How to Convert WAV to MP3 on Windows 10/11 in High Quality

WAV stores almost exactly what the recording hardware hears, making it large and taking up more storage space. Therefore, WAV format may not work well when sent as an email attachments, saved on a portable audio player, transferred from one device to another via Bluetooth or the Internet, etc.

If you encounter trouble with WAV, just convert it to MP3. The latter is a versatile audio format with better compatibility and smaller size. It’s usable in any situation. Now, let's take a look at how to convert WAV to MP3 on Windows 10 or Windows 11.

Directly jump to the tools introduced in this article:

 Cisdem Video Converter

The Best WAV to MP3 Converter for Windows 10

• Convert WAV to MP3, M4A, WMA, OGG, ARM, AAC, etc. and vice versa
• Turn WAV to preset devices like YouTube, Walkman, Zune, Palm, Android phone, iPhone, TV, etc. for easy uploading and playing the file
• Convert multiple WAV files to MP3 in batches
• Convert music DVD to WAV, MP3, MP4, AVI, and other 300+ formats
• Compress large WAV to smaller size
• Cut, join WAV files, and export them into a single MP3 file
• Tweak audio bitrate, channel, sample rate, and volume
• Download music with URLs from any website
• Work quickly with 30X faster speed
• Keep high quality
• Easy to use
• Support Windows 10 or Windows 11; macOS 10.12 or later

Free Download   Free Download

Reason to Change WAV to MP3 on Windows

Obviously, WAV has the highest quality and also can be opened easily on Windows PC. The reason why people change WAV to MP3 on Windows is because of their different usage.

WAV is used for distributing music, podcast, or audiobooks on iTunes, Spotify, TV, DVD, and other media requiring uncompromised quality. While MP3 is widely accepted on web pages like YouTube, web videos, Internet, and is good for storing on portable devices. Plus, MP3 simply compresses the file by removing sounds beyond the human capacity to hear, so you won't be able to tell the difference in sound quality from WAV to MP3 unless you're using top-of-the-line headphones or speakers.

How to Convert WAV to MP3 on Windows 10/11 in Bulk Quickly

Cisdem Video Converter excels in audio file conversion and supports any audio format, making it an excellent WAV to MP3 converter for Windows 10/11.

It can convert audio formats from lossless to lossy, lossless to lossless, and lossy to lossy. So it's extremely easy to change WAV to MP3, M4A to MP3, FLAC to ALAC, AIFF to MP3, etc. Also, the app allows you to extract audio from DVD discs and any video format like MP4, MPEG, and WMV.

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1. Download Cisdem Video Converter on your Windows computer, install and launch it.
   
2. On the conversion dashboard, drag and drop source WAV files to it.
3. Select MP3 as the target format.
   Click the “Output Format” menu or open the “Convert all tasks to” expanding list. The former is to set the format one by one while the latter is to set the format for all videos at in one click. Then, head over to the "General Audio" category on the left pane, and choose MP3 from the list.If you're tech savvy and have specific settings preferences, hit the “gear” icon, in which you can configure the output audio parameters to your own actual need.
   
4. Batch convert WAV to MP3 in Windows 10 or 11
   Press the "Convert" button to begin the conversion process.
   Once finished, click the "Success" icon (blue tick) to access the converted files in the destination folder.

How to Convert WAV to MP3 Using Windows Media Player

Windows Media Player is a built-in app for Windows with the ability to play digital files. It can also rip audio files from CDs, copy audio files to compact discs, and burn data or audio CDs. But when it comes to converting WAV to MP3 on Windows 10, it doesn't provide direct support. The only solution is to burn WAV to CD and rip out the contents of the CD to MP3.

1. Insert a blank CD into the optical drive, and open Windows Media Player.
2. Click the “Burn” tab located in the right pane.
3. Add WAV files to the empty burn list.
4. Hit the 'Burn options' icon > “Audio CD” > “Start burn” to write WAV audio to a CD disc.
5. Put the CD you just burned into your computer's DVD drive.
6. From the left side pane of Windows Media Player, click on your CD drive.
7. Go to the “Rip settings” drop down menu, and choose the desired format as MP3 and also choose the audio quality.
8. Convert CD to MP3 by clicking the “Rip CD” button.

How to Convert WAV to MP3 in Windows 10 Using Audacity

Audacity is not only an open source digital audio editor, but also a free WAV to MP3 converter for Windows 10. It supports importing and exporting a handful of formats, including WAV, MP3, AIFF, AU, and OGG. If you want to add support for other audio formats like WMA, you need to download LAME MP3 encoder.

When changing multiple WAV files to MP3, Audacity gets some of the metadata wrong. I tried to change an album with multiple artists from WAV format to MP3 on Windows 10. As a result, each track retains the same metadata as the last song.

1. Initiate Audacity. At the top, go to “File” > “Open or “File” > “Import” > “Audio”.
2. Choose the WAV audio you expect to convert to MP3, and click “Open”.
3. Navigate to “File” > “Export” > “Export as MP3”.
   Note: If you are converting multiple WAV tracks, select “Export Multiple” as the output option. Otherwise, all your WAV files will be mixed down and saved as one stereo track.
4. Specify a folder where to save the MP3 and change the file name. Click “Save”.
5. Edit metadata tags like artist name, track title, album title, and name to a few. Click “OK”. Audacity will start changing WAV to MP3.

How to Convert WAV File to MP3 with VLC on Windows 10

VLC is an across-platforms media player, encoder, and streamer. It includes plenty of decoding and encoding libraries, helping you convert WAV to MP3 on Windows 10 for free.

Despite applying many codecs provided by the libavcodec library of FFmpeg, VLC is still not good at converting large-size audio. In my test, a 30-minute WAV file ended up exporting only a third of the way through. And when batch transcoding files, VLC gets stuck in a rewriting loop unless the app is forced to quit.

1. Launch VLC Media Player. In the menu bar, hit “Media” > “Convert/Save”.
2. Click the “+Add” button. Browse to the WAV file on your computer and open it.
   Note: If you want to add multiple files to batch convert WAV files to MP3 with VLC, it works, but it prohibits you from selecting the output format in a later step.
3. Press “Convert/Save” to continue.
4. Next to the “Profile”, there's a dropdown box. Click on that and choose “Audio – MP3”.
5. Click “Browse”. Name the output file with the .mp3 extension.
6. Hit the “Start” button.

How to Convert WAV to MP3 via MediaHuman Audio Converter

As the name indicates, MediaHuman Audio Converter is specifically developed to deal with audio files, including converting audio file formats and extracting audio from videos. It supports converting almost all audio and popular video formats, and even can upload videos from iTunes directly.

With a clear interface and easy-to-understand icons, everyone can easily master it to convert WAV to MP3 320 kbps. This tool also allows users to batch convert multiple files simply, but doesn’t provide any editing features. If you want to adjust the audio effects, you should upgrade it.

1. Run the downloaded MediaHuman Audio Converter on your PC.
2. Directly drag and drop all WAV files to it. Or you can click on the according icons to the top left to upload files, folder, or iTunes playlist based on your needs.
   
3. Click on the “Format” button on the top, select MP3 and the preset setting option - “stereo, 44100Hz, 320kbps".
   
4. When selected, tap on “Close”.
5. Click on the “Convert” icon to batch convert WAV files to MP3 for free.
   

How to Turn WAV to MP3 on Windows 10 or 11 Online

1. Using an Online Audio Converter

If you are looking for a simple audio converter, without advanced options and installing software, you will love filezigzag.com. It’s an online WAV to MP3 converter for Windows 10, which offers 15+ audio format supports, and lets you convert more than one file at once.

A maximum of 10 file conversions can be completed per day. Make sure each uploaded file does not exceed 50MB. Then pay attention, there are some advertisements on its interface, don't click them by mistake.

1. Open the website https://www.filezigzag.com/online-converter in your browser.
2. Click the “Browse for Files” button and upload your WAV track.
3. It will directly jump to the “Files to convert” section.
4. Choose MP3 from the target format list.
   Note: If you add more than one WAV, you still need to select the output format for each file, as the “Set target format for all files” option doesn't work.
5. Click “Start converting”.
6. Download all converted MP3 at once.

2. Using Google Drive

Google Drive is well-known as a web-based storage service that can sync documents, photos, sheets, etc. from your local devices on the cloud, allowing you to access and play the files easily. Furthermore, it offers an extra function to quickly convert WAV to MP3 online and free in a few clicks.

Although it can only complete the conversion process with the third-party online converter, it doesn’t need to install any extra software, supports converting 200+ audios and videos smoothly, and can store the converted files permanently without deleting them manually.

1. Open a browser, log in Google Drive with your account.
2. Click on “+ New” button or the drop-down icon of “My Drive” and then tap on “File Upload” option to import the WAV file from your computer to your Google Drive.
   
3. After uploading, right-click on the added WAV file and then select “Open with” > “CloudConvert”.
   
4. Next, it requires you to log in the online converter with your account to enter the conversion interface.
5. On the web page of CloudConvert, choose “MP3” in the “Convert to” box.
6. If needed, you can click on the popped-up icon to edit the files.
7. Hit on “Convert” button to start the converting task. After finishing, click on “Download” button to save it to your Google Drive.
   
8. Finally, switch to Google Drive to check it on your account.
   

The Bottom Line

Even though we have narrowed down the methods to convert WAV to MP3 on Windows 10 or 11, which one is the best? Despite its popularity, Windows Media Player is not a dedicated audio converter, which makes the steps more complicated. Other free and online ways are more suitable for making a simple conversion without extra customization. So if you want more features and want to convert WAV to MP3 without losing quality, it is recommended to use Cisdem Video Converter, a simple yet powerful converter accessible for you.