Discord is a rather popular desktop and phone app used by many people for all sorts of things. You can set up a discord server and get the ability to talk to people using text, voice or video chat. 

Discord also offers a slew of other features, including screen sharing. While these features work most of the time flawlessly, you can run into a few issues here and there.

In this article, we’re discussing the black screen issue you can sometimes get when trying to share your screen on Discord.

Also read: Teamspeak vs Discord: Which one should you use and why?

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What causes this Discord screen share black screen issue?

This is a common issue seen when trying to record or stream screens, especially with dual GPU machines (read: laptops). The main reason for this glitch is that Discord and the app or screen you’re trying to cast are running on different GPUs.

Laptops have two GPUs in them. One is a low power onboard GPU that drives the screen and takes care of less demanding tasks, and then there’s the power-hungry dedicated GPU that lets you play games and do the other heavy lifting. Having this dual GPU system allows laptops to be more energy-efficient and have longer battery life. 

However, this doesn’t mean that you’ll only face this issue on laptops. Some other causes for the glitch include:

• Dissimilar permissions: If either of the programs (Discord and the program you’re trying to stream) is running with admin privileges and the other is not, it can cause this issue.
• Fullscreen mode: Sometimes, running a fullscreen program can cause black screen glitches when trying to stream the same in Discord.
• Using the Latest Technologies option: Discord has a new setting called Latest Technologies to make screen sharing better. However, sometimes this setting can cause this issue as well. 

Also read: How to add a music bot to Discord?

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11 ways to fix the Discord screen share black screen issue

Here are 11 methods you can try out to fix Discord screen share black screen error.

Run Discord with admin privileges 

Aforementioned, this issue can be triggered by permission conflicts. Try running Discord with admin privileges to see if that solves your problem.

Step 1: Press the Windows key and search for Discord.

Step 2: Right-click on Discord and click Run as administrator. 

Make sure that the program you’re trying to stream is running with admin privileges as well, and try sharing your screen again. 

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Disable the ‘Latest Technologies’ setting

Try disabling the latest technologies setting in Discord to check if using the legacy method solves your issue.

Step 1: Open Discord and click on the settings icon in the bottom left.

Step 2: Head over to the Voice & Video section on the left.

Step 3: Scroll down and disable the Use our latest technologies to capture your screen option. 

Also read: How to create a Discord bot?

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Switch to Windowed/Borderless mode

Streaming programs running in the fullscreen mode can often cause black screen issue with many screen streaming/recording programs, let alone Discord.

To get around this issue, try switching your program to a windowed or borderless mode to check if Discord can now see it and stream your screen.

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Disable Aero Theme

If, for some reason, you’re still using Windows 7 or any other version of Windows that runs Aero themes, try disabling them to check if your issue is resolved. Aero themes have been known to cause problems with a bunch of programs over the years. 

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Clear out the Discord cache

Clearing out Discord’s cache and files will force the program to redownload them and eliminate any corrupt files that may be causing this issue in the process. 

Step 1: Open the Run prompt using Windows Key + R, type in %appdata% and hit enter.

Step 2: Delete the discord folder in the directory.

Now repeat these steps with %localappdata% and restart Discord.

Also read: How to log out of Discord?

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Update your graphics drivers

An out of date graphics driver can cause all sorts of issues with programs and performance on your PC and could well be the culprit in this situation. 

Step 1: Press Windows key + R to open the Run prompt. Type in devmgmt.msc and hit enter.

Step 2: Scroll down to find Display adaptors — double click to expand and see all your graphics cards.

Step 3: Right-click on your graphics cards and select Update driver.

Step 4: Select Search automatically for updated driver software. Windows will automatically download and install any updates is available. 

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Disable Hardware acceleration

If you’re trying to stream a Chrome window on Discord, Chrome’s hardware acceleration settings can cause the screen share black screen error. Here’s how you can disable them.

Head over to chrome://settings/system. Make sure that the hardware acceleration setting is turned off.

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Reset your DNS and network settings

Sometimes, it could simply be an internet issue. You can try to resolve this by clearing out your DNS cache. Follow these steps.

Step 1: Press Windows key + R and type in cmd and hit enter.

Step 2: Type in the following commands to reset DNS settings to default.

ipconfig /flushdns
ipconfig /renew

If you’re on a mac, head over to your terminal and type in sudo killall -HUP mDNSResponder. 

Also read: How to use Discord on PS4?

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Update Windows

Another reason you might be facing this issue is potential bugs in Windows. Make sure you are running the latest Windows update to rule out any OS related issues. 

Step 1: Press Windows key + I to get to Windows settings. Click on Update & Security.

Step 2: Install any updates if available, restart your PC and try again. 

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Update Discord

The issue you’re facing may have already been fixed in an update you haven’t installed yet. Once you’ve launched Discord, press Ctrl + R. Discord will restart and download any pending updates and probably fix the Discord screen share black screen error.

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Reinstall Discord

If none of the above-mentioned methods worked for you, your last resort is to reinstall Discord. Here’s how.

Step 1: Right-click on the taskbar and click on Task Manager.

Step 2: Under the Processes tab, find any running Discord processes and close them by right-clicking them and selecting End Process. 

Step 3: Once you’ve ended all running Discord processes, we’re going to remove Discord. To do so, press Windows key + X to bring up the quick access menu. Select Apps and Features from this menu.

Step 4: Find Discord in the list, click on it and select Uninstall. 

Now head over to the Discord website to download the latest version of the program and install it on your PC. This should fix the Discord screen share black screen error.

Also read: How to fix Discord Javascript error?