WMA to WMA Converter

How to Re-encode a WMA File Online

1. Upload Your WMA File: Drag and drop or click "Add Files" to add a .wma (Advanced Systems Format container). Old Windows Media Player rips, Zune syncs, Pocket PC voice memos, and ASF-wrapped streams all work. Batch is supported — process a whole folder in one pass.
2. Pick the WMA Codec Variant and Bitrate: XConvert encodes to the WMA v2 codec (FFmpeg's wmav2), the most compatible WMA flavor and the same codec Windows Media Player uses by default. Choose Constant Bitrate for predictable file size (8-320 kbps) or Variable Bitrate when you want better quality per byte. Use a Quality Preset (Lowest through Highest) if you don't want to think in numbers, or enter a Custom Bitrate for an exact target.
3. Set Sample Rate, Channels, and Trim (Optional): Leave Audio Sample Rate at Original or downsample to 22,050 Hz / 16,000 Hz / 8,000 Hz to shrink speech files further. Switch Audio Channel from Original to Mono to halve the data rate on voice content. Use Trim with a start time and duration in HH:MM:SS.sss format to keep only the segment you need.
4. Convert and Download: Click Convert. Files are uploaded over an encrypted connection, processed on our servers, and deleted automatically after a few hours — no sign-up, no watermark, never shared. Downloads arrive individually or as a single ZIP for batches.

Why Re-encode WMA to WMA?

Windows Media Audio is a family of four sibling codecs Microsoft shipped in the late 1990s and 2000s: WMA Standard (1999), WMA 9 Pro, WMA 9 Lossless, and WMA 9 Voice (all 2003), per Microsoft Learn. A file with a .wma extension can be any one of them, and the ASF container also carries optional DRM, metadata, and even attached video streams. Common reasons to convert WMA back to WMA:

• Shrink an over-encoded WMA — A 320 kbps stereo WMA of a podcast is wasteful; re-encoding to 64 kbps mono cuts size by ~80% with no audible loss on speech content. WMA was designed for "CD quality at 64-192 kbps," per Microsoft's documentation.
• Match a target file size for email or upload — Gmail caps attachments at 25 MB and Outlook.com at 20 MB. Re-encoding a long lecture or sermon WMA from 192 kbps to 96 kbps drops it under the limit while keeping the WMA extension that legacy Windows tools expect.
• Normalize a mixed library — Old Windows Media Player rips often used VBR Quality settings that produced wildly varying bitrates across an album. Re-encoding to a consistent CBR target makes the library uniform for car-stereo USB sticks and older portable players.
• Strip a problematic ASF wrapper — Some WMA files were exported with embedded scripts, marker tracks, or odd channel layouts that confuse hardware decoders. A clean re-encode produces a vanilla wmav2 stream in a fresh ASF container that plays reliably.
• Convert from WMA Pro or WMA Lossless to WMA v2 — WMA Pro and WMA Lossless aren't supported on every device that nominally "plays WMA," especially older car stereos and budget MP3 players. Re-encoding to WMA v2 trades a sliver of fidelity for guaranteed playback.
• Downsample voice content — Sermons, audiobooks, dictation, and meeting recordings sound fine at 8,000-16,000 Hz mono. Dropping from 44.1 kHz stereo to 16 kHz mono can cut size 4-5× before bitrate reduction even kicks in.

If your end goal is a more modern format, WMA to MP3, WMA to AAC, or WMA to FLAC get you there in one step. To keep WMA but focus on file-size reduction with smarter presets, use Compress WMA.

WMA Codec Variants — What's Inside a .wma File

Source: Microsoft Learn — About the Windows Media Codecs.

Bitrate Selection Guide (WMA v2 Output)

Frequently Asked Questions

Why would I convert a WMA file back to WMA instead of to MP3?

Three common reasons: (1) downstream software or hardware requires the .wma extension specifically — older Windows Mobile devices, some Roland and Yamaha keyboards, certain church audio systems, legacy fleet-vehicle radios; (2) you want to shrink the file but stay in the Microsoft ecosystem your workflow expects; (3) you need to flatten a WMA Pro or WMA Lossless file down to the more widely supported WMA v2 codec. If portability outside the Microsoft ecosystem matters, WMA to MP3 is almost always the better choice.

Which WMA codec does XConvert encode to?

WMA v2 (wmav2), the most compatible Windows Media Audio codec. It's the same codec Windows Media Player uses by default and the one supported by virtually every device and player that advertises WMA support — Windows Media Player 6.4 and later, VLC, Winamp, foobar2000, Xbox 360 / Zune, Pocket PC, and most car stereos with WMA on the spec sheet. WMA Pro and WMA Lossless encoding require Microsoft's proprietary encoder and aren't offered here.

Will re-encoding a WMA reduce audio quality?

Yes — every lossy re-encode discards some data. The damage depends on the bitrate gap. Re-encoding a 192 kbps WMA to 160 kbps WMA is nearly inaudible. Going from 192 kbps to 32 kbps mono is audible immediately. Keep an original copy if the source is irreplaceable. For archival, WMA to FLAC produces a lossless copy from whatever the source happens to be.

Can I tell whether my WMA file is Standard, Pro, Lossless, or Voice?

Yes — open it in VLC or MediaInfo and check the codec ID. WMA Standard reports as wmav2 (or wmav1 for very old files), WMA Pro as wmapro, WMA Lossless as wmalossless, and WMA Voice as wmavoice. The .wma extension alone doesn't tell you. If a device refuses to play your file even though it "supports WMA," it's usually because the file is actually WMA Pro or Lossless and the device only handles WMA v2.

What's the lowest bitrate that still sounds OK?

For music: don't go below 96 kbps stereo with WMA v2 — quality drops sharply below that on full-range music. For speech: 32-48 kbps mono is comfortable, and 24 kbps mono is still intelligible for audiobooks and sermons. Microsoft's WMA 9 Voice codec was specifically designed for "less than 20 Kbps" speech streaming, per Microsoft Learn, but XConvert encodes to WMA v2 — for ultra-low-bitrate voice, WMA to Opus or AAC-HE produces better results.

Can I batch convert a folder of WMA files?

Yes — drop in dozens at once. Each file is encoded on our servers with the same settings and downloads individually or as a single ZIP. Useful for converting a CD-rip library that was encoded inconsistently in the early 2000s into a uniform target bitrate.

Will tags, album art, and metadata survive the conversion?

Most ASF metadata fields (title, artist, album, year, genre, embedded album art) carry through to the new WMA file. Some less common fields — script commands, marker tracks, custom DRM-related blocks — may be dropped during the re-encode. If you need bit-perfect metadata preservation, edit the original file with a tag editor instead of re-encoding.

Can I trim part of a WMA and re-save as WMA?

Yes. Open the Trim section, enter a start time and duration in HH:MM:SS.sss format (for example 00:02:15.000 to start 2 minutes 15 seconds in). The encoder re-renders only the selected range. Useful for clipping a single song out of a long DJ mix WMA, or extracting a sermon excerpt from a multi-hour service recording.

Does XConvert handle WMA files with DRM?

No. Windows Media DRM-protected WMA files (sold through old PlaysForSure stores, the original Zune Marketplace, or some library audiobook services) can't be re-encoded by any third-party tool — the protected stream isn't decodable without the original license. The file must be a plain, unprotected WMA. Most personal rips and modern downloads aren't protected; the issue is mostly limited to pre-2012 paid downloads.