HDMI ARC and eARC - Everything You Need to Know!

Check out my Sonos Arc Review:
• Sonos Arc Soundbar Rev...
HDMI ARC and eARC are very common terms in regards to home audio. ARC stands for audio return channel. It basically sends audio in the "opposite" direction down an HDMI cable.
However, HDMI ARC is very limited in the amount of data that it can transfer. For high quality and complex audio systems, it has to compress the audio signals in order to transfer them completely.
HDMI eARC fixed this by increasing the amount of data that it can transfer tremendously!
Purchases made through some store links may provide some compensation to us.
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[@hby7768]

You earned a sub for being honest, humble, and correcting your mistakes. This adds to the transparency of any misinformation you might have put out. Shows integrity, who, and what your channels is about.

[@koolk2115]

The detail of your presentations are not only interesting due to a passion for tech, but extremely educational. I've made solid purchases thanks to your in depth reviews and audio expertise. Yourself, Vincent and Caleb are outstanding for Audio and Visual enthusiasts.

[@totallyfrozen]

Who are “Vincent” and “Caleb”? Are they on this channel or another one?

[@manuelhermann7049]

@@totallyfrozen Vincent is a professional calibrator and I would say he is a really good expert. His youtube channel is called HDTVtest. You can see Caleb on the channel digital trends and he knows a lot of this stuff as well.

[@dankelley9361]

Great descriptive differences of EARC & ARC. Good to know that you no longer need the CEC part to control the system!

[@IvanRossS]

I been using optic cable for the pass 8 years lol and just not to long ago I find out that optic doesn't pass Dolby and DTS.... just basic 5.1 channel. I was happy to find out that my 8 years old Onkyo AV supported ARC all this time lol. So I reconnected with new HDMI and turn ARC on !! And OMG what a difference!!! Its sounds so much clearer, more effects, more details. Just WOW!! I've been missing alot

[@BORICUACHANNEL]

For me i think optical sound more crispier

[@Chromedome-ss6mg]

I thought an optical cable supports at least 5 channels? I'm really confused about this because I plan on getting E ark to run a 5.1 channel soundbar and I don't even know if I need E arc to do this, Do you know anything about this

[@rajendrabiswas]

If my playstation is playing Blu-ray but has only optical should I go for optical input ? Although my lg tv is 4k and has e arc

[@JoshFisher567]

The thing is they could have upgraded fiber to support any format but because there is no protection like HDCP they didn't. Fiber easily has the bandwidth for any audio format although they might have had to update it to support it but it could be done.

[@rajendrabiswas]

@@JoshFisher567 I hope will happen in future

[@zer0sIx]

Thank you for this. As i have seen your old video first. Good thing you have an update. Really help me decide on what soundbar to get.

[@safialmamun9426]

I saw your previous video. We learn from out mistakes :-) Appreciate your honesty and you deserve 💯 any my subscription, best of luck with your journey in KZbin

[@andoniades]

I'm subbing because you were honest with your mistake. Honesty goes a long way young man. Thank you.

[@SeanJohn127]

It wasnt even a big mistake. This stuff gets confusing

[@totallyfrozen]

“Young man” LOL! Stop it. He’s grown. Show a little respect.

[@andoniades]

@@totallyfrozen I mean, relatively speaking tho

[@Methodical2]

I'm in the market for an eARC AVR now. My TV (LG C9) recently had a firmware update to support eARC. I want all of the sounds available, haha. Thanks for not getting too technical.

[@jayakumarramachandran733]

You are doing a professional work. Learnt from you the power of honesty . Thanks

[@danenpauly3072]

Great video man. You're really able to present this confusing information in a digestible manner. Just a recommendation though, if you are intending this to be as informative as possible then I would mention somewhere that if people are planning on upgrading from ARC to eARC then they WILL need to upgrade their HDMI cable as well. I just know so many people won't know to do this and then be utterly lost.

[@brianhammond2560]

Thank you. This was just the information I was looking for.

[@iball1230]

Such genuine.....I haven't seen anybody like this for a while now ....Love from Tamilnadu.....🇮🇳..Thanks mate..👍🏼keep up the good work

[@manupawankalyan]

Liked just for the sincerity you showed

[@JoloNavarro]

Well detailed explanation! Thanks for this! ❤️

[@Lenonmendes]

I really like your channel. I started watching it while looking for a sound bar, and now I keep watching just because I like the content. Nice work. (Also, thanks for reviewing the Nakamichi system. I got one and I’m in love with it)

[@JonahMatthes]

Awesome! Thank you very much!

[@Supremax67]

@@JonahMatthes Hopefully you can as I desperately need an answer on this question. I bought: - Sony XR-55A80J - Active subwoofer with only RCA input options Now it looks like Sony disabled the option to use the headphones as a subwoofer output option. I look high and low and the Google smart TV simply does not have this option. Now I am stuck with a cable I can't use and a subwoofer I can't seem to connect to. I was going to use the earc as an output and then get an HDMI RCA adapter, will this work? Or finding an adapter for the digital audio out? What is more confusing is that the back of the TV said eARC is IN, but isn't that bidirectional and usable as an out?

[@larrymelman]

@@Supremax67 I think we are stuck with the "in" and "out" labels for historical reasons, from the early days of HDMI when it was a one-way connection. They have added bidirectional elements to it over the years.

[@tessjess1]

Your doing a good job brother appreciate your assistance in understanding this HDMI ARC..

[@rodriguesgryan]

Very interesting idea, thanks Jonah!

[@hj8607]

Humble pie prevents dementia . Good video .

[@melodychest9020]

Good info. I think with the advancement in TV displays with OLED, QLED, in 4K, 8K and AI upscaling and what not, I think it makes more sense to plug everything straight into the TV and just have one eARC HDMI connection to an external audio driver like a sound bar or AV receiver. When you run out of HDMI channels on the TV, then we can start using the HDMI ports on the external devices to go up the same eARC bandwidth. For AV Receiver lovers like me, eARC is still not common in them unless you get a flagship model at this point which is a bummer. They should really make eARC more commonly available on AV Receivers. Cheers.

[@michaelcampbell6721]

So easy to understand and follow...it helped me get my new LG Atmos Soundbar setup .. thanks 🙏

[@richardpells5974]

This is the best explanation I have come across. I really like Chris Majestic and Caleb Dennison, but this video did it for me and has been a great help. I have to explain this stuff as part of my job so I'm very grateful for your help and advice. Thanks Jonah!

[@edtob8273]

Thanks for the update! I was really bummed after your last video, glad you were wrong and appreciate the correction.

[@Nethanel773]

Thank you so much for putting this up! The ARC turned out to be the key/fault I ended up working through to restore HDMI output from my laptop > Yamaha > speakers.

[@badcompanyCDN]

You just scrambled my brain permanently

[@therealfirstone]

I finally understand ARC and eARC , thanks for making it so clear.

[@billmarkelz]

Thanks Jonah, this vid was very helpful to me. Liked .Subbed.

[@Simply_the_Best_One]

Thank you buddy for your enlightening!

[@adrianmusteata888]

Informative, helpful, and interesting presentation. Keep up the good work.

[@rumporridge1]

Definitely a helpful video. Thanks.

[@andrewtiley8172]

Great video, to the point and explained good

[@lyresmyth]

Thanks Jonah, you saved me hours more of trouble-shooting. After replacing my 20+ year old AV receiver the new receiver in addition to my TV support (e)ARC. I could not get sound to work thru the new AVR and it was the CEC clue that was the problem. No where did I find this information in setting up eARC on my TV. After some research on my TV I was able to find that CEC needed to be enabled, I've never seen this setting before going through all the menus on the TV. That did the trick, and now its a matter of tweaking some of the settings. My TV does have/support DDPlus so I will be checking to see what comes over all the different streaming apps over the next number of days. Thanks..

[@chefjpc]

Thanks.. Learned a lot 👍

[@acts9531]

If you're using a fairly modern audio receiver (Denon, Yamaha, etc.) you can overcome a lot of e-ARC issues by simply plugging your devices into the receiver, which will then handle the audio processing, instead of the TV. I.E. I plug my FireStick into a port on my receiver not a port on the TV. Then if the source the FireStick is pulling from has an audio format like ATMOS or DTS: X the receiver, not the TV processes the audio and video sending the video to the TV and the audio directly to my 5.1.2 surround speakers. I use this for all kinds of things including streaming services and my EMBY home server system. If I set the DSP on my Yamaha receiver to "Auto" then I get whatever format the signal is capable of producing though I may have to go into the controls on whatever video source is playing and select say "ATMOS" instead of 5.1.

[@aholmes6612]

So what would you suggest if the TV has only ARC but not EARC, the soundbar DOES have an EARC and I'm using an external amplifier, not a reciever or AV reciever that has HDMI input (2) and HDMI output (1)? I also bought a HDMI extractor in hopes that this will help resolve any issues of ARC to EARC.

[@juanherrejon8528]

Nice video, learned a lot .. 🤙🏼💯👍🏼

[@MoviesByeMark]

Informative. Good job. I now have a much better understanding of TV audio. Thank you, Jonah.

[@michaelhinchey]

Thank you for your clarification and making it easy for me to understand.

[@hectormedina7198]

Thx for the clarification. Cheers!

[@risingsons6336]

Very helpful! Thanks!

[@factuality431]

"I'll cut myself some slack as well".. Awsome! - Thanks for yet a great upload. Kepp up the good work.

[@VonSpud]

Great roundup on arc & e-arc thanks 😊 Decent that you can admit a mistake, I've made a few myself 🙄 Difference between an amateur and a professional...the professional is still willing to learn. 😏

[@johnadams5399]

Very good explanation of the difference. This newbie learned a lot lol! Thank you! 😎

[@LifeTiltz]

You seem like a great guy :) hope you and your family are happy and safe

[@malwatv]

Great information . thanks

[@CyanSkies]

This was such a highly informative video and it is so refreshing to see a content creator fess up to a previous error in information and correct it. Kudos to you! I was wondering if you or any others here have seen issues with Pioneer receivers when eARC is enabled. My receive shuts off a few seconds after turning it on. The problem disappears when I disable eARC on my Samsung TV and just use optical. Really annoying as I would love to use my remote to control volume (lost my receiver remote ages ago). Any idea why the receiver would shut off after a few seconds with eARC? This is driving me CRAZY!

[@LEO-pc6hc]

Nice job on this video; thank you!

[@southpike1000]

Excellent information. Thank you!

[@evancontos2267]

Great video, makes me want to upgrade everything to eARC :-)

[@hfxdronepilot9022]

Found youe eArc video ...thanks so much

[@phillipscharber]

Great video and quite helpful! Thanks.

[@annahanael7846]

Great explanation. Thank you.

[@joannvazquez7404]

Thank you so much!

[@melraine919]

Splendid! Very good and informative information so now I know 👍 Thank you Jonah Matthes. UK

[@nelsonjoaquim5918]

Thx mate. No worries. We are all constantly learning anyways so it's ok. Keep it up. Cheers

[@anajera644]

Thank you ! 🙏🙏

[@pushpindersingh8101]

Good video man.👍

[@aaoaaa]

Hi, I suggest you delete the older ARC video which you said it got some mistakes. It got me confused and mislead for few days

[@DJCasanovaToronto]

Agreed. Keeping a video up with mistakes just will lower your credibility and you don't want that. 😉

[@marcellomarcucci3348]

For input lag ps4 it is better to use hdmi 1 or hdmi 2 earc?

[@pawala7]

Yeah, no. That video has majority of his entire channel's views. That would essentially kill a small channel like this one. He did well enough to post a correction video, much better than what some bigger channels tend to do.

[@SuperAmazinglover]

@@marcellomarcucci3348 unless its audio lag arc or earc will do nothing to solve it. The primary purpose of arc is too send audio signals upstream or downstream and to allow your TV to play audio over a single cable to your AV setup.

[@marcellomarcucci3348]

@@SuperAmazinglover so it is better hdmi 1 for video?

[@lacmcasares8755]

excellent explanation

[@Eduardo99922]

Your video is very helpful.

[@fuckthisshit1988]

good job love the lights

[@krish2nasa]

Informative. Thank you very much.

[@kasperoon]

Another fantastic video. So easy to listen to your voice and follow them through. Now I understand why sometimes my ARC fm my Oled doesn’t ‘speak’ with my AVR. Now gonna shop for a new TV with eARC! Cool. Thanks Jonah!

[@deathward990]

Why not just get HDFury Arcana?

[@ffuentes900]

Kudos for correct a previous mistake and putting together a correction video

[@TimE_5150]

Jonah, thanks for these videos. I recently purchased a 2019 75" Samsung QLED. I then waited 2 months for a matching Samsung soundbar. I have issues with the lip syncing with broadcast cable mostly. Netflix is good but the cable really gets out of sorts. I read a few posts about the Samsung soundbars and it seems to be a wide ranging problem with Samsung bars. One person said not to use the ARC HDMI port, to use either a different port or an optical cable. If I scroll through the inputs on the soundbar remote it helps for a little while but eventually goes out again. I will try an update for the soundbar, let me know if you have any input. Thank you, Tim

[@101justlisten]

So this comment is very much late, but I bought a leftover 2019 Samsung Q90R. Bought a Q7CR sound bar. Then most recently a set of HW-Q90R surround left/right but I can’t get them to pair to the sound bar or TV? Please tell me I can connect these?

[@michaelh4484]

I enjoyed it. Thanks Jonah

[@CraigHighberger]

Great information thanks

[@kdausu90]

great video!

[@Candyman923]

You can get lossless sound if you have a Blu-ray player like Oppo UDP-203. It has internal decoding and Dolby Atmos + DTS- X. I have it and it works great on surround soundbar

[@dusanbolek8004]

To add little clarification as it could probably still confuse someone, yes it is true that eArc can send any uncompressed/lossless audio codec and also quite a few compressed ones, but what you can actually use depends on both side of the connection as they have to support them as well. And there can be a lot of unforeseen caveats in this area. What is obvious is a soundbar side, of course your soundbar will process only codecs it has built in support for. However, the less obvious might be limitation on the TV side as TV might not be able not only to process particular codec itself, but also fail to send some codecs through its eArc implementation despite the fact that eArc itself is perfectly able to handle that format. A very popular example of this from current year is a 2020 line of LG OLEDs (for example 65OLEDCX) who no longer support once very popular DTS sound format and will not only fail to process it in TV, but also will not passthrough DTS over eArc and therefore this format won't work even on DTS supporting soundbar connected to the TV.

[@CaptainVKanth]

Is this the normal 5.1 DTS that SPDIF supports?

[@mariooma4808]

Amazing thanks

[@karlsheldon60]

Awesome my friend🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽

[@martyjay75]

Thanks for the video. After getting a new LG C9 smart TV I was brand new to ARC (or in this case eARC). I'm using that TV with my old Onkyo TX-508 receiver and, for the most part, I got it to work with ARC (the old Onkyo only supports ARC). I have noticed that the audio drops out for a second every once in a while and I'm not sure if that's due to the age of my Onkyo receiver, or if it might be an HDMI cable issue. I did notice occasional drop in the both the audio AND video signal when playing an UHD Blu-Ray via my Xbox One S as well. It prompted me to try getting newer HDMI cables to see if that helped with the HDR content issue. Those haven't arrived yet, so I'm not sure if that would help solve either problem. The cables I'm using now are about 6 years old. Like I said, it's working about 99% of the time. It's just the audio hiccups and the video drop outs on HDR content that are a bit annoying. Just wondering if you had any other advice on what else I might look at to troubleshoot. Even though I got it to work I have a feeling that I might have the connections/settings out of whack. At the moment I have the cable box (HDMI port 1), the Onkyo (HDMI port 2, the eARC-labeled input) and the Xbox (HDMI Port 4) directly connected to the TV. With the old TV, I had the Cablebox connected to the Xbox passthru and that connected to the TV, but I didn't want to have the Xbox on to watch cable anymore. Do you think it would be better to plug the Cablebox and Xbox to the Onkyo inputs and then link that to the TV? Or would it matter? Thanks!

[@JonahMatthes]

eARC is known to have to issues like this. I think upgrading the cables was a good first move. If you keep having issue, I would definitely try switching the Cable Box and Xbox over to the Receiver to see if that makes a difference. If you keep having issues from there, then it could be due to the age of your receiver. Hope this helps!

[@andrethegiant2877]

Nice job kid. You speak very fluidly.

[@christianc.8063]

Thank you! This was exactly the information I was looking for! :)

[@sandyturner1911]

I just got a brand new Denon Ds217, and it has HDMI eArc, and HDMI. It also has Dolby Atmos, but you have to use HDMI eArc .My TV is fairly new, and it has that choice in the setup menu, too. No matter what I did, I couldn't get it to play sound, until I plugged in the Optical, but The Atmos doesn't work with Optical. Thanks for the video. I'm not Tech Ignorant, but normally, everything just works. My receiver had zero problems playing back, with eArc. But, most of the time, we just want a soundbar, with the Sub, for watching TV.

[@BrianDixonFTM]

Good job

[@tomconner3670]

Great video and thanks for being honest about making some mistakes. We all do and you corrected yours.

[@niteshpradhan2202]

I'm from India .your video is easy to understand

[@vidsbfree4me]

Good video! My next TV will definitely be eARC equipped which limits my current options due to budget constraints. Vizio yes, Hisense no unless you want a $1000 or more set. Just not sure it's worth it

[@geraldperry7779]

Thanks so much for this video best explanation on KZbin! I was waiting to purchase a eARC like the Sony 85" 900H, Sony said it will update to 2.1 end of the month. Would you say this best TV for price only Home Theater?

[@zZiL341yRj736]

So is ARC as good as a regular HDMI connected to my receiver for audio because I want my PS5 to connect straight to my TV not thru the old HDMI 1.4 on my receiver.

[@BKLNsF1nest]

What are the best HDMI cables for eARC? Thanks again for the great content and getting right to the point

[@prashanthcj]

Thanks a ton Jonah...you are a life saver...your videos are spot on and your in-depth analysis make so much sense for a layman like me. I am in the same boat as you...I have a 2017 Sony TV which only has HDMI ARC and I am looking to the buy the Sonos Arc...I was worried if I would even get Dolby Atmos content but your video was a sigh of relief. My TV still works great and I am not looking to buy one at least till next year...Do you know of any eARC adapters so that I can enjoy Atmos TruHD audio without needing to buy a new TV?

[@shelbyflf]

Im in the same boat as you sony 900e too what did you go with?

[@prashanthcj]

@@shelbyflf the process to get it working on my 900e was too complicated for me...so ended up buying a newer TV and then the arc

[@bobbysyed1]

Thanks for the detailed explanation, you made it so easy to understand . Is there anyway to see the volume level of Sonos arc on tv when connected with hdmi arc/earc. I can’t see the volume level, only visible on the phone app.

[@JonahMatthes]

I actually just went to my TV and got this working! 1st you’ll need to make sure HDMI CEC is enabled and working. Make sure it can recognize that a Sonos Arc is connected. Then for me, I went to my Vizio TV’s audio settings and enabled “Volume Control Display”. Now the volume shows up on the TV for the Sonos Arc. Hope this helps!

[@bobbysyed1]

Thanks so much. My Samsung TV has CEC on but can’t show volume control . Doesn’t even give me the option of displaying it on tv. I asked another you tuber Peter P who does extensive testing also confirmed his LG CX couldn’t display volume either .

[@kingtigi]

Great video! You have earned a new subscriber! In fact the reason I came across your video is because I have just recently bought a Sonos Arc and connected it to my PC/Desktop through HDMI eArc; At first it was working fine for a couple of days and all of a sudden it stopped for no apparent reason, I tried switching over to optical cable but no luck. I am currently using Windows 10 with the latest drivers and updates, my PC is also of the latest specs and updated so is my phone and Sonos app on it. I have no idea why the ARC isn't working with my PC even though it works just fine playing music from my phone. How did you get your ARC to work with your PC? Please help!

[@kokousic]

Very clearly explained. Love from India.

[@er1038]

Great vid! Thank you. Probably best to upgrade a receiver to have HDMI e/ARC. I was just given a old Harmon Kardon avr 134. And I think the SW needs repaired. Might just sell the entire lot.

[@marcgoldstein2957]

One of the clearest synopsis on the topic. Thank you! One question: you suggested plugging Apple TV into the receiver and not the TV? Can you elaborate on that?

[@1960jwh]

Excellent video -- great job with your technology descriptions and pro/con thoughts. One recommendation -- go back and fix the previous video that you corrected in this video. I had watched that video first -- had I not watched this I would have not know the corrected information. Regardless, excellent job!

[@matthewdavid9039]

You were great as The Deep in The Boys btw!

[@mahi...9863]

Hii David sir prise the lord . please reply me. I wanna talk to you .I'm waiting for your reply

[@kennethboss2549]

By the time I figure this out there will be a new cable?

[@Blackfeet]

😂

[@naveenraj7589]

Subscriber from india bro... Good.. nice points

[@ericlozen9631]

Good Job

[@youdodat2]

Good Job.

[@MrYayoperez]

Great video! What amps and TVs are coming with EARC?

[@ananyahome3499]

Hi Jonah, Thanks for great info on the video !I have a MiTV 4A pro with Souncore Infini pro soundbar and connected via HDMI Arc connection. At times , i see there won't be audio coming in at all and i need to restart my TV & Soundbar together. Settings like CEC is enabled already and it works like a charm . This is an intermittent issue. I don't think Soundbar directly has any issue as via Bluetooth , Soundbar plays awesome from a connected phone. What would be your suggestion here ??? Do you suggest i change the HDMI cable which came with the soundbar (I don't see that its even gold plated )

[@JaylinGant]

im confused so does the arc HDMI port just always send the audio/visual info? im trying to use a Sonos Amp with my tv which has an optical out and HDMI arc port...so if i just plugin the amp to the tv using an HDMI cord thats plugged into the arc port the amp will always pickup my TV audio? or do I need to use and optical to hdmi and then switch the sound output to optical on my tv for the amp to always be able to pickup my TV Audio

[@rolandgeorges960]

Well done, hard to find good info about the difference between ARC & eARC. Btw. Can a Roku smart soundbar use HDMI eARC on my Samsung TV eARC HDMI port?

[@sonictonic_]

You’re awesome. :)

[@MK1l]

I have a yamaha yas 209 it supports dts surround. Previously I had a Samsung tv with ARC and the surround option sounded horrible that I thought it was the sound bar. However I just upgraded to a Sony TV with e Arc and the sound quality massively improved.

[@dimoc2656]

Hey Man, what would happen if you use an HDMI splitter from an appletv to split the hdmi to one input for the sonos and another input for the tv?

[@MrTroutl]

Great vids Jonah. Are you aware of Roku issues where it wont connect to the receiver...and least for audio? I get the Roku screens visually...but no sound.