Sound, volume and the browser's permission

Two separate things, often confused: the sound Talkfront plays, and the permission your browser needs before it can show a notification when the tab is not in front.

The sound

Settings → Notifications. Pick the one you can live with, and test it there rather than by waiting for a chat.

Worth knowing: the sound only plays while the panel is open in a tab. If you want to be reached with the panel closed, that is either a browser notification or the desktop app.

If you share an office, turning the sound off and keeping browser notifications on is usually the right combination.

The browser’s permission

A browser will not show notifications from a website until it is allowed to, and it asks once. If you dismissed that prompt without reading it, the answer was no, and it will not ask again.

To change it, click the padlock or icon at the left of the address bar and look for Notifications. Set it to Allow and reload.

This is per browser and per machine. Allowing it on your laptop does nothing for the same account on your desktop.

Why the first sound sometimes does not play

Browsers refuse to play audio on a page nobody has interacted with. It is a rule about autoplaying video that catches notification sounds too.

In practice: on a freshly loaded panel that you have not clicked yet, the first alert may be silent. Clicking anywhere fixes it for that tab. If it happens every morning, click into the panel when you open it.

The operating system has a say too

macOS Focus and Windows Focus assist suppress notifications from every application, browsers included, and both switch themselves on for screen sharing and presenting.

If notifications were working and stopped, check there before anything else. Why you’re not getting notifications has the full order to check things in.

Last updated 22 September 2026.