Overview

Iconik's multi-channel audio feature gives you individual control over discrete audio streams during playback, letting you mute, solo, pan, and adjust volume for up to 16 audio channels directly in the web player.

Key capabilities:

• Play back 2 to 16 channels of audio simultaneously
• Mute, solo, pan, and control volume for each channel independently
• Sample-accurate synchronization between all audio channels and video
• Works with both video files (with embedded multi-channel audio) and audio-only files

Quick browser support reference:

✅ Full support: Chrome (Mac/Windows), Edge (Windows)

⚠️ Limited support: Safari, Firefox (up to 5 channels with some playback issues)

❌ Not currently supported: iOS app, Iconik Player (stereo playback only)

Understanding Multi-Channel Audio

What is a channel?

A channel (or audio channel) is a single discrete stream of audio—a component of a track. For example, in a stereo file, the left channel and right channel are two separate audio streams.

What is multi-channel audio?

Multi-channel audio means having more than two channels of audio in a single file. While stereo audio uses two channels (left and right), multi-channel is common in:

• Video created by professional cameras and recording devices
• Broadcast and live production workflows
• Delivery formats

Common example: A camera recording with 4 channels where:

• Channels 1 & 2 = internal microphone (scratch audio)
• Channels 3 & 4 = external inputs (boom mic, wireless lavs)

What is a track?

A track is a container or stream of data in a media file. A video file typically has separate tracks for video, audio, subtitles, and timecode. Some files may have multiple audio tracks (e.g., English, Spanish, commentary).

Important limitation: Iconik supports multi-channel audio within a single track. It does not support switching between multiple tracks, and it does not support surround sound playback (5.1, 7.1, etc.).

Prerequisites

Before you can use multi-channel audio in Iconik:

1. Your media files must contain more than 2 audio channels
   • Check your source files using a tool like MediaInfo or your NLE
   • Iconik supports up to 16 discrete channels in a single audio track
2. An administrator must enable multi-channel audio in Transcoder Settings
   • See "For Administrators" section below
3. Assets must be transcoded (or re-transcoded) with multi-channel support enabled
   • New uploads after enabling the feature will automatically generate multi-channel proxies
   • Existing assets will need to be re-transcoded to generate multi-channel proxies
4. Use a supported browser
   • Chrome (Mac/Windows) or Edge (Windows) for full support
   • Safari and Firefox have limited support (5 channels max, playback issues)

For administrators: Enabling multi-channel audio

How to enable multi-channel audio

1. Navigate to Admin > Transcoders
2. Select your transcoder (Iconik Cloud Video or ISG) > General
3. Toggle Multi-Channel Audio to ON
4. Click Update

What happens when you enable this setting

• New uploads: Assets with multi-channel audio will automatically generate two proxies:
  • A multi-channel proxy (preserves all channels)
  • A standard stereo proxy (fallback for unsupported browsers)
• Existing assets: Will continue to use their current stereo proxies. To enable multi-channel playback for existing assets, you must re-transcode them.

Re-transcoding existing assets

To generate multi-channel proxies for assets that were uploaded before enabling the feature:

1. Select the asset(s) in Iconik
2. Choose Re-transcode from the actions menu
3. The system will generate new multi-channel proxies

Note: Re-transcoding does not affect your original files; they remain unchanged.

For users: Using the Audio Mixer

Finding assets with multi-channel audio

Once multi-channel audio is enabled by your administrator, and assets have been transcoded:

1. Open any asset in the player
2. If the asset has a multi-channel proxy, you'll see the Audio Mixer icon in the player toolbar
3. If you don't see the Audio Mixer icon, the asset either:
   • Has only 2 channels (stereo)
   • Was uploaded before multi-channel was enabled and hasn't been re-transcoded
   • Is being viewed in a browser with limited or no support

Opening the Audio Mixer

The Audio Mixer is displayed on the left side of the screen by default.

To open/close the Audio Mixer:

• Click the Audio Mixer icon in the player toolbar, or
• Use the context menu to toggle it open or closed

Controlling individual channels

Each channel in the Audio Mixer has the following controls:

Mute (M button)

• Click the M icon to mute one or more channels
• Muted channels will not play back audio

Solo (S button)

• Click the S icon to solo one or more channels
• When a channel is solo'd, all other channels are muted (unless they're also solo'd)
• Use this to isolate specific audio sources

Volume slider

• Drag the volume slider left (decrease) or right (increase) to control each channel's volume independently

Panning wheel

• Use the panning wheel to pan an audio channel left, right, or center
• By default, channel 1 is hard-panned left and channel 2 is hard-panned right
• All other channels default to center pan

Audio meter

• Each channel includes a real-time audio meter that visualizes output levels during playback

Master controls

Use the master volume control in the player toolbar to:

• Mute all channels at once
• Control the overall volume of all channels simultaneously

Channel settings persistence

Your channel control settings (mute, solo, pan, volume) are saved on your current device.

Example: If you mute channel 1, solo channel 3, and pan channel 4 to the right, these settings will automatically apply when you open the next asset in the player.

This is useful when working with multiple assets that have the same channel layout (e.g., all footage from the same camera setup).

Default Proxy Behavior

When Iconik transcodes an asset with multiple audio channels, it creates two proxies:

1. Multi-channel proxy: Preserves all audio channels (up to 16)
2. Standard stereo proxy: Contains only channels 1 and 2, hard-panned left and right

How Iconik chooses which proxy to play

• Chrome or Edge (Windows): Multi-channel proxy plays by default
• Safari, Firefox, or other browsers: Standard stereo proxy plays automatically
• iOS app or Iconik Player: Standard stereo proxy only (multi-channel not supported)

You can view both proxies in the Files panel at the bottom of the asset view.

Browser Support

The browser support for multi-channel audio varies between different browsers. The tables below gives an overview of the support and limitations among different browsers. Test results show that multi-channel audio is fully supported in Chrome browser on both macOS and Windows, and Edge browser is fully supported on Windows. For web browsers that do not support more than 2 channels of audio, there is a fallback to the ordinary stereo proxy.

Fully supported

What "fully supported" means:

• All 16 channels play back correctly
• All waveforms display properly
• Video and audio remain in sync
• All Audio Mixer controls function as expected

Limited support 

What "limited support" means:

• Maximum 5 channels can play back
• Waveforms may not generate correctly
• Channel order may be incorrect in Safari
• Video may not play back correctly with more than 5-6 channels
• Fallback behavior: Iconik automatically serves the stereo proxy in these browsers

Note: Browser support data based on testing with Chrome 144.0.7559.97 and Edge 144.0.3719.82.

Limitations

• Multi-channel audio is web-only: The Iconik Player (desktop) and iOS app currently support stereo playback only.
• No surround sound playback: Iconik does not decode or play back surround formats like 5.1 or 7.1 as surround. If your file contains a 5.1 track, Iconik will detect up to 6 discrete channels, but playback is not spatialized for surround sound systems.
• Maximum 16 channels: Iconik supports up to 16 discrete audio channels per track.

Professional use cases

Multi-channel audio is designed for professional workflows where:

Field recording and documentary production

• Camera operators record internal scratch audio (channels 1-2) and high-quality external audio (channels 3-4+)
• Reviewers can mute noisy internal mics and hear clean external audio without downloading files or opening an NLE

Broadcast and live production

• Feeds contain 8-16 channels representing different microphones, mix buses, or commentary tracks
• Editors and QC teams can isolate specific sources instantly during review

Post-production handoffs

• When originals have multi-channel audio, proxies preserve that structure
• Teams can preview different audio sources before committing to downloads or full edits
• Reduces questions like "which channels have the good audio?"

Proxy-to-original workflows

• For teams using proxy-to-original workflows in Premiere or Resolve, web proxies now preserve multi-channel audio
• This eliminates the need for separate edit proxies in many cases
• Saves time (no additional transcode), storage costs, and ingest-to-usable time