Voice channels run on LiveKit's WebRTC stack, so this is real low-latency audio rather than a bolted-on afterthought. Your input mode and device choices live in your own settings and stay on the machine you are using, which is the right place for "which headset is plugged in".
Voice activity transmits when you speak. It is the default and the lowest friction. Push-to-talk transmits only while you hold a key, which is better in a noisy room or when you want explicit control. Switch between them mid-call without leaving the channel.
Push-to-talk keeps transmitting for a fraction of a second after you let go, so releasing the key does not clip the end of your last word.
Voice activity tracks the room's own noise floor live and adjusts as it changes. There is nothing to tune, and that is deliberate.
The old manual slider was the most confusing control in the app. It was a bare number with no correct value: set too high, your microphone looks broken and people tell you nobody can hear you, and set too low, you transmit every keystroke. The right value also changes with the room, the headset and the time of day. The slider is still there for anyone who wants to pin it, and most people should never open it.
Pick your microphone and your speakers independently, which matters if you run a USB microphone and Bluetooth headphones at the same time, or need to change output without interrupting a call. Your camera is chosen in the same place.
Three toggles, all on by default, which is what the browser was already doing before they existed:
If your audio sounds fine, leave all three alone. They exist for the minority the defaults are wrong for.
Mute stops your microphone. Deafen also stops incoming audio, and mutes you at the same time, since there is no point transmitting into a channel you cannot hear. Both are quick toggles in the voice bar, so neither needs a trip into settings mid-call.
Your voice connection is tracked separately from whichever text channel you are reading, so browsing elsewhere never disconnects you. The voice bar stays visible with mute and deafen wherever you go.
Joining and leaving play a short sound, including your own, so you know the join actually happened.
An instance owner can nominate an AFK channel and a timeout. Anyone connected to voice who has not spoken for that long is moved into it, which keeps a busy channel's member list honest about who is actually there. It is off unless the owner sets it up.
Moderators with the right permission can also disconnect someone from voice.
Both run over this same connection. See Screen Sharing & Camera Video.
