the idea of this video is cool and all but it is practically useless if we do not know what compression codec is being used. is it aac? speex? opus? the quality of audio can vary significantly based on the audio compression codec
in addition, the audio is compressed by RU-vid as well as the editing software you use, and so the perceived audio quality is lower than it would be in a real use case.
16 to 32 is only a 16 kb difference, and both are worse than average, so it's hard for us to differentiate. 32 to 64 is doubling the quality, and 64 is quite decent. 64 to 128 is less noticeable because both are high quality. It's like FPS: 30 to 60 is a big difference, but it starts diminishing especially when you get to 144+. 256 is misleading because I believe 256 is only on RU-vid music or something. If I'm wrong and 256 is indeed on RU-vid, I guess the diminishing benefit thing really shows there.
Depends on your phone audio chip tho, most of phone today can play a 16bit/44khz audio files, so 320kbps are very easy to processes by phone audio chip, but if you have a dac/dap then you could probably play a 32bit/392khz audio with ease, but until today, there is no music mas mastered on 32bit/392khz, the most is only 24bit/192khz, but having that hires audio is kinda useless if you only uses it for hearing the song, unless you want to remastered/mastering a song because it help to reduce a distortion on the audio when mastering it. 24bit/44khz is more than enough because its offer all frequencies human ear could hear@@anuragkat66
RU-vid uses Opus @160Kbps VBR and that is sometimes higher quality than a MP3 @320Kbps. Opus is the best audio codec for 64Kbps+ Music. It's the successor of OGG Vorbis. It's nearly 60% more efficient than MP3. Listening tests done by Audiophiles gave 192kbps opus a perfect score. 192kbps is indistinguishable from flac, even to audiophiles. 192kbps MP3 got a poor score. Even 320kbps MP3 didn't get a perfect score. Also, the *251* in *251 opus* isn't the bitrate, it's the format code. 251 = Opus 128 ~ 160Kbps VBR 250 = Opus 64Kbps VBR 249 = Opus 48Kbps VBR 600 = Opus 32Kbps VBR I'll post a reply with links to some sample files. If the comment doesn't show up, reply.
Different people have different opinions on what sounds good based upon how well you can hear, and the quality of your headphones. With my cheap headphones there is barely a difference between 64/128/256, but if I plug in a high range set of quality headphones the difference is pretty dramatic. This is exactly what I needed to determine the bitrate to encode for my kid’s cheap headphones, 64kpbs all the way! 😁
I think you should use ~64 kbps Opus instead, 64 kbps MP3 is just not capable of capturing the beauty of music. Speaking of the crappy sound system, I picked up my cheap earphones worth about 10 euros and did a blind test on it, and the ~64 kbps Opus was indistinguishable from the 128 kbps MP3 files. It's a disgustingly efficient audio format. At ~128 kbps it basically hits audio transparency.
320kbps is the best sound quality when downloading a song from internet. As a recording engineer my ears are well tuned all my music files are in CD quality, vinyl is nice but popping could be heard.
@@tibso. As a recording and or mix engineer the ear is tuned a different way then most. For many it is hard to distinguish, for us in the music/sound industry we hear it, only because we know ow what to look for. The principals of a sine wave and sound.
16: lots of missing details, u hear its compressed 32: u get some more detail, but u also hear they are compressed still 64: whoa! high! some "pinches" still blocky tho 128: now its sounds 'clear' 256: there now u have hard time to decide or notice
Its true that it compresses lower quality ones too but when we talk about lower quality ones the compresion dosent matter much because both will sound nearly same
@@shaldon1 bro in youtube or other source of video watching when you change quality from 360p to 480p the sudden change in audio will happen and what kbps is that in 480p??? and Maximum audio songs quality that we can get easily is which quality??
Try it You have to listen on headphone and your friend has to swap between 16k and 32k And same at 64k 128k 256k. Your job have to listen on close eyes. Can you hear any difference on close eyes at them
@@biswatma2383 I think I can barely hear the difference between 64 and 256 but moreso in the regards of dynamic range (?) 256 feels more full from the beginning to end of each note whereas 64 sounds more choppy but definitely still listenable
Do keep in mind that thus can vary WILDLY depending on what audio format you use. OGG Vorbis and Opus can encode audio in very low bitrates but sound like 192 - 240kbps still. Their compression algorithms are extremely clever and well designed, able to shave off a lot of bits with no audible loss in quality. I’d love to hear a comparison of those tbh.
I remember back in the day WMA encoded 64 and 128kbps to a smaller size than MP3s and yet sounded pretty much the same. The old days of trying to cram as many songs into a 64mb MP3 player as tolerable.
Doing this same video with audio from a live band with some light vocals would really help over digital audio. As you could get the highs from the cymbals to lows of the kick drum, and the warm mids from a vocal accompaniment. Nice video though.
Since recovering from my traumatic brain injury in 2018 the sound perception of my ears sounds so different. Since there is a hole at the right side of my head. The quality of sound of my left ear is different from the quality of sound from my right ear. I found your video today(nov. 14, '22) and I have never been happier(since Im testing my new headphones) Thank you for making this and for existing I hope you have a great rest of the day 💃😘
Uma velha conhecida, teve leucemia 😰 e um dos sintomas depois da quimeo, foi um barulho ensurdecedor que lê tirou a audição, a parte do cérebro responsável pela conversão do som proveniente do ouvido em pulsos elétrico, ficou comprometida, gerando um zumbido de alta frequência que a impedia de escutar sos de baixa e média frequências entre 60 a 4.000 hz
You will feel the difference in the higher frequencies, so you gotta have good tweeters to tell the difference. The quality also varies from one codec to another (for example: 64kbps sounds horrible in MP3 but it's great in OPUS)
For additional insight: I have the excellent equipment. It’s all perfectly placed. All the room correction is setup. The room is dedicated for A/V. SACD, Blu-Ray Audio, DTS disks, Atmos Blu-rays, streamed MQA, etc. I can tell a good recording / production from a bad one. I can usually tell a remastered version from an original track. I cannot tell high/low bitrate past ~192. I’ve done enough A/B testing across codecs, media formats, and streaming to have proven this to myself.
Even the trained ears have to listen in a quiet setting, in a song they know very well, to be able to hear the difference. And it’s usually “Oh the cymbals are ever so slightly crisper.” It’s not like the song becomes something and totally different. Lossy codecs are amazing considering how they were during the Napster days. While I still download all my music in FLAC, I have zero issues with 320kbps LAME MP3, Ogg, and 256kbps AAC for streaming.
@@ivanalvarado3646 that's what i was thinking... imho i ave no problem either with even 196kbps m4a for streaming or downloading random songs, but for mixing tracks i need at least 320kbps mp3...
Maybe you have best equipments, but i think you don't have ears to listen the differences between 192kbps, 320 kbps and wav without comp. But as an audio professionnal, i can hear the difference, because i know what i have the listen to hear that. Making your A/B testing on real website (not ytb lol) is maybe the best thing to know if your ears are golden (but i think you already did it) It's not about equipment but its about ears and listening
I have learned the hard way when i started dj -ing to never use anything below 320 kbps 😅. Now i use flac amd wav files which easily range from 800 to 1780 kbps. ..... crisp sound, i tell u😊😊😊😊
you can clearly hear the diffrence upto 128kbps but 256 sounds exactly the same because youtube audio bitrate is locked at 128 max , I think it would be better if you would include a link or a site so we could really hear the 256kbps bitrate or even higher if you gonna do that in future , anyway still a good video :)
Some genres get hit harder by compression than others though. In rock music you can lose a lot of detail in drums or guitar power chords when there's not enough of a sample rate. (Basically when there's more going on at the same time.)
Good video. I think it would be a better demonstration with acoustic music or Classical. Our ears know what real instruments should sound like but electronic music could be anything.
I think you should've used a song with higher pitched synths or strings/horns for a better comparison in 128/256. It is pretty hard to tell the difference without many layered, you need a good ear for details but it becomes pretty obvious when high strings sound a bit pitchy or compressed. Then again, I guess depends on how well it is encoded to begin with.
@@Chichichihuahua True. Actually, many classical rock songs would've worked well, also some modern synth hip-hop like Tyler The Creator too. You just need heavy layers of varying shapes and highs/lows.
@@Chichichihuahua Same bro. Also yeah, I hope more use it. I think it is partly due to copyright, but there are many fitting songs out there that are free-to-use or easy to bypass copyright.
Its almost impossible to hear the difference between 128/256 because youtube maxium bitrate is 126 or so you maybe could hear more compression artifacts on the 128kbps version but i doubt it personally i hear differences to 1,536kbps (16bit 48khz) Kbps cant really tell after that
@@koffisverygoodforhealth That's incorrect as fuck tho. If you use Spectrograph most of the qualities are reaching 20,000hz aka 320kbps. Obviously you can see a line on 16,000hz point in 144p video because youtube AI removes some unnecessary high frequency sounds to reduce the file size. Furthermore audio spectrum for 1080p is exactly same as 240p. So from 240p onwards, there is no audio quality difference on youtube, the audio you listen is 320kbps. And even the audio as a whole you get is not that bad as some websites claim, like - “stop watching video songs on RU-vid they are only 128kbps”. (they are actually not) Moreover you can see the same song on wynk music playing at so called - “Super high 320kbps settings”. Frequencies cut off at only 17,000 Hz. That means ~ 190kbps. Humans can also hear up to 20khz, so you can very much hear the difference... You need to get your information in check bro.
First, I was on iPhone with the standard Apple earbud, it was no difference between 128 and 256. So then I moved to my PC with a K-5 Pro DAC and AKG K257 studio headphones and BAM! Still no difference. I'm pretty sure that you need a track with more instruments covering from the lowest to the highest dynamic range to tell the difference. -12dB lowpass to +12db highpass. The track being played in the video doesn't have enough information. People who say they can tell the difference between those two must have superhuman hearing ability or out-of-this-world audio devices, or simply are victims of the psychological effects.
Funny thing is, that between 128/192/256 - there's not much of a difference to *humans*, as our ears genuinely have limits to what they can hear. You can *absolutely* pick out the differences in quality above 128 if you know what to listen for exclusively, but there's not enough gain between 128 / 256 to fret over it (unless you're cranking the music), tbh. I spent a few years on this, to realize that my Studio Monitors didn't sound much different than my 200 dollar speakers with a DAC when push came to shove. The difference between analog and digital is more pronounced than the difference between digital compression rates at the higher end, imo.
@@SinistralEpoch there is an audible difference between flac 256kbps, 320kbps, 990kbps and 1440kbps. above that I cannot affirm something because I am not able to distinguish. if you can't hear it it doesn't mean nobody can
@@franciscopostigogarcia2694 Did you even read my comment? At no point did I say, "You can't hear the difference." I said, unless you're *actively* listening for the differences, you're really not going to notice them. The audio quality between 128 and 256 is not *as* noticeable to the human ear without active listening. Take any test between 128 and 320kbps and it'll show you *real quick* that you can't always tell the difference, you just *think* you can. Audio quality is diminishing returns after a certain point, and spending money on the "off chance" that you'll hear audio above 192kbps and it'll enrich your experience somehow? It's wasted money, in my opinion. More important is the *quality* of the equipment you're using. That's when you'll really notice the differences. Analog v Digital v Bluetooth, etc.
RU-vid limits audio playback to 128kbps resolution. It also uses lossy compressions. Most computers - especially laptops and smartphones - have audio chips limited to 64kbps resolution. And, while this demo video is an exception, most audio is sampled at 64kbps, it just can't and won't ever sound better than that regardless of how high-fidelity your "audiophile" gear might be.
It should be also noted which codec is used. This seems like MP3 codec (most widely used), which frankly isn't the worst codec, but definitely not the best. For some reason it's most popular tho. If you did the same comparison with Opus (probably the best and most efficient codec so far), results would be vastly different.
Mp3 is the most popular audio codec because of it's easy accessibility. Cheap media players can easily access mp3 and most audio in mp3 codec are small in size, so you can store a large amount of them while they take very little space. Although it's rather outdated when it comes to quality, it's definitely preferred due to how easily available mp3 is.
Music is usually encoded at high bitrates for better quality. And at high bitrates (192 kbps and higher) the difference between the codecs (MP3, AAC, Vorbis, Opus) is negligible. So there are no big advantages of using something other than MP3. And MP3 is the most compatible audio format, which is supported by everything for decades. There are millions and millions of hardware players supporting only MP3 and nothing more. And they use highly optimized hardware decoders, allowing them to work longer from accumulators. All the patents on MP3 are expired long ago, so that's not an obstacle now. And there is free MP3 encoder (LAME), which was highly optimized for different types of music, for many years.
Yes, I agree. MP3 is very easy to use, it's now free codec that's been released to the public, and for many devices it's the only supported format. Opus nowadays however starts to get more recognition, it's even more efficient in compression algorithms, and it's a completely free and open source audio codec, which finds its usage in video files for audio encoding. Anyway, I didn't notice much of a difference between 16kbps and 32kbps audio, but from there, even 64kbps was a huge step up in sound quality. Opus and VP9 (or nowadays AV1) are on the rise, and even RU-vid supports those video and audio codecs. The only question is how many browsers and their versions support those relatively new formats.
The most impressive and entirely surprising thing about this entire video is just how good the 16 kpbs stream actually sounds. I was expecting it to sound horrible, but it actually sounds remarkably good. I think that's just a testament to how good digital audio really is today. Sure the higher bit rate recordings sound better and unquestionably have more dynamic range to them, but even at 16 kbps there is more than enough sound quality and fidelity there to be able to completely enjoy listening at that level.
Dude . Anything below 320 kbps sounds terrible on quality headphones and speakers. It's especially true for dj's..... on massive and high end speakers of clubs amd bars, a dj would be totally embarrassed to play those because the sound system amplifies everything. If the source material is crap, then u re fckt, and u will never get hired again by that venue. 320 kbps is great, but I don't play mp3s, I play flac and wav files which are easily in the 900's to 1780 kbps range - my files anyways. So u can imagine how clean they would sound on high end dj equipment and speakers 😮😮😮
64 kbps, и тут сразу вспомнил моё прошлое, моё детство с моторолой Е-398, почти все песни были с таким качеством:) но по тем временам это было круто по сравнению с Siemens у которых были Vav с диктофона :) я прям ностальгирую :)
Wav как раз был хорошим в зависимости от битрейта, как и MP3, просто формат неэкономный, много места занимал в сравнении с .mp3, а вот в формате .amr действительно было качество диктофона.
It depends on codec. Mp3 is quite old, there are more modern codecs that provide much better quality at the same bitrate, e.g. Opus (used by RU-vid) or AAC+.
Yeah. Considering RU-vid encodes audio in 160kbps opus I'd love to know how that compares to an mp3. When doing some research on AAC compression I've read that a 128kbps AAC "sounds" the same as a 192kbps mp3.
Since RU-vid always caps any audio bitrate to 128, there's no difference from 128 to 256. The the other ones, do show difference from 32 to 64 and from 64 to it's double.
@@WatchIt1 its maybe a wrong song, you will absolutly hear the difference between die bitrates with high quality songs which use a lot of different instruments
Wow. I've remastered all my original mostly- instrumental guitar compositions-many from the early 90s and from ANALOG cassette- to 320 KBPS files and I'm shocked how "relatively decent" they sound today on my YT channel. And I always try to get mp3 files that are a minimum of 256 KBPS. It DOES make a difference . Good demo here.
*Listening on iPhone* 256kbps has more high end and stereo information than 128 that the echoes sound more crisp and clear. Me personally, I find the sweet spot for all audio in terms of quality and file size is 192kbps (Converting down from WAV format of course). 128 just doesn’t cut it anymore like it did when ripping songs from CDs in Windows Media Player ignorant to sound quality lol 256 is a bit overkill which majority of people can’t really tell the difference in quality anyway. 320 is just being bougie and showing off but at least you have standards.
Aunque la calidad de audio esta limitada por RU-vid no suena realmente a 256kbps y para que suene a esa velocidad necesitas reproducirlo en YT Music que hay puede reproducir hasta 320kbps y la máxima calidad que he escuchado es en 1024kbps pero si tienen un audio en esa calidad y unos parlantes con esas características se escucha real es decir que si reproduces un ruido como hablar y lo pones se escuchara como una persona real, al igual que las pantallas OLED que tienen una imagen real y negros perfectos es decir obscuridad totalmente sin que se vea nada de luz de la pantalla, mientras mas calidad mas cuestan los equipos pero mas satisfactorio es
When I used to have the iPod, I used AAC format 128 kbps (that was the standard at that time), and it sounded awesome! I could not tell the difference between that and the CD
We need a bit depth comparison 24 bit vs 16 bit vs 12 bit vs 8 bit vs 4 bit vs 2 bit! 😊 Unfortunately all of this has to compete with RU-vid's own compression over the top - be good to have a link to a WAV or uncompressed master file for comparison.
on a 27" imac, builtin speakers. huge difference from 16 to 64. Noticeable from 64 to 128, 128 to 256 is even better. as the bitrate goes up, the sound gets fuller and fuller. Thanks for the listening test.
So do yoy prefer 128k or 256k? I've tried listening to a song named Next Level in 128k and 256k with my earbuds and it still sounds the same. Is 256k better? If so why is it only half the mbs of 128k?
You knew that sound basically was carried/produced through wave data right. Basically, 256k improve the graph to be more smooth. While 128k and below difference was more noticable because of the more information carried. 128k is like 720p. Its alr good, but 256k is 1080p, basically more better.
You will not feel the difference unless the headset is large, as for the handset headset 128, so you will feel the 256 exactly the same because it is the same headset as running a headset with a larger volume, you will see the difference
Se você for parar pra pensar, o formato mp3 surgiu num contexto em que a Internet ainda engatinhava no que se refere a banda larga. Retirar um áudio de CD em wav a 1411kbps requer cerca de 90MB de espaço físico, enquanto que o MP3 128kbps reduz para aproximadamente 9MB. Ou seja, uma redução em quase 90% do tamanho mantendo uma qualidade de áudio aceitável (embora irrisória, se comparado ao CD.) Como a Internet de banda larga se popularizou bastante nos últimos 10 anos, não faz mais tanto sentido o uso de formatos tão comprimidos. O próximo passo, acredito, seja popularizar ainda mais os serviços de streaming de áudio baseados em formatos de compressão sem perdas, a exemplo do flac.
Boa noite amigo. Então, no caso de baixar músicas da Net, como foi tube, por exemplo, onde tem sites on line pra conversão. Neste caso, quanto mais kbps melhor, isso?? Abraço.🐺👍🇧🇷
@@lucasaugustomunizfreitas2966 A ideia é que quanto mais bit por segundo, mais informação da música estará preservada. O formato mp3, apesar de apresentar perdas, continua sendo uma excelente opção para economizar espaço físico da mídia e poder armazenar um grande número de músicas. Eu particularmente opto por baixar músicas apenas quando não as encontro nas plataformas digitais, e assim mesmo no formato mp3 320kbps, que tem uma qualidade absurda.
@@netorego87 Estou procurando um Site que faça esta conversão dos vídeos do RU-vid para mp3 para eu poder ouvir no carro pelo pendrive, porém só aparece com download de 128kbps. Tinha um que era de 300 pra cima, porém removeram. Tem algum pra recomendar? Abraço.🐺👍🇧🇷
@Subtitles is because at this point mp3 is pointless, if you want a top tier format you should reconsider acc or flac, those are very good than mp3 Even people can tell the difference,whathever, wuth youtubr audio encoding comparison should be dammed
@@MrTsuyoshi123 nope it depend on the device/app/browser you listen in setting there is a tab called statistics for nerds when i use it, it shows me that mine is 251 opus
RU-vid videos audio is compressed, the highest one is 256kbps on Opus format, and you don't usually find 320 or 512 on most audios/videos on internet as the difference is not worth the size of the file.
![16 vs 32 vs 64 vs 128 vs 256 KBPS MUSIC COMPARISON / SOUND QUALITY DIFFERENCE BETWEEN [2024]](/img/logo.svg){kind=logo}
