Black Screen Problem: The recorded video file is black

A black screen in your recorded video is usually caused by one of three things: either a copyright protection or antivirus program blocked the recording, your screen is using a video acceleration feature that can't be captured, or you're missing the video codecs needed to play the file. If you are hearing sound but not seeing video when you play the recorded video, please try the solutions below.

* Solutions

1. Uncheck the hardware acceleration option in Edge/Chrome

If you have a black screen issue with a specific website/video, uncheck the "Use Graphics acceleration when available" or "Use hardware acceleration when available" option in Edge/Chrome/Firefox, and try recording.

- Edge/Chrome settings

Edge, Use Graphics acceleration when available

- Firefox settings

Firefox, Use hardware acceleration when available
If you can see the specific website/video on your smartphone, mirror your smartphone screen to your Windows computer and record it with Bandicam.

2. There might be a problem with the video codec or your media player.

1) Please choose Xvid or another H264 (CPU, NVIDIA, Intel, AMD) codec and try again.

H264 Video Codec

2) Please try VLC media player and try again.
3) If you recorded a video with the "H264 (CPU)" codec in "Windows 8, 10 or 11" and play the video through Windows Media Player in "Windows 7," you may have the black screen issue.

3. Please try the 'Game Recording Mode' instead of the 'Screen Recording Mode.'

To record a game, please use the Game Recording mode of Bandicam.

Game and Screen Recording mode


4. Start Bandicam before the recording target.

Please use the latest version of Bandicam and start Bandicam before the recording target. While Bandicam is running, Bandicam shuts off the overlay output and streaming videos will not be played through the overlay output.

5. Reinstall the graphics card driver and DirectX.


6. If you still have problems, send your video file to bandicam@bandicam.com

You may send the video file through one of the storage services below:

Related FAQs