Go full PipeWire on Ubuntu 22.04 and all family derivatives

Ubuntu already has most of PipeWire running in the background and replacing pulseaudio with PipeWire is really, very easy.

Start a terminal and run the following commands:

sudo apt install pipewire-audio-client-libraries libspa-0.2-bluetooth libspa-0.2-jack wireplumber

This should also automatically remove pipewire-media-session, which is exactly what you want. Now run:

systemctl --user --now enable wireplumber.service

and finally, reboot your system to enjoy your new pipewire audio server.

reboot

If you need to use pipewire’s bluetooth server, remove the pulseaudio server with:

sudo apt remove pulseaudio-module-bluetooth

How to undo these changes:

First remove the requirements for pipewire:

sudo apt remove pipewire-audio-client-libraries libspa-0.2-bluetooth libspa-0.2-jack 

Then reinstall the original pipewire media session:

sudo apt install pipewire-media-session 

This command should also remove wireplumber.

systemctl --user --now enable pipewire-media-session

if you get an error that says failed to enable unit. The error should look like this:
“Failed to enable unit: File /home/buzz/.config/systemd/user/pipewire-session-manager.service already exists and is symlink to /usr/lib/systemd/user/wireplumber.service.”
That file will need to be removed.

rm ~/.config/systemd/user/pipewire-session-manager.service

New repeat the previoiusly failed command

systemctl --user --now enable pipewire-media-session

Restart pulseaudio services:

systemctl --user restart pulseaudio

Now just reboot and everything should come back as it was

reboot

If for some reason you still don’t have audio, do the following commands one at a time

sudo systemctl --global --now disable pipewire-pulse.service pipewire-pulse.socket 

systemctl --user --now reenable pulseaudio.service pulseaudio.socket

systemctl --user restart pulseaudio

reboot