How to play music on Google Meet on a Mac

Option 1: present a tab with its audio

If the music or video is playing in a Chrome tab, this is the quickest way.

1. Open the music or video in a Chrome tab.
2. In the Meet call, click Share screen, then choose the tab.
3. Keep “Also share tab audio” on, and click Share.

Everyone sees the tab and hears its sound. Only that tab is shared, so Spotify’s app, Music or a video player won’t be heard, and the sound stops when you stop presenting.

Option 2: present a window with system audio

With Chrome 142 or later on macOS 14.2 or later, presenting a window or your entire screen can include your Mac’s sound. The option is off by default: turn on “Also share system audio” when you choose what to share. That covers Spotify, Music and other apps.

It shares all of your Mac’s sound, including notifications, and it still needs you to present. On an older Chrome or macOS, the option isn’t there.

Option 3: mix it into your microphone

Meet listens to one microphone. A virtual microphone mixes your real mic with the apps you choose and gives Meet the result, so the call hears your voice and the music together, at levels you set, whether or not you present.

Patch, which we make, does this on a Mac. It mixes your mic and up to four apps into a virtual mic called Patch Mix.

1. Add your microphone and the music app to Patch. Install Patch, add your microphone as a source, then add the app that plays the music: Spotify, Music, Safari or any other Mac app except Chrome.
2. Send both, and set the level. Turn on Send for your microphone and the music, and pull the music’s fader well under your voice.
3. Choose Patch Mix in Meet. In the call, open More options, then Settings, then Audio. Under Microphone, choose Patch Mix, and under Speakers, choose your headphones.
4. Turn off noise cancellation. If Meet’s Audio settings show Noise cancellation, turn it off, or Meet removes the music as background noise.
5. Go live. Click Go live in Patch. Meet hears your voice and the music together, whether or not you present.

Play the music outside Chrome, or send one tab. Chrome is running the call, so adding the whole of Chrome to Patch would send the call back to itself. Use Safari, another browser or the music app, or send just the music’s tab, below. Always choose your headphones as Meet’s speaker, never Patch Pass-Thru.

The same mic works in Zoom, Discord and OBS; see play music through your mic for each app’s settings.

Send just one browser tab

Option 1 sends a tab’s sound only while you present it. Patch for Chrome, our free extension for Chrome, Edge and Arc, sends a tab into your microphone instead, so the music plays under your voice and nobody sees a thing. It can be a tab in the same Chrome window as the call.

1. In Patch, add a Chrome tab, then add Patch for Chrome from the Chrome Web Store.
2. Open the music or video in its own tab, click Patch in the toolbar, then Send this tab.
3. Choose Patch Mix as Meet’s microphone, as above.
4. Click Go live in Patch. Meet hears your voice and the tab, with nothing presented.

Patch for Chrome refuses the Meet tab itself, so the call can’t hear an echo of itself. The sent tab goes quiet in Chrome and plays through Patch, so you hear what the call hears. More in share tab audio in any call, and every way Meet itself sends sound is in share audio on Google Meet.

Stop Meet filtering the music

Meet’s Noise cancellation removes sounds that aren’t speech, and Google’s own help says to turn it off if you need music in the meeting. Open More options, then Settings, then Audio, and turn Noise cancellation off. It’s on by default for many paid Workspace and Google One accounts; free personal accounts don’t have it. Keep headphones on, so your real microphone doesn’t pick the music up a second time.

What about Zoom or Teams?

Both send sound with a share, as Meet does, each with its own switch. In Zoom, tick Share Sound in the Share Screen window, and turn on Original sound for musicians so Zoom doesn’t remove the music as noise. Advanced › Computer Audio sends your Mac’s sound with no screen, but it’s still a share. In Teams, turn on Include sound when you share; on a Mac, Teams needs its audio driver installed once, and offers it.

The virtual mic works the same in both: choose Patch Mix as the microphone, and the call hears your voice and the music with nothing shared. Each app’s steps are in share audio on Zoom and share sound in Teams.

Is there other software for this?

Yes. To get music into Meet without presenting, three Mac apps are common:

• BlackHole: free and open source, but a driver with no mixer. To add your voice, you build an Aggregate Device in Audio MIDI Setup, or put a mixer app in between.
• Loopback: Rogue Amoeba’s full-featured router, for any apps and devices with a level for each. It does far more than this job needs.
• Patch: your mic and the apps you add, mixed into Patch Mix with a level for each. It needs a Mac with Apple silicon on macOS 26 or later.

How they compare, with prices: Loopback alternatives for Mac.

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