What is a WMA file?
Windows audio format with good compression
WMA files (also known as Windows Media Audio files) are used mostly for music, but they can also contain spoken word audio. The WMA file format was created by Microsoft and is a proprietary file format. The audio in WMA files are compressed similar to MP3 and OGG files. However, since WMA files are a proprietary format, they aren’t fully supported by all multimedia devices.
You can sometimes find WMA and WMV (Microsoft’s Video equivalent) files using another one of Microsoft’s proprietary digital audio and video container format known as ASF. However, WMA and WMV files are more common. Microsoft Windows Media Player 9 was the last version of the Windows Media Player developed for Mac OS X. However, Mac users can use Flip4Mac WMV (also known as Microsoft Windows Media Components for QuickTime) to play WMA files. Windows Media video files use a .WMV extension.
Common uses for WMA files
- Windows Media Player
- Legacy music libraries
- Windows voice recordings
- Windows Media Player
- Windows voice recorders
- Legacy music collections
Who works with WMA files?
Law firms, government offices, and call centers that standardized on Windows in the 2000s often hold large archives of dictation, recorded calls, and meeting audio saved as WMA. Researchers and journalists also run into WMA when working with older interview recordings made on Windows-based handheld recorders.
WMA vs MP3: which should you use?
WMA and MP3 are both lossy audio formats, but WMA is a proprietary Microsoft codec wrapped in the ASF container, while MP3 is an open ISO/MPEG standard supported by virtually every device and platform. WMA was designed to deliver comparable quality to MP3 at similar or lower bitrates, and it historically added features like DRM support that MP3 lacks. Choose MP3 when you need maximum compatibility for sharing or playback; WMA mostly persists in files that were originally created within Windows ecosystems.
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