capture audio from a single application stops working after application-restart

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swishfire

New Member
First I was happy to read that finally, the Mac-Version of OBS is able to capture desktop audio and even audio of a single application without additional software (as you can read here: https://obsproject.com/kb/macos-desktop-audio-capture-guide).

Unfortunatley there seems to be a bug (or I am doing something wrong). If I capture audio of a single application (for example "Spotify") via the new version of "Window Capture" or "Application Capture", everything works fine right after I have set up the source. BUT if I close Spotify and open it up again, only desktop audio is capturing sound (via "display capture"). "Window capture" and "application capture" stops capturing audio. Only fix so far is to go to the source settings, select another application/window and then switch back to spotify.

Am I doing something wrong? Do you guys have the same wrong behavior or is it just me? If so, hopefully it can be fixed in a next update :)
Cheers!

I am running Ventura 13.3 und OBS 29.0.2
 
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adamDK

New Member
Screenshot 2025-04-16 at 15.22.45.png

I am also having the exact same problem.
Audio capture from a single application works perfectly fine. But as soon as I re-start my computer, it no longer works. I have to go into obs, change it to a different window, and then back again, just as Swishfire describes.

I notice that when the "display link" icon appears in the top right hand corner of the window it works perfectly. So I wonder if it is something to do with display link?
 
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mishakim

Member
This is just a guess, as I don't use app audio capture currently, but this sounds like the same issue as with application capture: it's tied to a process ID that changes every time the app restarts. From Apple's point of view this is a privacy issue and is working as expected. I think there's a new API apps should use to intentionally provide an audio stream, but I'm not sure if it would be any more static.

For app window capture, you can still use the deprecated version, which keeps track of the app through restarts. I think for audio, you're stuck using the old methods of using third party software to route app audio to a virtual input that you can get using Audio Input Capture. AudioHijack, BlackHole, Caster, or SoundDesk are three options for that.
 
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mishakim

Member
mishakim said:
This is just a guess, as I don't use app audio capture currently, but this sounds like the same issue as with application capture: it's tied to a process ID that changes every time the app restarts. From Apple's point of view this is a privacy issue and is working as expected. I think there's a new API apps should use to intentionally provide an audio stream, but I'm not sure if it would be any more static.

For app window capture, you can still use the deprecated version, which keeps track of the app through restarts. I think for audio, you're stuck using the old methods of using third party software to route app audio to a virtual input that you can get using Audio Input Capture. AudioHijack, BlackHole, Caster, or SoundDesk are three options for that.
Click to expand...
Did some checking, and given that OBS got the ability to capture app audio with MacOS 13, it is using ScreenCaptureKit, which can't maintain it's connection to a given app through a close/restart cycle. There is a newer API for audio capture as of MacOS 14, but I don't know if it changes that behavior.
 
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