Streaming music is used more and more frequently in people's daily life. You are available to access the enormous cloud music library with simple clicks on your portable devices. By default, the format of online streams is AAC or MP3, both of which are compatible with most audio types of equipment and playable with a not-so-good internet connection.
AAC is a commonly-used format in many streaming music services such as Tidal, Spotify, Apple Music and so forth. Compared to the MP3 format, AAC file takes much more advantages. In this page, I will help you to make clear the difference between AAC and MP3, and more importantly, to show you how to convert Tidal (Normal / High quality) to AAC locally.
Part 1. Best Tidal to AAC Converter: Required Tool
Since AAC is commonly-used on different streaming music platforms, it is proved to perform better in Tidal than in other music apps. Even the same song at the same bitrate, the difference of streaming music quality sounds noticeable, though theoretically, it shouldn't be so obvious.
It is hard for us to figure out why this situation happens. But for sure, Tidal is ought to be one of your streaming music selection, if you are an average listener with average hearing and standard but not very expensive playback equipment.
Now I am going to teach you a method of how to convert and download music from Tidal to local AAC files. In the first step, we need a third-party conversion tool, named AudFree Tidal to AAC Converter, which is proficient in ripping DRM from Tidal tracks and playlists. Converting Tidal songs to AAC, MP3, FLAC, WAV, M4A, M4B with 0% quality loss, this powerful tool can also keep all metadata such as title, artist, album, etc. for easy management. Absorbing an advanced technology, this all-mighty Tidal converter will help you download DRM-ed AAC music to non-DRM AAC local files with ease.
Part 2. Transfer Tidal to AAC: Protected AAC to Local AAC
If you are using a windows computer, before starting to convert, you have to make sure that the Tidal desktop app is not downloaded from Windows Store. If it is a default installation, you are suggested to use a powerful uninstaller to completely delete the components provided by Windows Store. And then re-download the Spotify official desktop version. Now let's follow the instructions below to download AAC from Tidal as local files.
- Step 1Import Tidal songs and playlists to AudFree
- After installing AudFree Tidal Music Converter on the desktop, please open it and the Tidal app will turn on automatically. Next, please discover the songs you would like to convert to AAC from the Tidal app. Then copy and paste the link of track/playlist/album to the search bar. After that, hit the '+' icon to input it to AudFree.
- Step 2Define Tidal output format to AAC
- For Mac users, please find the "AudFree Tidal Music Converter" from the menu of the Mac system. For Windows users, just click the hamburger icon on the upper menu bar of AudFree. Then click to the "Preferences" > "Convert" to open a new setting window. Here, you are allowed to change the output quality to AAC. If you want to get the higher Tidal music quality, you are supposed to switch the bit rate to 32 bit and sample rate to 48000Hz. Also, don't forget to tick the "Conversion speed" if you would like to keep a stable converting process.
- Step 3Download and transfer Tidal to AAC
- Now, simply tap on the obvious "Convert" button to start the conversion. The software will work at a 5X faster speed (if you tick "Conversion speed" before, it will run at 1X speed) to unlock and save Tidal songs as AAC files into the local music library. When the conversion finished, a red prompt will mark on the "Converted" icon. Please check it to locate the converted local Tidal AAC tracks.
Part 3. Compare AAC to MP3, Which One is Better?
Both AAC and MP3 are lossy compressed files. The released date of AAC was 3 years later than MP3. As the new generation, AAC sounds better than MP3 at the same bitrate, especially at a lower bitrate. For instance, the AAC file at 96 kbps performs better than the MP3 file at 128 kbps, while the AAC file at 128 kbps sounds much better than the MP3 file at 128 kbps.
Besides, the size of the AAC file differs from the MP3 file. When the bitrate is less than or equal to 128 kbps, the size of both files is similar (the gap is less than 0.1M). While the bitrate is equal to or over 192 kbps, the size of the AAC file is much smaller than the one of MP3. By the Comparison of compatibility, MP3 is more widely-supported than AAC, which is able to work with every mobile device and portable player.
Aug 9, 2019 3:15 PM
Posted by Miley Swift to Tidal Tips
