To mute one audio clip in DaVinci Resolve, select only its audio item and press D. For a whole track, click the M button in that track's header. To remove a few seconds of unwanted sound, split the audio at both ends and disable the middle piece; when you want a gradual level change, use volume keyframes.
Menu names here follow Resolve 21.1.2 build 10 and its 21.1 manual. If one mute grows into dialogue cleanup, buses or delivery, the DaVinci Resolve Fairlight hub takes you to the next stage. The basic mute, link and manual split controls on this page work the same in Free and Studio.
How to Mute One Audio Clip
New to the Edit page workflow? Start with the DaVinci Resolve beginner's guide, which walks through the interface.
On the Edit page, Option-click the audio item on macOS or Alt-click it on Windows. Check that only the audio you mean is highlighted, then press D. You can also right-click that item and toggle Enable Clip, or choose Clip > Enable/Disable Clip. With Linked Selection on, a normal click can grab both picture and sound, so look at the selection before you disable anything.
A disabled item turns gray and stays where it is, but it no longer plays or renders. Older guides call the same command Mute Clip.
The DaVinci Resolve 21 Reference Manual documents this selection behavior, the Enable Clip label and the D toggle, plus the difference between permanent linking and temporarily suspending Linked Selection.
If the clip should stay audible, just quieter, drag its Volume overlay down or lower Volume in the Inspector. Disable the item when it has to drop out completely.
D is a toggle. If your selection mixes enabled and disabled clips, one press can flip them in opposite directions. Work on the audio item you mean, or assign the explicit Disable Clip action in Keyboard Customization if you do this often. On Fairlight, the menu path is Clip > Enable Clip, which older instructions may call Mute Clip.
Mute One Channel Instead of the Whole Clip
Sometimes the clip is fine and one microphone isn't. Camera files often carry a usable mix on one channel and a noisy lav or an empty input on another, and disabling the whole item throws away the good half. Right-click the audio item in the Timeline, choose Clip Attributes, open the Audio panel and set the bad channel to Mute. As the manual's Clip Attributes walkthrough explains, a muted channel stays in the clip without being heard, so you can switch it back on from the same panel later.
If you spot the problem before editing, fix it on the Media Pool clip instead. Select it, open the File tab of the Inspector and click that channel's mute icon in the Audio Configuration pane. Option-click (Alt-click on Windows) mutes every other channel, which works as a quick solo. Those pane controls only work on Media Pool clips, so for a clip already in the Timeline, go back to Clip Attributes. One catch for handoffs: a Pro Tools export from the Deliver page still includes muted channels. When the real complaint is dialogue in one ear, our one-ear audio fix covers channel mapping, track format and pan instead.
How to Mute an Entire Audio Track
Click the M button in the audio track header or the Audio Mixer to silence that track. Blackmagic’s Fairlight controls overview identifies the track mute and solo controls. Track mute changes both playback and the delivered mix, and that's the big difference from monitor mute.
Solo lets you hear chosen tracks while the others drop out. Before delivery, clear any temporary Solo states and bring back tracks you muted only while checking the mix. Leave an intentional mute alone if that track should stay out of the finished file.
M here means the visible button in the track header or mixer. The M key on your keyboard is something else. If you use a custom keyboard preset, check its assignments in Keyboard Customization. The lit M and S buttons are the quickest way to see what's currently left out of the mix.
Hide the Picture and Keep the Sound
The reverse request comes up just as often: drop a shot from view and keep its audio. Option-click (Alt-click on Windows) the video item and press D. The picture goes gray and stops rendering, the linked audio keeps playing, and whatever sits on a lower video track, or black, shows through. For a whole video track, click the film icon in its header. The Edit page track header reference describes the slash through that icon and the gray overlay: clips on a disabled track don't show in the viewer or on the Color page, and they aren't rendered.
Timeline > Video Track Enable toggles the same thing from the keyboard (Shift+Command+1 through 9 on macOS / Shift+Ctrl+1 through 9 on Windows). The Cut page track header has Mute and Enable buttons too, though audio-only tracks get Mute alone. On the Edit page, header buttons also take a drag: click one, such as the lock on A1, and drag down to A3 to set all three. It works for one control type at a time and never across audio and video tracks. When a title or graphics layer is only in the way while you check the shot underneath, I'd disable its track rather than delete clips, since one click brings everything back. Turn it on again before you render.
Mute Part of a Clip or Lower It with Keyframes
To remove a cough or an unwanted word completely, make two audio-only cuts and disable the piece between them. On Edit, temporarily turn off the chain-link Linked Selection button, press B, and click the audio at the start and end of the unwanted section. Press A, select only the middle audio piece, and press D. Turn Linked Selection back on when you're done. The timeline duration stays the same; don't ripple-delete the gap.
For a softer dip without extra edit points, use four Volume keyframes. Make the track tall enough to see its gain line; on Fairlight, turn on Fairlight > Show Clip Gain Line if it's hidden. Then:
- Option-click (macOS) or Alt-click (Windows) directly on the audio clip's gain line just before the reduction should begin.
- Add a second keyframe where the reduced level should be reached.
- Add a third where the reduced section should end, then a fourth a little later to bring the surrounding level back.
- Drag the gain-line segment between the second and third keyframes down. Leave the outer keyframes at the levels you want outside the dip.
- Play across both transitions, then listen again with the rest of the mix. Adjust the depth and spacing until the change sounds natural.
Keep the keyframes at separate time positions. Changing a parameter on an existing keyframe changes its value; you can't stack two gain values on one frame. Short sloping transitions avoid an abrupt jump in level. A quieter waveform still isn't silence, so when the sound has to go completely, disable the middle piece.
Fairlight also lets you highlight a range with the Edit Selection tool and adjust the Clip Gain line, and Resolve adds keyframes at the boundaries automatically. Zoom in around the neighboring words before you adjust the range. Clip gain changes only that item; the track's mixer fader stays where it is.
Turn a Clip Down from the Keyboard
When a clip only needs to sit lower, the level commands are quicker than dragging the overlay. Select the audio item and choose Clip > Audio > Decrease Audio Level 1dB (Option+Command+Minus on macOS / Alt+Ctrl+Minus on Windows), or the 3dB step (Option+Shift+Minus / Alt+Shift+Minus). The matching Equals shortcuts raise the level. The manual's volume shortcut section says they work while the Timeline plays, and with several clips selected they keep the level differences between those clips.
I'd pair them with Timeline > Selection Follows Playhead. Turn it on, play the scene and tap the shortcut as a loud clip passes: whichever clip the playhead crosses becomes the selection, so you can trim levels by ear without stopping. These commands change the clip's Volume, the same value as the Inspector slider. Full silence still calls for D, and a smooth dip still calls for keyframes. If you're lowering clips to hit a delivery target, check the mix against the targets in our audio levels and LUFS guide.
Separate Audio from Video
For normal edits, keep picture and its associated audio linked. Suspend Linked Selection for a moment when you need an audio-only change, and unlink the items only when you really need to break their relationship. Neither method repairs an existing sync error.
Option 1: Unlink Clips (Permanent Until You Re-link)
Select the associated items and choose Clip > Link Clips, or press Option+Command+L on macOS / Alt+Ctrl+L on Windows with the default mapping. Linked items show a chain icon before the clip name. To link them again, first make sure picture and sound line up, select both items and use the same command. Linking won't pull mistimed audio back into sync.
Option 2: Alt/Option Key (Temporary Override)
Hold Option on macOS or Alt on Windows while clicking the audio item to select it without its linked picture. Check the highlight before editing. For several audio-only cuts or trims, switch off the chain-link Linked Selection button for a while and turn it back on afterward. That changes only how items get selected; their stored link stays put.
Option 3: Extract Audio (Separate File)
In Media Storage, right-click the source video, choose Extract Audio, pick a destination with Browse, then click Extract. Resolve writes the audio channels to a standalone WAV file. Import that WAV into the Media Pool if the project needs it.
Extract Audio creates a file on disk and leaves the link between existing timeline items alone. Reach for it when you need an external audio file or a handoff; for routine editing, Linked Selection is the tool.
Option 4: Audio-Only or Video-Only Edits (No Unlinking Needed)
Sometimes the cleanest split happens before the clip reaches the Timeline. On the Edit page, Shift-drag a clip from the Media Pool or Source Viewer to edit only its audio, or Option-drag (Alt-drag on Windows) to edit only its picture. In the Source Viewer you can also hover over the image and drag from the Video-only or Audio-only overlay at the bottom, as the Edit page editing chapter shows.
The Cut page has a switch for it. Click the Audio Only or Video Only icon to the left of the upper timeline, and every edit uses just that part until you click it off. I'd use this for B-roll with camera sound you'll never keep, because nothing lands in the timeline that you'd have to mute and remember later.
Split or Cut Audio Clips
For a cut at the playhead on the Edit page, select the audio item you mean and choose Timeline > Razor, or press Cmd+B on macOS / Ctrl+B on Windows in the default keyboard mapping. If the cut must affect sound only, make sure its linked picture isn't selected. B on its own does something else: it enters Blade Edit Mode so you can click where to cut.
For several audio-only cuts, turn off Linked Selection, press B and click the cut points on the audio item. Press A to go back to Selection mode, inspect the new boundaries, then restore Linked Selection. A Blade click can cut the linked picture too, because the linking state decides what gets cut.
Timeline > Split Clips (Cmd+backslash on macOS / Ctrl+backslash on Windows) is the separate playhead split command. Before a track-wide cut, clear unwanted clip selections and check the red destination-track controls and track locks. The Resolve 20.2 track-control update moved the former Auto Track Selector role to the red right-hand controls; the blue source controls do a different job. Sync Lock governs ripple participation separately. On Fairlight, select the tracks you need and use Timeline > Split Clip or Timeline > Razor. Check the active page and keyboard preset too, because cut commands don't all share the same scope.
If a clip should be audible and isn't, stop editing and start troubleshooting the missing sound: follow the signal from clip and track meters to the bus and monitor output before you touch links or make more cuts.
Fix the Common Mute and Split Mistakes
The video turned gray when you pressed D
If the same items are still selected and were all enabled before the slip, press D again to bring them back. Otherwise check each item's Enable Clip state. Then Option-click or Alt-click just the audio item and disable that. You don't need to unlink a synchronized pair for one temporary selection.
Split Clips cut the wrong tracks
Undo right away. Check the actual clip selection, the red destination-track controls and track locks before you try again. For one audio item, disable Linked Selection, make a deliberate Blade click, then restore the linking state. The dedicated split-video guide covers through edits, ripple behavior and separate A/V cuts in more depth.
Audio moved out of sync with picture
Undo the independent move, restore the matching position, and check the chain and sync-offset indicators before you continue. Linked Selection protects normal edits only while it's switched on; permanent Link Clips decides which items belong together.
The clip is silent but no mute state is visible
Trace the signal before you cut anything else. Check clip gain, track Mute and Solo, the mixer, the main bus and monitoring. The Resolve no-audio checklist helps you tell an intentionally disabled clip from a routing, device or media problem.
Before You Export or Keep Mixing
Clear temporary Solo states and check every track and clip that should reach the final mix, keeping the mutes you meant. The monitor speaker control and DIM change what you hear in the room; track Mute, Solo, disabled clips and clip gain change the mix you deliver. Render a short check and listen to the exported file itself, because timeline playback can hide a mute you forgot.
For a sound-only deliverable, the audio-only export workflow covers the format, codec and output bus. You don't have to mute video tracks to export an audio file.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do I mute all audio in a DaVinci Resolve timeline?
For a silent exported file, turn off Export Audio on the Deliver page. For timeline playback only, use the toolbar audio Enable/Disable button; it doesn't change the mix sent to delivery. Track Mute and disabled clips do affect output, so don't treat them as monitoring-only controls.
Why can't I find the mute option when I right-click an audio clip on the Edit page?
Resolve 21 labels the clip command Enable Clip. Select the audio item and press D, or toggle Enable Clip, to disable it. Older guides may call the same idea Mute Clip. Lowering the Volume overlay is a separate gain adjustment.
Does muting affect the exported video?
Track Mute, Solo states, disabled clips and lowered clip gain all affect delivery. The toolbar audio Enable/Disable and DIM controls only change what you hear in the room, and the rendered mix ignores them. Check both track and clip states before adding a render job.
Can I mute audio without splitting the clip?
For the whole clip, yes: select its audio item and press D. To reduce only part of it without adding cuts, place four Volume keyframes at separate positions and lower the segment between the inner pair, leaving room for the transitions. That's a gain change, and a lower level can still be audible; split and disable the middle item when the sound must be excluded.
What's the difference between unlinking and extracting audio in DaVinci Resolve?
Link Clips changes the relationship between timeline items and creates no new media. Extract Audio reads a source clip from Media Storage and writes its audio channels to a standalone WAV file on disk, which you then import if you want it in the project.
How do I re-link audio and video after separating them?
Line up the matching audio and video, select both and choose Clip > Link Clips. The default shortcut is Option+Command+L on macOS and Alt+Ctrl+L on Windows. Check the chain indicators and sync before you move either item; linking alone won't correct a timing offset.
