How to fix Microphone and Camera permission on Mac

Nobody can hear you, or nobody can see you, and the app has sent you to System Settings. These are two separate permissions with nearly identical problems, so this covers both.

Where they are

System Settings → Privacy & Security → Microphone, or Camera.

Straight there:

open "x-apple.systempreferences:com.apple.settings.PrivacySecurity.extension?Privacy_Microphone"
open "x-apple.systempreferences:com.apple.settings.PrivacySecurity.extension?Privacy_Camera"

Switch the app on, then quit it completely and open it again. Neither permission applies to an app that is already running. If macOS offers Quit & Reopen, that is the same thing done reliably.

The app is not in the list

Unlike Accessibility, these two lists have no + button. You cannot add an app by hand. An app appears only after it has asked at least once.

So:

1. Open the app.
2. Do the thing that needs the microphone or camera: join a call, start a test recording, open the app’s own audio or video settings.
3. Let it ask, or let it fail.
4. Look at the list again.

If it never appears even after trying, the app is probably not requesting the permission at all, which is a different problem, usually an app that needs updating for a current macOS.

It is switched on and still does not work

In rough order of how often it turns out to be the answer:

• It was never restarted. Quit properly: ⌘Q, or quit from its menu bar icon. Closing the window is not quitting.
• The wrong device is selected inside the app. This is the most common cause that has nothing to do with permissions. Most conferencing and recording apps have their own input and output pickers, and they do not follow the system setting. Check the app’s own audio and video settings before anything else.
• The system input is wrong. System Settings → Sound → Input. A connected interface, a webcam with a microphone in it, or a headset can quietly become the input and stay that way. open "x-apple.systempreferences:com.apple.Sound-Settings.extension" goes straight there.
• Something else has the camera. macOS lets one app hold the camera at a time in most situations. A forgotten Photo Booth, or a conferencing app minimized since this morning, will take it. Quit everything else that could be using it.
• Two copies of the app. The permission is tracked per copy. Granting it to the one in Downloads does nothing for the one in Applications.
• A browser needs its own. A web app’s microphone access is the browser’s permission, plus a separate per-site permission inside the browser. Both have to be given, and people usually give one. In Safari, Settings → Websites. In Chrome, the icon at the left of the address bar.
• A managed Mac. A work profile can withhold either permission centrally.

The dots, and what they tell you

Current macOS shows an indicator whenever the microphone or camera is live: an orange dot for the microphone, green for the camera, at the right of the menu bar. Clicking Control Center shows which app is responsible.

This is genuinely useful for the opposite problem: something is using your microphone and you do not know what. The dot tells you when; Control Center tells you who.

It is a hardware-backed indicator for the camera on modern Macs, which means it cannot be faked by software. If the green light is on and you did not expect it, take that seriously.

Turning them off again

The same switches. Worth reading the microphone list occasionally in particular: conferencing apps accumulate, and a video call app you used twice in 2024 does not need standing microphone access.

There is more on this habit, and on the permission that deserves it most, on what Accessibility permission grants.