External mic not working with Apple Facebook app

Hi folks. Just wanted to let you know that I used an app today called Prism Live Studio, which allows you to live stream to various social media platforms at once, including Facebook and YouTube. I did a 3 minute test with me Wireless Rode Mic and it worked great. The app streamed to Facebook for me. It’s probably not ideal as you have a 3rd party app doing the streaming for you (maybe more chance of things crashing.) but until Facebook gets its act together I’ll be using this as it allows us to use our external mic’s. Just thought I would share. It was just a few minute test...I’ll be doing a longer stream later this week.

We just went live on Facebook today and the mic worked. We started the live and let it get going for a couple of seconds then plugged in our external Sennheiser mic and it worked. We were using an Apple iPhone 12 with iOS version 14. 2 We have not updated to 14.3

I ran a test this morning. My iPhone 11 Pro external audio would not work no matter what I did. I then ran a test using Prism Live and my iphone 11 external audio worked fine posting to Facebook Live. I then substituted my old iPad Air Pro and it worked fine. Same thing with the Pastor’s old iPhone SE. The old phone and iPad of course have the old headphone jack. I have texted Apple Tech Support. They said it’s a Facebook issue. I filed a tech issue report on FB (log into FB on a computer, go to Settings, click down arrow on the top right, then Help and Support and find the “report a problem” screen.). I have had no answer from FB. I went back to Apple Tech Support and asked them to escalate the issue. I think we all need to do this, and see if we get some attention.

I contacted facebook about this issue using Help & Support -> Report a problem. This is what I told them....

Facebook Live is not allowing the external microphone of the iphone XS and many other new style iphones to be used. This used to work for me and many other users before 12/14/2020.

When doing a livestream of a band for example. The sound goes through a mixer which goes to the iphone. After plugging in the lightning adapter the sound used to switch from the built in mic of the iphone to the sound source (in this case, a sound mixer).

However, NOW the iphone switches back from the external microphone to the built in microphone immediately. This does not happen with any other application other than Facebook Live, and it is an issue that recently popped up for me and many other users.

Here is an example... (PRIVATE VIDEO NOT COPIED, BUT MAYBE YOU COULD SEND YOUR OWN?)

Here is an apple discussion about the issue...

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/252051208?answerId=254339886022&login=true

Please go into Facebook on your iPhone, and under report a problem, choose “live“ and report this issue. I reported it twice, even with the new version of Facebook that just came out yesterday. I’m sure there are thousands of people that use a lapel mic when doing their Facebook live presentations, and the problem is obviously with the Facebook app, and not iOS. I say this because I also tested this with my mother-in-law‘s iPhone 6, which has been updated to 12.5.1 3 days ago, and yet my external mic used to always work with my iPhone 11 Pro Max with iOS 13 and I believe with the first version of iOS 14. If everyone having this issue reports it to Facebook, they should get on it and fix it.

This doesn't work if you're using a private Facebook group for the live broadcast. I've tried both apps that were suggested and I can't get either one to work with my private Facebook group. It says I don't have permission, even though I'm the only admin in the group.

Liquido19 wrote:

same issue here! Try Streamlabs app, it’s free and it recognizes external microphones, and you can live stream in landscape as well! For me, with the regular Facebook app, a landscaped video live stream was also a struggle: the picture appeared sideways no matter what I did!

I have tried it, but it still doesn’t work.

the work around that I tried a couple of days ago does actually. With the free app iRig recorder.

check my other post on this issue.

with iRig recorder in record mode, I go to facebook, click on “live” and I can see that already my external connection works. I then started facebook live and indeed it worked.

I have also sent feedback about the issue to Facebook... good luck!!

Hi MVB1430,

Yes, what I do, with the audio interface's output connected to the iPhone, is first open the iRig Recorder app, check the settings that under channel the stereo input is selected.

Then I closed the setting tab, started the record button.

Then I opened facebook and went live.

So while the iRig Recorder was recording, I started Facebook Live.

Just a minute ago, I set it up again, but skipped the step of starting the recording in iRig, then went Live on Facebook. It works that way too.

Good Luck!

Michaelwhyte1, you need to go back through the string and see prior posts. The best workaround is IRig Recorder, a free app. You need to choose setting for run in the background, start the app and let it run in the background when you start Facebook Live. Right now it is the only thing that works other than running thru Prism Live.

Assuming you are using a recent iPhone, The best workaround (IMO) is to download and use iRig Recorder. Its a free app. All you need to do is to go to the app's Settings and turn on Background Audio. When you want to go live on FB Live, open iRig, then just go ahead with FBLive, leaving iRig running in the background (don't close it). You do not have to start the Recorder on iRig. I made sure my external audio was going (in my case a Rode Wireless Go connected to mixer), then started iRig then FBLive. You just proceed with FBLive as usual. You dont need to do anything else with iRig. Good luck.

OK, this time I was able to get it to work! As you say, I started iRig, enabled Background Audio, closed iRig, and then restarted it. Next I began the livestream, and then plugged in the external mic. I did see an orange microphone dot and red time.

I'm still gonna try using my webcam and audio interface to livestream to YouTube this weekend, to see if it's better over all, but it's nice to have a working backup solution. I expect the video to be worse (the iPhone 12 mini has a better camera than my webcam even though YouTube permits 1080p), but the audio to be more clear with the XLR connection from the mixer.

Thanks to the one who discovered iRig! And to Peter for telling us to start, close and restart iRig!

IT'S almost FIXED!!! edit: Well, almost. You have to plug in the mic AFTER starting the transmission, but you don't need iRig or other software.

Version 303.0 for iOS of Facebook that just came out today WORKS with an external mic plugged into the lightning port on my 11 Pro Max without using iRIG (which did work btw), but after doing a 3rd test where it was plugged in before starting the transmission, that didn't work..

I'll be submitting another error report, but we're getting there.

Facebook update 306 seems to have solved the issue for me. No particular order is necessary. This was the case for two different iPhones that it was tested with.

I am using new hardware (IRig device plugged directly into our sound tower), but I tried it before updating. And then after. It worked after. So it doesn’t seem to be the new hardware that is changing anything.

I am keeping Prism Live handy just in case. The only issue I found with Prism Live was that the audio would disconnect from time to time. Or lapse.

I was able to get my external mic to work by plugging it in AFTER I started the Facebook Live video. Plugging it in before starting Facebook Live doesn’t work.

It worked for me now. I needed to wait a few seconds for Facebook live to start before plugging in the external mic. Earlier when I tried it - I plugged it in too fast.

thanks for the tip