amixer

Control ALSA soundcard mixer from the command line

TLDR

Turn up the master volume by 10%

$ amixer -D pulse sset Master 10%+

Turn down the master volume by 10%

$ amixer -D pulse sset Master 10%-

Mute the master channel

$ amixer -D pulse sset Master mute

Unmute the master channel

$ amixer -D pulse sset Master unmute

List all simple mixer controls

$ amixer scontrols

amixer is a command-line mixer control for the ALSA soundcard driver. It can adjust volume levels, toggle mute states, and query mixer control settings for any available soundcard. Running it without arguments displays current mixer settings for the default soundcard.The tool provides both simple and full mixer interfaces. The simple interface (commands prefixed with s) uses human-readable control names like "Master" or "PCM", while the full interface operates on numeric control identifiers. Volume can be specified as absolute values, percentages, or decibels.

PARAMETERS

-c card

Select card number (e.g., 0, 1, 2)

-D device

Select device name (default: 'default')

-s, --stdin

Read and execute commands from stdin sequentially

-q

Quiet mode; suppress output

-R

Raw value for percentage evaluation (default)

-M

Mapped volume for percentage evaluation

COMMANDS

scontrols

List all simple mixer controls

scontents

List simple mixer controls with their contents

set/sset NAME PARAMETER

Configure mixer control contents (supports percentage, dB values, mute/unmute/toggle)

get/sget NAME

Display simple mixer control contents

controls

List all card controls

contents

List card controls with their contents

info

Show mixer device information

INSTALL

sudo apt install alsa-utils

sudo dnf install alsa-utils

sudo pacman -S alsa-utils

sudo apk add alsa-utils

sudo zypper install alsa-utils

nix profile install nixpkgs#alsa-utils

CAVEATS

Mixer control names vary between sound cards. Use scontrols to list available controls for your card.

HISTORY

Part of ALSA (Advanced Linux Sound Architecture) utilities package.