About WAV to MP3
WAV keeps audio uncompressed, which is why a single ten-minute recording can easily be a hundred megabytes. That is fine for editing on a desktop, but it is painful to email, upload to a form or share with someone who just wants to listen. MP3 compresses the same audio into a file small enough to move around while staying compatible with almost every player ever made.
This converter decodes your WAV on the server and encodes it to MP3 with the LAME encoder at the bitrate you pick. Stereo and mono recordings keep their channel layout, and the duration is preserved. A 44.1 kHz 16-bit stereo WAV is about ten megabytes per minute, while the same audio at 192 kbps is roughly 1.4 megabytes per minute, so the saving is substantial.
What this tool does
Three clear bitrate options
128 kbps for clear speech, 192 kbps as a general default, and 320 kbps for the highest-quality MP3 this tool offers.
Stereo and mono preserved
The output keeps the channel layout of the source recording, so interviews, field recordings and stereo music stay as they were recorded.
Full duration kept
The MP3 covers the complete recording, start to finish, with no trimming of silence or gaps.
Massive size reduction
Uncompressed WAV audio is far larger than MP3 at the same duration; the result panel shows the exact before and after sizes.
Any modern browser works
The upload and download happen in the browser, and the heavy encoding runs on the server, so the tool behaves the same on a laptop or a phone.
Automatic cleanup
The WAV upload and the MP3 output are held in a temporary folder and deleted automatically after the download.
How to use WAV to MP3
- 01
Add the WAV file
Drop the .wav file into the workspace or browse for it. The upload limit is 100 MB.
- 02
Choose the MP3 bitrate
128 kbps is fine for voice notes and interviews, 192 kbps suits music, and 320 kbps is the safe choice if the MP3 will be edited further.
- 03
Convert the recording
Click Convert to MP3. Upload progress is shown, then the server encodes the audio and prepares the download.
- 04
Listen and download
Check the result in the audio player, then download the MP3. Use Start over for the next recording.
Supported formats and limits
- Input
- WAV
- Output
- MP3
- Processing
- Server-side FFmpeg job in a temporary directory, deleted after download.
- Maximum size
- Up to 100 MB
- Requirements
- Chrome, Edge, Firefox or Safari · Server-side FFmpeg conversion
Limitations worth knowing
- Accepts .wav files only, one file per job, 100 MB maximum.
- The MP3 is lossy; high-resolution WAV files are reduced to a standard MP3 configuration.
- A 100 MB limit is roughly nine minutes of CD-quality stereo WAV, so longer recordings need trimming first.
- Jobs stop after three minutes of processing time.
Privacy and file handling
The WAV file is uploaded to a temporary directory on our server, encoded to MP3, and streamed back as a download. The upload, the intermediate files and the MP3 are deleted automatically when the download finishes; no recording is stored or shared, and no account is required.
Read the full privacy policy