5 Ways to Capture Streaming Audio on macOS

You found a live DJ set on YouTube that you want to keep for offline listening. Or you are a guest on a podcast and want your own local recording. Or you need to grab a clip from a web radio station for a project. You go looking for a “record what I hear” button on your Mac, and it does not exist.

macOS has no built-in way to capture streaming audio. Apple’s audio system keeps apps isolated from each other for privacy, which is smart for security but frustrating when you have a legitimate reason to record what is playing on your own computer.

The good news: there are several ways around this. Some are clunky, some are overkill, and some are surprisingly simple. Here are five methods for capturing streaming audio on macOS, with the tradeoffs of each.

A quick note on copyright: Always respect copyright. Only record audio you have the right to capture. Personal archiving, recording your own podcast appearances, and capturing audio you have licensed are fair game. Ripping someone else’s paid content is not.

1. QuickTime Screen Recording

QuickTime Player ships with every Mac and can do screen recordings. What most people do not realize is that it can also capture system audio, but only if you set up a virtual audio device first.

Here is how it works: you install a virtual audio driver (like BlackHole or Soundshine), route your system audio into it, and then start a QuickTime screen recording or audio recording with that virtual device selected as the input source.

Pros: Free (QuickTime is already on your Mac), and the recordings are decent quality.

Cons: QuickTime alone cannot capture system audio. You need a virtual audio device installed first. With some free virtual cable tools, routing your output to the virtual device means you stop hearing audio through your speakers unless you also create a multi-output device in Audio MIDI Setup. That is a lot of steps for what should be simple.

2. OBS Studio

OBS is a free, open-source tool primarily built for live streaming and screen recording. It is incredibly powerful and widely used by streamers, but it works for audio capture too.

On macOS, OBS cannot capture system audio on its own. You still need a virtual audio device installed. Once you have one, you add it as an Audio Input Capture source in OBS, configure your output format, and hit record.

Pros: Free and open source. Extremely flexible once you learn it. Supports multiple audio sources, custom scenes, and a huge range of output formats.

Cons: Overkill for simple audio capture. The interface is designed for people managing streaming setups with overlays, scene transitions, and multiple camera feeds. If you just want to grab audio from a Spotify session or a YouTube stream, OBS is more tool than you need. You also still need that virtual audio device underneath, so OBS does not solve the core macOS audio routing problem by itself.

3. Browser Extensions

There are browser extensions that claim to let you download or record audio directly from web pages. You will find them for Chrome and Firefox, often targeting YouTube audio or general tab audio capture.

Pros: Easy to install. Some work well enough for grabbing audio from a single browser tab without touching your system audio settings.

Cons: Limited to browser audio only. If you want to capture audio from Spotify’s desktop app, a game, or any non-browser source, extensions cannot help. Quality varies, and some re-encode audio at lower bitrates. The privacy situation is also worth considering. Many free audio capture extensions request broad permissions and have unclear data practices. Check reviews carefully and stick to well-known options if you go this route.

4. Audio Hijack by Rogue Amoeba

Audio Hijack is a dedicated audio capture app from Rogue Amoeba, a company that has been building Mac audio tools for over two decades. It lets you capture audio from specific apps, from your system audio as a whole, or from hardware inputs. You build a signal chain by dragging blocks into a visual editor. Want to capture Spotify’s output, run it through an EQ, and save it as a lossless FLAC file? Audio Hijack can do that.

Pros: Extremely capable. Per-app audio capture, built-in effects processing, scheduled recordings, and support for a wide range of output formats. If you do a lot of audio recording, it is a serious tool.

Cons: It is a paid app ($64 for a license). The block-based interface, while powerful, takes some time to learn. For people who just want to quickly route system audio to a virtual mic for a call or a simple recording, it is more tool than you probably need.

5. Soundshine (Virtual Audio Cable)

Soundshine takes a different approach. Instead of being a recording app, it creates a virtual microphone that mirrors your system audio. Everything playing on your Mac is available as a mic input that any recording app (or calling app) can use.

Here is the setup:

1. Install Soundshine. A guided wizard handles the audio driver installation in about 30 seconds.
2. Click the Soundshine icon in your menu bar and toggle routing on.
3. Open any app that accepts a microphone input (QuickTime, GarageBand, Audacity, Voice Memos, OBS, or anything else) and select Soundshine Microphone as the source.
4. Record.

That is it. Your system audio flows into the virtual mic at 48 kHz, 32-bit float stereo quality. Your speakers keep working normally through Soundshine’s passthrough, so there is no need to configure multi-output devices or reroute anything in Audio MIDI Setup.

Pros: Simplest setup on this list. Works with any recording app, and with calling apps too (Zoom, Google Meet, Discord). No Audio MIDI Setup configuration. You keep hearing your audio while capturing it.

Cons: Soundshine is the routing layer, not the recording app. You still need a separate app to hit record. But since you almost certainly already have QuickTime or Voice Memos on your Mac, that is not really an extra step.

Which Method Should You Pick?

It depends on what you are trying to do and how much setup you are willing to deal with.

For occasional browser-only recording, a well-reviewed browser extension might be the fastest option, though you are limited to web audio and should be cautious about privacy.

For serious audio production where you need per-app capture, effects chains, and scheduled recordings, Audio Hijack is worth the investment.

For streaming or screen recording workflows where you are already using OBS, adding a virtual audio source to your existing setup makes sense.

For everything else, Soundshine gives you the simplest path from “I need to capture what is playing on my Mac” to actually capturing it. Install it, flip a switch, and pick it as the mic in whatever recording app you already use. No multi-output devices, no routing headaches.

The one thing all of these methods have in common: macOS will not do this for you natively. You need a third-party tool somewhere in the chain. The question is how much complexity you want between you and the record button.