pipewire-pulse

PulseAudio compatibility layer for PipeWire

TLDR

Start PulseAudio compatible daemon

$ pipewire-pulse

Use specific config file

$ pipewire-pulse -c [path/to/pipewire-pulse.conf]

Increase verbosity

$ pipewire-pulse -vvv

Display help

$ pipewire-pulse -h

SYNOPSIS

pipewire-pulse [-c config] [-v...] [-h|--help] [--version]

pipewire-pulse provides PulseAudio protocol compatibility for PipeWire. It allows applications written for PulseAudio to work seamlessly with PipeWire without modification, listening on the same socket as PulseAudio would.The daemon translates PulseAudio protocol messages to PipeWire operations, maintaining compatibility with existing applications while leveraging PipeWire's improved architecture and lower latency.

PARAMETERS

-c, --config file

Use alternate configuration file (default: pipewire-pulse.conf)

-v, --verbose

Increase verbosity level (stackable)

-h, --help

Display help information

--version

Display version information

CONFIGURATION

/etc/pipewire/pipewire-pulse.conf

System-wide PipeWire-Pulse configuration file.

~/.config/pipewire/pipewire-pulse.conf.d/

User-level drop-in directory for configuration overrides.

ENVIRONMENT

PULSE_RUNTIME_PATH, XDG_RUNTIME_DIR

Directory in which to create the native protocol PulseAudio socket.

PULSE_LATENCY_MSEC

Extra buffering latency in milliseconds added for libpulse client applications.

INSTALL

sudo apt install pipewire-pulse

sudo pacman -S pipewire-pulse

sudo apk add pipewire-pulse

CAVEATS

Cannot run simultaneously with actual PulseAudio daemon. Usually started automatically by systemd. Requires main pipewire daemon to be running. Some advanced PulseAudio features may not be fully supported.

HISTORY

pipewire-pulse was developed as part of PipeWire to ensure smooth migration from PulseAudio. It allows distributions to switch to PipeWire while maintaining compatibility with the large ecosystem of PulseAudio-enabled applications.