http://en.wikipedia.

org/wiki/List_of_file_formats#Sound_a nd_music Sound and music

Uncompressed o AIFF Audio Interchange File Format o AU o CDDA o IFF-8SVX o IFF-16SV o RAW raw samples without any header or sync o WAV Microsoft Wave Compressed o FLAC (free lossless codec of the Ogg project) o LA Lossless Audio (.la) o PAC LPAC (.pac) o M4A Apple Lossless (M4A) o APE Monkey's Audio (APE) o OptimFROG o RKA RKAU (.rka) o SHN Shorten (SHN) o TTA free lossless audio codec (True Audio) o WV WavPack (.wv) o WMA Windows Media Audio 9 Lossless (WMA)

[edit] Lossy audio

AMR for GSM and UMTS based mobile phones MP2 MPEG Layer 2 MP3 MPEG Layer 3 Speex Ogg project, specialized for voice, low bitrates GSM GSM Full Rate, originally developed for use in mobile phones WMA Windows Media Audio (.WMA) AAC (.m4a, .mp4, .m4p, .aac) Advanced Audio Coding (usually in an MPEG-4 container) MPC Musepack VQF Yamaha TwinVQ RealAudio (RA, RM) OTS Audio File (similar to MP3, with more data stored in the file and slightly better compression; designed for use with OtsLabs' OtsAV) SWA Macromedia Shockwave Audio (Same compression as MP3 with additional header information specific to Macromedia Director VOX Dialogic ADPCM Low Sample Rate Digitized Voice (VOX) VOC Creative Labs Soundblaster Creative Voice 8-bit & 16-bit (VOC) DWD DiamondWare Digitized (DWD)

SMP Turtlebeach SampleVision (SMP)

[edit] Other music

AUP Audacity project file BAND GarageBand music CUST DeliPlayer custom sound file format MID standard MIDI file; most often just notes and controls but occasionally also sample dumps MUS Finale Notation file, see also Finale (software) SIB Sibelius Notation file, see also Sibelius (computer program) LY LilyPond Notation file, see also GNU LilyPond GYM Sega Genesis YM2612 log VGM stands for "Video Game Music", log for several different chips PSF NSF NES Sound Format, bytecode program to play NES music MOD Soundtracker and Protracker sample and melody modules PTB Power Tab Editor tab S3M Scream Tracker 3 module, with a few more effects and a dedicated volume column XM Fast Tracker module, adding instrument envelopes IT Impulse Tracker module, adding compressed samples, note-release actions, and more effects including a resonant filter MT2 MadTracker 2 module. It could be resumed as being XM and IT combined with more features like track effects and automation. MNG BGM for the Creatures game series, starting from Creatures 2 PSF Portable Sound Format, PlayStation variant (originally PlayStation Sound Format). o minipsf, psflib Multipart PSF o 2sf, dsf, gsf, psf2, qsf, ssf, usf PSF for other platforms RMJ RealJukebox Media used for RealPlayer. SPC Super Nintendo Entertainment System sound file format. NIFF (Notation Interchange File Format) MusicXML TXM Track ax media YM Atari ST/Amstrad CPC YM2149 sound chip format JAM Jam music format ASF Advanced Systems Format MP1 for use with UltraPlayer MSCZ Musescore compressed file MSCZ, Musescore uncompressed file

[edit] Playlists

ASX Advanced Stream Redirector (.asx) M3U PLS RAM Real Audio Metafile For Real Audio files only. TXT/No extension Mplayer playlist XPL - HDi playlist XSPF the XML Shareable Playlist Format

ZPL Zune Playlist format

[edit] Audio editing, music production

ALS Ableton Live set AUP Audacity project file BAND GarageBand project file CEL Adobe Audition loop file (Cool Edit Loop) CPR Steinberg Cubase project file MMR MAGIX Music Maker project file NPR Steinberg Nuendo project file CWP Cakewalk Sonar project file DRM Steinberg Cubase drum file OMF cross-application format Open Media Framework application-exchange bundled format SES Adobe Audition multitrack session file SFL Sound Forge sound file SNG MIDI sequence file (MidiSoft, Korg, etc.) or n-Track Studio project file STF StudioFactory project file. It contains all necessary patches, samples, tracks and settings to play the file. SYN SynFactory project file. It contains all necessary patches, samples, tracks and settings to play the file. SND Akai MPC sound file

List of formats
See also: Comparison of audio formats and List of codecs

3gp - multimedia container format can contain proprietary formats as AMR, AMR-WB or AMR-WB+, but also some open formats act - ACT is a lossy ADPCM 8 kbit/s compressed audio format recorded by most Chinese MP3 and MP4 players with a recording function, and voice recorders AIFF standard audio file format used by Apple. It could be considered the Apple equivalent of wav. aac the Advanced Audio Coding format is based on the MPEG2 and MPEG4 standards. aac files are usually ADTS or ADIF containers. ALAC - Apple Lossless compression, a lossless compression format from Apple. amr - AMR-NB audio, used primarily for speech. atrac (.wav) the older style Sony ATRAC format. It always has a .wav file extension. To open these files, install the ATRAC3 drivers. Au the standard audio file format used by Sun, Unix and Java. The audio in au files can be PCM or compressed with the -law, a-law or G729 codecs. awb - AMR-WB audio, used primarily for speech, same as the ITU-T's G.722.2 specification. dct A variable codec format designed for dictation. It has dictation header information and can be encrypted (as may be required by medical confidentiality laws). A proprietary format of NCH Software.

dss Digital Speech Standard files are an Olympus proprietary format. It is a fairly old and poor codec. Gsm or mp3 are generally preferred where the recorder allows. It allows additional data to be held in the file header. dvf a Sony proprietary format for compressed voice files; commonly used by Sony dictation recorders. flac File format for the Free Lossless Audio Codec, a lossless compression codec. gsm designed for telephony use in Europe, gsm is a very practical format for telephone quality voice. It makes a good compromise between file size and quality. Note that wav files can also be encoded with the gsm codec. iklax An iKlax Media proprietary format, the iKlax format is a multi-track digital audio format allowing various actions on musical data, for instance on mixing and volumes arrangements. IVS A proprietary version with Digital Rights Management developed by 3D Solar UK Ltd for use in music downloaded from their Tronme Music Store and interactive music and video player. m4p A proprietary version of AAC in MP4 with Digital Rights Management developed by Apple for use in music downloaded from their iTunes Music Store. mmf - a Samsung audio format that is used in ringtones. mp3 - MPEG Layer III Audio. Is the most common sound file format used today. mpc - Musepack or MPC (formerly known as MPEGplus, MPEG+ or MP+) is an open source lossy audio codec, specifically optimized for transparent compression of stereo audio at bitrates of 160180 kbit/s. msv a Sony proprietary format for Memory Stick compressed voice files. mxp4 a Musinaut proprietary format allowing play of different versions (or skins) of the same song. It allows various interactivity scenarios between the artist and the end user. ogg a free, open source container format supporting a variety of formats, the most popular of which is the audio format Vorbis. Vorbis offers compression similar to MP3 but is less popular. ra & rm a Real Audio format designed for streaming audio over the Internet. The .ra format allows files to be stored in a self-contained fashion on a computer, with all of the audio data contained inside the file itself. ram a text file that contains a link to the Internet address where the Real Audio file is stored. The .ram file contains no audio data itself. raw a raw file can contain audio in any format but is usually used with PCM audio data. It is rarely used except for technical tests. TTA - The True Audio, real-time lossless audio codec. vox the vox format most commonly uses the Dialogic ADPCM (Adaptive Differential Pulse Code Modulation) codec. Similar to other ADPCM formats, it compresses to 4-bits. Vox format files are similar to wave files except that the vox files contain no information about the file itself so the codec sample rate and number of channels must first be specified in order to play a vox file. wav standard audio file container format used mainly in Windows PCs. Commonly used for storing uncompressed (PCM), CD-quality sound files, which means that they can be large in sizearound 10 MB per minute. Wave files can also contain data encoded with a variety of (lossy) codecs to reduce the file size (for example the GSM or MP3 formats). Wav files use a RIFF structure. wma the popular Windows Media Audio format owned by Microsoft. Designed with Digital Rights Management (DRM) abilities for copy protection.