Why do my sound effects click when they play in Unity?
Because the waveform does not start and end at zero. Here is how to find it, how to fix it, and why a level meter will never show it to you.
- 5 ms fade on both ends removes the discontinuity inaudibly
- DC offset pops on every play and does not appear on a loudness meter
- Unity guideline 2.7.b rejects submissions for exactly this
Why do my sound effects click when they play in Unity?
A click at the start or end of a clip almost always means the waveform does not begin and end at zero. If the first or last sample sits well above silence, and hard cuts are often as high as -3 dBFS, the speaker is asked to jump instantly, which you hear as a click. The fix is a 5 millisecond fade on both ends plus DC-offset removal: short enough to be inaudible, long enough to remove the discontinuity.
How do I stop audio popping at the start of a clip?
Apply a short fade-in of about 5 milliseconds and check for DC offset, which is a waveform sitting above or below the zero line for its whole length. DC offset produces a pop on every play even when the fade is correct, and it does not show on a loudness meter. Trim leading silence too: several hundred milliseconds of dead air at the head of a file delays the sound audibly in gameplay.
Why did Unity reject my audio asset submission?
Unity's submission guideline 2.7.b rejects audio containing discernable cuts, white noise or artifacts, and hard start and end samples are the most common cause. A level meter will not catch it: a file can sit perfectly at -1.5 dBTP and still begin on a hard cut. Check the first and last sample of every file, not just the ones that sound wrong on a quick listen.
How many of my files are likely affected?
More than most people expect. An audit of 150 shipped files across five packs found 126 with a first or last sample well above zero, some at -3 dBFS. Across a 300-file catalogue the figure was 244. Dozens also carried 300 to 1100 milliseconds of trailing silence, and one file peaked at -54 dBFS, effectively silent, and had shipped that way.
What to check, in order
Read the first and last sample value of every file and flag anything above roughly -60 dBFS. Measure the mean sample value across each file to catch DC offset. Measure leading and trailing silence and trim anything beyond about 50 milliseconds. Then apply a 5 millisecond fade at both ends and re-measure, because a fade applied before trimming just fades the silence.
Three flags need ears rather than a threshold and should be reported, not auto-fixed: a high noise floor, clicks in the middle of a file, and very short files. Continuous ambience beds and tick sounds trip all three legitimately.
How MoneyWithJJ Sound packs are prepared
Every file is screened for edge discontinuity, DC offset and padding before release, then level-matched across the pack and set to -1.5 dBTP true peak, because game engines re-encode audio on import and a file peaking at 0 dBFS can still clip afterwards. Packs ship as uncompressed 44.1 kHz 16-bit WAV with a README listing every file.
See the Fantasy RPG Sound Library or hear a preview of every pack.