emily Kirby 

Quality & Customer Obsession, Microsoft Teams