AudioDeviceLib

A small, dependency-free .NET library for Windows that lists audio endpoints and sets the default playback/recording device, plus volume and mute control.

It replaces the need to host PowerShell and the third-party AudioDeviceCmdlets module: the same Core Audio (WASAPI) interop is called directly from managed code.

• Target frameworks: net48, netstandard2.0, net8.0-windows
• No NuGet dependencies (pure COM interop).
• Windows only.

Why

Switching the default output device on Windows has no public Win32 API. This library uses the same, well-established techniques as AudioDeviceCmdlets:

• Enumeration via the documented Core Audio COM interfaces (IMMDeviceEnumerator, etc.).
• Setting the default endpoint via the undocumented IPolicyConfig interface.

Provenance & license

• Overall library: MIT (see LICENSE).
• The AudioController / AudioDevice facade is derived from the MIT-licensed AudioDeviceCmdlets by Francois Gendron. The PowerShell cmdlet layer was not copied; it was replaced with a plain managed API.
• The Core Audio (WASAPI) interop is the wrapper by Ray Molenkamp (zlib-style license). Most of it lives under CoreAudioApi/; two files are in Lib/, because the original MMDevice was merged into Lib/AudioDevice.cs and the original MMDeviceEnumerator into Lib/AudioController.cs.

See THIRD-PARTY-NOTICES.md for the full required notices.

Install

dotnet add package AudioDeviceLib --prerelease

The current release is 1.0.0-rc.2, a release candidate. NuGet does not resolve prereleases by default, so the --prerelease flag is required — or pin it explicitly:

<PackageReference Include="AudioDeviceLib" Version="1.0.0-rc.2" />

Usage

There are two ways in: static one-liners for the common cases, and the instance API when you need live objects or repeated operations.

One-liners

Each static call creates and disposes its own AudioController and device, so you own nothing and there is nothing to dispose. They hand back AudioDeviceInfo, an immutable snapshot, rather than a live AudioDevice.

using AudioDeviceLib.Lib;

// Defaults
AudioDeviceInfo playback = AudioController.GetDefaultPlayback();
AudioDeviceInfo recording = AudioController.GetDefaultRecording();
Console.WriteLine(playback.Name);

// Volume (0..100) and mute on the default playback device
float volume = AudioController.GetVolume();
AudioController.SetVolume(50f);
bool muted = AudioController.IsMuted();
AudioController.SetMute(false);
bool nowMuted = AudioController.ToggleMute();

// ...or on a specific endpoint
AudioController.SetVolume(playback.Id, 25f);

// Active endpoints, as snapshots
IReadOnlyList<AudioDeviceInfo> all = AudioController.ListDevices();
IReadOnlyList<AudioDeviceInfo> outputs = AudioController.ListDevices(AudioDeviceKind.Playback);

// Make the first device whose name contains "Speakers" the default.
// Returns null if nothing matches, so you can fall back or report clearly.
AudioDeviceInfo set = AudioController.SetDefaultPlaybackByName("Speakers");
if (set == null)
{
    Console.Error.WriteLine("No matching playback device found.");
}

These create a controller per call. For repeated work — polling, or several operations on the same device — use the instance API below.

Instance API

using AudioDeviceLib.Lib;

// AudioController is IDisposable — wrap it in a using so it is torn down deterministically.
using var audio = new AudioController();

// List active playback devices. AudioDevice is IDisposable; dispose what you enumerate.
foreach (var d in audio.GetPlaybackDevices())
{
    Console.WriteLine(d); // "Speakers (Realtek...) (Playback) [Default]"
    d.Dispose();
}

// Current default output.
using (AudioDevice current = audio.GetDefaultPlaybackDevice())
{
    if (current != null)
    {
        // Volume / mute
        current.SetVolumePercent(50f);
        current.IsMuted = false;

        // Set a specific device you already resolved (default = Multimedia + Communications)
        audio.SetDefaultDevice(current);

        // Or pick exactly which Windows roles to assign (flags can be combined)
        audio.SetDefaultDevice(current, DefaultRole.Console | DefaultRole.Multimedia);
        audio.SetDefaultDevice(current, DefaultRole.All);

        // Detach an immutable snapshot you can keep after the device is disposed
        AudioDeviceInfo snapshot = current.ToDeviceInfo();

        // Volume, sessions, metering and the raw property store hang off the device
        current.Volume.VolumeStepUp();
        var sessions = current.SessionManager.Sessions;
        float peak = current.GetPeakValue();
    }
}

Id, Name, Kind and State are captured when the device is created, so reading them costs nothing and still works after the device is disposed. Call Refresh() to re-read Name/State, or register for device notifications (below) to be told when they change. Devices compare by endpoint ID, so a.Equals(b) is true for two handles on the same endpoint — reference equality never is.

GetDevices on the instance API also takes DataFlowFilter and DeviceStateFilter (in AudioDeviceLib.CoreAudioApi) if you need endpoints that are disabled, not present or unplugged — the static ListDevices returns active endpoints only.

To resolve one endpoint by ID, GetDeviceById returns a live AudioDevice and GetDeviceInfo an AudioDeviceInfo snapshot:

using (AudioDevice device = audio.GetDeviceById(id))
{
    bool active = device.IsActive; // shorthand for State == DeviceState.Active
}

AudioDeviceInfo info = audio.GetDeviceInfo(id);

Both reject a null or empty ID with ArgumentNullException. A malformed ID throws ArgumentException; an ID that is well-formed but matches no endpoint throws COMException.

Disposal

Types which implements IDisposable. Dispose each one you obtain, with using or by calling .Dispose():

• AudioController
• AudioDevice
• the token returned by AudioController.RegisterDeviceNotification
• the token returned by AudioSessionControl.RegisterAudioSessionNotification

Disposing an AudioDevice also disposes its Volume (AudioEndpointVolume), SessionManager (AudioSessionManager), SessionManager.Sessions (SessionCollection) and every AudioSessionControl in that collection.

Disposing twice is a no-op. Afterwards, members that call into Core Audio throw ObjectDisposedException on both AudioController and AudioDevice; the AudioDevice identity snapshot (Id, Name, Kind, State, ToDeviceInfo(), ToString(), Equals()) stays readable.

The static methods return AudioDeviceInfo snapshots and leave nothing to dispose.

PropVariant is not IDisposable but owns native memory: call .Clear() on one returned by PropertyStore.TryGetValue or PropertyStore.GetValue(int). The PropertyStore indexers return PropertyStoreProperty, which already does this.

Session notifications

RegisterAudioSessionNotification returns an IDisposable token; wrap it in a using so the callback is unregistered deterministically when you are done listening.

Threading: callbacks are raised by Windows Core Audio on arbitrary, non-UI threads and may arrive concurrently. Keep each handler fast and thread-safe.

using AudioDeviceLib.Lib;
using AudioDeviceLib.CoreAudioApi;

// Implement the attribute-free contract for the events you care about. Every callback receives an
// immutable AudioSessionInfo snapshot of the source session (identifiers, display name, icon path,
// state), so one consumer can serve many sessions — and there is no live COM object to misuse from
// the notification thread.
sealed class SessionLogger : IAudioSessionEvents
{
    public void OnSimpleVolumeChanged(AudioSessionInfo session, float newVolume, bool newMute, Guid eventContext)
    {
        Console.WriteLine($"pid={session.ProcessID} volume={newVolume:P0} muted={newMute}");
    }

    public void OnStateChanged(AudioSessionInfo session, AudioSessionState newState)
    {
        Console.WriteLine($"pid={session.ProcessID} state={newState}");
    }

    // The remaining IAudioSessionEvents members can be left as no-ops.
    public void OnDisplayNameChanged(AudioSessionInfo session, string newDisplayName, Guid eventContext) { }
    public void OnIconPathChanged(AudioSessionInfo session, string newIconPath, Guid eventContext) { }
    public void OnChannelVolumeChanged(AudioSessionInfo session, float[] newChannelVolumes, uint changedChannel, Guid eventContext) { }
    public void OnGroupingParamChanged(AudioSessionInfo session, Guid newGroupingParam, Guid eventContext) { }
    public void OnSessionDisconnected(AudioSessionInfo session, AudioSessionDisconnectReason disconnectReason) { }
}

using var audio = new AudioController();
var logger = new SessionLogger();

using (AudioDevice device = audio.GetDefaultPlaybackDevice())
{
    if (device != null)
    {
        SessionCollection sessions = device.SessionManager.Sessions;

        // Register on every current session; keep the tokens so they can be disposed.
        var tokens = new List<IDisposable>();
        for (int i = 0; i < sessions.Count; i++)
        {
            tokens.Add(sessions[i].RegisterAudioSessionNotification(logger));
        }

        try
        {
            Console.WriteLine("Listening... press Enter to stop.");
            Console.ReadLine();
        }
        finally
        {
            // Dispose each token to unregister the callbacks.
            foreach (IDisposable token in tokens)
            {
                token.Dispose();
            }
        }
    }
}

For a single session you can inline the using:

using (IDisposable token = session.RegisterAudioSessionNotification(logger))
{
    // ...callbacks fire here...
} // token.Dispose() unregisters the callback

Disposing the owning AudioDevice (or AudioSessionControl) also unregisters any still-active callbacks as a safety net, so the tokens are the deterministic path and disposal is the backstop.

Device notifications

To be told when endpoints are added/removed, change state, or when the default device (including the default communications device) changes, register an IAudioDeviceEvents consumer on the controller. Like session notifications, registration returns an IDisposable token; disposing it (or the controller) unregisters.

using AudioDeviceLib.Lib;
using AudioDeviceLib.CoreAudioApi;

sealed class DeviceLogger : IAudioDeviceEvents
{
    public void OnDefaultDeviceChanged(DataFlow flow, Role role, string defaultDeviceId)
    {
        // role distinguishes the communications default from the console/multimedia default;
        // defaultDeviceId is null when there is no longer a default for this flow/role.
        Console.WriteLine($"default {flow}/{role} -> {defaultDeviceId ?? "(none)"}");
    }

    // The remaining IAudioDeviceEvents members can be left as no-ops.
    public void OnDeviceStateChanged(string deviceId, DeviceState newState) { }
    public void OnDeviceAdded(string deviceId) { }
    public void OnDeviceRemoved(string deviceId) { }
    public void OnPropertyValueChanged(string deviceId, PropertyKey key) { }
}

using var audio = new AudioController();

using (IDisposable token = audio.RegisterDeviceNotification(new DeviceLogger()))
{
    // ...callbacks fire here (on arbitrary, non-UI threads)...
} // token.Dispose() unregisters

Threading: callbacks arrive on arbitrary, non-UI threads and may be concurrent. Keep handlers fast and thread-safe, and don't register/unregister or dispose the controller from inside a callback.

Default-role semantics

Windows tracks three independent default-device roles. DefaultRole is a [Flags] enum, so you can combine them; each set flag maps to one Role assignment.

Flag	Maps to (Role)	Notes
Console	Role.Console	System sounds, games, voice commands
Multimedia	Role.Multimedia	Music and movies. Matches -DefaultOnly
Communications	Role.Communications	Voice chat. Matches -CommunicationOnly
Default (= Multimedia | Communications)	both	The default; matches Set-AudioDevice with no switch
All (= Console | Multimedia | Communications)	all three	Make this THE default for everything

SetDefaultDevice defaults to DefaultRole.Default, which (like the original cmdlet) does not set the Console role. If some applications on your target follow the Console role, pass DefaultRole.All or include DefaultRole.Console in the combination.

Notes for callers

• Endpoint friendly names are localized by Windows (e.g. "Reproduktory" on Czech/Slovak systems, "Lautsprecher" on German). Do not hard-code the English word "Speakers" when matching across a mixed fleet; match on a stable substring, or select by kind and default state instead.
• COM must be usable on the calling thread. In a plain console/service this works out of the box.

Build

dotnet build

Tests

dotnet test Library.UnitTests/Library.UnitTests.csproj -c Release

The suite runs three times, once per shipped asset: net48, net7.0-windows (which is how the netstandard2.0 build gets executed — netstandard cannot be targeted directly) and net8.0-windows. One test asserts which asset each leg actually loaded, so a silent collapse onto a single build would fail rather than pass quietly.

Tests are read-only: nothing changes volume, mute or the default device. Tests that need a real endpoint skip themselves on a machine with no audio hardware, so the suite is still meaningful on a headless CI runner — what it covers there is COM activation, enumeration and the deterministic Marshal.ReleaseComObject paths.