Mixing stereo tracks to mono in your Project

Current Audacity
To convert stereo tracks to mono in the current version of Audacity, select the track by clicking in its Track Control Panel then click. This mixes in data from both channels to one mono track without clipping. Note: if your stereo track is split into left and right channels, use "Make Stereo Track" on the Track Drop-Down Menu before using "Stereo to Mono". Then export your mono track as you would in 1.2.x. If you prefer to only have one of the stereo channels in the mono file, you can split the stereo track and close one of the channels in the same way as in 1.2.x.

Current Audacity has more customisable channel mapping ability on the. To enable this, select "Use custom mix..." in the "When exporting tracks" panel ''.

Then whenever exporting a single file, an "Advanced Mixing Options" dialogue will appear. In the dialogue, move the Output Channels slider from 2 to 1. By default the "left" audio track on the left of the window will appear linked to the "Channel:1" output in the right of the window, so that the "left" channel of your stereo track in Audacity will be all that will appear in the exported mono file. If this is what you want, click OK.

If you prefer only the "right" channel of your Audacity track in the exported file, click in turn on the "Channel:1", "name of track - right" and "name of track - left" boxes and the output channel will now link only to the "right" audio track.

If you want both channels of the audio in the exported file, click on the "Channel:1" box then the "name of track - right" box and the "right" audio track will now appear linked to the output channel as the "left" audio track already is. Click OK to export your stereo track mixed down equally into a mono file.

Advanced Mixing Options can also be used to allocate tracks on the Audacity screen to the channels of stereo or multi-channel (more than 2 channels) files. Note that Advanced Mixing Options do not apply when using the command for exporting multiple audio files at one go.

Audacity Legacy versions 1.2.x
This will obviously have in the mono output audio data from only one of the channels. To include information from both channels of a stereo track in the mono output:


 * 1) "Split stereo track" using the Track Control Panel dropdown menu (as above)
 * 2) Click on both tracks in turn and make each "Mono" using the same menu
 * 3) Select both tracks (, or  on a Mac) and hit the Play button. Check if the red hold lights to right of the green VU Playback Meter come on, which would indicate clipping (distortion). [[Image:metertoolplay.png|VU Playback Meter showing distortion having occurred in left channel]]
 * 4) If this happens, move the -....+ gain slider (above the L....R pan slider) on each Track Control Panel to left by the same amount until no more clipping is detected.
 * 5) Click