
What music file format is recommended? Part 2

Opus is a new audio compression format developed by the IETF and standardized by RFC6716 in 2012. There is very little hardware and software supported, but at low bit rates of 128 kbps or less, it appears to be the strongest sound quality with compression with lost.
Vorbis is a free audio file format developed by Xiph.org. It seems to be used on Youtube too. Since the standard bit rate is 112 kbps, the sound quality at a low bit rate appears to be good.
WMA is a standard Windows audio compression method developed by Microsoft. If the bit rate is 160 kbps or less, it exceeds the MP3 upper limit frequency. However, the size will be a little larger.
AAL (ATRAC Advanced Lossless) is a lossless compressed version of ATRAC mentioned above. According to Sony, it can be compressed to about half the size of the data without losing any music information on the CD, but it actually seems to vary considerably depending on the sound source.
As the name implies, Apple Lossless (ALAC) is Apple’s lossless compression audio codec. Used in iTunes, etc.
FLAC is an audio file format developed and distributed as free open source software. It seems to be the most popular in lossless compression.
Monkey’s Audio is an audio format that compresses PCM losslessly without degrading sound quality. It is so named because it is used in music playing software called Monkey’s Audio. The characteristic is that it does not fit the name and the compression rate is high.
TAK is a high-speed, high-compression, lossless compression audio encoder. It has the same level of compression as Monkey’s Audio, but it’s pretty crazy.
TTA is a free real-time lossless compression audio encoder / decoder. Like TAK, it’s too manic so I wouldn’t use it.
WMA Lossless is a lossless compressed version of WMA mentioned above.
Equalizer Image
AIFF is an uncompressed audio file format developed by Apple. It seems to be the Windows WAV. It seems to have been used on Macintosh (Mac) for a long time.
WAV (WAVE) is a format for describing audio data developed by Microsoft and IBM. This is what happens when you convert a CD (Linear PCM) into an uncompressed file in Windows.
Also, the sound quality of lossy compressed music file formats is almost the same at 192 kbps bit rates. If it is 160 kbps or less, I am wondering if other compression formats are slightly better than MP3. In this case, it is better to check the music player software. Sound quality is exactly the same for lossless and uncompressed music file formats. Lossless compression will have issues with compression ratio and playback load.
I want to read it together
What is free high-quality music player software for Windows?
After all, what music file format is recommended?
Image of listening to music with a portable music player
I’ve mentioned it so far, but I recommend MP3 or WAV (AIFF). The reason is as follows.
Due to the large capacity of hard drives and flash memory, lossy compressed music file formats do not need to have a bit rate lower than 192 kbps.
The compression ratio of the lossless music file format is currently 60 to 70% maximum, so taking into account the encoding time and effort and loading during playback, the file format of Uncompressed music is sufficient for lossless compression.
I don’t think I can distinguish between 192kbps MP3 and WAV, so I can’t help but worry about the compression format.
MP3 and WAV have many compatible hardware and software.


















