Accessing the user's camera and microphone is possible on the web platform with the Media Capture and Streams API. The getUserMedia() method prompts the user to access a camera and/or microphone to capture as a media stream. This stream can then be processed in a separate Web Audio thread with an AudioWorklet that provides very low latency audio processing.
The example below shows how you can process audio from the user's microphone in a performant way.
let stream;
startMicrophoneButton.addEventListener("click", async () => {
// Prompt the user to use their microphone.
stream = await navigator.mediaDevices.getUserMedia({
audio: true,
});
const context = new AudioContext();
const source = context.createMediaStreamSource(stream);
// Load and execute the module script.
await context.audioWorklet.addModule("processor.js");
// Create an AudioWorkletNode. The name of the processor is the
// one passed to registerProcessor() in the module script.
const processor = new AudioWorkletNode(context, "processor");
source.connect(processor).connect(context.destination);
log("Your microphone audio is being used.");
});
stopMicrophoneButton.addEventListener("click", () => {
// Stop the stream.
stream.getTracks().forEach(track => track.stop());
log("Your microphone audio is not used anymore.");
});
// processor.js
// This file is evaluated in the audio rendering thread
// upon context.audioWorklet.addModule() call.
class Processor extends AudioWorkletProcessor {
process([input], [output]) {
// Copy inputs to outputs.
output[0].set(input[0]);
return true;
}
}
registerProcessor("processor", Processor);
Browser support
MediaDevices.getUserMedia()
Web Audio
AudioWorklet
Further reading
Demo
HTML
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang="en">
<head>
<meta charset="utf-8" />
<meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1" />
<link
rel="icon"
href="data:image/svg+xml,<svg xmlns=%22http://www.w3.org/2000/svg%22 viewBox=%220 0 100 100%22><text y=%22.9em%22 font-size=%2290%22>🎙️</text></svg>"
/>
<title>How to process audio from the user's microphone</title>
</head>
<body>
<h1>How to process audio from the user's microphone</h1>
<button id="startMicrophoneButton">Start using microphone</button>
<button id="stopMicrophoneButton" disabled>Stop using microphone</button>
<pre id="logs"></pre>
</body>
</html>CSS
:root {
color-scheme: dark light;
}
html {
box-sizing: border-box;
}
*,
*:before,
*:after {
box-sizing: inherit;
}
body {
margin: 1rem;
font-family: system-ui, sans-serif;
}
button {
display: block;
margin-bottom: 4px;
}
pre {
color: red;
white-space: pre-line;
}
JS
const startMicrophoneButton = document.querySelector('#startMicrophoneButton');
const stopMicrophoneButton = document.querySelector('#stopMicrophoneButton');
let stream;
startMicrophoneButton.addEventListener("click", async () => {
// Prompt the user to use their microphone.
stream = await navigator.mediaDevices.getUserMedia({
audio: true,
});
const context = new AudioContext();
const source = context.createMediaStreamSource(stream);
// Load and execute the module script.
await context.audioWorklet.addModule("processor.js");
// Create an AudioWorkletNode. The name of the processor is the
// one passed to registerProcessor() in the module script.
const processor = new AudioWorkletNode(context, "processor");
source.connect(processor).connect(context.destination);
stopMicrophoneButton.disabled = false;
log("Your microphone audio is being used.");
});
stopMicrophoneButton.addEventListener("click", () => {
// Stop the stream.
stream.getTracks().forEach(track => track.stop());
log("Your microphone audio is not used anymore.");
});