Digital sound is nothing more than numbers. What separates one container from another is how those numbers are packed, how much data (if any) is thrown away, and which devices understand the result.

If you use iTunes or if you buy and download digital music, you’ll have come across a number of terms and abbreviations that describe digital audio files. This alphabet soup can be quite confusing.

Thanks to the ability of digital audio to be perfectly copied, transmitted, and carried in small packages, we may be surrounded by more music and human-made audio programming than at any other time in ...

MP3 file format (short for MPEG Audio layer 3) is a lossy audio data compression format, developed by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). This format is used to compress normal ...

I regularly get questions about lossless audio files, or files compressed in a lossless format, for my Ask the iTunes Guy column. These questions come from people who seek to listen to the best ...

Charnita is a wife, pet mom, tech enthusiast, and part-time freelance writer with over 14 years of experience. She's done countless app roundups, product reviews, and tutorials! In her free time, she ...

Yes, the lossless audio file you're using is probably compressed — that's completely fine for this reason.

MP3 is the most commonly used file format for audio files, but did you know that the OGG file format offers better audio quality? An OGG file is a compressed audio file similar to an MP3 file but with ...

John is a professional author, currently publishing evergreen and feature articles for Android Police. He discovered his passion for writing when he was very young, and enjoys how it challenges him ...

Audio files come in different formats, sizes, and quality. Many media players cannot play every type of format, and there are certain functionalities that are limited to a few audio formats. Thus, it ...

If your audio fidelity experience has only been in the form of CDs, MP3s, or lower-quality streaming services (such as Spotify and YouTube Music), you may be missing out on some audio bliss. There’s a ...