M4A, WAV, MP3: Which Audio Format and How to Convert

You record an interview on your phone and get an M4A. Your editor refuses it. You export to WAV and suddenly one hour of audio is 600 MB. Classic.

Which format, when

WAV is uncompressed. Use it while recording and editing, where you want zero loss. Budget around 10 MB per minute.

MP3 is the universal one. Email, web, slide decks. At 192 kbps you won't hear the difference and the file drops to a tenth of the size.

M4A (AAC) is what an iPhone and most voice recorders hand you. Better quality than MP3 at the same size, but older software still chokes on it.

FLAC is lossless like WAV but takes roughly half the space. Perfect for archiving music.

The simple rule

Editing audio → WAV. Sending it to someone → MP3. Archiving → FLAC. That's the whole decision tree.

Converting without installing anything

You don't need software for this. Drag the file into FileTools, pick the target format and bitrate, download the result. Everything runs in your browser, so the recording never leaves your machine — which matters for interviews and client material.

Batches work too: drop in thirty files at once and get them all back in the same format.

And if that audio is heading for a multilingual video, TubeVoice can build the dubbing and subtitles on top of it.