How to complete the Audio Only challenge in Phasmophobia

You have to listen closely to finish this one.

The player holding and using a Parabolic Microphone during the Audio Only Phasmophobia challenge.
Screenshot by Dot Esports

Every themed weekly trial in Phasmophobia tests your ghost-hunting abilities in a unique way, and the Audio Only challenge is all about sound-based equipment. You have to always be listening and paying close attention to successfully finish this trial.

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With missing equipment, an emphasis on noise, and a massive map to navigate, this can be a pretty tricky challenge to work through. Here’s what you need to know to complete the Audio Only challenge in Phasmophobia.

What is the Audio Only challenge in Phasmophobia?

The description for the Audio Only challenge in Phasmophobia.
Get ready to listen. Screenshot by Dot Esports

The Audio Only challenge is one of Phasmophobia’s special weekly trials you can attempt. Finishing any weekly trial nets you 5,000 experience and $5,000 cash, which means you should always try to tackle them when you can to level up fast and unlock special Phasmophobia achievements.

Audio Only Phasmophobia challenge rules

Tackling Audio Only isn’t easy, but it’s a lot less daunting when you know the exact rules this challenge has before you jump into it. Most of the special modifiers for this trial are focused on the overarching sound theme.

  • You have to complete this trial on the Sunny Meadows Mental Institution map.
    • Make sure you select regular Sunny Meadows and not Sunny Meadows Restricted.
  • There is a five-minute grace period you can use to set up without worrying about any pesky early hunters before the five minutes are up.
  • The fuse box is broken, which means the power is permanently off.
  • There are no Cursed Possessions you can use.
  • You’re missing a lot of equipment, including Sanity Medication, Incense, Crucifixes, Salt, UV Light, Thermometers, EMF Readers, Tripods, and Video Cameras.
  • You have a variety of equipment across all three Tiers.
    • Tier I: Igniter and Head Gear.
    • Tier II: Firelight, Motion Sensor, Photo Camera, Ghost Writing Book, DOTS Projector, and Flashlight.
    • Tier III: Parabolic Microphone, Sound Sensor, and Spirit Box.
All equipment for the Audio Only Phasmophobia challenge.
Not a bad selection at all. Screenshot by Dot Esports

How to complete the Audio Only Phasmophobia weekly challenge

To complete the Audio Only challenge in Phasmophobia, you must identify the ghost present at Sunny Meadows with the challenge mode active a total of three times.

When this trial is featured, you have a week to attempt it before a different one rotates in. All challenge modes come back from time to time, so if you don’t get it this time, you can always try again later. There’s nothing to lose since all equipment is provided for free, so try this challenge as much as you can when it’s active.

Phasmophobia Audio Only challenge tips

All weekly challenge modes in Phasmophobia can be difficult in one way or another, and Audio Only is an especially tough one to work through, so here are some tips to help you complete it.

Ghost hunt with other players

Sunny Meadows is arguably the most massive, confusing, and terrifying map Phasmophobia has to offer, which makes trying to complete this challenge alone very difficult. Because of this, you should tackle Audio Only with other players, whether those players are friends or random ghost hunters you match with in the lobby.

Ghost hunting with other players is one of the best tips and tricks for Phasmophobia since you have a massive advantage when you have others helping you.

Make an equipment pile by the door

This tip is a bit of a sneaky cheat, but it’s super useful for making the most of your time. Start each attempt at this challenge by bringing most or all of your equipment to the front door and piling it up there. Doing so saves you a ton of time down the line since you don’t have to waste precious seconds walking from the front door back to the truck.

The time it takes to navigate from the front door to the truck might not seem like much, but since you have no protection items and no power to keep your sanity high, you need to finish this trial as quickly as possible. This small change in how you use equipment ends up saving you many minutes by the end of the challenge, which increases your overall chances of success.

A pile of equipment by the door in Phasmophobia.
This saves you so much time. Screenshot by Dot Esports

Run, don’t hide

If you find yourself the victim of an unwelcome ghost hunt, always choose to run rather than hide if you can. I always find running to be the most effective option for escaping a ghost hunt, and this is especially true when you’re on a massive map like Sunny Meadows where it’s easy to loop around and continuously run from the ghost.

Check the truck cameras

Since you have no Video Cameras to work with in this audio-focused trial, you might be wondering how you can check for Ghost Orbs. There’s no way to rule them out with certainty, but you can use the truck cameras to view a total of eight locations around the map.

You might get lucky and spot Ghost Orbs, which means you’ll know one evidence piece and exactly where the ghost room is. But even if you don’t get lucky, you might spot something helpful like an open door or a thrown object to point you in the right direction.

The screen in the truck during the Audio Only Phasmophobia challenge.
Hopefully, the cameras give you some useful intel. Screenshot by Dot Esports

Update your journal often

You can die in this challenge and technically still complete it as long as you pick the right ghost, so try to keep your ghost selection in the journal updated as you learn new information. This will likely change often as you test out different equipment or experience more ghost events, but do your best to keep an updated guess circled to increase your odds of success if you end up being caught during a hunt.

If you’re unsure when to change your answer and what to look out for, keep an eye on the ghost’s general personality. When the ghost seems unusually shy, you might select Shade as your main guess, while a ghost that seems far too eager to hunt and sought you out a lot sooner than expected might mean you want to keep Demon circled.

Keeping your journal up to date is easier when you watch for general ghost patterns as you would in tougher challenges like No Evidence, Detectives Only, and Apocalypse, so you can also use the same methods from other trials to make this one easier.

Author
Image of Kacee Fay
Kacee Fay
Staff Writer at Dot Esports covering new releases and a wide array of topics including Minecraft, Disney Dreamlight Valley, Phasmophobia, general gaming, streaming, and more. She has been avidly writing and gaming her whole life and now spends her time combining the two. Kacee graduated from San Diego State University in 2021 with a Bachelor’s Degree in English and a Certificate in Creative Editing and Publishing. She then joined Dot Esports as a Freelance Writer in 2022 before transitioning to a Staff Writer in 2023. In her spare time, she enjoys buying more books than she can read, gaming alone or with friends, drinking too much tea, attending concerts, fangirling over movies and television, listening to music, and spending time with her family, friends, and pets, who are the most important parts of her world.