Convert MPEG to ALAC — Free Online Converter

MPEG video files from the DVD and broadcast era contain audio encoded as MPEG Audio Layer 2, a competent but dated lossy codec. ALAC (Apple Lossless Audio Codec), released by Apple in 2004 and open-sourced in 2011, provides bit-perfect audio reconstruction with roughly 50-60% compression compared to raw PCM. Converting MPEG to ALAC extracts the audio into Apple's lossless ecosystem.

If your media library lives in the Apple ecosystem — iTunes, Apple Music, iPhone, iPad, HomePod — ALAC is the only lossless format with native, seamless support across all devices. While FLAC offers slightly better compression ratios, it requires third-party apps on iOS and is not supported by iTunes at all.

Extracting audio from MPEG recordings into ALAC preserves every bit of decoded audio while integrating perfectly with Apple's metadata, AirPlay, and sync infrastructure. For audiophiles migrating a collection of digitized broadcast recordings or concert footage into their Apple Music library, ALAC is the ideal target format.

FFmpeg decodes the MPEG video container, discards the video stream, and re-encodes the MP2 audio to ALAC inside an M4A container. The command uses `-vn -acodec alac -ar 44100 -ac 2`. ALAC output is wrapped in an MP4/M4A container, which is required for Apple device compatibility. Unlike FLAC, ALAC does not support Ogg or Matroska containers.