Audio and video out of sync (Riverside etc.)

If your sound runs slightly ahead of the picture in Riverside or a similar recording or calling app, it's worth knowing where the drift comes from. The footage from FaceReady isn't itself out of sync — the picture and sound leave in step. The lag creeps in downstream, in how the recording app buffers a processed camera alongside your microphone. That's also why it's fixable from your side.

Why it happens

A processed camera takes a touch longer to deliver each frame than a raw webcam does, because the picture is being worked on live. Recording apps buffer audio and video separately, and on a busy machine or a shaky connection those two buffers can drift apart. The bigger and heavier the video stream, the more room there is for that drift.

Drop FaceReady to 720p

This is the single most effective fix. A 720p stream is lighter for the downstream app to buffer, which keeps sound and picture together. In FaceReady, turn HD off so it outputs 720p instead of 1080p. For a recorded interview the difference in picture is hard to spot, but the sync gets much steadier.

Close heavy background apps

Sync drift gets worse when your computer is stretched. Quit anything hungry you don't need during the recording — other browsers with lots of tabs, video editors, big downloads — so the recording app has the headroom to keep the two streams aligned.

Use a wired connection

For calls and cloud recording tools like Riverside, a patchy network is a common culprit. Plug into Ethernet if you can, rather than Wi-Fi. A steady connection means the app isn't constantly catching up, which is when audio and video slip apart.