HonkBoard: the soundboard that runs your Stream Deck

Find, edit, put it on a key

From sound site to Stream Deck key.

Search the web, capture a sound, trim it and put it on your Stream Deck without leaving HonkBoard. No need to open a separate browser, file explorer, audio editor, or the Elgato app. HonkBoard revolutionizes your soundboard workflow by putting it all in one powerful app.

1
Search and capture.

Search from HonkBoard's built-in browser. Sounds a page plays show up under Captured sounds, and one click adds them to your library. Or paste a link and keep just the seconds you want.

Only add audio you have the right to use.
2
Trim and tune it.

The new sound opens straight in the editor. Trim it, fade it, layer in another sound or record over it, add effects, then save.
3
Drop it on a key.

Drag it from the list onto your deck. The key picks up the sound's emoji and color and is live on the Stream Deck right away.

Downloads land in your Downloads inbox, and your sorting rules file them away.
Optional ad blocking in the built-in browser, off until you turn it on.

Performance

A fifth of the memory
vs. the Elgato app + Soundpad.

We ran the Elgato Stream Deck app and Soundpad side by side, then HonkBoard on its own, each driving the same two Stream Deck XLs on the same PC, and measured every process each one started.

Memory at idle MB, lower is better

Elgato app + Soundpad776

HonkBoard160

Processes at idle lower is better

Elgato app + Soundpad47

HonkBoard4

Measured October 17, 2026 on a Ryzen 7 5800X3D (16 threads) with 32 GB, Windows 11, each app driving the same two Stream Deck XLs, the Elgato app with the plugins its profile uses. Memory is private working set (Task Manager's "Memory"), averaged over 90 seconds at idle; HonkBoard was at 157 MB with mic mixing on.

Live FX

Bend any sound while it plays.

Pitch, speed, distortion and wobble, live, on everything that's playing. Drag a slider and let go: auto-center snaps it straight back to normal.

Auto-center per slider, so a quick pitch drop is one flick.
Glide from instant to very slow, so changes swoop instead of jumping, and the slider swoops with them.
On a key or a dial: hold a key for chipmunk, turn a Stream Deck+ dial for pitch.

HonkPlayer & Now Playing

Steer it while it plays.

Every playing sound gets its own card: drag to seek, click the time to start over, turn just that sound up or down. The queue crossfades like a DJ set, and you can reorder it or set each sound's volume before it starts.

HonkPlayer puts it all in its own window. Pin it on top so it stays over your game.
Play a whole category in order or shuffled, with up to 12 seconds of crossfade.
Scrub with Ctrl+scroll on any card or on HonkPlayer's waveform, which zooms in up to 1000× and keeps the playhead in sight.

Me and Others: what you hear and what your stream hears, each with its own volume, linked or not.
Hide what you don't need: categories, Live FX, volumes or the play mode.
Previous goes back a sound, even in the queue, without piling songs back into it.

Play modes

Stack them, swap them, or line them up.

Pick how a new sound behaves when something is already playing, switch with one click (or a Stream Deck key), and decide what pressing a playing sound again does.

Stack

Every sound plays on top of the others. Spam away.

One at a time

A new sound replaces the last one, cutting or crossfading.

Queue

New sounds wait their turn, then play back to back with a crossfade.

Crossfade up to 12 sPause & resume fadesPress again: stop, restart, or another copyPlay to Me, Others or bothKeys: play, toggle, play/pause, add to queueHold a key: loop, play while held, repeatPlay a category in order or shuffled

Instant replay & editor

Clip the moment. Keep every track.

Instant replay keeps the last stretch of your mic and desktop audio in memory. One key saves it as a sound, with each source on its own track. Then trim it, layer it, fade it, and export it however you like.

HonkBoard's editor with three layered tracks and the sound and effects panel

A real multi-track editor: trim, fades, gain, speed, EQ and effects.
Record a layer from your mic, your desktop or what others hear.

Export mixed, each track as its own file, or one multichannel WAV.
Nothing touches disk until you save: the replay lives in memory.

Phone & tablet remote

Your Stream Deck, on your phone.

Scan a QR code and your phone becomes a remote: the same keys with the same pictures, plus your whole sound library. Nothing to install, it opens in the phone's browser. Turn it sideways and the whole deck fits the screen.

Text to speech

Natural AI voices, running on your PC.

Type it, press Enter, and HonkBoard says it into your mic like any other sound. The optional natural voices (28 English voices, a one-time 350 MB download) run right on your computer: no account, and your text never leaves your PC.

A type-and-say box that pops up over your game.
From a key or a hotkey, each with its own voice, speed and who hears it.

Quick search

Type it, hit Enter, it plays.

One hotkey pops up a search box over whatever you're doing. Start typing a sound's name and press Enter. Ctrl+Enter plays it only to you; Shift+Enter keeps the box open for the next one.

Switching is easy

Bring your Soundpad library in one click.

HonkBoard finds your Soundpad library and brings every sound across, with its categories and play counts. Your files stay right where they are.

Any other soundboard too: point HonkBoard at the folder your sounds live in, and sub-folders become categories.
Your Stream Deck profiles come along: pages, folders, keys, hotkeys and multi-actions.
Setup walks you through it the first time you open HonkBoard: your Soundpad library, a folder, the free sounds and your Stream Deck profiles.

The import window: a Soundpad library of 368 sounds in 3 categories, ready to import, and importing from any folder

Sorting rules & tidy files

A library that sorts itself.

Rules work like email rules and read like sentences. New downloads land in an inbox and move where they belong. Turn on Organize files and the folders on your disk follow your categories too.

Sorting rules: three rules written as sentences, two of them switched on

Organize files: a preview of 56 sound files moving into folders that match the categories

Match on anything: name, length, where it came from, artist, album, genre, year, plays.
Suggest rules proposes a starting set from your library, and you preview before anything moves.

Folders match categories, sub-categories become sub-folders, with a preview first.
Undo, put files back, and a 90-day log: nothing is ever overwritten.

Stream Deck

Every key, every dial, set up out of the box.

HonkBoard talks to your Stream Deck over USB and draws every key itself. Setup can build you a ready-made layout: the 55 free sounds in folders, Now Playing and Up Next keys, Live FX, the voice changer, instant replay, a multi-action, a timer and a clock. On Stream Deck+ the dials scrub, pick from the queue and set the volume of what's playing.

The example layout on a Stream Deck + XL: 36 keys and six dials

The example layout on a Stream Deck +: eight keys and four dials

The example layout on a 15-key Stream Deck

61 key actionsPages, folders, profiles that switch with your gameDrag a page number to swap pagesDrag a box to pick keysLong-press & double-pressMulti-actionsTime on any sound keyScreensaverUndo history that names every change

Integrations

Plays nice with the rest of your setup.

Voicemeeter

Keys that press Macro Buttons, toggle a strip or bus (mute, A1, B1…), change a volume, or run a script. Keys light up when it's on in Voicemeeter, and the voice changer can press a Macro Button as it turns on or off.

Stream Deck plugins Experimental

Install Stream Deck and OpenAction plugins into HonkBoard and use their keys and dials, property inspectors included. Plugins are made by others and follow their own licenses.

When you import, keys from OBS, Discord, Voicemeeter, Spotify, Voicemod, Win Tools and ShadowPlay plugins can switch to built-in controls, so they work without the plugin. It's your choice: switch them all, keep the plugin keys, or pick for each kind.

Having trouble with a plugin? Email [email protected] and tell us which one.

Home Assistant

Turn anything in Home Assistant on or off, run scenes and scripts, press buttons, trigger automations. Keys light up while it's on and can show a value, like a light's brightness or the room temperature, and a Stream Deck+ dial dims a light.

Philips Hue

Lights, rooms and zones on, off, brighter or dimmer, and scenes, from a key or a dial. Pair with the button on your bridge; everything stays on your home network.

OBS Studio

Scenes, sources, recording, streaming and the replay buffer.

Discord

Mute, deafen and more, from a key.

NVIDIA ShadowPlay

Save a replay, record, screenshot.

Per-app audio

Send any app's sound to a different output, or turn just that app up or down.

Any media player

Spotify, browser tabs, VLC: see the song and its art on a key, play and pause.

MIDI controllers

Pads play, knobs and faders turn like Stream Deck+ dials.

OSC

Trigger anything from other apps and devices.

Hotkeys & clicks

Press or hold keys, type text, media keys, and an autoclicker.

Voice changer

Thirty-plus voices for your mic.

Robot, demon, chipmunk, radio, cave, hard tune and more, live on your microphone for everyone hearing Others. Tweak any of them and save your own.

The voice changer: voices grouped as Pitch, Auto-tune, Creatures, Machines and Places, with a Tweak panel

Categories & sub-categories

Categories inside categories, as deep as you like.

Drag a category onto another to tuck it inside, or between two to move it. Fold them away, give each its own color and icon, and play a parent to hear everything inside it.

Icons and colors on every category, from HonkBoard's icon library or your own pictures.
A parent plays its own sounds and everything below it, in order or shuffled.
Add a folder and its sub-folders become sub-categories in one go.
Files can follow: turn on Organize files and sub-categories become sub-folders on disk.
Each category remembers its view: tiles or list, size and sort.

The category tree: Free sound effects holding Game (with Announcer and Results inside), Callouts, Jingles and Effects (with Sci-fi inside), each in its own color

Library

Make your library look like yours.

Colors, pictures and emoji on every sound, categories inside categories, tags and album art read from your files, and every view remembers how you like it.

The sound library: the free sound effects as colorful tiles with emoji, grouped in Game, Callouts, Jingles and Effects sub-categories

Make it yours

Your buttons. Your colors. Your tiles.

Move the player buttons around or hide the ones you never press, pick one of 20 themes or mix your own, and choose how every sound tile looks. Change things right where they are: right-click the buttons and the editor opens on top of them.

Settings, Appearance: twenty color themes plus Custom, and the player buttons in a three by two grid you can drag to rearrange — **20 themes and a button grid.** Drag buttons to swap them, drop one on Hidden to hide it.

The Now Playing bar in the Honk theme, lime to cyan — Honk

The Now Playing bar in the Lava theme, red to orange — Lava

The Now Playing bar in the Sunset theme, orange to pink — Sunset

The Now Playing bar in the Ocean theme, sky blue to indigo — Ocean

The Now Playing bar in the Violet theme, purple to pink — Violet

The Now Playing bar in the Candy theme, pink to blue — Candy

Customize a sound: color, picture, emoji, where its name and length sit and how big, flat or shaded, and buttons to share the look with its Stream Deck keys

Every tile your way: put the name and length at the top, the bottom or nowhere, at the size you like, shaded or flat. Set it for the whole library or one sound.
Keys and tiles match: copy a sound's look onto its Stream Deck keys, or a key's picture back onto the sound.
A preview that's the real thing: changes show on a tile the size of yours before you commit.
Each page remembers whether it shows tiles or a list.
HonkPlayer your way: hide categories, Live FX, the volumes or the waveform.

Zoom

Zoooooooom.
As all things should.

Make the whole app smaller to fit more on screen, or bigger to read it from across the room. Everything scales together, crisp at every size, from 50% to 250%. The main window and HonkPlayer each remember their own size.

HonkBoard at 80%: the whole sound library fits on screen — **80%** Everything at a glance

HonkBoard at 150%: big tiles and big text — **150%** Big and easy to hit

Click, scroll or press a key: the − and + buttons next to the window buttons, the scroll wheel over them, or Ctrl+= and Ctrl+-.
Even steps: 10% at a time up to 150%, then 175, 200, 225 and 250%.

And everything else

Holds your push-to-talk

HonkBoard holds your game's talk key for exactly as long as a sound plays to others.

Ducks your other apps

Game and music volume dip while a sound plays, then come back.

Even loudness

Auto-level makes a whisper and an air horn play at about the same volume.

Profiles follow your game

Your deck switches layouts when a different app comes to the front.

Share it

Send a category, every category, or a whole deck layout with its sounds and the pictures you put on it.

55 free sounds

Announcer lines, game calls, jingles and effects, free to use anywhere (CC0), ready on day one.

Safe by default

Daily backups you can restore by day, and confirmations with counts before anything is removed.

English & Español

Every screen translated. HonkBoard follows your Windows language.

Light on your PC

Choose how often meters and progress bars update, and nothing updates while HonkBoard is minimized.