Setting Up Crossfeed

What Crossfeed Needs

As a standalone application, Crossfeed sits between your source and your headphones. Audio leaves the app you are listening to, passes through a virtual audio device, enters Crossfeed for processing, then returns to your headphones.

Four conditions have to be true for that path to work. If all four are true, Crossfeed works. If one is false, it does not.

1. A virtual audio device is installed on your computer.
2. Your audio source’s output is set to that virtual device.
3. In Crossfeed’s audio settings, the input is that virtual device and the output is your headphones.
4. Every device in the chain is running at the same sample rate.

Condition 1 — A Virtual Audio Device

A virtual audio device is a software audio path. It appears as an output on one side and an input on the other, so one application can send audio into it and another can receive that same audio back out.

You need it because the operating system does not normally let one application read another application’s output directly. The virtual device is the bridge between your player and Crossfeed.

Use any virtual audio device you trust. It does not need to be ours. It only needs to run in stereo, support the sample rate you use, and appear inside Crossfeed.

Condition 2 — Send Your Audio To It

Set the output of the app playing audio to the virtual audio device.

You can do that at the system level or inside an individual application. System output sends everything through the device. Per-app output routes only that app and leaves the rest of the system alone.

macOS — system output set to a virtual device

Windows — system output set to a virtual device

Ignore the exact device names. The selected output needs to be a virtual device, not your headphones or speakers.

Condition 3 — Tell Crossfeed What To Use

Open Crossfeed’s audio settings. Set two devices and make sure they are the right way round.

The input is the virtual audio device. The output is your headphones, or the interface they are connected to.

Reversing them is the most common mistake and it usually fails without any warning. Keep the direction simple: the virtual device goes in, your headphones go out.

Condition 4 — One Sample Rate Everywhere

Every device in the chain has its own sample rate setting, and they need to match: the virtual audio device, Crossfeed, and your headphone output.

When they do not, the chain either resamples badly or stops working. The usual symptoms are clicks, crackles, stuttering, wrong pitch, wrong speed, or silence.

Pick one rate and use it everywhere you can set one. 44.1 kHz and 48 kHz are both safe. Most of these controls live in the operating system’s audio device settings.

macOS — every device carries its own format setting

Windows — the same setting, one device at a time

The point is not the example rate. It is the number of devices involved. Each one has its own format setting, and the ones in your signal path need to match.

Confirm Audio Is Arriving

Crossfeed shows an input meter beside its input selection, in the same panel shown above. Play audio and watch it.

If the meter moves, the routing is correct. Audio is reaching the application. Any remaining problem is inside the app, not in the system routing.

If the meter does not move, audio never arrived. The fault is in one of the first three conditions, and changing processing settings will not fix it.

Check this before anything else. It tells you which half of the chain needs attention.

Start From A Factory Preset

Crossfeed includes factory presets. They put the processor into a complete, usable starting state in one move.

Open the preset browser, go to the Crossfeed category, and load Natural. Start there, then compare the rest once you know what the baseline sounds like.

Factory presets stay available as references. When you land on settings you want to keep, save them as a user preset.

What Crossfeed Changes

Headphones isolate the left and right channels completely. Each ear hears only its own side.

Speakers do not work that way. Both ears hear both speakers, with small timing, level, and tonal differences between the direct side and the opposite side.

Crossfeed restores part of that speaker-like overlap. The change is easier to judge by comparison than in isolation, so evaluate it by toggling it on and off.

How To A/B It

Use a short loop and compare the same passage a few times:

1. Pick a recording with something panned hard to one side. Wide mixes make the change easiest to hear.
2. Play it and focus on location, not tone.
3. Bypass the processing, then switch it back on. Do that several times without changing anything else.
4. If the change is still unclear, open an analyzer that shows the stereo image — a vector or polar display works well. Toggle the processing and watch the image pull inward toward the centre.

What You Are Listening For

Think in terms of image and placement, not effect depth:

• Hard-left and hard-right elements step inward. The edges feel less pinned to the ear cups.
• The centre fills in. Instead of two isolated sides, the image becomes one connected space.
• Centre content feels more planted. Vocals, bass, and other central elements usually sound more anchored.
• The image may narrow slightly and darken slightly. That is normal for crossfeed.

When It Is Not Working

Known-Good Examples

Everything below is an example, not a requirement. The four conditions above are what matter. If a product name, version, or screenshot here no longer matches your machine, substitute the current equivalent and keep going.

• Guide scope — standalone Crossfeed on macOS and Windows 11.
• Virtual audio devices on macOS — BlackHole from existential.audio/blackhole. ARIA-Audio-VAD, included with our ARIA Studio installer, also works.
• Virtual audio devices on Windows — VB-Audio Hi-Fi Cable from vb-audio.com/Cable.
• Where sample rates live — Audio MIDI Setup on macOS. Per-device properties in Sound settings on Windows.
• Screenshots — taken at 44.1 kHz. The device names in them are from our test machines and will not match yours.
• Factory preset referenced above — Natural.

Summary

Crossfeed needs four things in place: a virtual audio device, your source sent to it, the correct input and output assignments, and one sample rate throughout. Verify the route by watching the input meter while audio plays. Then load a factory preset and A/B against bypass with a hard-panned recording so you can hear the image pull inward.