Adjusting Keynote video volume and GarageBand music levels

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Level 1

13 points

Adjusting Keynote video volume and GarageBand music levels

Is there a way to turn the volume up on videos in Keynote while making the rest of the music for the presentation quieter? I have made a Keynote presentation, and I'm playing a song edited and timed on GarageBand to go silent during videos in the Keynote presentation so you can hear the videos, but the videos are too quiet. The quieter I record GarageBand, the quieter the inserted videos become. Since the song plays across all slides, changing the volume on one slide changes it on all slides.

I'm new to GarageBand and adding music to Keynote, so keep it simple and include all steps from the starting point, please. (If I insert the song individually in each of the many slides, will it start over on each slide? I didn't think so, since that's the function of playing across all slides...)

I'm working on a MacBook Pro (2021), iOS Tahoe 26.7.

MacBook Pro 16″, macOS 26.7

Posted on Oct 2, 2026 8:04 PM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

Camelot

Level 9

62,135 points

Oct 7, 2026 11:46 AM in response to Sweet Pease

There's lots to unpack here... and many ways this could go, so strap in :)

First off - for your video, in Inspector -> Movie there is a volume slider where you can control the volume of this specific video. You can't boost the video past 100%, but at least make sure it's not set too low.

If the audio levels of the video file are too low then you'll need to use some other software to boost the audio levels - you could use iMovie for a simple boost, or other audio apps if you're more comfortable with them.

Secondly, and this is where it gets more interesting, is the point:

> If I insert the song individually in each of the many slides, will it start over on each slide

That depends. The rules are:

IF a given video or audio file is on subsequent slides...

AND the video/audio file has the Inspector -> 'Play [movie/video] across slides' option turned ON

then the video/audio will start on the first slide, and continue playing as you transition through to the next slide. This can be extended throughout the whole presentation (e.g. for background music) by including the same audio/video file on each slide.

In this way you don't need to time your audio file to the slide/presentation duration.

However, if the 'Play across slides' option is turned OFF, then the video/audio will stop when the slide transitions out, and will restart from the beginning when the next slide builds in.

The neat part is that you can control the volume for the video/audio on each slide.

For example - take an audio file such as your GarageBand track, with a level volume (e.g. don't try to adjust the volume levels in GarageBand to time with your slides).

Create a new presentation. On the first slide, add your GarageBand track.

Set it to start automatically (turn OFF the 'Start audio on click' option), and turn ON the 'Play audio across slides' option.

Duplicate this slide twice (so three identical slides)

On the second slide, select the audio file icon and adjust the volume level of the audio file to, say, 25%.

Now play your presentation.

The GarageBand audio should start playing at full volume.

When you click to advance to the next slide, the audio should continue uninterrupted, but the volume should drop

When you click to advance to the last slide, the audio should still continue uninterrupted, but the volume should bump back up to full.

Now you can add your video to the second slide. Set it to auto-start. Then replay your presentation.

The audio should start at full volume on slide 1. When you advance to the second slide the audio volume will drop and the video should start playing (at its full volume).

When you advance to the last slide the audio should return to its normal level.

So in this way you let Keynote control the GarageBand audio volume based on slide timing, and you don't need to re-edit your GarageBand master to adjust levels as you edit your presentation timing (unless you want fancy things like fades).

Does that help?

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Answer 2

Sweet Pease Author

Level 1

13 points

Oct 8, 2026 2:15 AM in response to Camelot

Thank you! You’re explanation is super helpful. And you explained it simply—much appreciated! I will be doing this again, and your explanation is a keeper. Since I have to drop all the way to silent during the videos, will the transitions be abrupt between the slides? It sure would be easier to do it that way, but I’d like to be able to fade in and out, and the limitation to 100% volume is a problem for these particular videos. I boosted the volume of the clips in iMovie, inserted them, and they’d sound fine in playback while in editing mode, but when I’d play the actual slide show, they’d be too quiet again.

Because I was finishing the project the night I posted the question, I ended up setting GarageBand to fade in and out to silent behind the video slides (the way you said not to 😬 🤦🏻‍♀️). The “presentation” was almost 100 photos and a couple of videos, so I could more easily time the slides to the soundtrack rather than the soundtrack to the slides. My problem then became that the audio on the videos was still too quiet, even though the original audio was fine. I recorded the keynote presentation, music included, and transferred to iMovie, where I was able to increase the volume on each video to 400%. It was really late (early the next day), and I was simply not going to rerecord the GarageBand music at all one volume—I think I may have been a little fuzzy headed by that point, and I had spliced different segments of the music together and I couldn’t redo that—so I had to work with the built in silent places, which would have been great if they hadn’t shifted a second or so at the start of the iMovie. I tried fixing the timing in the slides and rerecording a couple of times, but while it recorded perfectly in keynote, it shifted in iMusic the slightest bit at the beginning every time. I finally tweaked it in iMovie as best I could by manually fading and muting the background music and it worked well enough. I learned a whole lot in the process, mostly what not to do, but I’ll be much more savvy next time. And knowing how to mute across slides is especially helpful.

I will say, thank you to you and the community for answering questions like this. I ended up googling (Can I say that in an Apple forum? 😂) how to do every step and finding answers to every problem, usually in the Community Forum. Those answers and explanations were/are gifts and a lifesaver. I could not have made my slideshow without it. And your personal, simple, thorough, nonjudgmental, step-by-step instructions are a breath of fresh air. THANK YOU.

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