WMA formatting versus MP3; when is one better than the other and is there even that much of a difference? I have pondered this a couple of times as I was downloading things and uploading other things and making little studio remixes of my own music. So I decided maybe it was a good idea to put one next to the other and see what I could come up and pass that info on to someone else.

Windows Media Audio (hereafter known as WMAs) is the Microsoft proprietary software for recording and handling audio files. All the dings and whistles that come with Windows to alert you to things are WMAs. These audio files are pretty large, but boast a higher bitrate- or the amount of bits per given time that the program will run. Microsoft claims that these files are more accurate than MP3s and better quality. We’ll talk about that in a bit.

When several countries’ labs converged to take on the evil that is Microsoft (not my words) they formed the Moving Pictures Experts Group (MPEG) and their third generation of audio software was called MPEG3 or MP3. My typing hand is very thankful for that. MP3’s main attraction has to be a greatly reduced file size to WMAs. They achieve this by cutting out the parts of the recording that the human ear can’t normally hear anyway. The result was a smaller program, or audio file.

The difference in quality between WMAs and MP3s is miniscule, even at the same bitrate, but still it can be noticeable by some. Of course a bad audio track will sound bad in both, but be more noticeable in MP3 format. WMAs win for that sort of versatility.

MP3 files are smaller by an average of 1/3 and that is an advantage to the format. On the smaller hard drives that came with the original digital music players, MP3 files were preferred because you could store more of them on a device. Now, this wouldn’t seem like as big of a deal, but consumers have grown used to MP3s and they have become the portable music standard. WMAs are used on computers and in a lot of games for Windows where hard drive space and processing speed are not really issues.

As to whether your MP3 player will play a WMA, the answer is “most likely yes.” There’s no reason why most will not. The thing to consider is if you want a lot of WMAs and MP3s on the same device, it won’t hurt anything, but things can get kind of weird. It’s a personal choice really. Hard drive space has increased a lot since the first generation of MP3 players were marketed, so space isn’t an issue anymore, but still, sticking to one format is a good idea.

If you have some WMAs and want to do a WMA to MP3 conversion, then feel free. There are all kinds of software packages that will enable you to do that. And you can even convert MP3s to WMAs, but I don’t know why you’d want to. Just remember, like everything else in life, when you make a copy of a copy, it’s never as good as the previous copy.

So overall in the war between WMA and MP3 format we’d have to go with MP3 for size and not much of a drop-off in sound quality. However for musical projects WMA seems to be the preference as the range of audio frequency is higher. I think like most other formats, each serves a purpose, but unless you’re a musician, serious music lover or have the ears of a canine, MP3 will serve you just fine.

Zeeman Haus enjoys writing articles online on a variety of subjects. You can check out his latest website on Touch Screen Mp3 Players which provides top deals on touch screen MP3 players From Creative Labs, Coby, Visual Land and more.