AirPlaySpeakers.com

Stream Any Audio Over AirPlay With Airfoil

Many of our loyal users messaged us about Airfoil shortly after we launched. We intended to write a post on it but were busy writing about speakers and it slipped past us. I would also like to disclose that Airfoil (Rogue Amoeba) is now an advertiser on AirPlaySpeakers.com, but we were Airfoil users long before. This post is not a sponsored one, just a long overdue one. Enjoy!

AirPlay is a beautiful thing; it frees your audio and video from your PC or Mac, and lets you enjoy them from anywhere in the house, but sometimes even those with the most comprehensive entertainment libraries need to look beyond iTunes to discover new content. And for people like us, Rogue Amoeba created Airfoil.

Now in its fourth generation, Airfoil is a clever piece of software that enables you to stream audio from your computer over AirPlay. Airfoil has earned a loyal following for its ability to extend web-based streaming audio from Internet radio sites like Pandora, subscription music services like Spotify, and even everybody’s favorite on-demand music search engine, Grooveshark! Basically, if you can play it, Airfoil can stream it. From Safari to desktop apps like Soundcloud, Airfoil streams them all. Available for Mac and for all you PC enthusiasts out there (you know who you are), there’s Airfoil for Windows. There’s also an Airfoil Video Player built into Airfoil that lets you watch video on your computer while streaming audio (in sync) to your AirPlay device. Handy for those YouTube videos.

Here’s a screenshot of Airfoil. You can see the current application Airfoil streams from (in this case Safari) and the AirPlay sources it can send audio to. You can select one source or all and adjust the volume individually on each. You’ll notice the computer is an audio source and if you have two computers on the same network running Airfoil you can send audio from one to another.

Here’s another screenshot showing the application selection screen. The great thing about Airfoil is you can stream audio from any application. If you don’t see it in the list, just select “Other Application…”, find it and start streaming.

Airfoil is a great application that makes up where Apple left off by enabling you to stream audio, over AirPlay, from any application on your computer to any AirPlay source.

Free to try, and $25 for the licensed version, Airfoil is available from Rogue Amoeba.

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Comments

10 responses to “Stream Any Audio Over AirPlay With Airfoil”

  1. Dave Avatar
    Dave

    I’ve been a long time user of Airfoil and use it daily. There are two features that if provided would blow everything out of the water. They are:

    1. The ability to send different sources to various speakers. Example, iTunes to living room and Pandora to back deck…etc.
    2. A mobile application that allowed me to change sources and speakers.

    Like I said I use it daily. But with these features, if possible, would prevent me from having to VNC to my mini to make these adjustments. Again not the end of the world but not elegant either.

    Reply
    1. frost Avatar
      frost

      I couldn’t agree more. Airfoil is so close to being the only choice with just those few additions

      Reply
  2. Matthias Merk Avatar
    Matthias Merk

    Have a look at Reemote App for Airfoil
    You can change speakers and volumes and even skip tracks in different applications like spotify or iTunes!

    Reply
  3. Ross Hurrell Avatar
    Ross Hurrell

    I find that using the Airfoil Speakers to stream music from my iphone to the PC leaves the audio very choppy and unenjoyable. I tried on two different computers in my house to the same results.

    Reply
    1. Vikarti Anatra Avatar
      Vikarti Anatra

      speed of WiFi connection matters a lot here.
      try switching WiFi to N-mode(instead of G-only) if you PC can use it

      Reply
  4. Peter Johnson Avatar
    Peter Johnson

    The Airfoil Speakers app is just what I have wanted for ages.

    It turns an iOS device into an AirPlay receiver, so if you have a few iDevices you can plug them each into docks and send music all around the house from iTunes, in sync with other Airplay devices.

    Reply
    1. Peter Johnson Avatar
      Peter Johnson

      Most important is that you dont need to send audio from Airfoil on a PC or Mac to use it, but can send from any Airplay source

      Reply
  5. Stefan Avatar
    Stefan

    I am thinking of the Airport Express in combination with Airfoil. However, what I don’t really understand is why this is so complicated… why would I have to choose sources and the likes. Couldn’t I just transmit ANY sound? Whatever my speaker would output will be outputted to the Airport express. Or is that possible at this stage? I don’t understand why one would hook in at the application level, not the system level.

    Thanks for clarifying…

    Thanks

    Reply
  6. Steven Avatar
    Steven

    I am trying to use Airfoil with my new B&O Beolit 12 speaker, but with no luck. The Beolit shows up in the Airfoil device list and I can even select it as “Active”, but no sound is transmitted. The Beolit works great with Airplay from iPhone, iPad or iTunes, but I really would be happy if I could make it work with Airfoil as well. Anyone with experience on that?

    Reply
  7. David Avatar
    David

    I’m having similar issues with the iHome iW1 Airplay speaker in my office. I was trialing Airfoil using Chrome as the source and it was streaming successfully to two iW1 speakers (both on WIFI). I decided to do some testing and started another Chrome browser to see if Airfoil would allow selecting between Chrome “1” and Chrome “2”. I started a video in the second Chrome window and now Airfoil will not play to one of my iW1 speakers. Airfoil shows it “active” and even turns it on (after I turned it off). Volume is MAX’d and the sound level in Airfoil is showing music playing (I can even hear on 2nd iW1). I have rebooted my PC but that didn’t help. I can connect via my iPhone and iTunes to the iW1 that Airfoil won’t play to. Even playing Pandora in IE doesn’t work to this speaker, though Airfoil will play to the 2nd iW1 speaker). Again it shows the problem iW1 speaker as “active” but nothing (sound is MAX’d to that speaker). I really want Airfoil to function but I’m baffled how to resolve this issue and don’t want to drop $30 having an issue like this.

    Thanks

    Reply

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