What this does
Decodes the AAC sound inside the M4A and encodes it as an MP3 at the bitrate you choose. Tags, cover pictures and the recording device’s details are not carried over.
What it can’t do
Convert a copy-protected file, or make a quiet or muffled recording clearer.
A worked example
A voice memo of a meeting needs to go to a colleague whose transcription service only takes MP3. The 40 MB M4A becomes a 25 MB MP3 at 128 kbps, in a few seconds, without leaving the phone.
Questions
- Where do M4A files come from?
- iPhone voice memos, iTunes and Apple Music downloads, and the audio from most phone videos. They play on Apple devices and most modern players, but some older systems, car stereos and web forms want MP3.
- Is quality lost?
- A little, because the sound is decoded and compressed again. For speech at 128 kbps or music at 192 kbps it is not noticeable.
- What about M4A files bought from a store?
- Files with copy protection, which Apple stopped selling in 2009, cannot be decoded and the tool says so. Ordinary purchases convert normally.
Your file stays on this device
The tool above runs in a sealed frame that cannot send your file anywhere. It works with airplane mode on, and the counter above it stays at 0. Here is how you can check that yourself.
Related tools
- MP4 to MP3 Save the sound of a video as an MP3.
- WAV to MP3 Shrink a WAV recording into an MP3 about a tenth of the size.
- Convert audio Change a recording to WAV, MP3, FLAC or OGG.
- Trim audio Cut the start and end of a recording.
- MP3 to WAV Save an MP3 as an uncompressed WAV for editing.
- Extract audio from video Save the sound of a video as its own file, with no quality loss.
- MOV to MP4 Change the container of a video without re-encoding it.
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