OBS diagnostic issues
Full troubleshooting articles with symptoms, fixes, verification, and rollback.
Hotkey conflicts with games or OS
OBS hotkeys do not fire because the game or OS captures the same keys.
Incorrect canvas or output scaling
Output looks cropped, stretched, or letterboxed from canvas/output mismatches.
Invalid or leaked stream key
Stream fails to connect because the stream key is wrong, revoked, or accidentally exposed.
Laptop multi-GPU capture and encode problems
Laptop iGPU/dGPU affinity causes black capture, wrong encoder GPU, or terrible performance.
Linux Wayland capture limitations
On Wayland, classic X11 capture methods fail; PipeWire portal capture is required.
Linux X11 composite window capture issues
XComposite Window Capture fails for some toolkits or when compositing is disabled.
macOS Accessibility permissions for hotkeys
Global OBS hotkeys fail on macOS without Accessibility / Input Monitoring grants.
macOS Screen Recording permission for OBS
OBS captures stay black on macOS until Screen Recording permission is granted and OBS relaunched.
Microphone or desktop clipping / distortion
Harsh distortion from levels hitting 0 dB / red in the OBS meters.
Monitoring delay in headset
You hear yourself or game monitoring late in headphones while the stream mix is fine.
Monitoring echo heard by viewers or locally
Echo or hollow repeat caused by Monitor and Output routing mistakes.
Multi audio track routing mistakes
VODs or recordings have missing or mixed tracks because track checkboxes are wrong.
Network dropped frames while streaming
Stats show dropped frames (network) from insufficient or unstable upload bandwidth.
No desktop audio in OBS
Desktop/game audio meters do not move and recordings lack system sound.
No microphone audio in OBS
Mic meter stays flat while Windows/macOS/Linux show the mic working elsewhere.
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