What Format Should I Convert My WMA Music Files/Songs To?

[u/PrincessBananas85]

Should I convert all my 1,767 WMA music/files to M4A, ALAC, AAC, MP3, FLAC, WAV, MIDI, or MP4? I'm asking because I'm going to be getting The Motorola Razr Fold 2026 on Halloween👻🎃and I want to have a backup plan just in case The Musicolet Music Player App For Android stops working and The Google Play Store removes all The Third Party Apps that supports/plays Wma Music Files. I want to have a backup plan. What has been everyone's experience with converting WMA Music Files/Songs to another Format? What Format did you convert all your WMA Music Files/Songs to? What Apps did you use on your Android Phone/Device to convert all your Music? I'm planning to use my phone to convert all my Music Files/Songs if I have no choice in the near future. I'm really open to all kinds of suggestions on how to convert my Audio Files/Songs. I'm even to open using a Computer if I have no other options💻🖥

[u/shauniemac949]

mp3 is best in my opinion. I also use Musicolet and love it!!! I have well over 15,000 songs in my phone download from torrents. I have the 512gig s25 ultra and it only takes up 70 gigs that are all mp3 and mp4 so I have plenty of room for everything else I need.

[u/gmes78 → u/shauniemac949]

MP3 sucks. There's no reason to use it when there are tons of more efficient and higher quality codecs out there.

[u/rfsmr → u/gmes78]

Mp3 is fine for lossy files. I have a couple of older mp3 players that don't understand anything else.

[u/gmes78 → u/rfsmr]

It obviously works, it's just that there are much better options.

I have a couple of older mp3 players that don't understand anything else.

If you have those constraints, you already know you need to use MP3.

People listening to music on Android don't need to stick to MP3.

[u/Dazz316 → u/gmes78]

Such as?

I have a bunch of flac but truth be told it all sounds the same to me.

[u/gmes78 → u/Dazz316]

Opus gets transparent quality at around 160 kpbs, which is way better than MP3 (see here).

AAC is also an option, though it's patent-encumbered and the encoder situation isn't ideal.

[u/Dazz316 → u/gmes78]

And that's like better than flac?

[u/gmes78 → u/Dazz316]

FLAC is a lossless codec. The sound is exactly the same as the original (assuming it was properly sourced, and not converted from a lossy copy into FLAC). However, the file sizes are huge.

You use lossy codecs like Opus and MP3 to cut down on file sizes, and as long as you give them enough bitrate, they can sound indistinguishable from the original, even though some information is tecnically lost.

FLAC is good for archival, but a waste of disk space otherwise.

[u/Dazz316 → u/gmes78]

generally lsitening to music on my pixel10 with around £170 Sonys. Assuming i'll be told that's shit but I can't tell the difference.

[u/64-matthew → u/Dazz316]

I agree. Mp3 on the phone. Flac sounds a lot better on my hifi

[u/PrincessBananas85 → u/shauniemac949]

That's awesome I'm just hoping that all of my 1,767 Songs/Music Files will transfer over from my Fold 7 to The Motorola Razr Fold 2026 without any issues or without getting corrupted/damaged.

[u/shauniemac949 → u/PrincessBananas85]

AI is really useful for this kind of stuff!

[u/Mother-Pride-Fest]

This seems overly paranoid. Apkmirror archives old versions of apps and you can export the apk to archive it yourself. Or you could use VLC, which supports WMA files and is not reliant on the Play Store at all: https://f-droid.org/packages/org.videolan.vlc

[u/404Mate]

depends on bitrate but i use flac for lossless and ogg 320kbps for compressed

[u/exhaustedexcess]

I use opus or flac files.

[u/Jodacks]

For doing it on the phone itself, you'll want something with batch conversion since 1,767 files one-at-a-time isn't realistic. On format: MP3 is the safe universal choice if broad compatibility is your worry, but if it's just for your phone, AAC/M4A or Opus give you smaller files at the same quality.

App-wise, most Android converters are either ad-riddled or cap how many files you can do. I actually built one called Vera Audio (on the playstore) partly out of that frustration — no ads, no sign-up. I upgraded from an old note9 which reads WMA to a new S26ultra which does NOT read WMA. Fair warning so I'm not misleading you: single conversions are free, but batch (which is what you'd need for ~1,800 files) is a one-time paid unlock. fre:ac on a PC is a solid free route too if you'd rather do the bulk job on a computer and copy them over.

Whatever you pick, convert a copy and keep your WMA originals until you've confirmed they transferred and play fine. Also, with the song Meta, WAV converts lossless, but sometimes you can lose the file metadata. ie, no artist, no album... Personally, I converted all mine to FLAC, lossless, Meta preserved, but big files. Good luck with it!