I thought it just happened to me, but it turns out lots of people have been dealing with hearing a blaring theme tune followed by whispering dialogue on their fave streamer’s TV shows and movies.
Thankfully, one Netflix user on X (formerly Twitter) revealed why this can sometimes happen on the site over the weekend ― and it could just be a settings issue.
In the post, which has garnered over 170,000 views as of the time of writing, @MittenDAmour shared: “Can’t remember who told me this but it’s fixed the blight of Netflix playing tiny mouse fart dialogue audio drowned behind trumpeting background noise.”
They added: “It thinks your TV is surround sound, so change this from English [Original] 5.1 to just English [Original]. You’re welcome.”
And the pros agree
Writers for TechRadar have covered this before.
“If you have anything other than a surround sound setup, be it a 2.1 soundbar, stereo speakers or just your TV’s built-in speakers, Netflix may be defaulting to a setting that will have a negative impact on the audio you’re getting,” they revealed in a 2023 article.
The feature was introduced to make TVs and laptops with surround sound capability sound better.
Netflix themselves say that you can tell if a movie or TV show is using the feature because they “will show a 5.1 or a Dolby Digital Plus icon on their description page”.
How can I get rid of this problem?
Begin by starting a movie or TV show, then pause it.
After that, hit the “other” option from the toolbar and choose English [Original] instead of English [Original] (5.1).
Your sound should equalise better for non-surround sound devices if this was the issue causing the problem.
People were pleased to learn the trick
“It works! Now I can fully appreciate Russell Crowe’s mumblings in Gladiator,“ one commenter said under the post.
“Trying this when I get in coz my hearing isn’t great and find the sound balance awful on most telly. Nice one!” wrote another.
“I realised this just last week. I felt reborn afterwards,“yet another app user said.
Having tried it myself, I can confirm it made my listening experience a lot smoother (now for an even more intense Baby Reindeer binge...).
