Convert M4A to MP3
Turn M4A and AAC files from a phone or Apple device into MP3s.
Drop a file to start
Runs in your browser. Nothing is uploaded.
M4A is what an iPhone voice memo, a QuickTime recording and most of the Apple ecosystem produce. It is a perfectly good format — AAC inside an MP4 container — and it is still the one that some car stereo, some hardware player or some upload form refuses.
MP3 is the format nothing refuses. That is the entire reason for this conversion, and it is worth being clear that it is a downgrade in principle: AAC is a better codec than MP3 at the same bitrate, so the file gets no better by moving. Keep the quality high and the loss is inaudible; the compatibility is the gain.
The decoding is done by the browser’s own AAC decoder and the encoding by LAME compiled to WebAssembly, both on your machine. A batch of voice memos converts one after another with no upload and no waiting on a queue.
Step by step
- 1Drop in your M4A files.
- 2Choose how much quality to keep.
- 3Press Convert, then download.
Questions
Is M4A the same as AAC?
Nearly. M4A is an MP4 container that almost always holds AAC audio. A file ending .aac is the same audio without the container.
Does the quality drop?
Slightly, because this is a second lossy pass. At high quality the difference is inaudible on speech and very hard to hear on music.
Why convert at all if AAC is better?
Compatibility. MP3 plays on hardware and in software that never learned AAC, which is the usual reason anyone is on this page.