Say you have a favourite RPG soundtrack saved in FLAC. It lives quite happily on your computer, but you want a few albums on a portable player as well. Before copying the lot, it is worth deciding which version belongs where.
Listeners convert FLAC to MP3 with Convertio to create smaller soundtrack files for portable playback. The important bit is keeping both versions.
There is no need to commit an entire collection to settings you have not heard yet. One track will tell you quite a lot.
Give the archive and the playlist different jobs
Make two folders now: one for the downloaded FLACs, another for the MP3 exports. This saves the small but irritating job of working out which version you are looking at later.
FLAC is useful as the starting point because it preserves the audio data while compressing it, as the Xiph.Org FLAC FAQ explains. You can return to that download whenever you want to make a different listening copy.
MP3 gets its smaller size partly by throwing information away. More precisely, the Library of Congress description of MP3 says its perceptual coding discards or reduces the precision of audio components judged less audible. That change is permanent.
Retain the master. Making a FLAC from an MP3 will not put discarded audio information back. Keep the downloaded FLAC album and make your listening copies from it.
“FLAC originals” and “MP3 for player” will do for names. The archive also deserves a backup. A second format in another folder on the same drive is not much use if that drive fails.
Work out your bitrate budget
A little arithmetic helps here. For constant bitrate, file size in decimal megabytes is roughly bitrate in kilobits per second × seconds ÷ 8,000.
A four-minute track at 192 kbps works out as 192 × 240 ÷ 8,000, or 5.76 MB. These are audio-payload estimates, not measured Convertio results; tags, artwork and other overhead add to the total.
| Bitrate | Four-minute track | One-hour album | Reason to try it |
|---|---|---|---|
| 128 kbps | 3.84 MB | 57.6 MB | A limited storage budget; check the sound carefully. |
| 192 kbps | 5.76 MB | 86.4 MB | A middle setting to compare with the original. |
| 320 kbps | 9.60 MB | 144 MB | More data per second when storage constraints are relaxed. |
For ten hours of music, allow roughly 576 MB, 864 MB or 1.44 GB at those three rates, plus overhead. That is enough to plan a folder without relying on a promise that every FLAC album will become five or ten times smaller. Your actual saving depends on the files you started with.
Incidentally, a higher bitrate will not repair a bad recording. If the distortion is already in the FLAC, it will still be something to deal with after conversion.
Make the listening copy in Convertio
Convertio handles the conversion on its servers. You use the browser, without installing a desktop converter, and its FLAC-to-MP3 settings let you choose bitrate and channels.
- Begin with one local FLAC track. Choose something familiar enough that you will notice a change. Keep the source in the archive.
- Add the file and choose MP3. Check the output format beside the filename before initiating conversion.
- Set the bitrate. Use constant bitrate for the table’s size estimates. Choose a rate, then leave channels at Auto (No change) unless you mean to alter them.
- Convert, then download. Put the result in the MP3 folder.
- Open it on your target player. Play it, seek through it and check the displayed track information.
You can also choose variable bitrate, which changes the data rate within the file. One small compatibility wrinkle: Convertio warns that some older players show the wrong duration for VBR. If yours does, try constant bitrate.
Check one track before the whole album
Do not judge a busy orchestral soundtrack by ten seconds of its opening menu theme. Find a few familiar moments:
- A quiet ending: listen for the reverb tail as the music fades.
- A busy passage: follow cymbals or layered percussion through the loudest section.
- A sharp entrance: replay a drum hit or sudden transition from silence.
- A track boundary: check playback between adjacent songs if the album runs continuously.
Listen to the same passage from each version at matched playback volume, using your usual headphones. If something sounds wrong, try a higher bitrate, starting again from the FLAC. This is a practical check for your listening, rather than proof that a particular setting will fool every listener.
Then scroll through the album on the actual player. Track numbers, titles and artwork matter when you are trying to find one song on a tiny screen. It is better to spot a sorting problem with a few files than with twenty albums.
Know what leaves your device
There is an upload involved, even though the controls are in your browser. Convertio says it removes input and temporary files after conversion, and deletes results after 24 hours unless you remove them earlier. Download the MP3 when it is ready.
The help centre lists a free allowance of up to 1 GB per file, 10 conversion credits per 24 hours and 10 concurrent conversions, checked on 21 October 2026. Credits represent processing work rather than an assured number of tracks; check your available allowance before queuing large albums.
With the first track checked, you can work through the rest. The useful end result is fairly ordinary: a backed-up FLAC album you can return to, and an MP3 copy that fits the way you listen away from the desk.
Last Updated: October 21, 2026
