AV1 to WMA Converter

Convert AV1 to WMA: Read This First

A bare .av1 file is a raw AV1 video bitstream — by design it carries picture only, with no audio track inside it. So if your goal is to pull a soundtrack out of an .av1 and save it as WMA, there is usually nothing to pull: the output would be silent or empty. WMA (Windows Media Audio) is also a legacy target — a Microsoft format from the Windows Media Player era that most devices no longer prefer — so for new files MP3 or AAC is almost always the better choice. This page is honest about both facts: it explains why a raw AV1 stream has no sound, lays out exactly what AV1 and WMA are, and points you to the files and formats that actually serve you.

AV1 Format at a Glance

WMA Format at a Glance

Why a Raw AV1 File Has No Sound

AV1 is defined by the Alliance for Open Media as a video bitstream and nothing else — AOMedia publishes audio separately (its IAMF immersive-audio work is a distinct specification). A file saved with a plain .av1 extension is normally a raw elementary stream: a sequence of AV1 OBUs, sometimes wrapped in a minimal IVF header, with no container around it to hold a parallel audio track. So there is no soundtrack inside to decode.

The AV1 video you watched with sound almost certainly lived inside a container — an .mp4, .mkv, or .webm — that wrapped the AV1 video next to a separate audio track (most often Opus or AAC). When a file is demuxed down to a bare .av1, that audio is left behind. If you run this conversion and get a silent WMA, that is not a bug in the converter — it is the raw AV1 stream doing exactly what the format specifies.

How to Convert AV1 to WMA

1. Upload Your AV1 File: Drag and drop your .av1 onto the page, or click "+ Add Files" to choose it from your computer. You can queue several files to process with the same settings.
2. Pick a Quality Preset: Open "Show All Options" and choose a Quality Preset, or switch to Custom Bitrate, Constant Bitrate, or Variable Bitrate to control the WMA rate yourself. The output codec defaults to WMA v2.
3. Set Audio Channel, Sample Rate, or Trim (Optional): Audio Channel and Audio Sample Rate both default to Original, which copies the decoded audio untouched; switch Channel to Mono to roughly halve a voice file, or use Trim to export only part of the timeline.
4. Convert and Download: Click "Convert" and download your WMA. No sign-up, no watermark.

Frequently Asked Questions

Why is my AV1 to WMA output silent or empty?

Because a raw .av1 file is an AV1 video elementary stream and holds no audio. AV1 is defined by the Alliance for Open Media as a video-only codec, so there is no soundtrack inside a bare .av1 to decode, and any WMA produced from it will be silent. The audio for that footage lived in the container — an .mp4, .mkv, or .webm — that the video was demuxed from. To get sound, convert that container instead: MP4 to WMA, MKV to WMA, or WebM to WMA.

Should I really use WMA in 2026, or pick MP3 or AAC instead?

For almost everyone, MP3 or AAC is the better target. WMA is a Microsoft format from 1999 tied to the Advanced Systems Format container; it plays reliably on Windows but is not supported by the core Android platform and was passed over by later industry standards such as DECE UltraViolet and MPEG-DASH in favor of MPEG and Dolby audio. WMA only makes sense if you specifically need a file for an older Windows Media Player setup or a device that expects .wma. If you want broad compatibility, use MP4 to MP3; if you want better quality at the same size, use MP4 to AAC.

Is there such a thing as "AV1 audio"?

No. AV1 (AOMedia Video 1) encodes picture, not sound — its bitstream, finalized in March 2018, defines video and says nothing about audio. The Alliance for Open Media handles audio through a separate effort (IAMF), not within AV1 itself. When a file is described as "AV1," the audio riding alongside it is a separate stream encoded with a different codec, most commonly Opus or AAC, carried in an MP4, WebM, or Matroska container. Pull that existing audio out by converting the container, not the bare stream.

Which WMA variant and codec does this tool output?

The converter targets the common WMA codecs — WMA v1 and WMA v2, with WMA v2 selected by default — written into a standard .wma (ASF) file that Windows Media Player and VLC open directly. These cover the WMA Standard tier, which handles stereo audio sampled up to 48 kHz. The high-resolution multichannel tiers of the format (WMA Pro and WMA Lossless) are separate variants aimed at surround and archival use and are not the typical web-conversion target.

Will converting a video's audio to WMA lose quality?

Some, yes. The source audio inside an AV1 container (Opus or AAC) is already lossy, so re-encoding it to WMA is a second lossy pass that sheds a little detail. Choosing a higher Quality Preset or bitrate keeps the result close to transparent for casual listening, but you cannot recover quality the original never had, so there is no benefit to encoding far above the source bitrate. A true raw .av1 stream, of course, has no audio to convert at all. In our testing, a real .mp4 or .webm container with an Opus track produces a normal WMA at the selected quality, while a genuine raw .av1 elementary stream yields a silent file regardless of the bitrate chosen.

How are my files handled, and are they kept private?

Files are uploaded over an encrypted connection, processed on our servers, and deleted automatically a few hours after conversion — never shared or made public. There is no sign-up and no watermark.