Making the DualSense mute button work on PC

There is a small button under the PS button on your DualSense, with a microphone icon. On a PlayStation 5 it mutes you instantly, with a light to confirm. Plug the same controller into a PC and it becomes decoration: pressing it does strictly nothing.

Why Windows ignores it

The button is not a standard control. Windows knows the sticks, the triggers and the face buttons because they follow a shared convention. The mute button is a Sony addition, reported in a place Windows has no reason to inspect.

So the press does reach the PC: Windows simply does not know what it is supposed to mean, and drops it.

What BatteryOnPC does with it

Pressing the button mutes your PC microphone, and pressing it again unmutes. A clear notification confirms the state, so you never have to guess whether you are live.

It acts on the Windows microphone itself, not on one particular application. Discord, a game's voice chat, a call, a recording: all of them stop hearing you at the same moment, which is exactly the behaviour you want from a mute button.

Why this is worth having

Muting on PC usually means a keyboard shortcut set up per application, which fails the moment you switch app, or a click somewhere in an interface, which means leaving your game.

The controller button is already under your thumb while you play. It requires no shortcut to remember, works the same everywhere, and does not interrupt what you are doing.

If nothing happens

• Check the controller is detected: its icon should be in the taskbar. Without detection there is no button to read.
• Check Windows has a microphone selected as the default recording device. Muting nothing produces nothing.
• The DualShock 4 has no such button: this feature concerns the DualSense and the DualSense Edge.

Note that the small light around the button on the controller is driven by the PlayStation firmware, and does not necessarily reflect the state on PC. Trust the notification.