Mac Volume Keyboard Shortcuts You Probably Don't Know

Every Mac user knows the volume up, down and mute keys. Press them and the system volume changes. But macOS has a few extra keyboard tricks for audio that most people never discover.

Built-in volume keys everyone should know

The basics

• Mute: the speaker-with-slash key (F10 on most Mac keyboards)
• Volume down / up: F11 / F12
• If your top row acts as standard function keys, hold Fn and press the key

Fine-grained volume: Option + Shift

Hold Option + Shift and press volume up or down. Each press changes the volume by a quarter of a normal step, so you get 64 levels instead of 16. This is the trick for finding the right headphone level late at night, when one normal step is too big a jump.

Change volume without the feedback sound: Shift

Hold Shift and press volume up or down. This flips the volume feedback sound for that press: if feedback is on, it stays quiet; if it's off, you hear it. Useful during a call or presentation. The feedback setting itself is in System Settings > Sound ("Play feedback when volume is changed").

Jump to Sound settings: Option

Hold Option and press any volume key to open the Sound settings directly. Faster than clicking through System Settings.

Switch output device quickly

Click the Sound icon in the menu bar (or in Control Center) to see your output devices, and click one to switch. If the Sound icon isn't in your menu bar, turn it on in System Settings > Control Center > Sound. On older macOS versions, hold Option while clicking the Sound icon to see the device list.

What the volume keys can't do

All of these keys control the system volume: one level that affects every app equally. There are no built-in keys or settings for:

• Changing the volume of one specific app
• Muting one app without muting everything
• Making one quiet app louder than the rest

macOS has no per-app volume control at all, so there's nothing for the keys to control.

Per-app volume on Mac

If you want one app quieter and another louder, SoundDial adds that to your menu bar. Every running app gets its own slider and mute button:

• Turn Spotify down without touching your video call
• Mute one app while the others keep playing (how to mute one app on Mac)
• Boost a quiet app above 100%, up to 200%

It works per app, not per browser tab. More detail: per-app volume control on Mac.

SoundDial, a per-app volume mixer for Mac is €14.99 one-time purchase on the Mac App Store, no subscription, and needs macOS 14.2 or later.