Disable Lower Volume of Other Apps when Narrator is Speaking

How to disable Lower Volume of Other Apps when Narrator is Speaking

Narrator is a screen-reading app built into Windows 10. Narrator lets users with vision issues to use PC and complete common tasks. The user can change its voice, adjust the speaking rate, pitch, and volume. When Narrator is speaking, it automatically lowers the audio volume from other apps, so you can hear it better. If you are not happy with this feature, here's how to disable it.

Microsoft describes the Narrator feature as follows:

Narrator lets you use your PC without a display or mouse to complete common tasks if you’re blind or have low vision. It reads and interacts with things on the screen, like text and buttons. Use Narrator to read and write email, browse the Internet, and work with documents.
Specific commands let you navigate Windows, the web, and apps, as well as get info about the area of the PC you're in. Navigation is available using headings, links, landmarks, and more. You can read text (including punctuation) by page, paragraph, line, word, and character as well as determine characteristics like font and text color. Efficiently review tables with row and column navigation.
Narrator also has a navigation and reading mode called Scan Mode. Use it to get around Windows 10 using just the up and down arrows on your keyboard. You can also use a braille display to navigate your PC and read text.

Windows 10 allows to customize options for Narrator. You can change its keyboard shortcuts, personalize Narrator's voice, enable Caps Lock warnings, and more. You can choose the voice for Narrator, adjust the speaking rate, pitch, and volume.

 

To Disable Lower Volume of Other Apps when Narrator is Speaking,

1. Open the Settings app.
2. Go to Ease of Access -> Narrator. 
3. On the right, turn off (untick) the Lower the volume of other apps when Narrator is speaking check box option under Personalize Narrator's voice.
4. Now you can close the Settings app.

You are done. You can re-enable this option at any moment.

Alternatively, you can apply a Registry tweak to change the Narrator Online Services option.

Disable Lower Volume of Other Apps for Narrator with a Registry Tweak

1. Open the Registry Editor app.
2. Go to the following Registry key.

   HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Narrator\NoRoam

   See how to go to a Registry key with one click.

3. On the right, modify or create a new 32-Bit DWORD value DuckAudio.
   Note: Even if you are running 64-bit Windows you must still create a 32-bit DWORD value.
   Set its value to 0 to disable the feature. A value data of 1 will enable it.
4. To make the changes done by the Registry tweak take effect, you need to sign out and sign in to your user account.

To save you time, you can download the following Registry files:

Download Registry Files

The undo tweak is included.

That's it.

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