MacOS Big Sur Safari 14 Google Meet wired EarPods poor audio

As a workaround, this issue appears to be resolved in the latest Safari Technology Preview.

I used google meet with Release 116 and did not experience any problems.

https://developer.apple.com/safari/technology-preview/

What worked for me is to install Safari Technology Preview.

https://developer.apple.com/safari/download/

Install the second one, it's for free. It solved the crackles. However as it is a separate browser, you will need to re-log in to everything. (I didn't want to use Chrome as it is slow.)

I think they will later solve it in the main Safari also.

Unfortunately, a clean install of Big Sur did not fix the problem.

My method:

• start up the MacBook Pro 13" i7 in Recovery mode
• Delete Macintosh HD
• Re-Install Big Sur
• Start Google Meet inside Safari

My findings:

• Audio-In seems to work fine. This means conference attendees are able to hear me crystal clear.
• Audio-Out is distorted and crackly. That means I am unable to understand anything anyone is saying.

My solution as previously mentioned by others above:

• Use Chrome, Edge, Firefox, Opera, etc. They all work fine.

My Conclusion:

• This is a Safari bug. :-(

My ask:

• apple please help!

# Correction

I've had the meet.google.com window open in the background for about 10 minutes. For some reason the audio problems have fixed themselves. I'm not sure why this would be the case but everything is running fine now.

# Question to the crowd:

Could anyone else confirm leaving the session open eventually leads to clean audio?

Exact same audio issues. I was not sure what the problem was and initially thought it was with the other participants. I use 2 different platforms (doxyme and phone.com) for tele conferencing and when I found issues with both I realized it was probably due to the Big Sur update. With doxyme audio would sometimes resolve after 30 seconds to 1 minute but not always. I switched browser to chrome and had have zero issues. I am just waiting for the bug to be fixed with Safari.

I have had the exact same issue since upgrading to Big Sur - when using Google Meet in Safari, the first 30 seconds or so the sound is unintelligible, and then it miraculously fixes itself - this is the same whether I use wired or wireless headphones or the internal MacBook speakers. This isn't unique to Google Meet - I just used a site called SchoolCloud (which is used for online parent/teacher conferences at my sons' school) and had the same problem. If I use Chrome, I have no issues at all. Clearly, I'll be doing that until Apple fix this!

I have a MacBook Pro 2020, 13 inch, 32Gb Ram, i7 2.3Ghz Quad-Core, running Big Sur 11.0.1, and I have 350Mbps fibre broadband. (ie this is not a system or network performance issue)

I am experiencing this problem as well. It is only when I use Safari and Google Meets - and it is very frustrating. One work around that I found was to download Firefox and use it as a browser - I experienced no problems then. It is really frustrating because I prefer to use Safari, and saw an article that said Apple was investing in upgrading Safari. I guess they still have work to do.

solved as of yesterday's update BigSur 11.1 update.

I've had fewer problems with this since I installed the macOS 11.1 update. In fact, I don't think I've had any issues since upgrading to macOS 11.1 on my 2020 13" MacBook Pro. I'm now on macOS 11.2 now and can't say I've noticed any issues at all.

I don't know if it makes any difference but I find changing the output format in Audio MIDI Setup improves things for me. I'm using a pair of quality hi-fi speakers connected via the optical output on my CalDigit Thunderbolt dock and these are the settings I'm using:

Might be worth having a play with these settings in Audio MIDI Setup, depending on the input/output device you're using for your Google Meet meetings. Google Meet does seem to exhibit more audio issues than most other remote meeting products I've encountered. I use Zoom daily with no issues. Somebody else suggested disabling IPv6.

Steve

I can confirm, that leaving the session open for a given time eliminates the problem (~10-15 minutes)

I have same issue but , it is working fine with firefox! please try firefox

thanks

The problem is IPV6, if you disabled it will work. Here is how to do it:

https://support.nordvpn.com/Connectivity/macOS/1047410442/How-to-disable-IPv6-on-macOS.htm

I am having the same issues. I find that the number of tabs open on a given browser tends to affect the sound quality of the Google Meeting. Usually, I close everything down and just leave the Google Meeting on, and the sound resolve after 1-5 minutes.

Same here, had to use Chrome for my meets meetings. I hope they solve this issue soon.

I have a very similar issue using latest Safari (Big Sur) and Google Meet. Regardless of headphones or speakers, sound is always broken. Using any other browser solved the issue.

Same issue here. I tried with Edge and got not audio issues.