Playing and Recording

The easiest way to control Audacity playback and recording is with the Control Toolbar (below).

The Control Toolbar, which you will use frequently for playing and recording

Play: If a subset of the time range is selected in the main window, only the selection will be played. If there is no selection, playback will begin wherever the editing cursor is. To start playback from the beginning, choose Skip to Start.

File:Loop.png Loop: Hold down Shift while pressing Play to loop the current selection, playing it over and over again until you press Stop.

Record: Recording begins at the current cursor location or at the beginning of the current selection, but always creates a new track.

Stop: will stop playing or recording immediately.

Pause: will temporarily pause playing or recording without losing your place.

Skip to Start: move the cursor to the beginning of the audio. This is often useful if you want to play everything, or record a new track starting from the beginning.

Skip to End: move the cursor to the end of the audio.

Keyboard Shortcuts

There are several keyboard shortcuts you can use that work exactly the same as the buttons in the Control Toolbar, listed in the table below.

Key	Action
Spacebar	Play or Stop
L or Shift-Spacebar	Loop
R	Record
P	Pause
Home	Skip to Start
End	Skip to End

Play Regions

The current region being played is indicated by arrows in the ruler - for example in the figure below, the play region is from 15 to 45 seconds. During playback, a green triangle indicates the current playback position - in this example, at about the 25 second mark (second figure below).

The arrows between 15 and 45 seconds indicate the current playback region

The green triangle at 25 seconds indicates the current playback position

You can play simply by clicking and dragging in the Ruler to create a play region! That's a great way to play without modifying the selection. Also, if you do modify the selection or the play region after playback has begun, it does not affect the active play region. The audio will stop whenever it would have based on the play region when playback began.

Special Playback Keyboard Commands

There are three extra keyboard commands that let you play a few seconds of audio without changing the selection. They can be really useful during editing, such as when you're trying to find the exact spot to cut and paste (below).

Key	Action
1	Play One Second
B	Play To Selection
C	Play Cut Preview

Play One Second ('1')

Press 1 while the mouse is pointing to a particular time, and you will hear 1 second of audio centered at that time. For example, position the mouse at 1.0 seconds and press '1', and you will hear the time range from 0.5 to 1.5 seconds (below).

Press the 1 key on your keyboard to play one second centered at the current mouse cursor position

Play To Selection ('B')

An example of a selection. In order to determine whether you've selected exactly the right range of audio, you can not only listen to the selection, but you can listen to the audio before and after the selection.

Suppose you've selected a range of audio (above), and you want to make sure it's exactly what you want to cut out. Of course, if you press the spacebar, you'll hear the whole selection (below).

Press the spacebar to hear the whole selection (indicated by the playback region shown in the ruler)

The "B" key lets you play the audio from the mouse to the selection - what you get depends on where the mouse pointer is. Move the mouse to a part of the audio you're interested in hearing, and press 'B', without clicking the mouse button (the first through the fourth figures below).

If the mouse pointer is to the left of the selection and you press 'B', you'll hear the audio up to the selection

If the mouse pointer is inside the left side of the selection and you press 'B', you'll hear the first part of the selection up to the mouse pointer

If the mouse pointer is inside the right side of the selection and you press 'B', you'll hear from the mouse pointer to the end of the selection

Finally if the mouse pointer is to the right of the selection and you press 'B', you'll hear from the selection to the mouse pointer

Play Cut Preview ('C')

Press the 'C' key to hear 1 second of audio before and then 1 second of audio after the selection - as if the selection was deleted (below).

Press 'C' to hear 1 second of audio before and then 1 second of audio after the selection

All keyboard shortcuts are customizable! Change using the Keyboard tab of the Preferences.

Timer Recording

Yet another way to record is using the Timer Record dialog, found in the Tracks menu (below).

The Timer Record dialog

Use it to start recording later, or to record for a certain duration before stopping.