Proximity Voice Chat for Your BeamMP Server

Connect Voice is proximity voice chat built into every paid BeamMP server on Connect Hosting. Players hear each other by where their cars are: full volume up close, fading with distance, silent across the map. It's one switch in your dashboard, there's nothing for you to install, and nothing for your players to download. An optional CB radio sits on top for convoys and roleplay.

This guide covers turning it on, what each setting does, how your players use it, and the few things worth telling them before they ask.

Before you start

• Paid BeamMP servers only. Voice is included with every paid plan at no extra cost. On a free server the switch is greyed out with an upgrade note — the free tier isn't open for voice yet.
• Your server needs to be running. The switch is disabled while the server is stopped.
• The first time you switch it on, your server restarts once (about 20 seconds). BeamMP only registers new plugin folders at startup, so the very first install needs a boot. Every change after that — range, mode, radio, off and on again — applies live with nobody kicked.

Turning voice chat on

1. Open your server in the dashboard and go to the Voice Chat tab.
2. Choose Proximity or Server-wide (you can change this later, live).
3. If your server offers a choice of voice server (Frankfurt, Virginia or Sydney), the nearest one to your game server is already selected. Pick a different one only if you know your players are elsewhere — it's fixed while voice is on, so this is the moment to decide.
4. Flip the Proximity Voice Chat switch. On the first enable the dashboard warns you about the one-time restart before you click.

Within a few seconds the card shows Live, and the Status panel on the right fills in: voice on, your range, the voice region, and "Game server link — Connected" once the plugin on your server has checked in. That last line is the one to watch if anything seems off; it means your server and the voice server are talking.

From that point, every player who joins gets the small voice mod with the rest of your server's resources (it's 5 KB) and can type /voice in chat for their link.

Proximity or server-wide

Proximity is the default and the reason the feature exists. Everyone within 30 metres hears each other at full volume; voices fade out until they go silent at 100 metres. Voices also come from the right direction, so a car pulling up on your left sounds like it's on your left. A conversation across the car park stays out of your ear, and a busy server doesn't turn into one giant Discord call.

Adjust range under the switch lets you change both numbers. Some starting points:

Save applies to everyone on the server immediately, mid-session.

Server-wide means everyone hears everyone at the same volume, wherever they are, with no direction. It's the right choice for a small friends-only server or an organised race where everyone should hear the caller. Two things to know: it uses noticeably more bandwidth on a busy server, because every player receives every other player, and the CB radio has nothing left to do while it's on (the dashboard says so).

Switching between the two is instant and nobody is disconnected.

How your players use it

The dashboard's How your players use it card is written to be copied straight into a Discord pin. The short version:

1. Join the server as normal. The voice mod arrives automatically. A small panel appears in the corner of the game showing who's nearby and whether their mic is on.
2. Type /voice in chat. The server replies with a link and puts it on the clipboard. The game will try to open it, and that attempt often opens BeamNG's own in-game window, which cannot use a microphone. The reliable instruction is: paste the link into Chrome, Firefox or Edge, press "Turn on voice chat", and allow the microphone when the browser asks. The prompt can pop up behind the game.
3. Just talk. Voice activity is the default, so there's no key to hold. A Mute microphone key can be bound under Options › Controls (search for "Connect Voice"), and there's a mute button on the page too. /voice hud hides or shows the in-game panel.

The browser tab is the microphone. Players can leave it open behind the game: it remembers them, reconnects on its own next session, and follows them between Connect servers. When they leave the server the tab notices and disconnects within a few seconds.

Why a browser tab and not something in-game?

Because BeamNG's mod sandbox doesn't let mods use a microphone, by design, and it's a good design: it's the reason a downloaded mod can't listen to you. Everyone doing voice in BeamNG needs a second process outside the game for the same reason, and the choice was between a program to install and a web page. A page needs no download, works on any operating system, updates itself, and can't be out of date. Playback, positions and the in-game panel all run inside the game; only the mic lives in the tab.

Managing who's talking

The In voice now card lists everyone connected to your server's voice room, with how long they've been on. Mute next to a name silences them for the whole room, and it holds: they can't unmute themselves. Mute again to lift it. Players who've left the server but still have the tab open show dimmed, and drop off on their own.

Voice is public to your server

Treat voice like text chat: anyone on your server can hear it. Proximity decides what a player hears by default, but it is not a privacy boundary. On a public server, assume anything said in voice can be heard by anyone on that server. If your community needs private conversations, that's what a password-protected or whitelisted server is for.

CB Radio (optional)

Once voice is on, the CB Radio switch below it adds a radio on top. It's for convoys, trucking servers and roleplay, and it works differently from proximity on purpose:

• Channels 1–40, like a real CB. Players start on channel 19, the trucker channel. Anyone coming from ETS2 or ATS will feel at home.
• Range is 5 km by default (set it under "Adjust range and starting channel"; 0 means the whole map). Distance doesn't make the radio quieter, it makes it worse: the signal breaks up into static as a driver falls behind, and cuts out at the edge. Staying in convoy actually matters.
• Channel 9 reaches the whole map regardless of range, like the real emergency channel.
• Hold to talk. The radio transmit key, channel up/down and on/off are bound under Options › Controls (search for "Radio").
• No keybinds needed. /radio 19 tunes a channel, /radio off switches the set off, /radio who lists who's on air, /radio hud puts the CB display on screen, /radio help lists the rest. /cb works as an alias.

Turning voice off turns the radio off with it. In server-wide mode the radio is redundant, since everyone already hears everyone.

Quick reference

In-game commands for players: /voice (or /vc) for the link, /voice hud to hide the panel, /radio 19, /radio off, /radio who, /radio hud, /radio help.

If something isn't working, see Voice chat troubleshooting. For the rest of the panel, see Understanding your BeamMP server panel.