Some websites can automatically play video ads or some other sounds all of a sudden when you’re browsing. If you have multiple tabs in a window, you can instantly recognize a tab that’s playing audio. Simply look for the speaker icon on the tabs. In such cases, muting a tab is the go-to solution. But remember that muting a tab is different from muting a site.
Mute Tab Directly
The easiest way to mute a tab is through the settings on the tab itself. Do note that you can only mute the website and not the tabs individually. These steps will apply to all tabs running the same website. For e.g., if there are multiple tabs that have YouTube open, Chrome will mute YouTube as a whole and won’t allow sound on other similar tabs.
- Hit right-click on any tab you want to mute.
- Then, click on Mute Site. Now, the speaker icon will also appear blocked.
- If you want to unmute the site, right-click on it again and select Unmute Site.
Using Chrome Experiments
There’s a way you can mute a single tab even if there are multiple tabs running the same website. Since the developers are always working to improve the browser, Chrome has many experimental features in hand that you can try out anytime. They are not official yet and they can indeed have a few bug issues. But usually, they are safe to use and work just fine.
One of the many features you can find there is Tab Audio Muting UI Control. All you need to do is enable it on your Chrome to start muting tabs individually. It also works on other operating systems, like Mac, Android, Fuchsia, ChromeOS, and such. Here are the steps you’ll need to follow:
- In Chrome’s URL address bar, enter:
chrome://flags - Type in “Tab Audio” in the Search bar at the top of the page. This will show you the Tab Audio Muting UI Control feature.
- Next to it, you’ll see the Default button. Click on it and change it to Enabled to turn it on.
- Then, you’ll need to restart Chrome. So, select the Relaunch button at the bottom of the screen.
- Now, play audio on the same website but also open it in another tab. To mute a tab, simply click on the Speaker icon on the tab. You’ll find that the other tab also doesn’t get automatically muted.
Disable Sound Permission on Specific Sites
If you don’t want to manually mute websites or tabs every time you open Chrome, you can set specific websites to mute by default through the settings. This feature will work even after you exit and reopen Chrome.
- On Chrome, click on the three dots in the top-right corner and go to Settings.
- From the options on the left, click on Privacy & Security.
- Then, go to Site Settings.
- Scroll down to the Content section and click to open Additional content settings. Here, select Sound.
- On the new page, you can either change the current settings or set custom behavior. Below Default behavior, select Don’t allow sites to play sound. This option won’t play sounds on websites.
- Next, check the Customized Behaviors section to specify websites that you want to mute. In the Not allowed to play sound option, click on Add.
- In the new pop-up window, add the URL of your desired website. Then, click on Add.
