Extract audio: settings and best results

What does Extract audio do?

Extract audio saves the sound from a video as its own audio file, on your own computer. Use it to turn a recorded interview into a podcast file, keep the music from a clip, or get a talk ready to edit. In the app the tool is called Extract Audio.

You can copy the sound out exactly as it is, which is lossless and near instant, or turn it into MP3, AAC or WAV. Each video you add gives back one audio file with the same name.

01Step 1: Add your videos

Click Tools in the sidebar, open the Video tab and click Extract Audio in the Convert section. You can also type "extract audio" in the search box at the top.

Drop your video files on the queue, or click it to pick them. Extract Audio takes MP4, MOV, MKV, WebM, AVI, M4V, MPG, MPEG, TS, MTS, M2TS, 3GP and WMV files. Each row shows the video’s size and length. Audio files are listed under Not applicable and are skipped. Use Add more to add files later.

1234

1. 1Format
2. 2MP3
3. 3Bitrate
4. 4Run extract

03Step 3: Run, then check the result

Check where the files will go: Default output folder saves them in your workspace’s output folder, in an extract folder with a subfolder for today’s date, such as 10-15. Click Change to pick another folder for this run. Then click Run extract.

When the run ends, each video shows Done and the panel says how many files were extracted. Click View on a row to play the result, and Open folder to go to the audio files. See See and compare your results and Where your files are saved.

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1. 1Done
2. 2View
3. 3Saved to
4. 4Open folder

Every setting, and when to change it

Format

Copy the sound as it is, or turn it into MP3, AAC (.m4a) or WAV. With Original, the file type follows the sound inside the video.

• RangeOriginal, MP3, AAC, WAV
• DefaultOriginal

Bitrate

How much detail MP3 and AAC files keep. Higher sounds better and makes larger files. Shown for MP3 and AAC only.

• Range64 to 320 kbps
• Default192 kbps

How do I get the best results?

• To edit or keep the sound, use Original. It is a perfect copy, so later edits start from the best quality there is.
• To share or upload, use MP3 at 192 kbps. Most podcast hosts and players accept it.
• For an editing app that wants uncompressed sound, use WAV.
• To change the sound afterward, open the new audio files in Audio Convert or Volume / Normalize.

Why does a result disappoint?

• A video failed with a message that it has no audio track. The video has no sound to take. Screen recordings and some exported clips are silent.
• A video failed with a message that its audio can’t be converted. The sound uses a kind that Hangar can copy but not convert. Choose Original for that video. You get an exact copy, often as an .mka file.
• I can’t open the .mka file. Some players do not support it. Try a player that handles many formats, or run the video again with MP3 if Hangar can convert its sound.
• The MP3 sounds worse than the video. Raise the Bitrate, or use Original to keep the sound exactly as it was.
• The language or commentary track is wrong. Extract Audio takes only the first audio track in each video.

For other errors, see A file failed: what to check.

Limits

• Extract Audio takes video files only. To change an audio file’s format, use Audio Convert.
• Only the first audio track in each video is saved.
• MP3, AAC and WAV work when the video’s sound is AAC, MP3, Opus, Vorbis or FLAC, which covers most videos. Other kinds can only be copied with Original.
• Add video files, not folders.
• Everything runs on your computer. Nothing is uploaded.