File Export Dialog

Clicking Export... on the File Menu opens the Export File dialog.

The Export File dialog lets you specify folder location, file name and format (Save as type) for your exported file.

The Options button opens another dialog for making settings like quality or Encoding for formats with options. Here are examples for the Uncompressed and MP3 formats:

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Always select the "Save as type" before clicking the Options button.

Save as types: Click a link after the bullet point to view further details and any available options for that format.

All formats support mono (1 channel) and stereo (2 channel) export unless stated. For formats supporting more than two channels, multi-channel export can be enabled at "Use custom mix" in the Import / Export Preferences.

• Other uncompressed files: includes all the uncompressed audio formats that Audacity can export. This menu item defaults to WAV (Microsoft) signed 16-bit PCM (or to AIFF (Apple/SGI) signed 16-bit PCM on Mac).
  ToDo Could someone on Mac initialise Preferences and verify if the above does default to AIFF on Mac?
• AIFF (Apple) signed 16 bit PCM and WAV (Microsoft) signed 16 bit PCM: WAV and AIFF are uncompressed, lossless formats which can be opened on either Windows or Mac computers. Choose WAV or AIFF 16-bit PCM whenever you want to burn your exported file to an audio CD. Up to 32 channels are supported.
• GSM 6.10 WAV (mobile): produces a mono WAV file encoded with the compressed, lossy GSM 6.10 codec as used in mobile telephones.
• MP3 Files: MP3 is a popular compressed, lossy format producing much smaller files than WAV or AIFF, at the expense of some loss of quality.
  You must download the optional LAME encoder to export to MP3.
• OGG Vorbis Files: Ogg Vorbis is the compressed, lossy Vorbis codec in an OGG container. Vorbis offers higher quality than MP3 for the same file size, but fewer applications can play the OGG format. Up to 32 channels are supported.
• FLAC Files: FLAC is a compressed but lossless format, giving larger file sizes than MP3 and OGGs. Up to 8 channels are supported.
• MP2 Files: MP2 is a compressed, lossy format similar to MP3, producing slightly larger files than MP3 for the same quality.
• (external program): sends audio via the command line to an external application either for processing or for encoding as a file. This is a method to export to an alternative MP3 encoder, or to a format not supported by Audacity.
• FFmpeg formats: The following export types marked "(FFmpeg)" are listed in released builds of Audacity on Windows and Mac, and in other builds where FFmpeg is enabled. They will only function if you install the optional FFmpeg library.
  • M4A (AAC) Files: Advanced Audio Coding is a compressed, lossy format used in Apple applications, generally achieving slightly better quality than MP3 for the same file size. By default, the exported file will be given an "m4a" extension. Optional permitted extensions of .mp4, .m4r (ringtone) and .3gp (mobile) may be added after the file name. Mono cannot be exported, otherwise up to 32 channels are supported.
  • AC3 Files: the common name used for the compressed, lossy codec used in Dolby Digital. Up to 7 channels are supported.
  • AMR (narrow band) or (wide band) Files: the Adaptive Multi-Rate codec is a patented compression scheme optimized for speech, but also used for mobile telephone ringtones. The wide band variant uses higher bandwidth for higher quality. Both variants are mono only. Note: AMR (wide band) export will not be available in release builds on Windows and Mac. On Linux, AMR support is unlikely to be available unless you compile FFmpeg yourself with AMR enabled. These restrictions are due to licensing issues.
  • WMA (version 2) Files: Windows Media Audio v2 is a compressed, lossy format developed by Microsoft. Optional permitted extensions of .asf or .wmv may be added after the file name.
  • Custom FFmpeg Export: Allows choice of the specific codec to use in the formats listed above, or to export to some additional formats not otherwise available. Note: not all formats and codecs are compatible, and some exports might result in zero-byte or invalid files if FFmpeg does not support the combination chosen.