There is a cracking/popping sound when I play music/video using the mbp speakers, and jump to next song/video

I experience the same issue with my brand new MacBook Pro 16-inch. I bought it a few days ago and after contacting Apple Support I now have a Genius Bar appointment on Sunday Dec 8th. Once I'm there, I will check if the Laptops on display also have the issue.

it is indeed not limited to the new 16 inch. I can reproduce the same problem with a 2013 Macbook Pro 13 retina, albeit at a lower volume level. I believe it's more noticeable with the new 16 inch model just because it can produce more volume and more low end.

having said that, please add a tiny lag before the power circuit is shut down. I can imitate that by running Spotify in the background at zero volume, and popping issue can no longer be reproducing on Youtube.

Just chatted with Apple support and seems they are aware of the issue. Support person said there will soon be a patch for this issue. No use returning this as many of us are having the issues so I doubt this is a hardware related issue.

Searching forums and found a temp solution that seems to work. Open Quicktime Player and select new recording and keep it minimized and then play audio/video and problem seems to go away. Good solution for those of you who like to skip clips on YT.

I have the same issue with my 16" MacBook Pro (issue with popping noise when sound stop / start )

I read about Apple working on software upgrade to eliminate this issue but there is no information when this happened and on which software update version. Do anybody knows more about solution ?

Just installed and tested on same YT videos at full volume and was not able to duplicate the issue. Maybe it is fixed.

Also noticed unit does not get as hot as it used to.

Wish they disclosed all of the fixes.

Here is temporary "fix":

Open tab with 10h video -> play it -> mute the audio.

Also switch to 144p resolution to save the bandwidth and cpu resources.

I was ready to send it back but it does look like the software issue. I will give Apple 2 weeks to fix it but if they won't, I will send it back for refund. The premium price should come with premium quality.

I am happy to report that after updating my 16-inch MacBook Pro to macOS 10.15.2 and Final Cut Pro X 10.4.8 the popping sound when editing in FCPX is gone. I did both updates before testing so unfortunately I can't say if just doing one of the updates would also have worked.

I just found something that would blow your mind... if you try to skip through some of the YouTube videos on your iPhone, like one of the relaxing music, you will get the same popping sound. I would guess it’s a common issue of all apple softwares...

Apple support don't acknowledge this problem.

Catalina 10.15.2 seems to have changed the problem. If you're not plugged in and are on lower power (haven't thoroughly tested the cases) it'll start popping in some quieter videos even without skipping or pausing.

At the moment we can't even be conclusive whether this is software or hardware lol. I'm sure it can be fixed by software as the problem can be solved by playing silent video (or at least it would help).

Hi to everibody,

i solved this issue in this way:

go to settings > audio setting > audio in > down volume to zero.

Thats it, to me it worked very well no more popping issue, i think it's related to static electricity, or something else that take control of mic, need more investigation on it!

Thanks and enjoy

Hi to everibody,

i solved this issue in this way:

go to settings > audio setting > audio in > down volume to zero.

Thats it, to me it worked very well no more popping issue, i think it's related to static electricity, or something else that take control of mic, need more investigation on it!

Thanks and enjoy

For clarity, 10.15.2 is NOT the solution for the problem I am experiencing. Major noise and popping during playback using my DAW, especially with MIDI. 2019 16" MBP, 2.4 GHz, 8-Core Processor with 32 GB DDR4

Krantzology wrote:

For clarity, 10.15.2 is NOT the solution for the problem I am experiencing. Major noise and popping during playback using my DAW, especially with MIDI. 2019 16" MBP, 2.4 GHz, 8-Core Processor with 32 GB DDR4

this sounds like a different issue. I'd suggest to open up a new topic.

just to repeat it because it might easily be over-read:

here 10.15.2 didn't help with the issue - the plops just sound a little different.

It helped setting the Audio-samplerate to 96 kHz in the Audio-Midi-Settings App.