Audio editing guide
Choosing safe settings
Use the audio workspace to trim recordings, adjust volume or speed, and convert supported formats. MP3 is widely compatible, M4A can be efficient, WAV is useful as an uncompressed source, and FLAC preserves audio without lossy compression.
For spoken audio, moderate AAC or Opus bitrates are usually enough. Music benefits from a higher rate and stereo channels. Keeping the original sample rate avoids unnecessary resampling. For archival or editing work, a lossless audio format is useful, but it creates much larger files.
Quality checklist
Speech generally needs less data than music. Raising bitrate above the source quality does not restore missing detail. Increase volume carefully because clipping creates harsh distortion.
Keep an untouched copy, trim before converting, and listen to quiet and loud sections after export. Verify duration and use descriptive filenames for different versions.
Privacy and safe handling
Media can reveal faces, voices, locations, documents and private conversations. Review a file before sharing it and remove unnecessary metadata when appropriate. Avoid uploading confidential work to any online processor unless you understand its privacy practices and have authority to do so.
A practical selection checklist
A file may be valid but unsupported by one player. Test it with a current media player and inspect its video and audio codecs. Missing sound can indicate an unsupported audio stream; a black screen can indicate unsupported video hardware decoding. Converting to MP4 with H.264 video and AAC audio is the most widely compatible fallback.