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SoundSwitch is a free, open-source tray app for Windows that switches your default playback and recording devices with a global hotkey, adds per-app audio rules and profiles, and can mute your microphone from anywhere.
SoundSwitch turns changing your audio output into a keyboard shortcut, instead of a trip through the Windows sound settings.
It sits in the system tray, costs nothing, and is open source.
Press the hotkey, the default device changes, and a small notification tells you which one you landed on.
The Default Hotkeys
Three are set up out of the box, and they are worth knowing before you change anything:
- Ctrl + Alt + F11 cycles through your playback devices.
- Ctrl + Alt + F7 cycles through your recording devices.
- Ctrl + Alt + M toggles microphone mute.
The microphone mute is the one people tend to miss, and it is the most useful of the three. It works from inside a full-screen game or a call, which is the entire point of a global hotkey.
There is also a quick menu that appears when you use a hotkey, so you can pick a device from a list rather than tapping the key until you hear the right thing.
What It Actually Switches
You tick which playback and recording devices belong in the rotation, and SoundSwitch cycles through only those. On a machine that has accumulated a dozen stale endpoints over the years, that is the difference between a usable hotkey and a lottery.
It also handles the communication device, which Windows keeps as a separate default for calls. If your headset needs to be the Discord or Teams microphone while something else stays as the system default, that is a setting SoundSwitch can reach and the standard Windows tray control cannot.
Profiles, and Switching Without Touching Anything
A profile is a set of devices plus a trigger. When the trigger fires, those devices are applied.
The triggers are the interesting part. A profile can fire when a particular executable comes to the foreground, when a window with a matching title gains focus, when a Microsoft Store app is focused, when Steam Big Picture launches, when SoundSwitch itself starts, from its own hotkey, or from an entry you add to the tray menu.
Turn on "Restore devices when trigger ends" and your previous setup comes back when you close the game or click away. Leave it off and the profile switches you and leaves you there, which is occasionally what you want and usually is not.
App Rules Are Not the Same Thing
Profiles change the Windows default device, so everything using the default follows along. App Rules, which SoundSwitch calls App Sound Lock, route one specific application to one specific device without touching the system default at all.
If you want the game in your headset while music keeps playing through the speakers, App Rules is the feature you need, not profiles. The two are easy to mix up and the documentation keeps them deliberately separate for that reason.
When Windows Keeps Resetting Your Default Device
It is a familiar annoyance: you set your headphones as the default, something quietly changes it back, and you never quite catch what did it.
SoundSwitch has a trigger built for exactly this, called Force profile. Whenever the default device is changed from outside SoundSwitch - a device disconnects, a driver update runs, another program helpfully rearranges things - the profile reapplies the devices you chose.
If the cause turns out to be a flaky driver rather than another application, updating the driver is still the real fix, and the Realtek Audio Codecs package is the usual starting point on desktop machines.
What It Does Not Do
It does not change volume levels and it has no equalizer. SoundSwitch decides which device Windows sends audio to, and stops there.
If tone control is what you are actually after, Equalizer APO with the Peace interface is the free system-wide option, and FxSound is the friendlier one if you would rather not assemble filter chains by hand.
It also does not create virtual devices, split one output across two sets of speakers, or mix inputs together. Those are audio-routing jobs, and a device switcher is not a router.
The quick test. Open Windows Sound settings and count your output devices. If there is only one, there is nothing here for SoundSwitch to switch between and you do not need it.
If it is more than you need, Audio Switcher and AudioPlaybackConnector both do the plain switching job in a smaller package with far fewer settings.
The rest of the audio utilities on the site cover the neighbouring jobs, and the audio codec downloads are where to look if the problem turns out to be playback rather than routing.
Installing It, and the .NET Message
Since version 7.0.0, SoundSwitch runs on the .NET 10 desktop runtime, and the installer fetches it for you if it is not already on the machine.
If you upgraded from an older version and it starts insisting it needs .NET 10 even though .NET 10 is installed, the developer's own answer is that leftover files from the previous install are the cause rather than a genuinely missing runtime. Uninstall, delete anything left behind in the SoundSwitch program folder, then install the current build.
There is only one installer to download. It works out whether the machine is x64 or ARM64 and lays down the matching build at install time.
Compatibility
Windows 10 or newer, on x64 or ARM64 hardware. There is no macOS or Linux version.
Anything your audio hardware exposes to Windows shows up, so USB headsets, Bluetooth devices, HDMI outputs and virtual cables all sit in the list alongside your onboard outputs, provided Windows can see them and they are enabled.
Because it changes the Windows default rather than talking to applications individually, it works with any player, from foobar2000 to AIMP, with nothing to configure per app.
Lighter players such as XMPlay and Dopamine follow the default in exactly the same way.
Recording behaves the same. Point Audacity at the Windows default input and the recording hotkey changes what it captures mid-session.
Streamers get the most out of it, since devices can be swapped mid-broadcast without touching OBS Studio or the rest of your capture setup. Version 7.1.0 fixed the banner notification so it no longer steals focus in exclusive fullscreen games, which had been the one real objection to running it while playing.
What Changed in 7.3.3
This is a maintenance release rather than a feature one. It fixes an error message that repeated itself when the Keep Volume option was switched on, and a Windows notification that would appear without ever showing its popup.
Quick questions
Is SoundSwitch free?
Yes, completely, and it is open source under the GNU GPL. There is no paid edition, no trial period and no feature held back behind a donation.
Why does it ask for .NET 10 when I already installed it?
This usually happens after upgrading from an older version, and the cause is files left behind by the previous install rather than a missing runtime. Uninstall SoundSwitch, delete anything remaining in its program folder, then run the current installer again.
Can it change the volume or add an equalizer?
No. It changes which device Windows plays through and nothing else. For tone control, Equalizer APO is the free system-wide option.
Can it send one app to my headset and another to my speakers?
Yes, using App Rules, which route an individual application to a specific device without changing the system default. Profiles are the other feature and they do the opposite - they change the default for everything at once.
Will it stop Windows switching my default device on its own?
That is what the Force profile trigger is for. When the default changes from outside SoundSwitch, the profile reapplies your chosen devices automatically.
Does it work on Windows 11 and on ARM laptops?
Yes to both. The requirement is Windows 10 or newer, and the single installer handles x64 and ARM64 machines, picking the right build itself.
Download SoundSwitch 7.3.3 and see how it handles your devices, or tell us how you got on if you have used it before.
