Xbox party chat not working on PC

Xbox party chat is a very popular feature. It allows you to chat with your friends in the game. For some, this is the most useful feature of the Xbox platform. But as of late, it’s been hit or miss. Sometimes it works perfectly, but other times, it doesn’t. This has been causing some frustration.

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Before you frantically whack your console to try and fix it yourself, maybe try our troubleshooting tips. Here are our top suggestions, for fixing Xbox Voice Chat if it doesn't seem to be working.

How To Fix Xbox Voice Chat Not Connecting

If you're struggling to get voice chat working, the first thing to do is the classic, restart your console. If this doesn't fix the problem, then here's what to do next:

• Start by checking the Xbox Status page. Specifically, look under Friends and Social Activity to see if there are any issues with Party chat. If there are any problems, you can sign-up for notification, to let you know when the service has been fixed.
• Your next option is to check your network is working properly. You can check this by following these steps:
  • Press the Xbox button to open the guide. 
  • Select Profile & system > Settings > General. 
  • Select Network settings > Test network speed & statistics.
• Assuming everything at your end is working correctly, ask your friends in the chat to test their network connections, in case one of them has a NAT problem. To do this:
  • Press the Xbox button to open the guide.
  • Select Profile & system > Settings > General. 
  • Select Network settings > Test network connection.
  • If someone does have an issue, they can troubleshoot the issue by following the steps outlined here.
• Finally, if you are on WiFi, try using a wired connection instead, to create a more stable internet connection.

Having looked at the network side of things, let's consider some of the settings that could be impacting this issue.

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Read More: Is Steam on Xbox: Can you play Steam games on Xbox One or Xbox Series X/S?

Xbox Party Chat Not Working? Check Your Settings!

There are some other steps that might be worth considering as well. It may not be an issue with your network connection, and could be something in your settings.

• For example, make sure your privacy settings allow you to communicate with everyone. You can check this by going to Settings > Account > Privacy & online safety > View details & customize > Communicate with voice and text
• Make sure you haven't accidentally muted or blocked the people in your party
• Check that you joined the party from within the party window.

Hopefully, going through all of these steps will resolve your voice chat problems. If none of these solutions works, then contact Xbox support for additional help and advice. You can also reach out to them on Twitter, @XboxSupport.

If You Can't Switch to Party Chat

Usually, if you find yourself unable to switch from in-game chat to party chat on your Xbox, it's because of a problem with either your network connection or the Xbox service. Try the following steps recommended by Microsoft:

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• Check the Xbox status page for any known issues.
• As we suggested earlier, check your network is working properly.
• Restart your console.
• Try switching from WiFi to a wired connection, as these do tend to offer a more stable connection. If you can't do this, try to move your Xbox and router closer to each other.

Perhaps the best part of playing multiplayer games is talking to your friends. Sometimes, though, you’d have to fix Xbox Party Chat not working to enjoy the feature.

But online bonding is as valid and as fun as any other; we don’t want you to turn the experience into a “hello, can you hear me?” Or, it can be a necessary feature if you’re trying to stream on your Xbox.

The Xbox Party Chat not working can have many causes. We’ve found reasons ranging from a loose cable to Microsoft’s server issues.

And whatever the reason, we’re looking at the best solutions to fix Xbox Party Chat. Some of these require extra effort, though.

Xbox Party Chat Not Working Causes

The reasons are varied but typically relate to one of these four following issues:

• Wrong Configurations: You may bring your chat back on by enabling certain settings on your Xbox console.
• Privacy Settings:Your Xbox may be limiting your sharing features. Alternatively, the NAT Type, which comes with the router, may limit your features. You’d need to change these options to fix Xbox Party Chat not working.
• Damaged Hardware: Lastly, your audio and chat hardware may be malfunctioning. The issues could range from loose connections to dust and worn cables. 
• The Xbox Servers are Down: It’s not very common, but it can happen. Seldom the Microsoft Xbox multiplayer servers are down for service. 

How To Fix Xbox Party Chat Not Working

Because we don’t know your specific problem, we advise you to try the solutions, one by one, until you find your fix.

That said, our solutions work for the Xbox One and the Xbox Series. Both consoles have the same interface so that you can follow the same steps regardless of your device.

Change Your Privacy Settings

Your Xbox’s privacy settings may be damaging your communications. Here’s how to set the proper settings:

1. Press the Xbox button on your controller
2. Go to Profile & system
3. Go to Settings
4. Select Account
5. Select Privacy & Online Safety
   
   
6. Select Xbox Privacy
7. Select View Details & Customize
   
   
8. Select Communication & Multiplayer
9. Make the necessary changes

By now, you should be on a menu you can scroll to the left. These are various privacy settings you can customize. In particular, to fix Xbox Party Chat not working, you should allow everyone to talk to you and enable your chat to hear all voices.

In particular, tweak these settings:

• Allow your user to join multiplayer games
• Allow your user to join crossplay games
• Enable Everybody to communicate with voice, text, or invite
• Enable Everybody to communicate outside of Xbox Live with voice & text

Across the board, you should have the following settings: Allow, Allow, Everybody, Everybody, Everybody.

Unmute or Unblock the Person

Similarly, you can check if you have muted or blocked the person you’re trying to talk to

1. Press the Xbox button on the controller
2. Go to Parties & Chats
3. Select the party to expand it
4. Choose the person you want to unmute
5. Select Unmute
   
   
   

Check Party Chat Volume

You also need to check the party chat volume for each person at the party.

1. Press the Xbox button on the controller to open the guide
2. Select Parties & chats
3. Select the party and expand the roster
4. Chose each person to verify the volume slider
   
   
5. Use the D-pad or the left stick to move the volume slider if you need to.

Raise Your Headset’s Volume

You may want to check the volume as well: 

1. Turn on your console and connect your headset or mic.
2. Press the Xbox button to open the guide
3. You should see a speaker symbol at the bottom of the tab. Select that to enter the Audio and Music settings
4. Adjust the headset volume sliders.
   
   
5. Also, ensure the headset or mic is “On“

That said, there’re three volume sliders:

• Headset Volume: The game’s volume
• Headset Chat Mixer: The volume of the friends at your party
• Mic Monitoring: Your mic’s volume

Route Xbox Party Chat Audio to Tv

The issue may be on your Headset. If it doesn’t work on other devices, you may want to push the party chat audio through the TV speakers instead. 

Here’s how: 

1. Press the Xbox button on your controller
2. Go to Profile & System
3. Go to Settings
4. Go to General
5. Select Volume & audio output on the right panel
   
   
6. Select Party chat output
   
   
7. Select Speakers on the output drop-down menu
   
   
8. Adjust the volume by 10 steps on “Change volume with voice by.”
   
   

Test the Network Speed

If your network is slow, latency and ping issues won’t allow your chat to work properly. Xbox Live requires a minimum of 3Mbps download / 0.5Mbps upload to work.

If you hear or share distorted audio, check your internet strength:

1. Press the Xbox button on the controller
2. Go to Profile & system
3. Go to Settings > General > Network Settings
4. Select Test network speed and statistics on the right panel.
   
   

The test will give you info about your Xbox’s connection when the test finishes. Make sure the download and upload speed meet the minimum requirements. If you can’t or are too close, consider doing the following solution.

Add a Static Ip and a Public DNS

If your broadband is slow, perhaps the connection is not quite stable on your Xbox. For example, if your speed is less than 6MB, or there are too many devices in your house, your Xbox competes for broadband and sometimes loses.

And when it loses, the Xbox Party Chat doesn’t work. One way to fix this is to make the connection more stable by adding a static IP and a public DNS.

A Static IP is a set IP address you select for any device. IT means your router won’t change its number, as a dynamic IP, every time it logs to the web. Then, a Public DNS is like an internet server companies like Google offer freely to improve worldwide connectivity.

Here’re the steps:

1. Turn on your Xbox
2. Press the Xbox button on your controller
3. Go to Profile and System
4. Go to Settings
5. Go to the General Tab
6. Select Network Settings
   
   
7. Select Advanced Settings on the right panel
8. Take a note of the following info: IP Address, Subnet mask, Gateway
9. Go to IP settings on the left
   
   
10. Select Manual
11. Enter the same IP address you wrote down, but add 100 to the last digit. For example, if the original is 196.165.0.6, it would look like this: 196.165.0.106.
    
    
    
    The Xbox has four boxes or sections to input your IP address. You’re going to leave the first sections the same as the original IP address. The last one changes as you add 100 to the digit.
12. Press enter so the settings take you to the Subnet Mask number. Add the same you wrote down.
13. Press enter again to go to Gateway number. Add the same as before, and hit enter.
14. Go back and select DNS settings
    
    
15. Choose Google’s DNS: 8.8.8.8 as primary DNS; 8.8.4.4 as secondary DNS. Another option, from Cloudfare, is 1.1.1.1 as primary; 1.0.0.1 as secondary.
    
    
16. Test the connection to see if it works.

Clear the Network Mac Cache

Similarly, a potential fix is clearing the Xbox’s network cache. It’s the option you should use if you’re encountering frequent difficulties when connecting to other parties. 

Press the Xbox button on the controller

1. Go to Profile & system
2. Go to Settings > General
3. Select Network settings
   
   
4. Go to Advanced Settings
   
   
5. Select Alternate Mac Adress
   
   
6. Select Clear, and then Restart.

This option can clear corrupted data from the Xbox and solve various random bugs. 

Check Your NAT Type Configuration

If you’re having trouble joining any Xbox Live Party, the issue may be your Nat Type (Network Address Translation). This privacy setting comes with the router and your internet provider. 

Here’re the steps to test your Nat Type: 

1. Turn on your Xbox
2. Press the Xbox button on your controller
3. Go to Profile and System > Settings > General
4. Go to  Network settings
5. Select Test Nat Type
   
   

There’re three Nat Types (Open, Moderate, and Strict). The Strict configuration limits your network settings, like sharing audio on party chat. 

Change Your NAT Type

Changing the Nat Type requires modifying settings from your router. We covered how to change the Nat Type for PlayStation, and you can follow that tutorial as the steps are the same. Moreover, it includes adding a static IP and a public DNS, which I already explained above.

Either way, here’re the general steps: 

• Add a static IP and a public DNS to your Xbox
• Open a web browser on your PC
• Type your default gateway IP address, or your router’s address
• Log in as the admin with your username and password
• Find Universal Plug n’ Play (UPnP) on the router settings
• Enable UPnP
  
  
• Port forward your router by opening a virtual server, port forwarding rules, or similar on the router’s admin page. 
• Save the settings.

Port forwarding means adding specific ports designed to communicate better with a particular server. It bypasses security options, therefore changing the NAT configuration. 

In specific, Xbox can work with these ports:

• Port 88 (UDP)
• Port 3074 (UDP and TCP)
• Port 53 (UDP and TCP)
• Port 80 (TCP)
• Port 500 (UDP)
• Port 3544 (UDP)
• Port 4500 (UDP)

Those are the ones you’d add by following the tutorial I shared above instead of the PlayStation ports. However, some games require specific ports.

Enabling UPnP and port forwarding is different on each router’s admin page. On my router, I did this:

1. Click on the Advanced tab
2. Click on Advanced on the left panel
3. Click on UPnP
4. Enable UPnP
5. Click on Virtual Server
6. Add Virtual Server on the right panel
7. Add the following data and save:

After you finish the port forward process, wait a few minutes. Then, go back to the Xbox and test the Nat Type again. It should display something like this:

Fix Party Chat Coming Through Tv

Sometimes the chat audio comes through TV speakers after connecting the headset. The solution is re-associating the controller to your profile. 

1. Click the Xbox button on the controller to open the guide
2. Go to Profile & System
3. Select Add or switch
4. Select your profile 

It’s not very intuitive, but it should fix the issue. 

Fix No Game Audio While Party Chat Is Working

The Party Chat may be working, but you can’t hear the game properly when it does. You can change it by visiting the Chat Mixer: 

1. Press the Xbox button on the controller
2. Go to Profile & System
3. Go to Settings
4. Go to General
5. Select Volume & audio output
6. Select Chat mixer
   
   

There’re four options: 

• Reduce the volume of other sounds by 50% 
• Reduce the volume of other sounds by 80%
• Do nothing (it allows the game to play at full volume)
• Mute all other sounds to eliminate game noise

Re-pair Your Kinect

If you’re using Kinect gear for party chat and it’s not working, it may be off. Here’s what you can do:

1. Unplug and plug Kinect again
2. Press the Xbox button to open the guide
3. Go to Profile & System
4. Go to Settings
5. Go to Devices & Connections
   
   
6. Select the Kinect, and enable its use for party chat
   
   

Recalibrate Your Kinect

Similarly, you could calibrate the Kinect if you hear echoes when another person talks.

1. Press the Xbox button on your controller
2. Go to Profile & system > Settings > Devices & connections
3. Select Kinect
4. Choose Kinect doesn’t hear me
5. Follow the guide to recalibrate the Kinect

Please note Microsoft discontinued the Kinect gear. You can use it with the Xbox One or the Xbox 360, but it’s not available for the Xbox Series. 

Check Xbox Server Status

Lastly, you can check the Xbox Status page. If you see an alert on one of its services, expand the service, and scroll down to notifications. Then, you can sign in to receive a message when the server goes back up.

For example, the moment I checked, I saw an alert on the Games & Gaming service. When I opened the signal, it showed The Elder Scrolls Online servers were down for service.

Xbox Party Chat Requisites

Lastly, ensure you meet the requisites to join or host a party:

• An Xbox Live Gold subscription for non-free-to-play games. Alternatively, you can have the Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscription
• A voice chat headset or a mic plus a headphone

Power Cycle the Console

If all else fails, you could hard reset the console. It will clear the ram and corrupt data and solve random bugs preventing Xbox Party Chat functionality:

1. Turn off the Xbox
2. Unplug all of its cables for 30 minutes
3. Press and hold the power button for 10 seconds while you wait
4. Plug the cables back

Change the Headphone, the Mic, or the Cable

Lastly, you should try your audio gear on other devices. If it doesn’t work either, the problem relies on the gear or the cable.

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