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Lossless audio formats

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WAV (.wav) The WAV format is nothing more than a digital recording of real sounds, sounds that come from a source outside the PC. With WAV music, drums, piano, guitar, bass or vocals are heard the same, no matter what computer the file is played on (with the same acoustic quality of hardware components, of course).

DSD (DFF, .Dsf) are used in digital media such as Super Audio CDs. Sampling quality is very high (variable sampling rate is approximately 64 times higher than for audio CDs), although according to several operators in this sector, it must be absolutely determined whether the final quality is higher than the sampling quality. PCM (used in high quality Blu-Ray and DVD Audio). I can reproduce free readers like Foobar 2000 or AIMP on our computer.

AIFF (.aif). It’s the Apple audio format used by Apple for Mac. It’s basically the WAV equivalent used by Windows.

APE (Mono Audio; .ape): Ordinary with a loss that allows us to reduce by about 50% the space occupied by our music (in some cases even more), without losing quality. In this way, an album that takes up about 600 MB in wav format averages 300 MB (much more than about 100 MB of high-speed mpc and 60 mp3 mp3, but the quality is the same as the original); On average, I speak because there are certain types of music where the level of compression is even higher. You can use WinAmp plug-ins to listen to songs in this format, or better yet, a player that uses it natively as Foobar 2000. Right now, it’s probably the best lossless codec, considering the balance between speed and compression (Click here for a lossless comparison table) format.)

Apple Lossless Audio Codec – ALAC (.m4a) This is a lossless audio codec created by Apple a few years ago and available as an open source from Apple since October 2011. Some programs support it in Windows (encoded). , including DbPowerAmp.

FLAC (.flac): a very popular open source format. It used to be very popular (among music purists), but some space has been lost with the MonkeyAudio bee format, which allows for better compression in the same quality. Compared to others, it always came in .ape format (but also after WavPack).

LA (Lossless Audio: .la): The lossless format that compresses the most. Conversion to this format is very slow, but achieves the best compression in history (for example, MonkeyAudio, this album would take up about 290 MB compared to 300 MB in APE). This is not widespread, as some MB obtained on a bee is not worth the long wait (and less support from third-party programs), but it is the winner of my lossless format comparison.

OPTIM FROG (.ofr) – Excellent lossless codec, best after LA as compressibility. Compression, when set to slightly high levels, is about 3 times slower than Monkey Audio and the gain in MB is about 2%. Like all other formats on this site, you can listen without the addition of Foobar 2000.

WAVPACK (.wv, wvc) – is a valid open source compression format that allows lossless, lossy and hybrid results. The compression rate is high and the compression is good. Another interesting hybrid format is that the lossy file is merged with another file, which allows you to completely restore the original file without loss in case we want to restore it.

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Guide to fully understand lossless formats

They end with a period followed by three or four letters. This is what happens with absolutely all the files on a computer or smartphone. Those last letters represent the format in which this file is. Today we are going to focus on one type of format, the lossless format.

What is a lossless format?

Any element in a computer has to have some type of format, or so to speak, some type of structure that is known by that computer so that it can work with the file. In a parallelism with the world of physical objects, the format would be something like the material with which said object is constructed.

Just as there are different materials with different properties, there are also different formats with different characteristics. Most of the files we use today have a compressed format, so they take up less space on our computer and are easier to send via the Internet, or to upload to any social network. However, these formats are not the highest quality, since this position would be occupied by formats without loss. These formats retain the original quality of the file, and offer the best results.

If we talk about images, the lossless formats are RAW, BMP and PNG, among others. Meanwhile, the compressed formats are JPG and GIF. However, there are certain differences with some of them. RAW, for example, stores all the light data captured by the camera’s sensor. It is a perfect format for photographers. But it would not even be for photographers who want to share a certain photograph on a social network. A RAW photo can easily take up to 25 MB, depending on the resolution of the camera. A high-quality JPG photo would be a photograph that would take two or three megabytes, although it would have less quality.

If we talk about audio, there are three main lossless formats: WAV, FLAC and ALAC. The latter is the one used by Apple in iTunes. They are formats that do not lose anything of quality with respect to the original audio. Yes we would be losing quality with the MP3 and the OGG.

And if we talk about video, there are few lossless formats that we can talk about. In fact, there is a problem, and that is that storing videos without loss would be an impossible task for anyone without a storage server nearby. That is why we usually opt for MKV, WMV, and H.264 formats. Of course, the latter is much better, since the compression process it carries is much more intelligent.

Compression, how does it work?

Now, what is this about compressed formats? As its name suggests, we are talking about formats that reduce files, and we can rely on it to fully understand how these formats work. Surely we have all been in the situation of having to pack a suitcase with just enough space, finish choosing all the clothes that we are going to take on a trip, and finally having to decide what we can do without in order to close the suitcase, because we had too many clothes. Well, that is the compression of each of the formats. They remove elements from that file, and thus make it weigh or occupy less.

Why are there different formats? Returning to the case of the suitcase, each person will make different decisions regarding those things that they can do without for their trip. It will vary from person to person. The same goes for formats. The developers of these reduce the space occupied by a file, but each of the formats removes data in a different way, so that a file compressed to JPG, can be different from one GIF, even if both are compressed. Each of them has followed a different procedure to delete the data, and that the song, image, or video, continues to play practically the same as the original version.

When to convert from compression to lossless?

The question at the top of this paragraph is especially important to anyone who has ever converted a file from a compressed format to a lossless format. And it is that, in reality, it is cheating, because you should never convert a file from a compressed format to a lossless file. Actually, nothing happens if we do, but we will not improve the quality of that file, even if it will now be available in a format in which the files are not compressed.

Of course, it is also not a good idea to convert a file in a compressed format to a different compressed format. Keep in mind that each compression process is different depending on the chosen format. In other words, each format eliminates the data it considers appropriate to maintain the quality of the image. If we have a file in a compressed format, this will mean that it no longer preserves all the original data. If we now convert it to a different compressed format, the compression process will remove new data from the file, and chances are we have a much more corrupted file.

What are digital audio formats

Digital audio formats are basically containers. And the differences between them are fundamentally in:

Whether or not they are compressed.

If they are compressed, in the quality of compression.

The type of labeling they can support.
Digital audio formats

MP3

It is the best known, popular and most widely used. They are known by their “.mp3” extension.

It was developed by Moving Picture Experts Group, so that it was part of the well-known MPEG-1 and MPEG-2 standards.

Its fundamental characteristic resides in the fact that the technology behind it performs a compression of the sound sequence, resulting in a really small file, which normally occupies half of the original file. To achieve this, the loss of certain sounds is necessary, which supposedly cannot be heard by the human ear.

Audio formats

WAV

Developed by the Microsoft and IBM companies, this format, whose name comes from the acronym WAVE (Waveform Aujdio File Format), is currently one of the audio formats that do not have compression in the data, therefore they present an excellent quality.

They are known by their “.wav” extension.

On the other hand, this format has the peculiarity that it includes support for almost all current audio codecs. This makes WAV one of the most widely used formats in the field of professional sound, since the sound is captured with parameters of 44100 Hz and at 16 bits, the same quality can be obtained as on a CD.

On the contrary, one of the disadvantages of this format is that it has a limitation in recording, since it can only capture a maximum of 6.6 hours in the same file at maximum quality.

Audio formats

AIFF

The AIFF (Audio Interchange File Format) format is very similar to WAV. It was born as an answer from Apple to Microsoft’s WAV, being initially only compatible with MAC computers. Currently it can also be used in Windows.

Due to its characteristics, AIFF, together with FLAC and WAV, are usually the most widely used formats in the professional field of audio.

WMA

The WMA (Windows Media Audio) format is a music file format created by Microsoft.

One of its main characteristics is that those files that have been compressed in WMA format take up less space than MP3 files, which also implies a reduction in their quality. Therefore, it is a lossy audio compression format.

OGG

OGG audio formats are compressed audio files, which means that they have a size that allows them to be transmitted via WIFI, but at the same time they avoid the damages that are usually generated in the compression process.

For example, Spotify uses these OGG formats.

Audio formats

FLAC

When we talk about the FLAC (Free Lossless Audio Codec) format, we are referring to a codec free of audio compression and without loss of quality.

Emerged within the community responsible for the OGG project, FLAC has become one of the WAV format’s strongest competitors, due to its advantages in terms of sound quality.

Its objective is to reduce the size of the original file, eliminating data that is usually known as “waste”, without causing loss of quality.

This is the format used by the Tidal platform, the best high quality audio streaming service.

Digital Music: A Quick Guide to Having the Best Lossless Files

Digital Music

Surely changing our music from one side to the other, from an analog format to a digital one or even music already stored in digital format on a compact disc towards one for use on mobile devices, would result in a loss of sound quality that would exceed convenience and comfort.

This has been the main vision of people who care about sound quality, since the concept of digital music files was born. A reference generated by the common use of highly compressed lossy formats such as MP3.

wHowever, it is an opinion that simply “cannot take any more water.” Yes, popular formats like MP3 and AAC sacrifice some quality to keep file sizes small, but the emergence of lossless digital audio formats that are capable of preserving every piece of information from a CD recording means that a ripped file It may sound indistinguishable from the original.

You may still be wondering why you should spend precious time ripping up your CD collection. It’s all about convenience: a lossless digital music collection saves shelf space, is easy to move and to back up; for larger collections, it also makes locating individual songs and albums much easier and faster. You can also access a digital music library from multiple sources simultaneously, for example, from multiple network music players located in different rooms in your home.

Additionally, thanks to higher quality file acquisitions with popular streaming and download sites like B&W Society of Sound, higher quality music files can now be accessed as part of a subscription-based model without taking up space valuable on shelves – or even the attic – with physical means.

On the hardware side, storage devices like NAS and external hard drives offer huge amounts of space at ever lower prices. And with increasingly better and less expensive, widely available high-quality DACs, computers now offer excellent reproduction and can be easily connected to your existing hi-fi system, either wired or wireless.

When streaming or ripping discs, the file format option may seem complicated by too many options. This is what we think of the main formats that can be the salvation of true audio enthusiasts:

FLAC

Free Lossless Audio Codec is a popular choice for many audiophiles. Like MP3 and AAC, FLAC is compressed to keep file sizes relatively small, but unlike those formats, it is lossless and therefore – in theory – indistinguishable from the quality of a CD. In theory. Audio from CD converted to FLAC will typically shrink about 50 percent from its original size; a typical three-minute song on a CD will take up 30-40MB of space, while a ripped FLAC version of that song results in 15-20MB.

FLAC supports metadata (artist and song information can be embedded in the file and artwork can be referenced by the file) and will be played on a wide variety of software and hardware. Crucially for many, it is currently not compatible with Apple products like iTunes or the iPhone.

However, there are downsides to FLAC from an audiophile perspective and a lot of that comes during encoding and decompressing the file for playback. Because FLAC is unzipped on the fly, the sound quality is highly dependent on the software you are using to do that. Therefore, although it is theoretically lossless, there are still barriers to overcome when listening to the music contained in FLAC.

Apple Lossless

As you might guess from the name, Apple Lossless Audio Codec (or ALAC) was developed by Apple and works with company products like iTunes, iPod and iPhone (as well as supported by a number of other computers and players on software); If you are an avid user of the Apple team, it will be very attractive to you. However, like FLAC, this format is compressed, and files ripped from a CD are typically around 40-60 percent of their original size. Furthermore, ALAC suffers from the same decoding problems as FLAC.

AIFF

AIFF is a lossless format, but also without compression. While this means that it takes up as much space as the source file when ripping from a CD, it also avoids any compression issues, making it the ideal file for people who are concerned about sound quality.

Lossless audio formats

We will show you the formats that maintain all the quality of the audio files, compressing just enough. Lossless formats tend to maintain the original quality almost totally, suffering a minimum loss of quality. In summary, they are slightly compressed so that the audio remains intact and the size on disk is smaller.

Among the Lossless formats we have:

FLAC, is a format whose algorithm is similar to ZIP or GZip, but specially designed for audio compression. While ZIP would compress a CD quality audio file from 10% to 20% of its original size, FLAC would compress it from 30% to 50% while maintaining the full quality of the source.

Monkey’s Audio (APE), like FLAC allows lossless compression, but the greatness of Monkey’s is that it compresses bit by bit, reaching data rates of up to 700kbps without any loss of quality.

Apple Lossless (ALAC) uses an MP4 container (with a .M4A extension) for its files just like the MPEG-4 AAC and is specially created for use on the iPod.

Shorten is another Lossless format with characteristics similar to Monkey’s Audio or FLAC, but using the .SHN extension and requires fewer resources for its reproduction.

WavPack uses a hybrid mode, unlike the other Lossless formats, since it uses a Lossy file, which creates a relatively small file at high quality, and a corrector file that recovers the remaining quality of the original file, resulting in an audio file at averages between Lossless and Lossy, but with the same quality as a compressed file with any other Lossless algorithm.

TTA (True Audio) is a free and free LossLess format that reduces by 30% the original size of the source audio file and uses compression / decompression in real time.

What are the advantages of listening to music in FLAC format?

The FLAC format allows us to save audio without loss of quality. This codec encodes the file with the same information that the original CD would have (which would be the WAV file).

It is an open source format (Free Lossless Audio Codec) that could be improved, thanks to its registration as an open source license.

Higher quality, especially for HiFi equipment: this format allows us to enjoy a bitrate between 900 and 1100 kbps that does not delete information as it does in the MP3, even if it is of high quality. You will notice a warmer, fuller and cleaner sound.
The information is continuous between tracks: just like on the original CD, you can listen to music without interruptions between tracks.
The music is not altered: and that is the main reason why FLAC is ideal. Well, the file you use is the same one that you would download from the CD.
The FLAC format supports unlimited sampling rates – a FLAC can reproduce frequencies of 192,000 Hz without problem.
However, all that it reduces is not gold. There are also some problems with FLACs that you should be aware of, although they are not serious at all.

Disadvantages of listening to music in FLAC format

They take up more: as a FLAC file usually takes up a little more than half of the original CD file. It is easy for an album to go to 300 MB.
Many players do not support FLAC – this is changing in a beastly way. But the industry has fought for the MP3 to the last breath and many players, radios, etc. do not yet support this standard.
That is, the disadvantages are or rather were. In the future we will have a new cleaner format, which will surely take up less space and be an evolution of FLAC. Currently, however, it is the format par excellence and the one that we should all use, although I am not sure that a new, closed format will not come out, that can cope with it before it reaches its peak.

What is the difference between the different audio formats, and which should I choose?

Lossless formats: WAV, AIFF, FLAC, Apple Lossless and others

In summary, there are two types of sound quality: lossless and lossy. Lossless music preserves the sound quality of the original source – in most cases, CD – intact, on the other hand, lossy music compresses the file to save space (in exchange for decreasing quality). Lossless formats include the following formats:

–WAV and AIFF: Both are uncompressed formats, making them exact copies of the original sound source. The two formats are essentially the same quality; they simply store the data differently. AIFF was created by Apple – you will see it often in its products – but WAV is much more universal. However, since they are not compressed, they take up too much unnecessary space. Unless you are editing sound, we do not need to use this format.

–FLAC: Free Lossless Audio Codec (FLAC). It is the most used lossless codec, it is a good option if we want to store our music without losing quality. Unlike WAV and AIFF, it uses compression, taking up less space. However, it is still a lossless format, which means that the sound quality is the same as the original source, so it is better for listening than WAV and AIFF. It is also free and free software, which is useful if you like to take a look at how it works.

-Lossless Apple (Apple Lossless): Also known as ALAC, it is similar to FLAC. It uses compression, although it is made by Apple. Its compression is not as efficient as that of FLAC, so the files will be slightly larger, but it is compatible with iTunes and iOS (FLAC not). Therefore, if you use iTunes or iOS as the main software for listening to music, you should choose this format.

–APE: It is a very high lossless compression file, which means you will save more space. The quality is the same as FLAC, ALAC and other lossless files, but it is not compatible with most players. On the other hand, it makes the processor work more to decode because it is so compressed. Generally, I would not recommend using this format unless you are very concerned about space and have a compatible player.

Lossy formats: MP3, AAC, OGG and more

For day to day, we are more likely to use lossy formats. They save significantly more space, and if they have a high enough bitrate, it will be very difficult to distinguish the quality of the original source. The most commonly used formats are shown below:

–MP3: MPEG Audio Layer III, or MP3 for short, is the most common lossy format. So much so that it has become synonymous with music downloads on the internet. It is not the most efficient f-format of all, but it is certainly the most compatible, making this the first choice of lossy sounds.

–AAC: Advanced Audio Coding, also known as AAC, is similar to MP3, although slightly more efficient. Which means that the files take up less space and with the same sound quality as MP3. And, with Apple’s iTunes making it so popular, it’s as compatible as MP3.

–Ogg Vorbis: The Vorbis format, often known as Ogg Vorbis due to the use of the Ogg container, is the free software version to MP3 and

–AAC. Its main attraction is that it is not restricted by patents, but that does not affect you as a user – in fact, despite being open it is of similar quality, and much less popular than MP3 and AAC, so not all players support it. . I do not recommend it unless you are interested in being open source.

–WMA: Windows Media Audio. Microsoft’s proprietary format, similar to MP3 or AAC. It really doesn’t offer any advantage over other formats, and it’s not very well supported.

So which one should you use?

Now that we have seen the differences between each format, which one should we use for our music? In general, we recommend using MP3 or AAC. They are compatible with most players, and the quality of both is very similar to that of the original source if encoded with a high bitrate. Unless you have specific needs, MP3 and AAc are the most recommended options.

However, there is something to be said for storing music in lossless formats like FLAC. Although we probably won’t notice higher quality, it is good for storing music if you plan to convert it to other formats later – as converting from one lossy format to another. Lossy (eg from AAC to MP3) will produce lower quality files.

Encoding digital audio with a loseless format?

Compressing a digital audio with loss is to reduce the size of an audio file.

Codecs are used to reduce the size of the files. Some of the operations that codecs can perform to reduce file sizes are as follows:

Reduce the bit rate of the original sound so that the audio takes up less space.
Remove sounds at frequencies that are not noticeable by the human ear.
Elimination of redundancies of the audio signal.
They can reduce the number of existing channels by transforming a surround sound to Stereo.
Reduce the number of bits per sample.
Etc.
Note: The compression process of an audio is extremely complex. In addition, each codec applies different methodologies to compress the size of an audio.

Obviously during the compression process there will be a loss in audio quality. The higher the weight reduction of the compressed file, the higher the loss of quality.

UTILITIES THAT YOU HAVE TO COMPRESS AN AUDIO

Obviously compressing an audio has certain utilities. Some of them are as detailed below:

The space needed to store the songs on our hard drive will be much smaller. Although hard drives are cheap and their storage capacity is large, it is not feasible and / or practical to store all of our songs without loss.
We can pass the audio files to third parties in a much more convenient and fast way. After compressing a music song we can pass it by email or other means without any problem.
It seems that the trend in the very near future will be to consume video and audio via streaming. Therefore the compression of video and audio is very important. If we offer a web service in which we provide streaming audio, it is essential to compress the audio to save bandwidth and so that customers can play it at home without problems.

Select the compressed audio file format

There are numerous types of compressed file format with loss. Some of the most popular are the following:

.mp3
.ogg
.wma
.m4a
.aac
Depending on the needs, it may be useful to select one format or another.

However in my case I recommend using the mp3 or ogg file format. The reasons are as follows:

The .mp3 files do not stand out for providing the best audio quality. However, the .mp3 format is the most universally extended.
Any music player is capable of playing the .mp3 file format. You cannot say the same of the other file formats.
Everyone is able to play audio in .mp3 format. Even people with little knowledge technologically speaking.
If someone does not want to use the .mp3 format because they think the quality is not enough, or because it is a proprietary format, I recommend using .ogg. In the following link you can find the advantages and disadvantages of the .ogg files with respect to the .mp3 files.
Select the audio compression codec (encoder)

Once the file format is selected we must be aware of the codec that we will use to perform the audio compression.

In the case that we want to compress in the .mp3 file format there are the following codecs:

FHC: It’s the first codec that existed. At present this codec has become obsolete. Its compression time is very high and does not support variable bit rate.

Xing: It is the fastest encoder and allows you to obtain files with a variable bit rate (VBR). However, the quality level offered by this type of encoder is lower than Blade and Lame.

Blade: Until Lame’s appearance was the best option. It is slightly slower than Xing, but the quality levels obtained are much better. Currently this host has a problem and it does not support variable bit rates.

Lame: It is available under the GNU license and is also the best host available today. It supports variable bit rates, is fast and the quality obtained is better than in the rest of the encoders.

Guide to fully understand lossless formats

They end with a period followed by three or four letters. It is what happens with absolutely all the files of a computer or a smartphone. These last letters represent the format in which said file is. Today we are going to focus on one type of format, the lossless format.

What is a lossless format?

Any element in a computer has to have some kind of format, or so to speak, some kind of structure that is known by that computer so that it can work with the file. In a parallel with the world of physical objects, the format would be something like the material with which the object is constructed.

Just as there are different materials with different properties, there are also different formats with different characteristics. Most of the files we use today have a compressed format, so they take up less space on our computer and are easier to send via the Internet, or upload to a social network. However, these formats are not the highest quality, since this position would be occupied by lossless formats. These formats retain the original quality of the file, and are the ones that offer the best results.

If we talk about images, the lossless formats are RAW, BMP and PNG, among others. Meanwhile, the compressed formats are JPG and GIF. However, there are certain differences with some of them. RAW, for example, stores all the light data captured by the camera’s sensor. It is a perfect format for photographers. But it would not even be for photographers who want to share a particular photograph on a social network. A RAW photo can easily occupy 25 MB, depending on the resolution of the camera. A high quality JPG photo would be a photograph that would occupy two or three megabytes, although it would have less quality.

If we talk about audio, there are three main formats without loss: WAV, FLAC and ALAC. The latter is the one used by Apple in iTunes. They are formats that do not lose any quality with respect to the original audio. Yes we would be losing quality with MP3 and OGG.

And if we talk about video, there are few lossless formats that we can talk about. In fact, there is a problem, and storing videos without loss would be an impossible task for anyone who did not have a storage server nearby. That is why we usually opt for the MKV, WMV, and H.264 formats. Of course, the latter is much better, because the compression process is much more intelligent.

Compression, how does it work?

Now, what is this about compressed formats? As the name implies, we are talking about formats that reduce files, and we can rely on it to perfectly understand how these formats work. Surely we have all seen ourselves in the situation of having to pack a suitcase with just the right space, finish choosing all the clothes we are going to take on a trip, and finally have to decide what we can do without being able to close the suitcase, because we had too many clothes. For that is the compression of each of the formats. They remove items from that file, and thus make them weigh or occupy less.

Why are there different formats? Returning to the case of the suitcase, each person will make different decisions regarding those things that he can do without for his trip. It will vary from one person to another. The same goes for formats. The developers of these reduce the space occupied by a file, but each of the formats deletes data in a different way, so that a file compressed to JPG, can be different from one GIF, even if the two are compressed. Each of them has followed a different procedure to delete the data, and that the song, image, or video, continue to play almost the same as the original version.

When to convert from compression to lossless?

The question that heads this paragraph is especially important for all those who at some point have converted a file from a compressed format to a lossless format. And, in fact, it goes with a trap, because you should never convert a file from a compressed format to a file without loss. In reality, nothing happens if we do, but we will not improve the quality of that file, although it will now be available in a format in which the files are not compressed.

Of course, it is also not a good idea to convert a file into a compressed format, to a different compressed format. Let’s keep in mind that each compression process is different depending on the format chosen. That is, each format eliminates the data it deems appropriate to maintain image quality. If we have a file in a compressed format, that will mean that it no longer retains all data.