Convert WAV to FLAC

Why archive in FLAC

FLAC is lossless compression, a little like a ZIP file made for sound: decode it and you get back exactly the samples you put in. Unlike WAV, it also stores proper tags (title, artist, album) and a cover picture, and each file carries a checksum of its audio, so damage can be detected later.

That makes it the usual choice for keeping recordings and CD rips: about half the disk space, nothing lost, and files that music players can label properly. It has been around since 2001 and is an open format, so an archive you make today doesn't depend on any one company's software. Windows 10 and 11 play FLAC directly, as do VLC and Android. The exception is Apple's Music app, which doesn't import FLAC; for that, see FLAC to ALAC.

How much space you'll save

How small a FLAC gets depends on the sound. Quiet speech, solo instruments and recordings with silence shrink the most; dense, loud music the least. For CD-quality music, expect roughly 5 to 7 MB a minute against about 10.6 MB for the WAV, so a 700 MB folder of rips usually ends up somewhere around 330 to 460 MB.

24-bit recordings compress too, though often a little less in proportion, because their lowest bits are mostly background noise, which doesn't pack down well. The summary after each batch shows exactly what you saved, and each row shows the change for its own file, so you can see which recordings shrank the most. Long room or field recordings that are mostly quiet can end up well under half their WAV size.

Bit depth, sample rate and long recordings

Octoolo keeps the WAV's format: 16-bit stays 16-bit, 24-bit stays 24-bit, and the sample rate doesn't change. That is what makes the FLAC an exact copy. You can choose 16-bit or a lower sample rate under More settings, for a CD-quality copy of a hi-res master, but then it's a new version, not an identical one.

Multichannel recordings keep all their channels, since FLAC holds up to eight. Very long recordings are no problem either: FLAC has no 4 GB ceiling like WAV. And when you need WAV again, for an editor or a CD, FLAC to WAV gives back the identical sound, as many times as you like.

Folder layouts survive as well. With Save in left on its first choice, each FLAC lands next to the WAV it came from, so a session folder stays a session folder. Once you've checked a few files, you can delete the WAVs yourself to get the space back.

Tags for your archive

A WAV's own tags (title, artist), when it has any, are carried into the FLAC. Most WAVs have none, so the FLAC is named after the file but otherwise blank. Add titles, artists and a cover in your music player or a tag editor afterward; FLAC keeps them neatly, and file names stay the same, so “Session 12 take 4.wav” becomes “Session 12 take 4.flac”.

It pays off later: when you convert those FLACs to MP3 for the car or to ALAC for an iPhone, Octoolo carries the tags and the cover along, so you only label your music once. See FLAC to MP3.

The same goes the other way round. Moving an Apple Lossless or AIFF collection to FLAC in this window keeps the cover pictures embedded in those files, along with their titles and artists, so a library switched to FLAC looks the same in your player as it did before.